Why does Western society hate feminine males?

[Prismatica 37]

Western society is probably the most ironic civilization there is in the Known Universe And Possibly Other Unknown Galaxies We Haven't Discovered Yet, where people are proud to say "Be Yourself!" and then say "Oh, don't be like that" or something like that. That's what I'm here to talk about. While girls are allowed to be either a "tomboy" or "girly girl" or whatever the hell they want to be, boys are taught at a young age "Don't do that, that's for girls!". In both gay or straight societies, feminine boys are shunned or even outright despised. It also annoys me when a boy acts feminine in fiction, there's stuff like "Is X gay?" all over the Internet. And then there are shippers who use the excuse "X should be with Y instead of Z, because X needs a manly man!" to get their ships sailing.

In the Hetalia fandom, some people hate AusHun because Austria is "effeminate" and Hungary needs a manly man like Prussia, and people agree. I'll tell ya this: If I walked into the Pokemon Adventures/PokeSpe fandom and said "Sapphire shouldn't be with Ruby, she needs a manly man like Gold" I would be laughed out of the community in ten seconds flat.

Ruby is still fabulous

[Silver Letter 1,832]

Because western society often denounces feminism and females in general. It is anti-woman. Males are taught that it is the ultimate insult to be compared to a female. "Don't be a girl/that's for girls" is a simplistic version of the insult thrown by children to reinforce the dominion of males in society and to shun those males that do not conform.

[Sceethe 704]

i can only agree with you, most people here probably would.

The trend seems to be that the situation is slowly getting better, but there are still so many people who believe that the traditional gender roles are "set in stone" or "just natural" or something like that.

 

Our society is still way too focused on sexuality(most curse words are related to it), and connects things to sexuality that really don´t have anything to do with it.

[Silver Letter 1,832]

 

 

but there are still so many people who believe that the traditional gender roles are "set in stone" or "just natural" or something like that.

They're ignorant. Gender is learned and it is something that can be unlearned.

[Eloquence 2,076]

Because western society often denounces feminism and females in general. It is anti-woman. Males are taught that it is the ultimate insult to be compared to a female. "Don't be a girl/that's for girls" is a simplistic version of the insult thrown by children to reinforce the dominion of males in society and to shun those males that do not conform.

 

This exactly ^

 

There's a quote that perfectly encompasses this, something to the effect of "It is ok for women to wear pants and have short hair and act manly because it is ok to be a boy, but it is not ok for men to wear dresses and make up and act feminine because it is not ok to be a girl." This is the notion that pervades Western society, unfortunately, but I do hope that someday we might be able to grow beyond this immensely idiotic notion.

[Guest]

Because western society is still stuck with the notion that girls play with barbie dolls and boys play with action figures and should NEVER/COULD be the other way around.

Edited February 15, 2015 by Guest

[Akemi Homura 7,680]

Men/boys wearing dresses and garments "specifically made for women" seems a little strange to me, but only aesthetically. I think they'd look better wearing something else, but it's not my problem if they want to wear it so I don't shun them for something ultimately trivial.

 

The world is bigger than your zip code, the galaxy is much bigger than your planet, and the universe is certainly magnitudes larger than your galaxy.

[RainbowGlass 224]

It is strange here in America. People are very judgmental, especially when sexuality is concerned. I've been to England and Japan recently; sexuality and feminine males are well accepted norms from what I've seen and talked to about with friends there.  . America is one of the (if not thee) most religious nation(s) in the world with a vast majority being Christian, Christianity being the most practiced religion in the U.S. This fact alone is easy to see why feminine males are not viewed in a positive light compared to other nations around the world whom are much more open to sexuality in general. In America, if you are given a blue cap at birth, to stride outside of your expected sexual norm is to be considered weak, non-manly, gay, queer, etc.

I believe men ought to be able to be sensitive but more importantly people as a whole, despite their sexual orientation, should be able to be themselves without being criticized. ~Homosexuality, like any sexuality, is a form of love and should be respected.   

Edited February 16, 2015 by RainbowGlass

[Odyssey 5,716]

Since men are often looked up as the dominant gender, people often hold higher standards on them. And it is justifiable, as some men take on risker, or as what society calls it, "manlier jobs". Some of these jobs include being in a construction site, joining the Navy, sports, mining and other things. Since women are often the ones who take on "healing" jobs like being a nurse or a teacher more, people would be confused at the sight of a man being in touch with his feminine side. Not that there is anything wrong with it, really.

[Justin_Case001 4,896]

Sweet merciful Gandhi, I can't say enough about this topic.  Holy crap.  First off, I agree 100%.  I have written many an essay on this subject.

 

Obviously we have a backwards-ass, f*cked up mentality in this culture that it's more acceptable for females to be masucline than vice versa.  It seems to be a long-engrained, unfair notion that males are better/stronger, so when a female acts/dresses/does something masucline, they are becoming stronger, fighting the power, so to speak, but when a man does something feminine, he's becoming weaker, even embarassing himself.  This whole mindset is obviously bullsh*t.  It's changing, but not fast enough, imo.

 

The bullsh*t starts practically from birth.  My mom has told me about how when my brother and I were little, she saw mothers whose daughters wanted to play with toys traditionally for boys, and other mothers would praise her for encouraging her daughter to be herself and be whoever she wants to be, etc.  But when my brother was 5 years old, he wanted a doll because he thought it would be fun to brush her hair.  My mom got it for him, and the same moms told her not to let him play with it because it was going to screw him up/turn him gay.  She didn't listen to them, thankfully.  And guess what?  He's now married to a woman, so I guess playing with a doll at five years old isn't what makes person gay after all.  Who'd have thought?  My head a splode.  My head just f*cking a splode.

 

I think this mindset is largely due to the fact that we've had a mostly patriarchal society throughout history.  It might well be completely inverted if we'd had a matriarchal society.

 

I am a hetero guy with a strong feminine side.  I don't really act all that feminine, but I like a lot of feminine things, and love to wear feminine type clothing and dresses.  But I design and make my own clothes, specifically designed for a male figure, and to suite my look and personality.  There's not really a specific reason why I'm telling you this, I just wanted to say a little about myself.  I like to think I'm doing my own small part to change society.

 

This whole problem with society is probably the underlying reason, in some form or another, behind half the threads on this forum.  I mean, it's obviously the reason why bronies were controversial in the first place.  It's the reason for all the hate.  If teenage and adult women wanted to watch Spider Man, or Batman the Animated Series, nobody would care.

 

This was kind of my angry, abridged version, because I didn't feel like writing a carefully worded essay on this subject, since I've done so many times before.

[TheMarkz0ne 962]

I'm anti western. I am with the eastern side of culture. Westernism is just a dead carcus and it's always been that way. Yeah, we can do some impressive things, but it happens with some frowns and some people being killed. I am fairly feminine as a male, but I'm going to dress as a male and act like a male.

[~Sylveon~ 188]

Basically what others have already said- western society has this thing against women. 99% of insults I hear at school (not to me, I keep to myself ) are "You're such a little girl!" and other things,  in fact it's almost always slang/swear words about female body parts that I won't post here x.x and it's considered "bad" to be feminine, unless you're a girl. Especially here in the south U.S., it's the worst, since all the churches here- and there are really SO FREAKING MANY, there's like twenty in my town, and no that is not exaggerating, I live in a pretty small town too- are male dominated, ex. the "leader" of the church must always be male, in my church there are bishops, and the bishop cannot be female, nor can any of his counselors. It's like that in other churches too. Everyone around here pretty much conforms to gender roles, which makes me want to tear my hair out. Every single girl wears 55 pounds of makeup. I'm not bashing on makeup, I wear it too, but only foundation to cover my pimples because A. I don't want to see them B. You don't want to see them C. I don't want you to see them so it's better for everyone if I do. but the girls at my school treat their faces like colouring books most of the time x.x and Celestia forbid you're a male who isn't quite as "manly" as they "should be"- I'm not exaggerating, if a boy wears pink he gets bullied to the max. It's horrible. Idk if it's worse in any other part of the U.S., but eh.

this was way longer than I intended it to be holy crap

and sorry if any of this offended anyone, I did not mean it to! I think everyone should embrace themselves through everything they do, including what you wear. And if you want to put 50+ pounds of makeup on your face, hey, that's your choice

[Dani_uwu 211]

Because we (I am quite "girly") are "gay". And being gay is wrong in this "free" country called America.

[The Professor...8D 823]

Western Society my posterior, It's all over the bloody place, there are very few society's that practice matriarchal policies or even true equal mentality's between the sexes. It's a lording mentality, that most of the world takes on. If people could learn to let go of those and just let others be, but No, World peace is a bad joke. But all we can do is try with those around us & whom ever we encounter.

[Dani_uwu 211]

Basically what others have already said- western society has this thing against women. 99% of insults I hear at school (not to me, I keep to myself ) are "You're such a little girl!" and other things,  in fact it's almost always slang/swear words about female body parts that I won't post here x.x and it's considered "bad" to be feminine, unless you're a girl. Especially here in the south U.S., it's the worst, since all the churches here- and there are really SO FREAKING MANY, there's like twenty in my town, and no that is not exaggerating, I live in a pretty small town too- are male dominated, ex. the "leader" of the church must always be male, in my church there are bishops, and the bishop cannot be female, nor can any of his counselors. It's like that in other churches too. Everyone around here pretty much conforms to gender roles, which makes me want to tear my hair out. Every single girl wears 55 pounds of makeup. I'm not bashing on makeup, I wear it too, but only foundation to cover my pimples because A. I don't want to see them B. You don't want to see them C. I don't want you to see them so it's better for everyone if I do. but the girls at my school treat their faces like colouring books most of the time x.x and Celestia forbid you're a male who isn't quite as "manly" as they "should be"- I'm not exaggerating, if a boy wears pink he gets bullied to the max. It's horrible. Idk if it's worse in any other part of the U.S., but eh.

this was way longer than I intended it to be holy crap

and sorry if any of this offended anyone, I did not mean it to! I think everyone should embrace themselves through everything they do, including what you wear. And if you want to put 50+ pounds of makeup on your face, hey, that's your choice

Sounds like Texas to me. Bunch of sexist asshats here.

[~Sylveon~ 188]

Sounds like Texas to me. Bunch of sexist asshats here.

Not quite, but pretty close. x.x Georgia, actually, though I'm pretty sure it's the same across all the "Southern" states.

[Sapphire Lightning 784]

Wow I can SO relate to this discussion!

 

Full disclosure: I am a post-op transwoman. Luckily for me (although most thought me unlucky at the time) I always looked really girly. This made my transition much easier, as I pass well. Anyways, when I came out as trans WOW did the flood gates OPEN! I got comments ranging from asinine to completely threatening. All of this because people thought that I wanted to be a "girly man" instead of see that I was always Katie, but was not allowed to show it.

Oh.. And all of the people asking why I would want to "become" a girl if I am attracted to girls. Also, all the suggestions and not so subtle hints about why I shouldn't "go though with it"... Sorry, I digress. I just wanted to put that out there to give my personal example of how this style of culture is so harmful.

 

A really sad thing about western "hetero-normative" values is that they have been widely exported in the last few centuries. Many places on earth used to have a much more fluid view of gender/sexuality until the "great and powerful West" showed up. (India comes to mind).

[~Sylveon~ 188]

A really sad thing about western "hetero-normative" values is that they have been widely exported in the last few centuries. Many places on earth used to have a much more fluid view of gender/sexuality until the "great and powerful West" showed up. (India comes to mind).

It seems our stupidity is contagious. X.X Didn't think stupidity was contagious. Well, maybe I did, but I was in denial.

Dangit America you ruin everything

[Mrain901 216]

Western Society my posterior, It's all over the bloody place, there are very few society's that practice matriarchal policies or even true equal mentality's between the sexes. It's a lording mentality, that most of the world takes on. If people could learn to let go of those and just let others be, but No, World peace is a bad joke. But all we can do is try with those around us & whom ever we encounter.

My Spanish teacher says that in Italy and Spain it's a lot less ridiculous. Guys can hold hands in public and - for the most part - people might not even assume that they're gay. (Though I may need someone from Spain/Italy/France to verify this for me.)

[Nervous Stitch 813]

I honestly don't think the hate is as widespread as it is normally portrayed as.

 

You're always going to have a few bad apples that ruin the bunch, regardless of culture or location. Even in this thread; some of you must be western, and if I'm not mistaken, a majority of the replies are...yet not one post has replied about how western society is justified in it's hatred. I mean, of course there are going to be personal cases where that individual has it tough because of others and I wish there weren't people like that in the world; but if you weren't being pestered for being a feminine male, it would be something else. 

 

Traditional gender roles are pretty set in our society and the societies that our society came from...but because I was born in the time I was, as a woman, I can have a career and vote and I'm encouraged to have an education. If that isn't progress, I don't know what is. Change is slow, and change is even slower when it's across the span of millions of people. its difficult to say that the ideas of "society" are dominated by the loud individuals who scream hate.  Just my two cents!    

[VulpineTaco 525]

My parents never really told me about "girly" and "manly" stuff as a kid, so I grew up just liking what I like. Most of that tended to be considered masculine, because as a young boy, I was mostly friends with boys, but look at me now. I like cartoon pastel horses.

[King Sejong 859]

   Western culture has become pretty Spartan or Roman, when the genders were expected to behave in accordance with gender standards and roles. Any moment of weakness or sympathy is frowned upon or ridiculed, if you watch YouTube you might come across some rant videos where someone with a country accent, spews bile about gentle or sensitive males, and denounces them as gay, maybe they think it is a Christian thing to flaunt masculinity, but I'm just guessing, I am Jewish, of the reform branch, my temple was started by a female Polish Jew, when ever we go to congregation we have to humble ourselves to everyone there, and embrace one another no matter what differences we have, all that is asked is for all of us is to respect those differences. The feminine male is making a come back, little by little, for the true strength of masculinity is not buff muscles nor doing what's popular, it is the independence and discipline, that makes us balance and at peace, I am a feminine male, straight and an American, I wish to make friends with all manner of males, with that gentle touch, for they could use a friend to be there, for companionship and support, our world is changing, I hope it will be for the better.  

[[NULL] 906]

If you'll hear me out, this is why I'm against "feminine" males: 

 

We all know about the double-standard with "effeminate" behavior; It's okay for women to be "feminine", but not men. Yet, both men and women are encouraged to be "masculine". Arguably even more so for women, since by doing so they're being strong and independent, and not conforming to gender roles. The term "masculine" has always been associated with feats such as strength and independence, as opposed to being "feminine", which is associated with being weak and dependent.

 

But I think everyone's looking at this the wrong way.

 

I don't discourage being weak and dependent because it's "womanly". I discourage it because being weak and dependent is a bad thing, whether you're male or female. Unfortunately, this kind of submissive behavior has always been socially acceptable for women, and accepting the same behavior from men will only make things worse. Instead, we should encourage both men and women to be strong and independent, and stop associating positive and negative traits with genders.

Edited February 16, 2015 by SpaceOnion

[Steel Accord 6,660]

@@Prismatica,

 

I take a some issue with the nature of your post, OP.  :okiedokielokie: I could be mistaken, but it seems a tad backhanded. Appearing non-offensive, when your intent is venomous. Trying to sneak a knife, under a smile.

 

Western society does not hate feminine males, people within that society do. Standards of what is or isn't feminine even, change over time. Only a couple hundred years ago, pink was considered a masculine color and many gentlemen wore it. On the inverse, blue was considered feminine. So most baby boys are feminine by an older set of standards. 

 

It even comes to practices. Once upon a time, being skilled at poetry and science was considered the apex of manhood. This was in Western Europe, a part of that society you claim hates femininity.

 

Acting, as in classical dramatic stage acting? Was only done by men in Greece, even with women characters. So we can add cross dressing amongst the feminine things that Western society "apparently" hates.

 

I would say without irony that the Western value of "be yourself" is a culturally endemic meme in modern western society, even more so than in the past. It will never be universal, no meme ever is. The fearful and jealous will always seek to punish the outlier for their own inefficiencies.

 

But I have seen more evidence of people's tolerance in the West than in elsewhere of the world, and I have seen much of it in my lifetime.

 

While the symbol I would use to exemplify my stance on this topic may be ironic as far as the political landscape of it's culture went, socially it's very much in keeping with the above.

 

 

More than half these guys? Gay and bi-sexual.

Edited February 16, 2015 by Steel Accord

[Sapphire Lightning 784]

@SpaceOnion:

SpaceOnion... SpaceOnion... SPACEIONION!..... (Dangerzone) (Yes, I am also a major Archer fan!)

Having said that, I do agree with many of your points, but still there is the issue of how the culture at large treats people. (this next statement also goes to steel accord). Society is defined by the mores and views of the people within it. You cannot have a society without people, nor can anypony have a people without a society. When somepony makes a judgement call about society, they are basically refering to the general view of the people that manifest the society as a whole. Anyways, just my 2 bits.