Photo by Katie Harp on Unsplash
Having recently said, I wasn’t going to do much more about findom and kink, here I am, doing findom and kink. Sorry!
However, when an opportunity came up to interview Kinks and Curves, an online adult content/experience seller with plenty of experience in the findom space, including twitter, I jumped at the chance.
Photo by Elliott Stallion on Unsplash
As we all know, there’s a general election approaching on 4th July this year in the UK.
I’m not going to write up an impassioned plea on who to vote for.
Nor some arm chair statistician view of tactical voting etc.
I think this is a moment for us to take stock of where we are as a country and to think back over previous choices perhaps?
Of Boys and Men – by Richard Reeves
Having finished my read through of Of Boys and Men by Richard Reeves – sadly, I found myself disappointed. Bitterly so.
But perhaps, not entirely surprised. And I should add, not disappointed by every little bit in totality. There were things about the book I really enjoyed and agreed with. But it was a bumpy ride. One paragraph would hit the nail on the head, the next would leave me face palming with frustration.
By the end I was left feeling that sadly, whilst Reeves is somewhat elevating the level of discussion about the issues faced by men and boys in today’s world, he was doing this through a potentially deeply destructive lens, kowtowing to other ideologies and perhaps even trojan horsing more suffering upon us.
Whilst there were lots of bits I liked, overall, unfortunately, I believe Reeves to be, sadly, yet another in a long line of “concerned feminists” who want to try and “help” men by using an ideology (and supporting theories) which hates them.
This isn’t, I would argue, what we need.
Solutions FOR men must come FROM us, by US, throwing off the oppression of our traditional gender roles. We have to do this for ourselves with a mixture of the best of old ideas and some new/innovative ones. Not through existing ideologies that hate us and certainly not through what women choose for us.
This all sounds very dramatic, I know. If you have five minutes though, please let me explain why I feel this way and tell you what I agree with and what I don’t about Of Boys and Men.
Photo by Mike Tinnion on Unsplash
I’ve fallen back several times in my writing here on the term – “narrative.” But what exactly do I mean by it?
I use this as a catch all term for the “current view” on something.
Narrative is the current story. Its the orthodox thinking of the day. The word on the street. The story we tell to make things make sense.
It’s the generally accepted view, opinion or understanding of something, particularly non scientific. It’s “just how it works.”
Photo by Andrew Neel on Unsplash
I dislike the term “manosphere.”
It’s used, most commonly, as a derogative term, often by those with an agenda or by those in the uninformed mainstream as a mechanism to quickly round together and write off ANY discussion about gender roles/rights for men which may diverge from narrative (I’ll come to what I mean by narrative in a moment).
It’s a neat, somewhat patronising term, that lets it’s users associate anybody having any sort of conversation about men as all the being the same.
Photo by Maria Vlasova on Unsplash
Before I get started, I should once again issue my usual disclaimer.
I am not a psychologist. I don’t have qualifications in psychology, sociology or therapy of any sort. What I do have is a bit of experience, a lot of observation and a degree of self analysis. So everything I write here once again is just my opinion.
Finding detailed academic writing and research on this topic is hard to do it seems, so, here I am as a layperson to just give my views. I would imagine someone with a proper background in the topic would probably laugh at my opinions expressed here – there are probably much better and well documented explanations for the things I’m describing.
In summary, use what I’m writing here as an interesting opinion or entertainment. Take it with a pinch of salt though!
Photo by Andrew Neel on Unsplash
How can one crave enslavement – yet at the same time, want to be entirely free from it?
There’s a crack in the middle of my personality and my psyche that I’ve become very much aware of in the last 4 years.
It’s a chasm, or a deep valley, with two, seemingly diametrically opposing sides.
Photo by Daniil Onischenko on Unsplash
A dude I knew from college wanted to go for a drink with me in November last year.
Lets call him “Mike”
I’ve known Mike for the best part of 26 years I think. We went to many of the same classes at college and stayed in touch on and off over the years since. I went to his wedding about 20 years ago and spent a bit of time with him on the train in the years since in and out of London as we both ended up getting jobs there.
I’m not into “destiny” and that sort of hocus pocus, I’m a stuck in the mud sceptic. But if I were into all that stuff, I’d definitely tell you, the universe just seemingly kept pushing us back together one way or another.
I never proactively set out to be his “friend” as such. Actually there’s multiple things about him that annoy me a bit and many areas we don’t see eye to eye. Plus, I’m not really much of a “friends” person.
However, that’s another related story for another day.
For now, let’s just say, he’s one of three people I’d say are probably “a friend.”
Photo by Helena Lopes on Unsplash
As I wrote about in my series, Changing Gender Roles for men , when I was younger, what men and women were supposed to be/do was very clear.
Over the years and through a number of discussions with people, I’ve come to believe you can boil these down into “outcomes statements.”
I use them as high level summaries for “our traditional gender roles.”
They go like this..
Women are objectified nurturers
Men are disposable providers
I recently watched “Is AI dangerous for men?” by Villain Retro (@VillainRetro) (re titled since to “The dark reality of AI companions”) on YouTube and found it to be a well made, interesting and thought provoking video.
I’ve not yet written much here about AI, partly because of time but also because my knowledge in this area isn’t amazing.
“Well that’s never stopped you before!” I hear you cry!
In truth though, it is something I think about on and off a lot, often in relation to the future of gender relations but also capitalism and society in general.
