I graduated in 2006 with a political science degree and spent a couple years doing odd jobs – bartender, tuxedo salesman. Soon I realized I wanted to do academic work, specifically studying men and masculinity, so I re-enrolled in some sociology courses. I was like, I’ll use my academic qualifications to talk about men’s rights issues. I’ll grit my teeth and listen to the feminists and read their stupid books, but then I’ll go my own way. Things didn’t go as planned.
The first semester I took Intro to Gender Theory and the teacher asked, “What does gender mean to you?” Everyone talked about their lived experiences as women or gay men. When it was my turn, I said, “I’m here to offer a man’s point of view on gender.”
My instructor smiled and said, “Well, you must love our textbooks, then.” I looked at the syllabus and saw Masculinities and The Men and the Boys by Raewyn Connell, both about gender from the perspective of men’s lived experiences. I just thought, Well, shit.
I read them and it didn’t take long for my men’s rights beliefs to start falling away. They didn’t stand up to all the empirical evidence I was finally reading – research that was informed by feminist theory and offered actual solutions.