The Will to Change: Men, Masculinity, and Love is a book by bell hooks about men, patriarchy, the relationship between them, and most importantly love. It's a book that I wish I had read much earlier, and so I decided to start a reading group. I'm a couple chapters in but will be re-reading (well, re-listening) to the chapters as we go through the book. This book is an empathetic look at masculinity, and focuses on learning how to love.

This idea was spawned by comrade @Othello@hexbear.net after I mentioned that I had been checking out the book and played the first chapter on Hextube. There is no need to pick up a copy, comrade Sen has already uploaded the entire audiobook onto Youtube. Content warnings are generously provided by Sen at the start of each chapter. Let's start with Chapter 1. Each chapter is only about 30 minutes long, so it's not a long commitment. I wanted to post this to c/menby but that didn't seem to work.

Uhh I don't know how to lead a reading group so let's start out with some questions:

-What stood out to you about this chapter?
-Are there any ideas that bell hooks introduces in this chapter that you've never heard of or wish you had heard earlier in your life?
-Are there any stories in this chapter that resonate with you on a personal level?

  • operacion_ogro [he/him]
    ·
    10 months ago

    The part where Hooks expresses how she'd freak out when her ex talked about his feelings was poignant. I've heard women expressing contempt for men who cry

    Several of my friends and I have all remarked that we've had girlfriends who clearly lost respect for us when we shared a little bit of our vulnerability with them. It was a very clear marker in those relationships, and the breakup always came soon after. My friends are very hesitant now to express their emotions to their significant others because they're afraid that they will then perceive them as weak.

    I understand that many men have a tendency to dump all of their pent up emotions on to their partner because she's the only "safe" person in their lives to do that with, which can be overwhelming, but this was not the case for me and my friends. It was sometimes something as simple as "I'm very stressed and worried about work" which was a kind of signal to women that we were failing as men to be manly enough about whatever hardship we were meant to bottle up.

    It is difficult to try and break the social conditioning you mentioned, only to have our loved ones quickly reinforce it for us.