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I guess I should have figured that I would become a male feminist in this life but I didn’t think of it when I was younger. Nevertheless, had I been more aware, I could have seen the signs.
My infancy was marked by the violence and anger of my father, whose physical, mental and emotional abuse of my mother and I led to my developing a great fearfulness around him, which developed into full-blown Avoidant Personality Disorder. The behavior of this disorder led to bullying and teasing from boys at school. My mother married four times, so there were changes in men as I grew up. Despite this, I managed to maintain some reasonably normal and healthy same-sex friendships with boys of my own age until I was 11. Then they started some strange “testing” behaviors that I either couldn’t do or failed, so that was the end of them.
I come from a matrilineal family. What we define as family is always the female side. My grandmother divorced my grandfather before I was born. She had two daughters, then a son. The son joined some kind of religious cult, so was often unavailable. The eldest daughter married my uncle but we don’t see his family much. Each time my mother divorced, she would always get the kids, since the courts usually do that unless the mother is certified insane or on drugs or some other problem. So fathers die, husbands divorce, boyfriends split up; but women last forever.
So I grew up talking to my mum and my sisters and thought this was normal. When women talk, they discuss their feelings, talk about nuance; there’s a lot of “he said, she said” commentary; sentences start with “I felt” – and I felt happy and accepted.
After 22 years of this, I left home and moved to London. When I met women, I would talk as I had always talked – but now there was a different reaction. I was surprised to receive awkward, fake smiles, dismissing hand gestures, as if to shoo me away; and comments like, “well, it was nice meeting you but I have to get back to my friends.”
Huh? What happened? This was alien, unusual and uncomfortable. After a few further attempts, this pattern became cemented and a regular occurrence. The overwhelming feeling was of suddenly being alone, a loss of belonging and a sense of guilt, as though I had done something wrong but didn’t know what.
As time went on, I began to fear that this would be a permanent state of affairs. Strangely, though, I observed that guys at work were totally unfussed by it. Women would treat them the same way, yet the guys didn’t appear to be bothered. In a flash, it occurred to me that they thought this was normal. I thought about my family background and for the first time, realized that other guys might not have experienced the same thing.
Well, if it was normal then I suppose I would have to accept it. However, at the same time, I experienced the first bout of loneliness and isolation, something that has been a feature of my life at different times. I spoke to guys in bars. I liked it but I noticed that male conversation was mainly just to kill time, shoot the breeze and talk junk. “Did you see the match the other night?” they would say. “I thought Shearer scored a great goal in the second half.” I enjoyed this conversation but it was lightweight like I couldn’t actually say anything meaningful that mattered. I got stressed out and started dropping things and becoming clumsy. I became renowned for smashing glasses accidentally and knocking stuff over.
Then I got a job on a cruise ship in Florida. One day a female work colleague from Poland complained of discomfort in her shoulders. I told her that I used to give my grandmother shoulder massages. “Wow, really?” she exclaimed. “Do me!” So I did and was surprised to find that she loved it. “That was great! You’re awesome at this!” she said when I was finished. I was modest about it but within a few days, she had told a range of female friends who also showed up. After massaging one or two of them, I was approached by the Social Hostess, who invited me to her cabin.
At the appointed hour I knocked on the door and was let in. I was surprised to see not only her but three other female friends. They all chatted animatedly as she told me to give her a full-body massage. She laid down on her bed and waited. I wasn’t sure how to go about asking her to take her clothes off, so decided to commence with her fully clothed. I massaged her back through a thick jacket. “I think I’ll take this off,” she announced presently. Off came the jacket. Continuing to massage through her blouse, her friends told her that I should do her lower body. Off came the skirt. I did her legs for a while before returning to her back. After a few minutes, she decided to take off the blouse. Eventually, nearly everything came off. The women seemed impressed by all this but I felt I needed to remain professional in my approach.
After that, I was invited back a few days later. Some seven women were present and they all discussed guys they had met, what they had done with them and they went into eye-opening detail. As for me, I was delighted. I WAS BACK! I had returned to the sisterhood that I had grown up in, despite doing nothing wrong to leave it. However, more importantly, it was because I had done nothing wrong during the message that I was able to return.
This then led me to understand more about what was really going on. I had demonstrated that I could be trusted to be in the presence of a woman with no clothes on without taking advantage of her in any way. Logically, this must, therefore, mean that other men had never experienced the sisterhood because they had never demonstrated this. As years went by, I became aware of other things that men had been getting up to in my absence and I didn’t like the sound of any of it.
Eventually, I got married. I thought it was right to love one woman rather than be friends with many. This was correct but an unfortunate side-effect is that I once again was regarded by women as not being in the sisterhood. While I have been very happy with my wife and son, I have been prone to bouts of loneliness as I have had to grapple with the fact that, as the main provider of the family, I must go out to work. However, as a married man, I am unable to rely on massage therapy to gain access to friendship among female colleagues like I did when I was single. What to do?
A combination of greater awareness of negative male behaviors and a desire to find a non-physical replacement for massage to establish female friendships has led me to realize feminism is the answer. I am irritated beyond measure that it is the patriarchy’s fault that I left the sisterhood without wanting to, having important relationships severed without my say-so, having done nothing wrong, suffering stress, anxiety, isolation, and loneliness for absolutely no reason at all, just because a woman thinks I might be a rapist – you know, like those “other men”. Stuff those guys!
Whenever I meet a new female colleague at work, I still get the fake smiles and stilted politeness at first. However, a commitment to feminism can conquer that and allow a true friendship and alliance to develop. Plus, I don’t have to suffer loneliness anymore. In this new column for the Good Men Project, I intend to show you exactly how that pans out. In the meantime, though, I wanted you to know my background, so you can understand where I’m coming from and the issues at stake. LET’S GET STARTED!
Oliver Chapman, DipCPC, CPT
Certified Life Coach
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Photo by Taylor Grote on Unsplash