This week’s prompt is: Do you feel pressured to be a useful man?
Thought I’d start off this weekly discussion thing with an old discussion post from when we were quite a bit smaller. Put another way: How does your understanding of utility inform your own and other folk’s perceptions of masculinity?
This post will stay pinned until next week’s discussion post.
I think the pressure is there, and I think the word itself is one of the ways men are objectified. Objects are used, people should not be.
We’re social creatures by nature, and we all have needs. Fortunately or unfortunately our needs cannot be met without effort. I think everyone who can should contribute at least as much as they consume, if not more for the betterment of society. The way I see it, you have two ways of contributing to society.
There was a scene in the show “suits” where they were trying to fire the least productive intern, but before they fired him, they realized he made everyone around him more productive. That was his contribution, and getting rid of him would be a mistake.
I think with men it’s often only the first form of contributing that counts as “useful” and I don’t think that’s a good thing.