Male bashing?

Hmm…the words are barely nestled into the blog when the notion of ‘male bashing’ surfaces. Is that what I’m doing? Is that what others will see if/when they choose to read what I have written about myself….about my quiet truth?

For whatever reason, as I consider these thoughts, I am pulled to seek out Ray Landry’s blog (www.eternallyevolving-ray.blogspot.com). Ray is one of those (to me) rare and amazing men who is willing to do what it takes – no matter how much pain they must move through – to find themselves…the ‘self’ that lies buried deeply under decades of dogma and pretense and intense effort to crush …and all that it takes for them to get there.

I read his words and I am drawn to write to him. In this moment, I do not feel quite so alone.

Ray:

I read your most recent entries today and am very mindful of that increasing sense of intensity…that urgency to engage differently…be different….create new experience.

Yesterday, I wrote in my blog about what I knew as a ‘quiet truth’ for myself. Last night and today I had the first suggestions that I am ‘male bashing’….taking random pot-shots at all men because of gender. For the last hours, I’ve been wondering about that. And I’ve been reading your thoughts in your blog and felt the need to engage with you.

If I consider it all as a metaphor, I believe that your experience and mine are mirror images of each other. I’m not even sure I know what that means except that it somehow feels right inside my body. It is not about reflections, even, it is more that one of us lives inside the mirror into which the other gazes, with each of us reflecting back to the other what we’ve lost. I am increadibly mindful of the tension…the intensity..and the density of its manifestation in the world in which we both move.

You can say things…can generalize…about men in a way that I can’t because I’m not one. I read your blog and I share every thought that you’ve written.

So what am I trying to say???? Firstly, I am deeply grateful to see your words and to know that your voice is being heard, ringing in the ears of men. My voice would only be heard as shrill and accusatory, droning on sufficiently to become yet more white noise to be ignored. Can other men ignore your voice?

In your words, I consider my sons. What harm has come to my sons (and it has) has come at the hands of other men. Physical assault. Ridicule. Humiliation. All of these because they were ‘different’ and without the desire to assault, ridicule and humiliate anyone else. As their mother, this is deeply painful to me. As I encouraged them to hold their ground and be true to themselves, I lived in fear that who they were would be sufficiently irritating to escalate the aggression against them by other boys/young men. (I notice as I write this that I am struggling, even to this day, to make sense of any of it! How mindless! And I wonder…what were those children taught???) Today, what comes to mind is the loss of innocence. When ours has been taken, we seek to destroy it in others.

I continue to struggle to find the point that I am trying to make…..

Gratitude! Deepest appreciation for your courage! Relief! At these thoughts being in YOUR words and in the sound of YOUR voice! Who would accuse you of male bashing???

In this single moment, I do not feel quite so alone because of you. In this moment, my voice finds within its spaces my own courage to continue to say what is true and meaningful for me. And in this moment, as I re-read what I wrote yesterday, I am clear on who I am, what I stand for – and that my voice is clear and rings true.

My saddest moments are those when I fear that my sons – my beautiful, loving, generous, kind, funny, compassionate sons – will become what they hate in order to protect themselves. Is this what awaits all young boys as they become men? In this moment, one son has chosen to become a police officer, and the other is moving toward a career in the military. It breaks my heart…..

My last thought in yesterday’s entry krept up on me as I was writing. I had no idea that it would go there, and it simply did. And that thought was: what of those men who do not know what it is to be loved? What future will unfold for them?

Men hurt others…..women, children and other men. All men? No, absolutely not…but far too many to pretend that it is not so. Women will never stop men from spiraling down this path to destruction of self and other – only other men can do that.

In all the years that I have been working with people – men and women – I cannot begin to tell you how many times I bore witness to the histories of young boys who were assaulted, humiliated, ridiculed and brutalized at the hands of the men in their lives. And I don’t doubt for a moment that as young children, they (the bringers of harm) too were scarred in the same way by yet someone else. I don’t know if your willingness to be all of who you choose to be will make a difference, but I do know that it will not if you don’t. I don’t know if raising your voice to declare, as a man, that who men have become is not acceptable to you will make a difference – but I do know that if you don’t , it won’t.

My voice – the voice of a woman – will only be heard as whining, complaining, etc. My hope, from somewhere deep in my belly – likely where my children grew – is that your voice will matter. As much as mine may not, I am unwilling for it not to be heard.

Thank you, Ray….your blog gives me hope.

Louise

Breathing is good….