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Toxic Masculinity
(lemmy.world)
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this post was submitted on 10 Jun 2025
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Exactly which nuance is important in this context?
Presumably the fact that she isn't hanging around his male friends when he is not around? Otherwise they would technically also be "her male friends". Beyond that, he probably has more context to trust his friends.
Apples to apples would be saying they should stop hanging around his female friends, but given how he is implied to act, I would think it unlikely he has any (or at the very least they are unlikely to want to fuck him).
Though frankly, if he is worried about her male friends to the extent that he wants her to stop hanging around them, then the relationship is already on shaky ground. Because he is overly possessive and controlling, and possibly also because she really is giving him reasons to feel insecure. If it's just the former, then her trolling his toxicity is very funny. If it's also the latter, then... well it's still kinda funny, but in a more mean spirited way.
So I'm not sure the nuance between the asks really changes the point of the post.
I 100% agree with this. He's already behaving badly, and overall it's a huge red flag of a comment.
But his male friends are presumably his friends from either prior to the relationship or with no regards to his partner. They would be betraying a friend they're fond of to act on this attraction.
Her male friends do not care about hurting his feelings anywhere near as much, and may even have delusions of replacing him. Many of them may have become her friends directly because of their attraction to her.
I don't believe that this inherent means that he intends to cheat on his partner with a female friends of his own, and therefore believes men are like this, to be clear. I am lucky enough to have a beautiful partner, and have close female friend who I have platonic friendships with while aware those women are very attractive. But I wholeheartedly trust myself not to act on any attraction to anyone else, which is the bare minimum of course. There are men my partner is friends with who I can tell are attracted to her, but largely I don't care, because I wholeheartedly trust her to rebuff them too. But I'd also expect that if one of them made a move on her, she would distance herself from them.
To me, his comment means "I don't trust you around people who find you attractive." That means one of two things. Either he is behaving possessively and exerting authority over her, or there actually is basis in his comment. I'd assume the former, largely because personally, I've known more possessive men than women who would cheat but we don't really know enough about the situation.
Overall I hate the entire post and absolutely do not believe these two people are going to have a happy relationship.
Edit: I support her in maintaining those friendships. If he truly believes she's not trustworthy to be around those friends, and does not want to remain in a relationship if something were to happen there, he should leave her. If it's in his head and he's behaving possessively, she's better for it anyway.
We all know that with boyfriends like that, if one his friends did get her, he'd be calling her names and forgiving his friend.
I had a GF try to cheat with a friend of mine once ( he declined her advances and showed me the texts). I was like, buddy, you might as well have took her up on it. I'm done with her either way. It's on the person in the relationship to not cheat. Obviously if my friend had been harassing her it would have been a different story but she was fully open to him fucking her.
You see, when some motherfucker you don't know wants to fuck your girl, that's BAD! When it's ya homies, it's chill.
Life lesson
Women are human beings that should have autonomy to do as they please. And they're not "yours" or anybody else's but their own selves. (Women, feel free to correct me if I'm wrong)How are you defining "want to fuck"? As in being attracted to? If so, I wouldn't mind if stranger or friends are attracted to my spouse. As in actively pursuing? If so, I wouldn't want strangers or friends doing that (unless it's an open relationship).
I'm not trying to be an ass, I just don't know what type of "wanting to fuck" is okay for friends but not from strangers.
This is 100% true, for anyone (obviously excepting it doesn't infringe on others, such as murder for example), but also its okay for people to have boundaries and for you to compromise within those boundaries, assuming you want to be with the person more than you care about the boundary they have.
Now whether such a thing should be a boundary is another question, but if it's normal to, for example, not want your partner to cheat and have that as a boundary, we can at least agree its okay for boundaries to exist at all within a relationship, and that it isn't necessarily infringing on your autonomy as a person for your partner to have them.
There are however definitely boundaries that should be considered a red flag, and for many people this may be one of them. That's fine, and it's fully your choice to decide whether you accept a boundary, just as some people may only want an open relationship, and so "no 'cheating' of any form" would be a boundary they wouldn't accept, despite being common.
Fully agree.
I feel like the bit that's sort of being glossed over/missed is that the bf in the relationship is making his issue (my gf has friends that want to fuck her) into his gf's issue by introducing the boundary of "you're not allowed to have friends that want to fuck you". That should be an unreasonable boundary for anyone (barring edge case scenarios that involve informed consent between adults) because one person is taking their internal issues and externalizing it on someone else (presumably) without consent.
And then the gf flips that wrongheadedness back onto her bf by saying "if I'm not allowed to have friends that want to fuck me, then you're not allowed to have friends that want to fuck me either". It's a humorous response that illustrates the hypocrisy of the first boundary introduced by the bf, and also hints at the slippery slope nature of forbidding relationships based on uncontrollable, external criteria like "does someone want to fuck you".
IMO cheating is by definition something your partner does not want. Defining cheating as a certain set of actions that everyone agrees on independent of the relationship is a dead end. If you instead define cheating as "knowingly violating your partner's boundaries" (and make sure to talk about those boundaries!), everything becomes so much easier
Good to see some nuance and reflection in a Lemmy comment section :)
Tbh, not all jealousy is misdirected. My ex did a ton of inappropriate-but-not-cheating things with other guys and told me that she was close to cheating on two occasions. Didn't exactly make me feel secure in the relationship and I did tell her that I felt uncomfortable with what she was doing. She ended up actually cheating with one of these guys.
I've been with my wife for ~10 years now, and I never felt any bit of jealousy with her at all, ever. I can just trust her and I do.
So apparently, it's not a me-problem here.
the two nuances in her post image
as shitty a person as the comment guy is he’s probably right in that most if not all of her friends do want to fuck her
just ready anything about the shit pretty women have to put up with
Is she not also right that most of his male friends also want to?
What's nuanced about his controlling behaviour?
nothing is nuanced about his behavior, for sure it is shit and controlling
what’s nuanced is how male relationships behave in modern western cultures(US specifically) and pointing out how a pretty woman is going to have a real hard time finding genuine male friendships
and snark aside most his friends are probably not interested in fucking him as only about 1/5th are openly gay
Even if you're right that all men hit on her, he's wrong that that means he's the only man she can be friends with. Period. There's no nuance to that, it's just controlling. He can control her or he can love her, but he can't control and love her.
Pretty women develop the skills to keep drooling men at arms length early on. The mistake is thinking that she hasn't been picking and choosing so far and in thinking that control is the right response to the possibility of her choosing someone else. Either she leaves or she is at the very least emotionally abused, there's no third option with a controlling man.
you keep trying to frame it like I don’t think he’s controlling or that I support his conclusion
as to pretty women developing skills all you got to do is read a bit on the internet or hell female biographies for that matter to see how bullshit that is
just because you develop tools to cope and defend yourself doesn't mean it doesn't fuck you up, some do ok but plenty don’t
so yea it’s gonna be really really really hard for a pretty woman to have honest male friendships, that’s the nuance, not the turd boyfriend you keep trying to focus this on
No, no, no, I didn't say it was easy for her, I just think you completely lack nuance, balance, credibility and fairness when you excuse a position that pretty women can't be trusted around men unattended. That's not nuanced, it's misogynistic.
There's no nuance to "pretty girlfriend can't be trusted to spend time unattended with other men", that's not nuanced, it's blanket, it's controlling, it's relationship destroying, it's toxic and it's misogynistic.
I'm NOT arguing that it won't sometimes be hard for her to fend off men who aren't good at respecting women's boundaries.
I AM arguing that you utterly LACK nuance when you talk like pretty women can't have platonic friendships with men. It's untrue. Not all men are rapists. Not all women cheat. You're making a gross generalisation and it's nasty and not at all nuanced.
If hypothetically you spent all your relationship talking to your girlfriend like she's going to cheat on you, I think you would push her to live up to your expectations. After all, if she's already done the punishment of hearing you lecture her about how she/women can't be trusted around men, and you're already giving her a hard time about keeping male friends, and you're already forbidding male friendships she holds independently, and you're already breaking up her preexisting friendship groups making it hard for her to plan/maintain a social life, and you're already having the arguments about her unfaithfulness when she hasn't cheated yet, she may as well cheat because she is already living the punishment and the destroyed trust. But in this scenario, it was you that destroyed it all on your own.
You keep pushing this attitude to women as nuance, but it's like arguing that there's nuance in "I permanently grounded my teen children all their lives, to stop them being drawn into taking drugs by their friends". I mean, sure, ground them if they did drugs, but temporarily, because you can't be the police of someone else's entire social life, they're going to escape that toxicity or you're going to ruin their life. You can't ground them as a permanent preventative measure, there's no nuance to that, none at all, even though peer pressure is both real and powerful.
I completely reject your assertion that you're being nuanced by claiming that because some pretty women and some men can't be trusted, there's some reasonableness or counterbalance in the scenario, and I reject your claim of nuance wholeheartedly when you talk like platonic relationships between men and women are the exception instead of the rule. Very very wrong indeed. Like excruciatingly wrong. Statistically way out. Most male/female relationships are platonic. Most pretty women are not sleeping around and most pretty women can be trusted, even around men in your absence. There's no nuance to saying otherwise. There's no nuance to using the existence of male rapists and unfaithful women to justify toxic and controlling behaviour. There's no nuance to talking like petty women are inevitably going to sleep around. Stop using the word nuance to describe toxic misogynistic overgeneralisations.
you keep attributing to me words I’ve not actually said lol
I’m neither the guy in the post nor whatever this strawman is you are building
reading these literal paragraphs of you arguing with yourself is kinda painful
At least this time you didn't try to claim nuance where there is only extreme.
if that’s what you want to take away from this go for it lol im done with what I wanted to say after this
the nuance is that even crappy people can have worthwhile observations
that you can’t seem to get past his conclusions and separate the wheat from the chaff isn’t on me
that you keep trying to handwave this like women don’t massively have issues with platonic male relationships while we’re in a toxic masculinity post is again lol
women are choosing the bear but you think somehow it’s all better as friends?
the are so many examples of women complaining about this issue if you spend any time in female dominated subs
What you wanted to say was that you're incapable of trusting women, you disagree when I say mild things like "not all men are rapists and not all women cheat" and your response to "I'm your boyfriend now, you're not allowed any male friends because I'm taking charge of your social life and tearing your friendships apart" is "wait, this guy has a point". Yeah. Very nuanced. Are you sure she will obey your friendship commandment? Perhaps you'd feel better if you lock her in the basement while you're out!
His friends aren't his friends because they want to fuck his girlfriend. They were his friends before he had a girlfriend.
Her guy friends are only friends with her because they want to fuck her.
Those are completely different things in this small window of context.
That's not nuance, that's literally the toxic masculinity the post is talking about.
Anyone can be friends. Assuming anything less is unnecessarily divisive.
The assumption the boyfriend is making - the same assumption you're making - is just mysogyny.
In my experience it's easy to tell when a guy is only being friendly with a girl because he wants to fuck her and when he's genuinely bring her friend.
It's not misogyny to think other men would try to fuck your girlfriend. Especially if she remains in contact with someone who is only her friend because he's trying to fuck her.
Not all men, lol
Sounds to me like you live in circles with desperate incels. Time to upgrade your friends group.
Even if you can be correct in a given individual assessment within the context of your own life, you made a broad, unconditional statement where you intrinsically assumed the guy you've never met is correct in his assumptions about multiple friendships you have no knowledge of.
It's not mysogyny to be wary of the intentions of other men. It's mysogyny to assume all intergender friendships are exclusively sexual. For all you know, the boyfriend in the OP is just deeply insecure.
Edit - besides, it really doesn't matter what other men "would try," unless you have reason to believe the person in question is dangerous and will act without consent. If you think she will cheat on you, that's an issue with your relationship, not her friendships with others.
Sure, but this small window of context also still indicates that "he":
Which sounds pretty toxic imho. Given that, if she wants to respond to toxicity with trolling, it certainly is pretty funny. Which seems to be the main point of the post, and the added nuance doesn't really undermine that.
For Nuance's sake, it is important to note that not everybody makes every decision with perfect rationality and clarity, nor is everyone always completely and totally aware of the intentions of others that surround them.
Obviously, requesting that someone abandon their friends for the sake of a relationship is a piss take, but communication and building trust in the relationship can solve that.
The correct answer here is not that the relationship end because of the guys insecurity, but rather that both sides work on addressing his fundamental insecurity in the relationship and both sides keep all of their friends.
If the guy chooses not to work on his insecurity and double down on it, then you can justify ending the relationship because of this. But you should at least give it the college try first, right?
Frankly, I don't have enough information to know if this is the case. It's certainly possible that this is a relationship well worth saving, and that the overall net benefit is worth the toxicity brought on by his insecurities. The fact that she can joke about it certainly might indicate that the relationship is a safe and comfortable space for both of them despite his controlling behavior.
It's also hypothetically possible that she is exacerbating his insecurities by being overly flirtatious (or even flat out cheating on him) with her friends. In which case he might want to end it, as being in that situation will only reinforce his insecurities in his next relationship. (Hell, it's possible he is cheating, and that guilty conscience is making him project his infidelities onto her.)
It's also possible that she is not even in a relationship, and posted this simply as a joke she thought was funny.
So all things considered, the information provided only gives me enough to confidently say that trolling toxicity is pretty funny.
As far as the "correct answer here" and the value of giving it "the old college try", that's more between her, the hypothetical him, and maybe a therapist, and their friends, and innumerable other factors I'm not really qualified to speak on.
Ok, ChatGPT
I don't see it that way at all. He can trust her while not trusting the people she associates with.
I've had this issue with multiple girlfriends (who all ended up with one of the guys I warned them about). It's easy to tell when a guy is only being friendly to try to fuck a girl. Pointing that out isn't controlling in my eyes it's trying to be protective.
I'll grant you he shouldn't have said "stop hanging out with them" but the main point is there if you don't have the knee jerk reaction to the phrasing.
It sounds like you pushed them away to me: These other dudes will have been being nice and friendly to her meanwhile you're being controlling and untrusting of the very guys who are considerably more fun to be with whilst you're telling her which of them definitely fancy her, so she's in if she wants to take a punt on one of them.
I mean, you're kind of acting like an annoying wing man for her male friends. Why not swap you out?
If the existence of alternatives is a threat to your relationship, your relationship is on borrowed time anyway.
But, if you trust her, there shouldn't be a problem, right?
Or is it that you (in this hypothetical situation) don't truly trust her, otherwise you'd trust her around people you don't trust.
And that's okay, just don't pretend it's actually trust.
I don't trust other men to respect boundaries. If another man is only friends with my girlfriend because he wants to fuck her then he's already the type of man I wouldn't trust not to make unwanted moves.
She might not reciprocate but that's not what I'm worried about in this scenario.
It's fine, maybe even healthy, to be wary of other men. It's also important to respect your partner's autonomy, and to trust that with that autonomy, they will act in a manner that is healthy for the relationship (and for that trust to be reciprocated). It's great that you are willing to protect your partner, but it's important that you let your partner inform you when that protection is needed, instead of assuming based on your one-sided view of the person your partner is interacting with. Taking action based on that one-sided view, instead of having a discussion with your partner first, can make you come off as possessive.
Are you suggesting they would rape her?
I'm sure they feel very protected.
I mean, I completely agree that if he went about this in a non-toxic/non-controlling way, and instead clearly just wanted to protect her from legitimate threats, it would be completely different... But the funny thing about that is....
Do you have any idea how many women friends I have for the sake of being friends? No I'm not fucking gay.
6? ish?
Err let's see...idk how many I can truly count as friends anymore as I have been rather isolated lately. But one is a co-worker that is just nice, so of course we are friends. One is someone who I'm friends with because of god knows why...she is kind of a bully, but oh well. Two are childhood friends. Screw it, I don't really know.
Too many to count then? Me too buddy, me too.