is one of the most intolerable aspects of the insane worldwide culture of Patriarchy.
And I think patriarchy dehumanizes dominant males just as much as it does everyone else. "Real men" don't cry. "Real men"are tightly restricted in the range of behaviors acceptable for them (just imagine what would happen to a boy who chooses to play with dolls). Rage and resentment are the only emotions they are permitted to show. "Real men" are so trapped in the system that they can't even perceive the chains that bind them.
Our species can't survive patriarchy. Either patriarchy comes to an end in the next decade or 2, or we all do.
Patriarchy is all about dominion--male dominion over women, human dominion over Gaia. Dominator ideology has brought us fracking, climate change, and Dick Cheney. Well, Mother Nature has about had it with this lunacy. We either get our shit together and grow up out of our dysfunctional adolescence or She's going to take us off the board and start over with the cockroaches.
The Atlantic article points out the mixed blessing and curse of the Internet and social media as they interact with all this. The ugliness is being exposed; it's up to us to decide how to use that information. For some, it's a negative feedback loop--exposure to the information leads to compassion for the victims, disgust with the violence, and the impulse to end the ugliness. Unfortunately, for too many others, it's a positive feedback loop--exposure results in desensitization and in the impulse to glorify and emulate the violence.
Who will prevail, the humanists or the monsters?
That, my dears, is the question of the age.
The answer will determine not only whether the species will survive, but whether it deserves to survive.
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