0:00

Hey everybody, it's me again, already.

0:02

The weeks just fly by, don't they?

0:05

So do the years, to be honest. My son comes back from uni in a couple of weeks and it feels like only yesterday when he was just this tiny little baby and now he's old enough and man enough to come out for a pint.

0:17

Because that's what you do, isn't it, when you're a man?

0:20

Whether it's friends or family, when you're a bloke, you don't meet a mate for a coffee, you don't nip round for a cup of tea, because that's for the ladies.

0:30

And if you're a bloke, you go out for a pint, or at least that's how it used to be.

0:36

And anyone under the age of 30 probably wouldn't agree, because these stereotypes are starting to fade.

0:43

Times have changed, but there are people that need to change along with it.

0:49

Otherwise the world isn't going to fit in with their view of it.

0:53

Like with many things, if we make a decision about something when we're young, an ideology, stereotypes, those things become unconscious expectations that will drive our emotions and drive our behaviours.

1:08

And if the world then doesn't fit in with those expectations, then it's going to feel quite jarring.

1:14

Maybe it'll feel as if we don't belong, which is the horrible feeling.

1:19

And that causes people to push back and double down on those old beliefs.

1:24

And if we're not careful, we've then got a with us or against us society, all trying to create the same goal, of everyone being safe and happy, but going about it in different ways.

1:38

The thing is, stereotypes make our life easier.

1:42

Because our brain loves shortcuts.

1:45

And for hundreds of thousands of years, back into our prehistory, there have been roles assigned to gender.

1:53

In its simplest form, it's just that women would look after the children, and the men would bring home the bacon.

1:59

And here we are, all these years later, still playing out those stereotypes.

2:04

And I know that a lot of people are going to think that in the last, maybe 20 years or so, there have been some big changes.

2:11

But really they're not that big.

2:15

The best we've got is that people are more aware of this patriarchy.

2:21

And they do what they can to offer the same opportunities to both men and women.

2:25

They're aware of it. They're no longer asleep to it.

2:28

They're awake to it. They're woke, and what we've found lately is that the pushback tries to turn that awareness, that wokeness, into an insult.

2:39

And I don't think it's an insult to be awake to injustice, because the alternative is to carry on with the stereotypes, and continue to have those beliefs.

2:49

That if you're a man you must earn more money than your wife, and if you're a woman, it's your responsibility to make sure that the house is tidy and that there's food on the table.

3:01

And to blur those roles is weird.

3:05

What, a man who cooks and cleans, and he's got a wife who drives a van?

3:10

That's emasculating, the men might say.

3:14

And to that, I ask you this.

3:18

What's wrong with that? What's wrong with being less masculine?

3:25

Because I do think that a lot of men don't like the idea of being less masculine simply because of their opinions about women.

3:34

Because if they've been taught all their lives that women have less value, then what they mean by, I'll be less of a man is, I'll have less value.

3:46

Until you sit back and learn to think more critically.

3:49

But that means admitting that there's a problem in the first place, doesn't it?

3:53

And I have genuinely read articles from men saying that the patriarchy is a good thing.

4:00

Because it provides a political and social structure.

4:04

Even going so far as to say it means that there are less likely to be arguments within families.

4:11

Like I always say, nothing's a problem unless it causes problems.

4:15

So does it? In short, yeah it does.

4:19

And not just for all of the exploited women.

4:22

Because everyone loses. If men think that they have less value if their wife earns more money than them, even if someone's value was based on how much money they earned at the end of every month, even with that ridiculous assumption, surely all that happens is the woman's value goes up.

4:41

Not the man's value goes down, but a lot of men are genuinely threatened by the idea that they aren't the breadwinner in the relationship for some reason.

4:52

And I do think we all need to sit back and think more critically about it.

4:56

Anyway, it's an absolutely massive topic.

4:58

It's really not something I'm going to be able to thoroughly cover in a five minute personal development podcast on a Friday, but the internet is a massive place.

5:06

So if you want to hear some more about it, you go for it.

5:08

Anyway, I love you and leave you for today.

5:11

I'll speak to you next time.