Some of my favourite people are men.

(CW/TW: rape, violence against women)



Give me a word that means detestation

Bitter, green and gagging

Of the patriarchy

That venerable institution

Which keeps women subjugated, excruciated, obfuscated

Only sometimes celebrated

Usually when there are points to score

Or money whored



Give me a word that means abhorration

Firey, red, with passion

Of privilege

That invisibility cloak and ‘social theory’

Which treats women as inferior, exterior, ulterior

Only ever superior

When it comes to ‘womens stuff’

Like getting up the duff



Some of my favourite people are men

My dad is a man, or he was, until I started earning more than him

No wait, he’s still a man

My brothers are men, or were, until I had the right to determine myself what happened to my body

No wait, they’re still men too

I’ve had lovers who were men, until I proclaimed that I was not to blame for the disrespectful way they treated me

They’re still men too, though lovers no more



Misandrist: a hater of men

Surely that’s not you!

Why aren’t you a humanist?

An equalitist?

Isn’t feminist just another way of saying women’s rights before men?





Love the sinner, hate the sin

That’s how the proverb goes



Which is fine except when the sin is perpetrated against you every minute of every day by so many men you can’t keep track and every day you put on armour to steel yourself against the male gaze and him possessing you with his eyes and his mind and being touched without your permission and having decisions made on your behalf by people who have no clue and being blamed for all of the woes of the world from poorly raised children to the domestic violence or rape perpetrated against you and being used for your body and being told by society that that’s okay and that poor behaviour is fine because ‘boys will be boys’ and that if you believe that your body is your own to make decisions about you are ‘pro death’ and the fact that despite doing the same job you’re getting paid less and all the bullshit politics that will be played against you so that a man can get his own way because you’re only a woman and how could you possibly be an expert in your field of study/expertise/profession or the best witness to your own experience and the man knows best and let me explain to you how you’re wrong even though I have no formal training or education in this thing that we’re talking about and as a cissexual white man I have very little concept of what it means to be a member of an oppressed minority trying to make their way in the world and over and over and over and over until you’ve been sinned against so many times that all you want to do is march them all into the sea so that you don’t have to try so fucking hard to exist in this world as a human being worthy of equal respect and dignity.

Turn the other cheek on that

TURN THE OTHER CHEEK ON THAT



So, until I have a word for hatred

Pure, white and hot

For what makes men think they have the right to

possess me

speak for me

belittle me

politicise me

blame me

control me

earn more than me

speak over me

touch me

explain to me

I am a misandrist.