A 'biographical' lens peering into mysogyny and misandry...

Cruelty is a modest word, that can morph into ideology of the victim (ideological feminism) on the one end of the spectrum and into the triumph of the alpha male on the other end of the spectrum. Regardless of which polarity is speaking, writing or acting, men and women are being hurt, some of them irreparably.

Debates over the virtues/sins of men and women have raged for centuries. Whether the female goddess image, worshipped by both men and women, or the heroic king, also worshipped by both genders, have witnessed and enhanced the swinging of the pendulum in a cultural oscillation, without end.

Various writers over the last two or three decades have attempted to document, some of their work as revisionist history, a theory of masculine dominance that, like a criminal sentence has to be removed from the culture, while others point to the under-coverage, under-noted, and under-valued victimization of men. And  while the theories and the vocabulary of the extreme polarities reads like two deaf people talking past each other, and while debates about the merits and demerits of each side, even those calls for further discussion seem impaled in a universe dominated by a zero-sum, Manichean dichotomy, with temporary victors and losers depending on the skill and the artistry of the protagonists.

A man living in the twenty-first century who refuses to acknowledge not only the rights but more importantly the inherent strength, endurance, creativity, capacity for affiliation and community, leadership, mentorship and outright “value” of women is, metaphorically living in his own dark cave of denial. Similarly, a woman of the twenty-first century who refuses to acknowledge the capacity of men to experience deep and profound emotions, tender care for vulnerable babies, parents, and the elderly, as well as the strength, endurance and creativity, adventurousness and risk-taking of men is clinging to reductionistic archetypes of brute force.

Misandry, the contempt for and hatred of men, has been well documented in the evidence from the popular culture that needs men as buffoons, jerks, idiots, and the butt of such perverted humour. Similarly, although far more deeply embedded in the social consciousness, misogyny, the contempt for and hatred of women, is the subject of multiple court cases perpetrated by men against women, mostly of their own intimate association. While the legal system is one theatre for attempting to balance competing forces, interests and ideologies, the public square is the place where attitudes, perceptions, beliefs and even thoughts are tested, revised, and potentially transformed. Let others debate whether or not both misandry and misogyny warrant definition as legally actionable under human rights legislation. In our view, this is a no-brainer; both attitudes and the actions each provokes are reprehensible. However, having plucked those keys into this space will do little to accomplish that legislative development. Indeed, while ‘definition of rights’ is and can be a path to social and cultural change, much of the ink and the narrative of enhancing human rights serves as only one arrow in the quiver in the over-all movement toward equality and equity*.

Indeed, it is not only reasonable, but often overlooked, to argue that the campaign for human rights, while an effective consciousness-raising instrument dependent on the courage of oppressed and victimized individuals to take legal recourse in response to their victimizers, has another impact. This headline and narrative of this worthy initiative tends to pit victims against aggressors, and can leave an imprint that the ‘war of the genders’ like the Middle East, is not only interminable but intractable. Throwing up arms, however, is to relinquish hope, without which  nothing can or will move.

Having been reared in a home in which the dominant female (mother) exhibited  ultimate power and control, while the passive-aggressive (father) exhibited a compliant appeaser role, this scribe has been consciously and unconsciously wrestling with the issue of equality and equity in such a “nest” for eight decades. And while anger and disappointment to and for each has oscillated back and forth, often triggered by an incident, a comment, a piece of prose or poetry, any attempt to reconcile each parent the other, obviously hypothetically and posthumously and imaginatively and ideally, is and can be at best only subjective and tentative.

Personal narrative, as opposed to formal research required for doctoral study and public recognition, pales as just another personal story. And as such can easily, glibly and dismissively be trashed as just another person’s opinion. And in this case, when the overt abuse was imposed by the female, while the male provided the quiet, supportive, care-giving archetype, the story contravenes the demographic and statistical evidence. As a consequence, many would read any such account as reducible to the (male) victim, who is self-indulging in a pity-party. Respectfully, I ask you, dear reader, to suspend that specific judgement, at least for the moment.

Each parent’s strength, while evident and appreciated by two siblings, was largely un-recognized and definitely undervalued by the other. A kind of unwritten arrangement provided employment and income from both, a modest house, a bountiful larder and table, a verdant and energetic garden of fruits, vegetables and flowers. In retrospect, it was the hidden darkness of each parent, their unconscious that erupted in dramatic conflict, without triggers that were perceived or available to spectators. Indeed, the many conflicts were also keep as deep, dark secrets from the outside world, camouflaged by a religiosity and a public performance of upstanding citizenship.

Having been raised in what amounted to a ‘gender war’ long before the rise of feminism, and the interjection of the word misandry, I can still hear references to the former Ottawa mayor, Charlotte Whitton’s pungent and cogent epithet that “in order to be considered equal to a man, women had to be twice as good; fortunately, men have made that quite easy.” Power, in the service of busy hands to accomplish determined goals, primarily for the apparent purpose of public acclaim, seemed to be the operative principle, authored and enforced by the maternal actor. And “actor” while somewhat reductionistic, nevertheless attempts to capture the energy, the drive and the intolerance of ambiguity, uncertainty, challenge to authority and dominance of this woman. A partially ‘trained’ soprano voice that neither knew nor respected the context in which it vibrated, embarrassed this pre-teen sitting in the back pew on Sunday mornings. Beside her, a totally unmusical, tuneless and muted sound was creeping from father’s larynx. That scene and its sounds is metaphor for the drama of the family of origin.

Adding to the ‘sound’ metaphor, back home, were a somewhat shrill argumentative ‘forte’ voice counterpointed by a gentle, soft male ‘piano’ speech impediment, offering a manuscript of disharmony and dysfunction. Rin the 1950’s radio stations CKEY and CHUM from Toronto, along with WKBW, Buffalo and WOWO Fort Wayne were constant ‘companions’ offering a popular music version of harmonies and rhythms to ears weary of cacophony.

Navigating between these two sounds, attitudes, perspectives, personalities and Shadows, as a teen, in a neighbourhood populated by quiet, alpha-fathers and submissive, compliant mothers was another of the differences between life inside and life outside the house. And it is those imaginative guard rails, models of masculinity and femininity, the former warm and loving the latter cold, calculating and austere that have shaped this somewhat helter-skelter path.

Male teachers, both friendly and supportive, along with occasional female teachers whose need for control exceeded their good judgement, seemed to be a second act of the home-scene, or a reiteration of the only kind of drama I knew. From the perspective of 2022, in the 1950’s men in the classroom did not have to be concerned about their authority while women were the exception, and were paving a path for generations of women to follow. Strict, austere, detached and over-bearing are descriptors of at least two female teachers, while others were matronly, compassionate and friendly. Among peers, the boys hunted with their fathers, played hockey and drove and worked on cars when they reached driving age. The girls, scholars, and more compliant and rigorous in following instructions, were interested in choirs, dances, movies and guys.

Stereotypes among peers, however, differed from what happened at home. We never considered those adolescent stereotypes of masculinity or femininity to be a curtailment of either our attitudes or our potential. They were all that we ‘knew’. The question of our orientation to authority, however, is central to the development of adolescent psychology.

Rarely, did an incident occur about which I was familiar, that demanded an authoritative response. A single occurrence of a strapping, in grade four, an occasional bullying in the school yard, the occasional missed homework assignment, and the occasional inebriated male on the main street on Saturday evening in summer in this tourist town were about the only dramatic incidents of my experience, outside the house. Tranquillity in the community, during adolescence, was the norm. Neighbours, too, were polite, friendly and generally soft-spoken without red-flag opinions even if they harboured them. A modest, moderate, although never really questioned ‘brand’ of authority was the template to which most people were accustomed. A main street fire in the middle of the night, in the summer between first and second-year of undergraduate years, continues as the most ‘inflamed’ imprint in memory, with the exception of a litany of suicides of adult male members of the community, all of whom I knew at least superficially. And those suicides, in varying degrees, left a ‘scar’ on memory. One especially of the father of a classmate, continues to ‘pain’ my memory and conscience.

Both son and father, of that family, the latter a Christie’s Breadman, were among the most implacable, unflappable, composed and friendly males of my experience, then and since. I have since learned that the son, at fifty, died of a cardiac arrest. Something about family secrets, within my own family, and obviously in that family, struck a note, a minor and reverberating note, in my psyche, especially given my own experience at having to remove the .22 from my father as a pre-teen.

In a Bach Fugue, themes are detailed in then repeated in a different voice and pitch, in relatively the same rhythm, sufficiently similar to be unmistakable as an echo. Somehow, in a manner of composing, different, for example, from the effervescence of Beethoven, Bach’s strict discipline, and formal mathematical intellect was able to imitate in a creative and imaginative way, something very deep and profound about human existence: that we are part of the themes and characters of our ancestors, and our off-spring will be part of those same themes.

And family secrets, for reasons of pride, shame, fear and even convention have been a theme of humans for centuries. Literature is replete with appearance/reality tensions and our lives are no different in that way. Very early, we know and respect some deeply hidden notion that there are certain things we do not tell our parents. What they are likely change as we grow. We also become aware that certain ‘stories’ are for family telling and re-telling only. Among the ‘secrets’ for example, are personal answers to how we each envision, consider and worship God. Some are openly and earnestly willing to enter into such conversations, for their own reasons. Others, not so much. Our family was among the latter.

So, one of the earliest operational scales on which the notion of authority was applied, was the question of belief. What one believed, for instance, was a subject that could and would only provoke intense emotional reactions. In order to engage in public life, one avoided that topic. Similarly, sex was another subject verboten, among the public discourse, secret, and both metaphorically and literally sacralized/demonized, at the same time. Conventionally, however, the demonized aspects of sex far outstripped the sacralized in public morality. And morality, for adolescents in this tiny very conservative town reigned supreme.

Authority, then, was seeded in morality, and keeping family secrets was high among the list of acceptable standards.

                                          -----to be continued---

 *Equality means that everyone is treated the same exact way, regardless of need or any other difference. Equity means everyone is provided with varying levels of support depending on what they need to achieve greater fairness of outcomes. An example of equality occurs when a government subsidizes gasoline or food. The subsidy is available to all people, rich and poor alike. An example of equity occurs, for example, in affirmative action policies such a quotas for marginalized sections of society, and/or decisions by companies to consciously look for a female director of a board composed of all men.