YOU ARE NOT ALONE - A companion online community discussion board for The Mental Illness Happy Hour podcast with Paul Gilmartin

Respect to:

* The amazing podcast episode of Pigeon

* The vastly interesting introductory thread by quickfall

If imitation is the most sincere form of flattery, then I intend to flatter them indeed by posting here regarding my experience with:

• *Male beauty
  *Male privilege
  *Passing
  *Being Seen
  *Queerness, including regarding gender
  *Masculine energy
  *Desire, particularly female desire
  *The endlessly delicious intersection of masculine energy and female desire, including the dark side of that meeting
  *De-escalating male aggression in other men, when their aggressiveness doesn't serve my interests
  *Je Ne Sais Quos
  *A man's aura which is both:
  a. "Throwing one's aura around" ie filling up the space one is in
  b. The physical space of a man, which one tresspasses into at one's own risk

I hope you will indulge me writing about these topics.

I am very grateful to have a forum to express myself regarding such important topics to me.

Men are disproportionately punished for not being effective and self-actualized. But individuals of all sexes ultimately benefit from being effective and self-actualized. It is hard for me to invest a lot of energy in differences between the sexes and dynamics between the sexes because the benefits of winning the internal battle are overwhelming. But then I am a pretty weird cat, my brain juices are all mixed up, so I want to know where I am mistaken or where my focus is misplaced.

As cliche and trite as it sounds, I think talking about masculinity is, for all intents and purposes, the same as talking about gender in general. After all, masculinity is the measuring stick for both genders, right?

Last week I went on a stream-of-consciousness rant about gender and this sort of stuff because I get so sick and tired of the way people talk about the topic that sometimes I have to let off steam. Here's the link to the rant; read if you wish. Note: I'm not trying to do any sort of self-promotion. It's just a super long read and didn't want to clog up the space here.

I'm hoping to write a more coherent follow up to that rant, but work has been insane, and therefore I've been in exactly the wrong mindset to think about this.

I hope that the male gender isn't the measuring stick for both genders. I want the freedom to be girly. I like pink, I like pretty things, I love being playfully exuberant and vulnerable, I like being sensitive and empathic and mirroring, I love getting all the tiny details right, I love making things tidy and right. A lot of masculinity is crap.

I typed all this as stream of consciousness, so please forgive me if insensitive or if I am speaking hurtfully from privilege. I want to hear criticisms and corrections.

Thanks, quickfall, for that link to your writing. Very interesting and helpful. I very much appreciated the "Spectra of Biological Sex"

Much forum love, Manuel Moe and quickfall.

I greatly enjoy and anticipate your thoughts on gender.

Like you, quickfall, I am emotionally exhausted from work, so I will offer the most broad outlines of what I listed above.

Again, thank you all for your kind indulgence. I am worried about coming across as navel-gazing, but then I realize that "internet" is not a finite resource so I'll just type away. And of course I speak only for myself.

The most broad outlines of me

Certain facts are hardwired into me: I am right-handed, have hazel eyes, and I have a speech impediment.

Two other hardwired facts pertain to this topic: my sex and my sexuality.

When I popped out, as a cute little baby, everything then and now was default setting for "male": reproductive organs and later facial hair and broad shoulders.

Also, I am a towering inferno of heterosexuality. Unless when I am a slow burn of smoldering heterosexuality. I burn with desire for women.

I burn.

While I admire male beauty on occasion, particularly clean cut men, it is more of an aesthetic appreciation. I can't say that I have ever sexually desired a man. Of course, I celebrate the dignity and worth of LGBT people.

While my sex and sexuality have been clear, my journey in gender has been tortured. Until it wasn't.

As I will get into later, from birth to age 29 society had one message for me regarding gender:

NOT ENOUGH.

Since I posted this thread in Seminal Moments, here was said moment:

One Friday night in November 2005 I read this new dating book that changed how I viewed myself. I vividly remember setting the book down, knowing that there were other men, men who were like me.

Since then I have played with gender.

Growing up, I understood lust.

After reading Nancy Friday and Susie Bright, I understood desire.

I do not believe I am a beautiful man. At least on the outside. I've long known I can't compete with other men, so I don't, when it comes to cars, money, muscles, job, etc.

But I can take good care of what I have: I can wear clean clothes, proper shoes, and smell at least not-bad.

Where I have cleaned up is in inner beauty.

Je Ne Sais Quois.

Masculine energy is one of the most powerful forces in the universe.

I am chemically straightedge: no alcohol, non-prescription drugs, or smoking. But I am addicted, deeply addicted, to feminine energy.

One of my favorite quotes is by Kahil Gibran: "Work is love made visible".

I believe male beauty, masculine energy, is a radiant, elemental form of love.

When the masculine energy goes wrong, it creates a monster like Hitler, Stalin, or a thousand other despots.

But when masculine energy is used properly, it is dazzling.

Though effort and good luck, I stumbled into one source, one method, of tapping into that power.

When I post here next I think I will share my thoughts and experiences regarding male privilege. A delicious topic, and thanks to quickfall for getting me to examine my own experiences with it.

Just to be clear, I am speaking only for myself, and about myself.

I recognize that many men have been awful throughout history, and that topic deserves its own thread.

I also recognize that masculinity is entwined with race and class.

While I will touch on race and class, those topics are not my stated goal.

For my own thread, I humbly offer my own experiences.

See, all my life I was told that I didn't fit the cookie cutter mold for being enough of a guy. Or enough of a man.

I see this forum as a safe space for me to express myself and how I currently view my masculinity.

Two final caveats/realities:

1. I did not create the rules/norms of masculinity, but I am obligated to play according to these rules.

2. The question is not IF I will radiate masculine energy; the question is if I will use it for good or evil. Or a little of both.

Thanks for listening.

(btw, gender can get fraught in a hurry. I feel more comfortable remembering that I speak only for and about myself. Much love.)

What I meant by saying that "male" is the measuring stick is that men have to measure up to a certain "male-ness" standard, whereas women have to measure up to a certain NOT man-ness standard. In either case, there's retribution if anything happens any other way.

I think that might be only making sense in my head right now, so hopefully tomorrow's commute will allow me to think about this some more and put my thoughts together more clearly.