How to really feel like a man
Yeah, first time hearing "a man wants to feel like a man"
My first interpretation was a bunch of guys fighting with sticks and everyone having a blast
Strong people build others up. Weak people knock them down to feel big. You want to feel like a strong man? Protect others and be generous with your spirit.
You want to feel like a strong man? Protect others and be generous with your spirit.
Fucking this. Strong men—strong people—help others. Healthy or not, realistic or not, this is the message that’s been sold to us since time immemorial. The knight that slays the dragon and saves the kingdom. The alien that crash lands and moonlights as a superhero. The sled dog runs 261 miles to bring the medicine to a town beset by an epidemic.
Yes, sure, one can argue some romanticism (or propaganda) with any given example. But the overall message of heroism, of strength, is not one of selfishness or of “me and mine”.
Heroism is something we ought to focus more on as a culture in general. Doing things simply because they are right and protecting others who cannot protect themselves cannot be understated.
I think a challenge with “right” is that it is subjective. For example, there are people today who believe that doing what’s “right” entails doing things that hurt people, or deprive them of happiness, or even a future. Or, that doing what’s “right” means only helping your family or your friends or your church or your Elks club.
Semi-related, as this reminded me of a quote from Cary Grant:
I pretended to be somebody I wanted to be and I finally became that person. Or he became me.
This was then repurposed on Star Trek Strange New Worlds by chief engineer Pelia (from a species that lives several centuries):
Most heroes I've seen... are just pretending half the time. There's this one guy I remember, he said to me, 'I always pretended to be someone I wanted to be, until finally, I became that someone, or he became me.'
A patient I dealt with had schizophrenia and dementia, "but I'm a man, not a little girl with panties" was his counterargument to everything.
You can only have one cigarette at a time because otherwise you lose them all and run out. "But I'm a man."
You know the doctor says your food needs to be cut up. "Do I look like a little girl to you?"
That's the communal cheese bowl, this is your plate. You can't eat from the communal cheese bowl with a fork. "Do you see me wearing panties?"
Whenever I hear people making these kind of gender essentialist arguments, they just sound pitiably out of touch with reality to me.
If Men want to feel like Men then they have ways to deal with their insecurity:
Redo their own plumbing, twice. Once to change things and again to fix the problem they caused.
Chop firewood.
Build a furnace that you're only going to use like 4 times, ever.
50 pushups. If not reaching it makes you sad, start skipping numbers.
Redo their own plumbing, twice. Once to change things and again to fix the problem they caused.
I'm in this comment and I don't like it.
If not reaching it makes you sad, ~~start skipping numbers~~ forgive yourself and repeat tomorrow. You'll feel awesome when you get there.
NO. THATS NOT MANLY ENOUGH. REAL MEN GIVE THEMSELVES THE AUTHORITY TO SKIP NUMBERS.
With the plumbing example, the first time was a training exercise and doesn't count.
I met a marine mechanic once - he fixed Argos afterwards, which is how I met him. His saying:
One [nut] for me, one for the bilge.
Just waiting for the day when someone can explain to me what makes a man a man without describing skills, qualities, and actions that anyone can do regardless of gender.
And don't tell me it's "have a penis", because if that were true then effeminate men wouldn't be insulted all the time for not being "real" men, and there wouldn't be toxic masculinity.
I’ve always thought the least manly quality you can have is caring about how manly you are.
When first reading "a man likes to feel like a man", i thought it was about trans men
That's the perfect answer, IMHO.
More in general, it's not up to others to change the way they act to feed somebody else's self-delusions of having some kind of quality they do not have.
I've actually had to deal with something somewhat parallel to this when I moved from The Netherlands (whose people are known for being blunt) to Britain (were everything is sugarcoated and people are evasive, the higher the social class the worst it gets) and then proceeded to go around unknowingly insulting just about every insecure person I met in that place by giving them my blunt opinion on what they cared about, without evasiveness or sugarcoating.
The balance I found was to stop giving my opinion unless asked and if asked by somebody who didn't know my ways yet, give them a notice ("I used to live in The Netherlands so just point out ways in which things can be improved, but that doesn't mean I think they're bad") and then proceed to give them my blunt opinion.
I have to feel that "a woman needs to feel like a woman" wouldn't get a similar reaction.
It sounds like something terfs would say to explain why being a tradwife is good and desirable.
That sort of could be interpreted as "a woman needs to know her place".
I'm not so sure. If I went around standing at doors waiting for them to be opened for me, I think it might get laughed at.
Just don't cast shit on a man that's had enough of it from his work or society. Sometimes we just want to feel human.
I thought "feeling like a man" meant eating a lot of meat and losing money on sports betting.
Idk I don't do traditional man things.
I do do traditional man things: woodworking, maintenance on the family vehicles, and I’ve been thinking of getting into machining as a hobby because I have a lot of hand-me-down yard equipment that’s showing its age and I might need to start making my own parts because eBay is looking kind of barren.
Anyway, none of these activities have ever made me feel “manly” I never understood what that means. I feel like myself doing either something I enjoy, or something that needs to be done. My wife always says that she likes that she married such a manly guy who can fix all this stuff and make furniture, but anyone with functioning hands and a brain can do this stuff, it’s not exactly hard. Having a penis doesn’t make you an expert carpenter or mediocre mechanic, working with wood and old engines does that.
I'm stumped at the simple task of trying to imagine what does imply to "feel like a man".
100% guy here, real man feel is when others can rely on me, when I can help, that kind of stuff. Not “big car hurr durr bbq male superyorr” and the likes.
Did the first person just translate "like a man" as "superior to you"? They done failed their own little word game.
Is this a real thing? I don't believe I've ever encountered this. I suspect they're actually being demeaning to men in general, or men who don't fit their idea of masculinity. I've encountered people like that. Though the opposite is more common (men, and women, demeaning women who don't fit their idea of what a woman should be like, or just demeaning women in general).
I've never heard anyone say that phrase, is it possible that people use that expression to mean "a man likes to feel like a man... not a machine"? Ie he has thoughts, emotions, and priorities. He is not a commodity, his worth is more than just profit he can produce.
Not that women don't also have those attributes, just that "man" is being used as an outdated shorthand for humanity.
LOL! Almost that exact phrase is what I use whenever my wife asks me why I'm peeing outside in my backyard instead of just going inside to the bathroom.
~~I need to feel like a man.~~ I need someone to hold me tight for a moment.
As a biological male and someone who identifies as a man, it's pretty weak, IMO, to need someone else to make you feel a particular way.
Are you in control of your feelings, or do you constantly need someone else to reinforce, or induce a feeling in you?
Personally, I'm in control of my feelings, and bluntly, nobody else has control over me. Neither for how I feel, or what I think/do; with the only exception to what I do being governed in part by legality. Eg. If I know a thing isn't legal to do, then I won't do that thing. Beyond the rule of law, I do, think, say, and feel, whatever, and however I want.
To me, having that much control over my own self is what makes me a person living in a free country. Anyone who does not have the ability, like I do, to think, feel, do, and love, whomever and, whatever they want, is someone who I want to support in gaining that right.
This seems ...um.. naive. I love my wife and her opinion of me affects my feelings. And the more I care about my wife, the more I love her, the more her opinion of me matters. Humans are social creatures and we look for positive feedback from the people we care most about. To pretend like this doesn't matter is silly.
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