This is Man Feelings
I should begin by crediting my friend Annie for inspiring the creation of this newsletter.
A few months ago, I was mouthing off on Twitter—quelle surprise—about the new Caitlin Moran book, What About Men?. I hadn’t actually read the book, but I was enjoying the various takedowns of it that were being published by other men. I think I was trying to express my frustration that a woman was writing about the lived experience of men, while acknowledging she had no idea what it’s like to be a man. What right did she have to assess what it’s like to be a man, let alone tell us how to do it better?
Annie was kind/patient enough to message me privately to challenge my take on the book – like me, she’s the mum of a young son and understandably concerned about his future. Unlike me, she’d actually read the book. She made some really good points in our discussion about what Moran has to say about the issues facing men, and the fact that prominent mainstream feminists are now speaking out about them. I promised her I’d read the book and get back to her.
Talking the talk
Fast-forward to today, and I’m a couple of chapters into the book (sorry Annie, I’m a slow reader). I’d just finished a section about the difference between men and women’s conversations: Moran sums up the average discussion topics amongst her female friends, then contrasts it with the topics her male friends tell her they discuss at the pub, the gym, etc. All her male friends are horrified at her suggestion that they might want to raise difficult emotional topics with their mates, or cry, or express themselves when they’re going through hard times.
I had to grudgingly accept that this assessment was fairly true of my own experience, even accounting for my status as a proud feminist, progressive dad and anti-toxic-masculinity stalwart (or so I’d like to think). I’ll occasionally reach out to close male friends when I’m struggling with things, but I can count the number of times on one hand. Usually I end up comparing what I’m experiencing with things I know they’re going through and decide I have little to complain about. Or I’ll conclude that while I know my mates will offer me sympathy and well-intentioned advice, usually the things that are getting me down aren’t easily solvable problems with quick answers, so what’s the point troubling them with it?
Even as I’d been reading the book, I’d been wrestling with challenges. My four year old son had just started school that week and, without realising it, I’d been struggling with the adjustment just as much as he was. I’d gone from getting daily updates about his activities at nursery (plus photos, rundowns of meals, accident paperwork etc) to basically waving him off at the school gates and then being unable to gather any insight from him about what happened in the classroom.
I felt like I was being distanced from him: hearing echoes of my own dad when I chided him for being mischievous, losing my cool when the house was messy etc. One morning I came downstairs and said good morning to him and he completely ignored me, watching TV intently. Was my relationship with my son collapsing?
In the cold light of day now, this sounds ridiculous: I spent this morning building Duplo robots with him while having a conversation about what whalesong might mean (tips on “flowers and chocolate”, according to Ted). But reading Moran’s book, lying next to my partner in bed, I suddenly felt tears in my eyes as I realised I hadn’t even spoken to her about how I felt. I rolled over and she held me there for a bit while I tried to process why we don’t talk about our feelings, even when we think we do.
Men with feelings
So hence this newsletter. It’s called Man Feelings in tribute to Peep Show – and because I think more men should be talking about how they feel.
Don’t worry: it’s not going to be a comprehensive rundown of every emotion I’ve experienced that week. What I think it’s going to be, though, is a weekly theme about a particular, well, man feeling. Masculinity? Shame? Anger? Fear? I don’t know yet – I want to pick a couple of these each week that I’ve lately experienced, and write about what that was like.
Why am I doing this? I don’t really know that yet, either. But I think that just normalising speaking about feelings, as a man, is something that I can do. Other men might read it, and might speak about their feelings too – whether it’s to me, to their mates, or just to themselves (which might be what I’m doing if nobody subscribes).
It might be cathartic, it might be funny, and it might be shit. Who knows?! But sign up, and give me an excuse to try to engage with the topic of being a man and feeling things, because I know that I need to get better at sharing and understanding these things. Thanks, Annie.
– Matt