A Walk in His Shoes

“It was an insightful combination, and perhaps the perfect depiction of modern man at his most beset and wasted, taking the world on his shoulders and rolling it uphill. Being the man in charge brought with it a whole host of burdens and anxieties that seldom if ever occurred to me or the feminists I knew.” – Self-Made Man

In 2018, a book by Professor Jordan Peterson, “12 Rules for Life” became an international best-seller following his successful YouTube channel, featuring a series of biblical lectures, and most notably, his defiant pushback against political correctness prompted by a Canadian law supporting gender identity recognition.  Promoted by a successful world tour, his self-help book sold more than 5 million copies.  Catering to a majority male audience, Peterson, a clinical psychologist, began to focus on the increasing disillusionment and despair in the lives of men.  Encouraging them to better themselves through personal initiative and effort, not only struck a nerve for many disaffected young men but also made Peterson a household name. 

Since the 1970s, a near doubling of men of working age have left their jobs and have exited the workforce, a self-imposed he-cession, of sorts.  For reasons spanning from addiction to mental illness, and a growing dependence on welfare or disability, many of these men, without families to support, have become overwhelmed by their lack of success.  Now, over 7 million men, are no longer employed in any meaningful way and have simply given up. 

Adding to their dismal reality is a feminist movement still struggling against an imaginary patriarchy.  Certain that men hold all the magic cards, they are quick to demean all that is masculine in a vain attempt to deflect from their own shortcomings.  As an example, serial bed-jumper and occasional actress/director, Olivia Wilde, mocked Peterson’s alienated followers with the pejorative term “incels”, for their inability to find love and relationships.  Yet, while Wilde attacked and derided men for their failings, another feminist, years earlier, had put her own gender spin on the “Black Like Me” experiment and began to live her life as a man. 

In Norah Vincent’s 2006 book, “Self-Made Man”, Vincent set out to document the privileged life she believed her male counterparts enjoyed.  By stepping into their plush shoes, she expected to find a life of abundance and entitlement, certain that men had it easier in the world than women.  A tomboy in youth, and a lesbian in adulthood, Vincent, a journalist by profession, was anxious to pull back the curtain and observe how men behave, with and without women, in several areas of life.  Ironically, Vincent, a woman disguised as a man, thought that she would be the ideal man, embodying all the empathy women desire.  Instead, she found that women were wildly inconsistent in their expectations of men, at times lamenting the chivalry of the traditional gentleman and at others, disparaging their perceived privilege.  Unfortunately, her experiment would be cut short when a bout with depression landed her in the hospital.  As she inadvertently discovered, the boy’s club was anything but favored. 

Vincent’s textbook feminist views on male privilege, borne of tales of oppression, drove her preconceived ideas about modern manhood.  Yet rather than finding a socially constructed male psyche instigating aggression and abuse towards women, she instead found men struggling to meet the demands from the thankless cult of female victims, often willing to give without expecting anything in return.  Nor were men living the high life with rewarding jobs acquired through unearned privilege.  Most, instead settled for labor-intensive work, content to do what was necessary to support their families.  More surprisingly, she found men were more genuine in their friendships, expressing their affection through fun and banter.  While female relationships were too often shrouded in superficiality and pretense, the brotherhood had no time for such fakery, presenting a more natural and effortless appearance.  Men were certainly more introverted about their own troubles, choosing to carry those burdens alone. 

In sex and dating, Vincent immediately recognized the stark reality of testosterone, a force of nature incomparable in women.  While sexuality for women is emotional, it is a basic bodily function for men.  Yet, preconceived notions of toxic masculinity resulting from the effects of the male hormone have had the opposite effect of creating a fear of weakness in men.  Thus, making men feel insecure when interacting with women corrupted with prejudiced notions of male entitlement.  Nor do all men acclimate well to the constant rejection in social situations, leaving them to feel expendable and useless.  Then, of course, there is that cognitive dissonance of women, who are expected to resist the patriarchy on the one hand but are left thirsting for a traditional courtship, on the other, leaving men confused and uncertain.

The first known version of the adage, “To understand a man, you’ve got to walk a mile in his shoes” came from an old Native American prayer from the 1800s.  And that is exactly what Vincent’s politically incorrect gender study experiment set out to accomplish.  As her journey continued, she became increasingly sympathetic to men’s plight, recognizing that they, too, have constraints.  And despite her limited experience as a man, she came to believe that it was women who were the privileged lot.  Women have far more power than they are willing to admit or concede.  Yet despite all this, men are still the one group that can be openly discriminated against.  Norah Vincent never overcame the fallout from her experience, choosing to end her own life by assisted suicide in 2022. 

With the disciples of Jordan Peterson buckling under the weight of unfulfilled expectations, those once deemed the oppressors have unjustifiably become the oppressed.  Women are trying to have it all, thinking men already do.  But neither is possible.  As Vincent conceded, it’s not a man’s world after all.