Humanity Hallows Issue 5 Out Now
Pick up your copy on campus or read online

In the run up to Reclaim the Night Manchester UK 2017 on February 23, we’re asking students to share their experiences and tell us why they’re a feminist.

By Frankie Richardson

Becoming a mother changed everything for me. Before The Boy I was a wild, free spirit type of girl flitting here and there at will, enjoying the freedoms that the women’s rights movements of the past had brought me. Travelling alone, being politically active, living independently, working in managerial positions, being sexually liberated, these were all things I recognized as the hard-won fruits of feminism and I was, and still am, fiercely proud of the long line of incredibly strong women who raised me and came before me.

Then came The Boy. And in the last four years I have come to understand, with a growing sense of maternal fear, that the toxic ideal of masculinity so perpetuated by a patriarchal society hurts our boys and men just as much as it does women, and that if we call ourselves feminists we have to recognise and combat that damage.

I love my son. He’s a happy, cheeky, smiling little soul. Flying everywhere on fast little feet like a tiny beautiful multicoloured bird, there’s something so pure and innocent in his face that the thought of him being corrupted by the darkness in the world fills me with hot, angry tears.

I bought him a doll for his second Christmas.

Another mother at playgroup told me I’d make him gay.

We buy our boys violent toys, we buy them guns and swords and monsters and tell them they’re not allowed to play with dolls, or kitchens, or cuddly toys. Even the way we dress our boys can be toxic, buying them t-shirts that say ‘heartbreaker’ or ‘trouble’ on the front. What messages are we sending?

The most recent DfE figures show that at age 11 only 50% of boys are reaching the expected standard in reading, writing and mathematics, with only 5% exceeding that standard. In fact, girls outstrip boys at every stage of the education system, culminating, according to UCAS, in there now being 58,000 more girls than boys at university in this country. The ‘boys will be boys’ mentality means that we expect boys to be naughty, we expect them to do badly at school, we let them know in a million subtle ways that studying is not a manly thing to do, and they live up to our expectations.

It doesn’t end with education, almost every area of their lives is governed by the guiding principles of Boys Will Be Boys and Big Boys Don’t Cry.

We raise our sons in a system of gender norms which teaches them to hide their feelings in the name of a perceived ‘strength’ that men are supposed to have. The suicide rate in men is now three times higher than that of women; The Samaritans put the numbers at 16.8 per 100,000 in men and 5.2 per 100,000 in women. The Royal College of Psychiatrists say that men suffer depression at the same rate as women, but they are far less likely to ask for help, and much more likely to self-medicate with drugs and alcohol. They go on to suggest that this is because men find it hard to communicate their feelings, particularly with their romantic partners, and that relationship breakdown is the number one cause of depression in men.

Are we really going to raise another generation of boys that don’t know how to communicate with the most important people in their lives because they’ve been told since birth that real men don’t do that? Are we still raising boys who still believe that caring and nurturing is somehow beneath them? That achievement isn’t cool? That they have to use their fists to get respect?

That’s not how I want to raise The Boy.

I’m a feminist because I want my son to achieve his full potential.

I’m a feminist because I want my son to be a warm, loving, emotionally intelligent man, and not be ashamed of that.

I’m a feminist because I want my son to be able to talk about his problems without being laughed at or perceived as weak.

I’m a feminist because I believe that toxic masculinity is destroying our boys.

I’m a feminist because I love my son.

Get involved and tell us why you’re a feminist. To submit a contribution, email HumanityHallows.Editor@gmail.com