[PJ] In an article for Public Books, Lisa Wade, a sociology professor at Occidental College (which, I’m embarrassed to say, is my alma mater) recently wrote that "we should reject the idea that men have a psychic need to distinguish themselves from women." Why? Because "masculinity is toxic." In fact, we should be "suspicious of males who strongly identify as men."Frankly, I’d be more suspicious of males who identified as something other than males like, say, toasters, or unicorns, or their great-aunt Mildred’s long-lost cat. It seems to me that those males would be delusional and therefore far more suspicious than males who actually identified as males. Since that’s what they are. It would at least display a much stronger grasp on reality than our dear friend professor Wade.
Let me break Wade’s theory down for you, because I could see how sane people might have a little trouble following it. Wade believes that there is literally no difference between men and women. And, since there’s no difference between men and women, anything that is seen as being inherently masculine or inherently feminine is actually just a social construct. And (as if that wasn’t crazy enough,) every single thing that is supposedly male is bad. "If we are going to finish the gender revolution," declares Wade, "then, we need to call masculinity out as a hazardous ideology and denounce anyone who chooses to identify with it."
Honestly, I despair for the male college students of America who sit in lecture halls and seminar rooms and have to listen to this garbage. Who don’t know any better than to believe it. Who sign up for classes that promise to help them reduce their own toxic masculinity, because, by virtue of having grown up a man in a gendered world, they are at risk of becoming rapists. Who passionately deny that there are inherent differences between men and women, and feel they must apologize for everything they do, or like, or say, that fits the stereotype of their "assigned" gender.