On Women Being Expected to "Tame" Men

Posted by Melissa McEwan at Tuesday, October 06, 2015
[Content Note: Toxic masculinity.]

I tweeted a few thoughts about toxic masculinity and the idea that women are expected to "tame" (straight) men. For those who aren't on Twitter, and to open a place for further discussion, here are those tweets.

screen cap of a tweet authored by me reading: ''He didn't have a girlfriend' isn't why he was a resentful violent shit. Being a resentful violent shit is why he didn't have a girlfriend.'
screen cap of a tweet authored by me reading: 'Women are expected to 'tame' men, but we're loathed & abused for drawing boundaries, i.e. communicating how we want to be treated.'
screen cap of a tweet authored by me reading: 'If a woman suggests some patriarchal behaviour be set off limits, she's despised. Yet we're tasked with 'taming' men.'
screen cap of a tweet authored by me reading: 'To criticize toxic masculinity is to be deemed a 'man-hater,' to try to convince us to care for men and gently 'civilize' them.'
screen cap of a tweet authored by me reading: 'What 'taming' men really amounts to is indulging them & personally sucking up their abuse so it isn't directed at other people.'

I can't put this any more plainly: Women were not put on the planet to "tame" men. But it's the people who believe that we are who most aggressively push back on attempts by women to challenge the toxic masculinity that harms us.

They don't really want women to "tame" men. They want women to submit to men, and they want to blame women for men's violence.

[Related Reading: You Don't Own Women; You're Not Entitled to Women's Affection.]

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