What About Men? A Feminist Answers The Question by Caitlin Moran
320 pages
Published September 2023 by HarperCollins Publisher
Publisher's Summary:
Like anyone who discusses the problems of girls and women in public, Caitlin Moran has often been confronted with the question: “But what about men?” And at first, tbh, she dgaf. Boys, and men, are fine, right? Feminism doesn’t need to worry about them.
However, around the time she heard an angry young man saying he was “boycotting” International Women’ Day because “It's easier to be a woman than a man these days,” she started to wonder: are unhappy boys, and men, also making unhappy women? The statistics on male misery are grim: boys are falling behind in school, are at greater risk of depression, greater risk of suicide, and, most pertinently, are increasingly at risk from online misogynist radicalization. Will the Sixth Wave of feminism need to fix the men, if it wants to fix the women?
Moran began to investigate—talking to her husband, close male friends, and her daughters' friends: bringing up very difficult and candid topics, and receiving vulnerable and honest responses. So: what about men? Why do they only go to the doctor if their partner makes them? Why do they never discuss their penises with each other—but make endless jokes about their balls? What is porn doing for young men? Is sexual strangling a good hobby for young people to have? Are men ever allowed to be sad? Are they ever allowed to lose? Have Men's Rights Activists confused “power” with “empowerment”? Are Mid-Life Crises actually quite cool? And what’s the deal with Jordan Peterson’s lobster?
In this thoughtful, warm, provocative book, Moran opens a genuinely new debate about how to reboot masculinity for the twenty-first century, so that “straight white man” doesn’t automatically mean bad news—but also uses the opportunity to make a lot of jokes about testicles, and trousers. Because if men have neither learned to mine their deepest anxieties about masculinity for comedy, nor answered the question “What About Men?,” then it’s up to a busy woman to do it.
My Thoughts:
I'm a huge fan of Moran (this is the fourth of her books that I've read). She's funny, smart, does the work to make sure she's getting it right, and is the feminist I wish I were. Which, of course, made me question why a feminist was writing a book about men (and I'm sure a lot of men might be wondering why any woman is writing a book about men). But, again, I know Moran to be someone who will have done the research to make sure she's coming from a point of knowledge, grounded in what she's learned. What she's learned, as it turns out, comes largely from doing the work of asking men the questions.
I came away feeling like I'd learned an awfully lot from Moran, that I had a better understanding of what it's like to grow up as a man and the challenges that they face. There were parts where I didn't agree with Moran (I have been, after all, married to a man for 42 years and am the mother of two grown men so I have some knowledge on this subject of my own).
Stuart Jeffries, writing for The Guardian, found a lot to dislike about this one (and he is, after all, actually a man). Moran, for example, writes that you will not find the kinds of self-help books for men, written by men, that you will find in any bookstore anywhere for women. Jeffries, on the other hand, points out what he says are two excellent books for men, written both authors that are both from the same town as Moran. And I have to agree with Jeffries when he writes, in response to Moran positing that the patriarchy is screwing over men as much as it is women:
"The patriarchy does have its downsides for men, but its most terrible consequences such as raping, underpaying, genitally mutilating, harassing both at work and on the street are overwhelmingly things that men do to women. Or is there a memo I didn’t get?"
I do have to agree that some of what Moran writes is pretty stereotypical - men dress boringly, to some extent to avoid being accused of being gay. All three of my guys do not fit Moran's thesis at all; all three of them care very much about what they wear, how it fits, and spend time considering what they will wear.
All of that aside, I think this is more of a book for women to read to try to learn more about men than one that men will pick up. That being the case, it may well provide women with the kinds of questions that can ask of their friends, husbands, significant others, and sons, that will open up conversations that certainly need to be had. Take, for example, the chapter about how harmful the ready access to pornography has been for men, particularly young men. It has rewired their brains to the point where a not insignificant percentage of them find actual sex lacking. And there is a chapter about what our young men can find out in the "manosphere," much of which is quite alarming.
Is this a book without faults? No. Would you be wise to take this as an opportunity to ask your guys some of the same questions? Yes. I wish I had read this book twenty years ago, when my oldest's male friends were in my house constantly. I wish I would have thought to ask the questions and address the issues that Moran raises here. There is no reason that some of the problems that young men (and, consequently, grown men) deal with can't be chipped away at, one person at a time. Take this as a starting point.
