by nis0s | 2025-08-16 17:40:21+00:00
The prescriptive feminist talking points about what makes a man are poorly justified, and as such more likely to be taken as political agenda than well-meaning advice for self-actualization. But I don’t think this post deserves to be flagged, it’s bringing up a discussion relevant to the current political landscape.

Human populations independently progressed so much culturally and otherwise beyond being hunter-gatherers, and the fact that the discourse neglects all those lines of human cultural evolution when it talks about “monkey brain”, “brain made for eating berries in a cave”, or “you gather, me hunt” is both thoughtless and incomplete.

Let’s consider this first point in particular,

> Your authentic self should not be: dominant, highly interested in sex, competitive, emotionally reserved, prone to risk-taking, bad at reading emotions, stoic, or interested in power.

Coupled with the rest of the points, it appears to be describing the mental state of a Eunuch, which goes against the advice to not be stoic, so I find that inconsistent. Secondly, I don’t think it’s fair to demand that one shouldn’t expect good behavior from others—that’s the very basis of social contracts. But let’s stay on point.

There are many inventions which have created cultural paradigm shifts, and I think the invention of guns/drones are similar in that they have equalized men and women in terms of strength and capability. FFS, please don’t read this as me inciting any kind of hatred against one type of people or another. Instead note that physical strength is not the differentiating factor that it once used to be.

I think it’s necessary now to think of the potential that that cultural shift presents. To me, I think there’s an opportunity here to truly design a gender-neutral cultural framework because what matters now is what’s in your mind, that is your character, desires, and personal expression.

Instead I offer this version of what it takes to be a man or woman or as-you-wish: think of mirroring God (note: I am not religious, but I think of god as a philosophical framework).

So women, men and whoever: as God’s mirror, you’re a creator, you’re magnanimous, you’re wise, you’re just, you wield your wrath in a just manner, etc. etc. You are the embodiment of noblesse oblige. But you are mortal. So you must take care to protect yourself, both physically and mentally from people with parasitic or narcissistic traits. Encourage self-reliance and independent thinking, the basis of exercising free will.

The above isn’t exactly completely thought out on my part, so I am sure there are gaps to be addressed. But I don’t think that kind of philosophical framework precludes sex or relationships, or demands heteronormativity. You could have multiple partners, but that just means do it in some gracious and respectful manner, for example. I don’t know, it depends. A lot of people with money don’t have class.

I also don’t think it’s fair to expect men to do all the hard work of trying to fix these cultural issues by programming themselves to be one thing or another, but not expect that of everyone else. Everyone is terrible, in their own unique and special way.

But most of all, everyone needs to realize that there are huge capability gaps between themselves and other people, and one may never be able to close such gaps for any number of reasons. The best you can do is educate and move on.