Dear Sugars,

How do I deal with my anger toward men? I go to therapy, I’m on anti-depressants and I’m trying to practice self-care. But I’m still angry. I don’t think it’s unwarranted. I’ve been sexually assaulted at least twice. We live in a time where women have more rights than ever, but our president is an alleged sexual predator. Men are socialized to be condescending toward women, and even the few who check themselves often fail.

The only way to tell if a man is a sexual assaulter is to say no, and once you’re in that position, it’s too late. I have male friends who care about me — some who’ve even been sexually assaulted themselves — but they still don’t understand my pain. In my observation, there are elements of sexism in even the healthiest relationships, and that makes me angry.

I don’t want to be emotionally unavailable to the entire sex that I am attracted to. How am I supposed to find a life partner if I can’t even find many men who treat women like equals?

Justifiably Angry Feminist

Steve Almond: Your letter made me think of James Baldwin’s famous formulation that to be African-American in this country “and to be relatively conscious, is to be in a rage almost all the time.” You have every right to be angry with men who have harmed you, in word or deed. No man can understand how it feels to grow up female in this culture, especially not an affluent white man like myself. We are largely ignorant of what it’s like to be economically, socially, professionally and sexually bullied. Having said that, your essential beef here really isn’t with men, individually or as a population. It’s with patriarchal thought and behavior, those monstrous forms of privilege by which men control women. The deeper question we need to reckon with is why boys and men are socialized to derive their self-worth from the denigration and domination of women. The symptoms of this mindset — discrimination, abusive behavior, rape — are infuriating. But beneath this rage lurks a deep sorrow that belongs to all of us.