Homosociality, pro-feminism, and the support of other men

Still sick.  This bug is absolutely tenacious.  At least the sun has shown its face again in Southern California, which is an immense relief.

This flu (for I now admit that is what it is) has left me so drained that forming coherent blog thoughts seems immensely difficult.  But I'll try today...

I've been thinking about homosociality a bit these past few days.  Homosociality (as explained so well in Michael Kimmel's Manhood in America) is the principle that all men, including heterosexual ones, are raised in our culture to be more eager to please other men than women.   It doesn't take much in my classes to get heads nodding as the subject comes up!

To use one cheap and easy example, homosociality explains the function of catcalls and wolfwhistles.  I've often been asked by female students why men whistle and hoot at them from construction sites and passing cars.  "Why do they do it?  Do they think this actually 'works' to pick up women?"  I usually inquire whether the whistling was done by a single man or a group; the answer is almost invariably that it was the latter.  The answer, seen through the lens of homosociality, is obvious -- men whistle and yell to connect with other men.  Women are devices for creating non-sexual, same-gender bonds.   This doesn't explain all catcalling behavior, but it goes a hell of a long way towards doing so.

One of the most significant difficulties (and opportunities) about pro-feminist men's work is that it challenges homosocial norms.  Pro-feminist men are often characterized as "wimps" -- soft, gentle men with submissive natures.  Actually, pro-feminist men who work to match their language and their lives have to be remarkably brave.  Few things are more difficult than speaking up against sexism in all-male environments!   To do so is to risk anger (and in a few areas, perhaps violence) and ostracism.   In most contemporary Western cultures, there is a strong code that declares that men don't criticize their fellows attitudes towards women and gender.  Given the intense desire for male approval that most young men have, it scarcely seems likely that many will feel comfortable taking feminist positions in all-male environments!

When I was an undergraduate, I quickly mastered the "talk" of feminism.  In my classes, and around female friends, I was, if not a model of egalitarianism, a thoughtful, polite, and intelligent critic of gender roles and the patriarchy.  But get me alone with my male friends (especially with a beer or two in me) and I spewed the same objectifying garbage that they did.   There were many reasons for this.  First off, I was deeply ambivalent about feminism as a younger man.  Being alone with the guys gave me a chance to "blow off steam"; indeed, the more I tried to match my words, actions, and politics in mixed groups, the more I felt the overwhelming need to act boorishly around the guys when we were alone together.  Second of all, I was desperate for male approval.  In college, most of the guys I hung out with lived in my co-op; they were all pre-law or engineering types.  None were liberal arts majors, much less interested in taking women's studies classes!  I knew that to criticize their words and actions would be to lose their companionship -- and at that stage of my life, the craving for companionship won out over my ethics, hands down. Indeed, I often made fun of the very material I was studying, as if to reassure my companions that I didn't take it too seriously, and thus could be trusted to remain one of the guys. 

This kind of double life left me feeling ashamed and fraudulent.

It wasn't until my thirties that I grew comfortable challenging men in single-sex environments.  I'd like to think I do it politely, but firmly.  I certainly don't do it on every occasion I hear sexist humor or beliefs expressed.  Like most folks, I've learned to pick my battles -- and frankly, sometimes, I'm just too tired or busy to speak up.  But what has given me the courage to speak up those times that I do has been the support of other men.  It wasn't until I started to do men's work with other pro-feminist men that I began to feel sufficiently empowered to start calling guys on their (sometimes) unintentional miosgyny.  Doing male retreats (through church, and with groups like Men Can Stop Rape) put me into contact with guys who didn't just share my politics, but had spent far longer than I had living out pro-feminist beliefs as strong, courageous men.

When I talk about these issues with younger men and boys, they almost invariably acknowledge the tremendous power of homosociality.   Many of them are receptive to feminist ideas, but cannot even imagine actually speaking up about them when they are alone with other guys.   I acknowledge how difficult it is to match language and life in the face of homosocial pressure to conform, and I am particularly careful to stress that just because they aren't ready to speak up yet, it doesn't mean that they are "frauds."  The key thing, I tell them, is finding male allies who will support them and share with them a commitment to take small steps towards changing their own lives and (perhaps in due course) asking other men to do so as well.

Whether we like it or not, young and not-so-young men are homosocial creatures.  Though the influence of mothers and wives, girlfirends and sisters can be tremendous, most will have their worldviews heavily shaped by their fathers, brothers, and male peers.  I think pro-feminist men can see that as a real opportunity.  Our sex has given us an unearned credibility with other men, a credibility that on many gender issues may exceed that of women feminists.  We need to respond by banding together and reaching out to each other and to our brothers who will, in many cases, be initially unreceptive to a pro-feminist message.  We'll have to battle our own insecurities and doubts, and the periodic pressure to chuck our ethical commitments and just "go along to get along."  But I've seen this done, and I've seen it work.

I'm so grateful for the women in my life who have shared with me their stories, who have encouraged me to do pro-feminist work.  But I cannot do the work I need to do without a band of brothers who share those same commitments.   Male acceptance and approval is a uniquely powerful elixir, and rather than ignore or deny that reality, I have chosen to rely on it.

 

Comments

[Hugo]

Joseph, to say that women "harass" men by wearing short skirts is patently silly, and it trivializes the very real problem. Plenty of men find it perfectly possible to see attractive women in revealing clothing -- and continue to see them as human beings worthy of respect and dignity.

[Caitriona]

walking down a street wearing makeup ... way for women to harass men. So men respond in kind.

Now THAT is a new one to me.

[Uzzah]

Joseph> 1) Construction work is hard, dangerous work (not too long ago an acquaintance lost part of his hand in a construction accident). Men (and it was mostly male at the time) are risking their lives in order to build the structures that protect women and allow women to go about their safe pink and white collar jobs.

Hmm.. I used to do it for the money..

[alexander]

Plenty of men find it perfectly possible to see attractive women in revealing clothing -- and continue to see them as human beings worthy of respect and dignity.

No doubt many women can see a Playboy centerfold over a man's desk as harmless. Yet this is criminalized under "sexual harassment" laws.

[Vacula]

Joseph-Alexander: Despite the fact that both scenarios involve attractive women, there is absolutly no "harassment" parallel between a woman wearing "sexy" clothing and a man having a Playboy centerfold on his desk.

A man wearing tight pants or no shirt might parallel a woman wearing revealing clothes, but obviously the "harassment" potential would have to be judged according to the clothing expectations of the specific context and their actual behavior, not just their clothes or lack therof.

You can't charge obnoxious people you meet on the street with sexual harrassment - it's an employment issue.

[mythago]

Yet this is criminalized under "sexual harassment" laws.

Please cite a criminal statute prohibiting possession of a copy of Playboy at private workplaces.

[Hollow Women]

Feminism is Communism. Feminism must be eradicated forever!

History calls communists to account
From Charles Bremmer in Paris

FIFTEEN years after the fall of the Berlin Wall, the Council of Europe last night became the first international body to condemn crimes against humanity committed by the communist regimes of the Soviet Union and other states.

However, in a vote that was bitterly contested by Russia and Western Europe’s left-wing parties, the 46-nation council failed to raise the two-thirds majority needed to approve a tougher resolution by a Swedish MP that called on former communist states to teach the truth about their former regimes and create days of remembrance.

The council assembly, which includes MPs from all former European communist states except Belarus, voted by simple majority for a motion deploring that there had never been an international inquiry on the “crimes committed in these states”.

“These have never been condemned by the international community as have been the horrible crimes committed in the name of (German) National Socialism”, said Göran Lindblad, a Swedish conservative MP. The failure to win the broader motion underlined the misgivings among parliamentarians over the wisdom of revisiting painful history and issuing blanket condemnations. The council was founded after the Second World War to protect human rights and the rule of law. The case made by conservatives for putting Stalin on a par with Hitler has fuelled a furious dispute in recent years in France, Greece and other Western European states where Marxist doctrines and communist parties enjoy strong sympathies. A Russian opinion poll last month suggested that 42 per cent of Russians believed that Stalin had played a positive role in their country.

MPs from Hungary, Estonia, Bulgaria and other former Soviet satellite states gave emotional backing to the vote. Russian MPs relayed the anger in Moscow over what is seen as a hostile act aimed at isolating their country and opening the way to lawsuits.

Natalia Narochnitskaya, deputy chief of the Duma’s foreign affairs committee, said that Europe should be denouncing the terror of the French Revolution. She added: “Oliver Cromwell has never been denounced.”

REGIMES OF DEATH

# Conservative estimate of deaths attributed to Soviet and other Communist regimes in the European Council document presented yesterday (1917-present day): 94.5 million

# Soviet Union (1917-89): 20 million victims (includes party purges, mass murder, deportations, starvation policy in 1930s Ukraine, wartime reprisals)

# China: 65 million (under Mao Zedong and successors)

# Vietnam: 1 million

# North Korea: 2 million

# Cambodia: 2 million

# Eastern Europe: 1 million

# Latin America: 150,000

# Africa: 1.7 million

# Afghanistan: 1.5 million

[alexander]

A man wearing tight pants or no shirt might parallel a woman wearing revealing clothes, but obviously the "harassment" potential would have to be judged according to the clothing expectations of the specific context and their actual behavior, not just their clothes or lack thereof.

My point is something like this: the mere fact that we are "judging" such behavior shows just how repressed we really are--and how much time we are wasting on such nonsense. I could care less about if someone wanted to walk around campus in a thong or sunbathe in the buff on the university green. But I could also care less if a Playboy centerfold were displayed at a work cubicle.

We waste our time on idiocy like this. Yet real workplace safety goes by the boards. You know how many workers die every year on the job? And how little OSHA does to prevent this? And are you aware of how much management violates union laws? Or of the abysmal treatment that whistleblowers get? But all this gets only a fraction of the debate and enforcement that "sexual harassment" does.

I've always contended that the "sexual harassment" laws were put into place as a means to keep the workers divided among themselves. They used to show PSAs on TV (back when I had a TV) how women could bring "sexual harassment" suits for co-workers daring to tell a female worker that she looked good. Wow, I really feel safe!

In this respect, feminism is simply another tool used by the elites to keep us all in our places.

[Kythi]

Alexander sounds like a typical sexist hetero pig. Feminism is a movement that has helped pull women out from under men. If a woman is in a working environment, she may not necessarily want to hear stupid unwanted inane comments about her appearance, good or otherwise. Yes, men do need to learn how to keep their fat traps shut and it kills you that you cannot say and do as you please like men could thirty or forty years ago did. New legislation brought on by feminism has helped put a lid on some of the disgusting harassing behavior, although unfortunately not enough. Until people realize that there is NO acceptable level of harassment that should take place at work, then the lawsuits will continue, and rightly so. Secondly, I also doubt the agenda of the writer of this website. I don't believe any man can embrace a movement that threatens his privileged position in this patriarchy. Nothing men do in this patriarchy truly benefits women and there is nothing men can honestly do for a movement that benefits women because men lack perspective into what it is to be oppressed by the opposite sex.

[Amelia]

Kythi, does that then mean only people of color can claim to be anti-racist since white people are historically the oppressors who lack perspective and embracing an equal rights movement threatens their privileged position?

[gayatri]

I really enjoyed your post on homosociality ... i did a google for the topic since i need to read up on it for my Cinema Studies exam...
I found your article very practical and practicable.
Good luck on your mission !!!!

[Diana]

Kythi, your comment made me smile. However, I disagree with your statement that the writer of this article has ulterior motives - I think it's completely possible for a man to fully support and respect women without a personal agenda. I say this as a feminist and a lesbian, so you can't really say that I'm biased towards men on those counts.

I found the article quite insightful though - confirms a lot of suspicions and answers a lot of questions about male behavior. Hell, even I find myself behaving similarly in some occasions. In female company, and on my own, I completely object to the use of the words whore or slut towards a woman, however, amongst my 'rough and tough' guy buddies who use these terms in derogatory manners, objecting to them would make me either sound preachy or like a giant whimp.

[Ryan]

Is it not funny that the vast majority of the posters here nailing Hugo to the cross are, in fact, male? Just what are they trying to prove, exactly?

In my experience, not conforming to the traditional masculinity means being labeled a traitor by men. That is far more common than the potential traitor label applied by some women. Even though in order for Hugo to actually be capitalizing on capital "P" Patriarchy, he'd have to actually be subscribing to essentialist notions of what it is to be a man, which he clearly is not.

[Samia]

Bless you for this.

[Jordan Sneakers]

Excellent post. It makes me realize the energy of words and pictures. I learn a lot, thank you! Wish you make a further progress in the future.

[Jordan Sneakers]

Your article is written very content, All of the projects look great! you make it look so simple to make this purse that I'll have to try it myself! Thanks!

[Rud]

Kythi, the fact that men can no longer say what they please and now need to learn "how to keep their fat traps shut and it kills you that you cannot say and do as you please like men could thirty or forty years ago did" just because a woman might be around and get offended is probably only going to just separate men and women in the long run. in the previous page Kris posted about how she is excluded from her boyfriends guy trips, well let me tell you, one of the big reasons guys exclude women from these trips is so that they can say whatever they please without having to worry about offending women, it just so happens that men happen to dislike having to watch what they say, as a guy, having to watch what i say around women sucks major balls, which is why whenever i hang out with friends most of the time its just us guys (no girls allowed).

[Construction Accident]

Common accidents involve workers being injured by falling off a roof, broken or defective ladder, or scaffolding. Workers hurt by objects falling from an elevated height, or workers who suffer injuries as a result of a fall may be entitled to make a claim for their injuries against the property owner and/or general contractor.