Man or bear: Taboo
May. 6th, 2024 09:55 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
blimixHere's a deeper framing of the "Bear or man" question.
In short, non-men have been asked whether they would prefer to encounter a bear or a man while hiking alone in the woods. Most choose the bear.
Some men understand. Some men are butthurt, challenging the answer.
The hidden undercurrent is this: These answers publicly highlight the fact that people view men as threatening. Men who are invested in the current, partriarchal power dynamic do not want this discussion to happen. Those men try to enforce taboos against speaking up about sexual assault, and against pointing out the bad behavior of people in power. All such taboos exist to reinforce existing power structures. (That goes for any too open discussion of money, race, religion, social status, etc.)
It's not that these men don't understand why women and nonbinary folks feel threatened by them. They just don't want people saying that they feel threatened. They know that their unearned patriarchal power must remain unexamined and unchallenged in order to remain at all, and so challenges must be silenced.
Of course, patriarchy hurts everybody, so these men are harming themselves along with others. But they're also showing their asses far more than they realize.
On this topic, I just helped my friend Amalia shoot a hilarious video:
https://www.tiktok.com/@thewildamalia/video/7366042053735681281
https://www.instagram.com/reel/C6pYRZaxZLu/
In short, non-men have been asked whether they would prefer to encounter a bear or a man while hiking alone in the woods. Most choose the bear.
Some men understand. Some men are butthurt, challenging the answer.
The hidden undercurrent is this: These answers publicly highlight the fact that people view men as threatening. Men who are invested in the current, partriarchal power dynamic do not want this discussion to happen. Those men try to enforce taboos against speaking up about sexual assault, and against pointing out the bad behavior of people in power. All such taboos exist to reinforce existing power structures. (That goes for any too open discussion of money, race, religion, social status, etc.)
It's not that these men don't understand why women and nonbinary folks feel threatened by them. They just don't want people saying that they feel threatened. They know that their unearned patriarchal power must remain unexamined and unchallenged in order to remain at all, and so challenges must be silenced.
Of course, patriarchy hurts everybody, so these men are harming themselves along with others. But they're also showing their asses far more than they realize.
On this topic, I just helped my friend Amalia shoot a hilarious video:
https://www.tiktok.com/@thewildamalia/video/7366042053735681281
https://www.instagram.com/reel/C6pYRZaxZLu/
