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OK, class, time for a quiz. True or False?

1. “Men are, by nature, violent, sexually predatory, and irresponsible” is a statement that could only have been penned by that notorious feminist man-hater, Andrea Dworkin.

2. It was that grumpy feminist kvetch, Betty Friedan, who said that men are “by nature oppressive, possessive, flesh-obsessed pigs,” and that “giving them advice on successful marriage is like offering Vikings a free booklet titled How Not to Pillage.”

3. “Men are not biologically as attuned to being committed fathers,” argued feminist law professor Catharine MacKinnon, advising other feminist lawyers on how to prevent fathers from getting custody of their children during divorce.
 
No doubt you, brainy skirt! reader, picked up the trend. All of the above are False. But wait! If man-hating feminists didn’t utter those slanders against men, who did? Who are the male bashers who think men are biologically-driven, testosterone-crazed, violent and rapacious predators?

Actually, it’s the anti-feminists! It turns out that some anti-feminist men have the most relentlessly negative view of the male species around.

Here are the actual answers to the quiz:

1. Those sentiments are those of conservative writer and Republican Party advisor George Gilder. Gilder also blames feminism for seducing women into abandoning their natural roles as home-based wives and mothers and to seek satisfaction in the workplace in some vain imitation of men, which reverses nature’s plan and wreaks social havoc.

2. Actually, that was pop-biologist Robert Wright in his best-seller, The Moral Animal, arguing that males have a natural predisposition towards promiscuity, sex without love and parental indifference. Like other evolutionary psychologists, Wright believes that only by applying Darwinian evolutionary history can you make sense of the mating rituals at a college mixer.

3. This was written by right-wing family values proponent David Popenoe. “Left culturally unregulated, men’s sexual behavior can be promiscuous, their paternity casual, their commitment to families weak,” he says. It’s women’s fault—for going to work, seeking sexual freedom, and abandoning their natural role of constraining men.

One final question. Extra credit. True or False?

4. “Boys will be boys.”
False. Well, it’s a tautology, so on its face it’s true. It’s often accompanied with a shrug of bemused acknowledgment, maybe even a smug little grin. Like, “what did you expect? They’re boys, after all.” Do anti-feminist male bashers (men and women) really think so little of boys that they encourage us to throw up our hands in resignation and sigh at every single moment of men behaving badly? 

Actually, it’s ideas like this that are probably the most harmful to boys. American boys carry the weight of an avalanche of stereotypes and media images that insist that real men shoulder that impossible burden with no visible expenditure of effort—“naturally.”

While one of feminism’s key projects was to free women from such stereotypes, to enable women to claim those traits and characteristics—like assertiveness, ambition, competence—that had previously been coded as “masculine,” young guys remain nearly as tightly bound in a straightjacket of stereotypes than ever. As I interviewed more than 400 young men for my book, Guyland, I found many confused, torn between the fantasy images in the media and the realities of their lives. How can they navigate the relentlessly homophobic and sexist peer culture while remaining faithful to their friends, partners, sisters and mothers?

Some are angry, defensive and resistant to women’s public equality. Others quietly acquiesce. Many adopt a sort of public-private split: sensitive and caring in private, while being a bystander (at best) or a participant in the very behavior the anti-feminsts claim is so natural.

Feminist women—and their male allies—set the bar a bit higher. Feminist women believe in men enough to know that we can be compassionate friends, nurturing parents, supportive colleagues and co-workers and loving partners and husbands. And do it in public. Feminist women wouldn’t insist on it unless they also believed we were biologically capable of it.

Michael Kimmel is the author of many books on masculinity, including Manhood in America and Guyland. He was one of the founders of NOMAS and teaches sociology at SUNY Stony Brook.