How Men Became the Villains of American History

It did not happen all at once. Each phase built upon the last until an entire generation inherited a version of history in which men were remembered less for what they built than for whom they supposedly oppressed.

American culture did not wake up one morning and decide that men should be remembered mostly as oppressors, predators, colonizers, abusers, and patriarchs. The rewriting happened gradually. It began as a correction, became a framework, hardened into institutional policy, and eventually spread through media, movies, schools, law, and the internet.

The original project was framed as a correction. Feminists argued that women had been systematically excluded from many areas of public life and that traditional histories had overlooked or minimized their contributions. They believed those omissions should be corrected and women’s experiences given greater attention. But somewhere along the way, the project changed. It was no longer simply about recovering women’s history or pursuing equality. Increasingly, it became a project of placing men—and masculinity itself—on trial.

The turning point came in the mid-to-late 1960s. The National Organization for Women was founded in 1966, and second-wave feminism began to frame American life through the language of male power and female oppression. The slogan “the personal is political” encouraged women to reinterpret private pain, disappointment, marriage, sex, motherhood, work, and family life as evidence of larger male-dominated systems.

Then came the 1970s, when the framework entered the institutions.

Women’s Studies began formally at San Diego State in 1970, the first program of its kind in the nation. Ms. magazine followed in 1972, creating a national feminist media platform. Title IX, also passed in 1972, moved sex-discrimination politics directly into education law. These developments helped establish a new moral vocabulary: women were the excluded class, men were the dominant class, and history needed to be reinterpreted through that lens.

This was the first phase: recovery.

The stated goal was to recover women’s lost history. But recovery soon became reframing. Men’s achievements were no longer simply achievements. They became evidence of exclusion. Men’s authority became oppression. Men’s leadership became patriarchy. Men’s protection became control. Men’s provision became privilege.

The second phase was suspicion.

By the mid-1970s, feminist theory had moved deeply into literature, film, and culture. Laura Mulvey’s 1975 essay “Visual Pleasure and Narrative Cinema” helped popularize the concept of the “male gaze.” This was not just a critique of a few movies. It became a way of viewing male creativity, male desire, male spectatorship, and male-created culture as inherently suspect.

The third phase was legal and policy institutionalization.

In the 1980s, the Duluth Model became influential in domestic violence policy. Its framework emphasized men’s use of power and control over women. By the time the Violence Against Women Act passed in 1994, the male-perpetrator/female-victim model had gained enormous legal, cultural, and funding power. It was driven by the erroneous idea that males were the perennial perpetrators and women the sole victims.

This mattered because law does not merely punish behavior. Law teaches culture what to notice. Once male violence was made highly visible while female violence, reciprocal violence, male victims, and children’s need for fathers were minimized, the public absorbed the message: men are the danger, women are the endangered.

No-fault divorce also belongs in this phase. California adopted the first modern no-fault divorce law in 1969, and other states followed over the next decade. The reform was intended to reduce bitterness and eliminate the need to manufacture fault in order to end a marriage. Yet the broader cultural consequences were far-reaching. The reality was that no fault divorce removed accountability and gave an opening for a revolving door of divorce.

Divorce increasingly came to be viewed through an asymmetrical moral lens. A woman who left her marriage was often portrayed as courageous, independent, or finally “finding herself.” The husband she left was more likely to be viewed as the obstacle she had overcome than as a person experiencing one of life’s deepest losses. His grief, his loss of daily contact with his children, his financial upheaval, and the collapse of his identity as husband and father were seldom given comparable attention. This was also the time when the label of deadbeat dads was assigned to fathers and placed on milk cartons.

As divorce became more common, the cultural story shifted. The focus increasingly rested on the woman who was leaving rather than the man and children who were also living through the consequences. The emotional costs borne by fathers—and the developmental costs often experienced by children who lost the daily presence of their fathers—received far less attention than the narrative of female liberation.

This, too, became part of the broader rewriting of men. The father was increasingly remembered not as someone whose presence was vital to family life, but as someone whose absence was often assumed to be manageable—or even beneficial. One of the most profound losses a man can experience became, in many public discussions, almost invisible.

The fourth phase was media popularization.

News media discovered that stories of female victimization and male wrongdoing were emotionally powerful, morally safe, captivating, and easy to package. The suffering of women could be personalized. The suffering of men was usually abstracted or ignored. Dead soldiers, dead miners, dead linemen, dead fishermen, divorced fathers, homeless men, suicidal men, falsely accused men, and alienated fathers rarely fit the preferred narrative.

The fifth phase was cultural saturation.

Movies, television, advertising, and later streaming platforms increasingly repeated the same moral structure: women awakening, women escaping, women resisting, women healing from men. Meanwhile, men were more often portrayed as obstacles, fools, predators, oppressors, or emotionally defective beings needing correction. Again, not always. But often enough that the pattern became familiar.

The sixth phase was internet amplification.

The internet did not create the anti-male frame. It accelerated it. Social media rewarded outrage, simplification, repetition, and moral accusation. Complex history became hashtags. “Patriarchy,” “toxic masculinity,” “believe women,” and “men are trash” could travel farther and faster than any careful discussion of male sacrifice, male duty, male disposability, or male contribution.

The players in this rewriting were not all the same.

Academics supplied the theory. Activists supplied the urgency. Journalists supplied the stories. Legislatures supplied the authority. Filmmakers supplied the images. Social media supplied the enforcement.

And the reasons were not all the same either.

Some wanted genuine correction. Some wanted justice. Some wanted power. Some wanted status. Some wanted revenge. Some wanted to ruin men. Some were working from unresolved pain. Some discovered that portraying women as victims and men as oppressors brought funding, attention, moral authority, and institutional protection.

The Seventh Phase: The End of the Narrative Monopoly

History took an unexpected turn.

The same technology that accelerated the rewriting of men also made it possible to question it.

For nearly three decades, the institutions that shaped public understanding of the sexes had spoken with remarkable consistency. Universities, major newspapers, television networks, publishing houses, Hollywood, and many professional organizations had increasingly adopted the same interpretive framework. There were always dissenting voices, but they rarely possessed comparable influence or access to large audiences. There was very little challenging of the default female-victim mentality.

The internet changed that. The internet giveth and the internet taketh away.

For the first time in generations, ordinary people no longer needed the approval of traditional gatekeepers to reach millions of readers or viewers.

Researchers studying boys found audiences.

Fathers’ organizations shared information that had rarely appeared in mainstream reporting.

Male victims of domestic violence began telling their stories publicly.

Psychologists discussed male depression, shame, grief, and suicide from perspectives that differed from the prevailing narrative.

Independent journalists, writers, and podcasters began asking questions that had received comparatively little public attention.

The conversation itself began changing.

This helps explain why so much attention has been directed toward what is loosely called the “manosphere.”

The label has become so broad that it often obscures more than it explains. It encompasses fathers’ organizations, psychologists, researchers, educators, podcasters, political commentators, men’s advocates, and many others whose views often differ dramatically from one another. Some are thoughtful and evidence-based. Others are not. Some are deeply concerned with helping men and boys. Others spend time exposing the flaws in feminist arguments.

Treating this entire landscape as though it represented one unified movement misses the larger historical development.

The real story is not simply the emergence of new voices.

The real story is that the monopoly over the cultural narrative had begun to disappear. After several decades of the narrative being sung in unison without counterpoint, alternative ideas were suddenly getting airtime. This was a shock for those who had comfortably relied on the exclusive spigot that spouted only one side of the story. These folks found themselves unprepared to deal with these long hidden ideas. They had no experience in having to defend their ideas since they never really needed to when only their narrative was the default. Now they were running up against a nightmare of counterpoint.

For decades, one interpretation of men had dominated most of the institutions responsible for shaping public opinion. The internet did not eliminate that interpretation, but it made it increasingly difficult to prevent competing interpretations from being heard.

History had become a conversation again.

Conclusion

The rewriting of men did not happen overnight, and it will not be undone overnight. But something fundamental has changed. For the first time in decades, the dominant narrative no longer enjoys a monopoly. Alternative voices are being heard. Research that was once ignored is being discussed. Men’s experiences are becoming visible again.

That is precisely why the word manosphere has become such a powerful weapon.

It is no longer used simply as a description. It has become a label designed to end conversations before they begin. Instead of answering uncomfortable facts, critics simply dismiss them as “manosphere talking points.” Instead of debating evidence, they attack the people presenting it. It is an old tactic: if you cannot defeat the argument, discredit the speaker.

Do not let them get away with it.

When someone dismisses an argument because it supposedly comes from “the manosphere,” ask a simple question:

“Which argument is wrong?”

If they cannot answer that question, they are not engaging in debate. They are avoiding it.

Insist that ideas be judged on their evidence, not on the labels attached to the people presenting them. Demand arguments instead of stereotypes. Demand facts instead of slogans. Demand evidence instead of guilt by association.

The same people who spent decades condemning the practice of judging entire groups by the actions of a few are now too often willing to do exactly that with men, men’s advocates, and anyone associated with the so-called manosphere. Reject that double standard.

History is healthiest when no one controls it. Progress is made when ideas compete openly, evidence matters more than ideology, and every claim—whether it comes from feminism, the manosphere, academia, or anywhere else—is expected to stand or fall on its merits.

The goal is not to replace one orthodoxy with another. The goal is something far more difficult—and far more valuable.

Tell the whole story.

“Fairness for Everyone?” Then Why Are Only Boys Being Lectured?

A few days ago, two friends whose judgment I respect, Jim Nuzzo and David Maywald, both wrote on X about a new Australian government publication titled Gender Equity for Early Years Education: Fairness for Everyone. So I downloaded the report.

 

The subtitle immediately caught my attention: “Fairness for Everyone.” Wonderful. Who could object to that? I expected a thoughtful discussion about helping both girls and boys flourish. Instead, I found something quite different.

The report repeatedly presents girls as the group needing protection while portraying boys as the group needing correction. Educators are encouraged to challenge boys’ privilege, reshape their attitudes, and prevent future violence by changing boys. Yet there is almost nothing about boys’ own vulnerabilities—their struggles in school, developmental differences, higher suspension rates, literacy problems, or the tragic fact that many of these little boys will one day grow into the group with the highest suicide rate.

Then I reached the section recommending children’s songs. Most were fairly harmless, but one stopped me cold. The report recommends a song called Come On Boys, describing it this way: “This song was written to shift the responsibility from girls to boys to address toxic masculinity and gender-based violence.”

 

Read that sentence again: “shift the responsibility… to boys.” The lyrics make the intention even clearer. “Some boys somehow think that they are strong, if they push a girl or make her feel wrong.” The chorus tells boys, “Come on boys, it’s up to you,” and “Respect, respect, it’s our responsibility.”

Please don’t misunderstand me. I don’t object to teaching boys to respect girls—not at all. I have spent decades encouraging boys and men to speak their truth in a way that can be heard. That is not the problem.

The problem is the asymmetry. Imagine if the government had instead recommended a song called Come On Girls and described it this way: “This song was written to hold girls accountable and address their toxic relational aggression.” The song began, “Some girls spread rumors around… Leave another girl out or put her down.…” and then declared in the chorus, “Come on girls… it’s up to you.” How long would that survive before people accused it of stereotyping girls? How many editorials would condemn it? How many educators would object that most girls don’t behave that way? Those objections would be entirely reasonable.

So why are they not equally reasonable when the target is boys? That is the question this report never asks.

The issue isn’t respect, kindness, or preventing violence. The issue is that one sex is addressed collectively as the moral problem to be corrected while the other is not. That isn’t fairness for everyone—it’s a double standard dressed up as fairness.

The saddest part is that the report almost never stops to ask a different question: What do boys need? Not how do we change boys, not how do we prevent them from becoming harmful men—simply, what do boys need in order to thrive? That question is almost entirely absent.

Until we begin asking it with the same seriousness that we ask about girls’ needs, we will continue producing educational policies that claim to be about fairness while quietly teaching children that one sex deserves understanding and the other deserves correction.

Perhaps the greatest bias in this report is not what it says about boys, but what it never becomes curious enough to understand.

Men and Boys Are Good

Today I’d like to begin sharing portions of The Way Men Heal (Second Edition).

 

When I wrote Swallowed by a Snake more than thirty years ago, there was remarkably little research explaining why so many men seemed to grieve differently than women. Much of what I understood came from listening carefully to grieving men and from studying grief rituals in cultures around the world.

Since then, an enormous amount of research has emerged. We now know much more about stress, testosterone, moral typecasting, empathy, precarious manhood, and the different ways many men and women respond to emotional pain.

Those discoveries inspired me to revise and update The Way Men Heal. This second edition includes many of those newer insights while remaining true to the simple goal of the original: to help men in crisis—and the people who love them—better understand how many men heal.

Today’s excerpt is available to everyone. Future installments will be reserved for paid subscribers. If you’ve been thinking about becoming a paid subscriber, I hope you’ll consider joining us. Your support allows me to continue researching, writing, and sharing these ideas each week.

I also hope you’ll use the comments section as we go. One of the great advantages of sharing the book here is that we can actually discuss it together. If a chapter raises questions, reminds you of your own experiences, or even if you disagree with something I’ve written, I’d love to hear from you. It’s very helpful to hear your thoughts.

Rather than beginning on page one, I’d like to begin with one of the questions that has fascinated me for decades:

Why is men’s emotional pain so often invisible?

A Man’s Pain Is Taboo

(pages 19-22)
When I first began working with men, I assumed I had no real bias about men and emotional pain. But the longer I worked, the more I came to see that I did have biases, and that they were affecting my work.

Over time I developed a simple exercise that can help people see this bias in themselves.

Imagine you are being seated at your favorite restaurant. As you walk toward your table, you notice a woman in the corner crying, her head in her hands. What is your first reaction?

I have asked this question to thousands of people in my workshops. The most common responses are things like, “She is upset,” “Poor thing,” or “She needs some support.” The woman’s pain is usually read as understandable and worthy of care.

Now erase that image and imagine the same restaurant, the same corner table, but this time it is a man who is crying.

What is your first reaction now?

In my workshops, the responses often shift dramatically. People become wary. “Something is wrong with him.” “He must be drunk.” “I’d stay away from him.” The woman’s pain evokes sympathy. The man’s pain evokes unease, suspicion, or avoidance.

That difference tells us something important.

A woman’s emotional pain is often treated as a call to care. A man’s emotional pain is more likely to be treated as a disturbance, a threat, or a violation of expectation. In that sense, male pain functions almost like a cultural taboo.

Peter Marin captured this problem beautifully in an article about men and homelessness. He wrote, “To put it simply: men are neither supposed nor allowed to be dependent. They are expected to take care of others and themselves. And when they cannot or will not do it, then the assumption at the heart of the culture is that they are somehow less than men and therefore unworthy of help. An irony asserts itself: by being in need of help, men forfeit the right to it.” Marin put his finger on the powerful and often invisible double standard men face around dependency. When women appear dependent, people are more likely to move toward them with care; when men appear dependent, people are more likely to pull back, judge, or devalue them. And it is important to remember that it is nearly impossible to express emotional pain without appearing, at least to some degree, dependent.

Modern psychological research may help explain why my workshop attendees were more likely to respond with compassion to the woman than to the man. One useful concept here is moral typecasting. (See Going Deeper: Moral Typecasting) This research suggests that we tend to cast women more readily as sufferers and men more readily as agents. Women are more easily seen as those to whom bad things happen. Men are more easily seen as those who cause things, control things, or should be able to handle things. When a woman cries, people often see vulnerability. When a man cries, people are more likely to wonder what is wrong with him, what he has done, or whether he is unstable. The moral typecasting studies help explain why men’s grief is so often misread: a grieving man is less likely to be seen simply as someone in pain and more likely to be viewed as someone who should keep himself together, get back to functioning, and ask little of others.

There is also a broader cultural force at work that I would call gynocentrism—a tendency to place women’s needs, suffering, and perspectives closer to the moral center of our concern, while placing men second. John Barry and Martin Seager describe a similar pattern in their research using the term gamma bias: female suffering is more readily magnified, while male suffering is more easily minimized or overlooked. (See Going Deeper: Bias and Perception) Together, these ideas point to the same underlying reality: our culture tends to center women’s pain more readily than men’s, and most people do not even notice they are doing it. These dynamics help explain why male pain is not only hidden by men, but also frequently misread by the culture around them.

Men, of course, are not blind to this. They know, often without consciously thinking about it, that public displays of emotional pain can bring discomfort, judgment, or avoidance rather than comfort. It makes sense, then, that many men would gravitate toward quieter, less visible ways of grieving—toward action and inaction rather than public emotional display. These quieter forms of grieving are often not empty activity at all, but early attempts at meaning-making. Unfortunately, these quieter modes are often judged harshly as men “not dealing with their feelings,” when in fact they may be dealing with their pain in the only way that feels safe.

When something is taboo, people learn to hide it. Men are not simply failing to express pain. Many are doing their best to keep that pain out of sight because they know how it will likely be received.
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if you are looking for the book on amazon be sure this is the cover, The first edition will sometimes pop up when the title is searched link to amazon