Great idea, the main problem I see is that many violent and angry men have no idea why they are violent and angry and are as shocked as anyone by their own outbursts - but struggle to get past their own shame at their behaviour.
Wow! He helped open Hampshire College, from which I would graduate 19 years later. It was an experiment between 4 other colleges - UMASS Amherst, Amherst College, Mt. Holyoke College and Smith College. My parents were mathematicians at Smith and Mt Holyoke. It wasn't until I was 16 years old and was lamenting the terror and uselessness of grades that my mother told me about Hampshire. I hitchhiked to my interview and crossed a pasture, showing up in muddy jeans, long, wild hair, and braces. They practically accepted me on the spot. No one would ever know how my mother's experience mirrored Jim's mother's, except for myself who was doomed to repeat it (for a while.) All that education was great, but somewhat like putting lipstick on a pig. Patriarchy endures (but it is my unerring aim to help it not to.)
So sad. Literature and film are filled with the stories of how we repeat the traumas that we're born into. What's really amazing is when we are able to step out of those stories and create new ones. Even at the cost of cutting off part of ourselves in order to be different. I'm always somewhat astonished at men who are really feminist. Their capacity for empathy and change is remarkable.
I admire men who can view their abuse at the hands of other men, in particular their fathers and make the choice to detach from their families and not repeat the abuse. Patriarchy and its gods are an ideology of dissociation that rewards men for identifying with the ideological trauma of imperialism or State violence and repeating the violence on an ever widening circle of women, children, other populations and whole countries and maintain a level of denial about what they're doing. I had a homeless friend, a gay black man both brilliant and troubled, who the worse things got for him, the more he identified with the military might of the USA saying "we need to go over there and kick their butts!" I would think - my dude, you just got arrested for sleeping at the airport. For many confused men, it's easier to punch down and blame women since it's a key feature of Patriarchy but we're in the midst of a systems change so it's not really working as it once did.
Every man should learn to control his own violence and stop taking his anger out on women and children.
Great idea, the main problem I see is that many violent and angry men have no idea why they are violent and angry and are as shocked as anyone by their own outbursts - but struggle to get past their own shame at their behaviour.
and animals... at the bottom of the defenceless chain...
Wow! He helped open Hampshire College, from which I would graduate 19 years later. It was an experiment between 4 other colleges - UMASS Amherst, Amherst College, Mt. Holyoke College and Smith College. My parents were mathematicians at Smith and Mt Holyoke. It wasn't until I was 16 years old and was lamenting the terror and uselessness of grades that my mother told me about Hampshire. I hitchhiked to my interview and crossed a pasture, showing up in muddy jeans, long, wild hair, and braces. They practically accepted me on the spot. No one would ever know how my mother's experience mirrored Jim's mother's, except for myself who was doomed to repeat it (for a while.) All that education was great, but somewhat like putting lipstick on a pig. Patriarchy endures (but it is my unerring aim to help it not to.)
I’m very moved by this man’s story. Thanks for sharing it.
This line really resonates with me:
« there were no moments of “but he was my dad and I loved him”— he took no pleasure in his rejection of Emil and didn’t enjoy talking about it.«
Powerful writing.
So sad. Literature and film are filled with the stories of how we repeat the traumas that we're born into. What's really amazing is when we are able to step out of those stories and create new ones. Even at the cost of cutting off part of ourselves in order to be different. I'm always somewhat astonished at men who are really feminist. Their capacity for empathy and change is remarkable.
Every woman should own a gun or know how to get her hands on one.
so women can speak 'men's language' with a gun in their hands?
Exactly. Furthermore for the first time in her life violent men will actually listen.
I appreciate the sentiment, but it won’t actually help.
I admire men who can view their abuse at the hands of other men, in particular their fathers and make the choice to detach from their families and not repeat the abuse. Patriarchy and its gods are an ideology of dissociation that rewards men for identifying with the ideological trauma of imperialism or State violence and repeating the violence on an ever widening circle of women, children, other populations and whole countries and maintain a level of denial about what they're doing. I had a homeless friend, a gay black man both brilliant and troubled, who the worse things got for him, the more he identified with the military might of the USA saying "we need to go over there and kick their butts!" I would think - my dude, you just got arrested for sleeping at the airport. For many confused men, it's easier to punch down and blame women since it's a key feature of Patriarchy but we're in the midst of a systems change so it's not really working as it once did.