One of the things depth psychotherapy tries to do is to discover and face the truth, --particularly the truths we like to hide from ourselves-- so I am going to talk about one of these differences.
Because feminism has come to dominate any discussions about gender, it is uncommonly difficult to talk about male and female differences without people blowing up. You can find these differences played out all over the place, especially in comedy, but in "serious" discussions, there is more heat than light.
Doing pro-male psychotherapy and counseling in this atmosphere sometimes requires boiling things down to simple starting points. One of mine: whatever a man is, he is not a boy, he is not God, and he is not a woman. So the differences between men and women are important. Humans are not just generic "persons". They are specific. And one of the most basic specifics is gender.
By the way, although gay men have a relationship both to actual women and to The Feminine which is quite different from other men, they are still men. Their path through manhood is not the same as it is for most males, but it's a path they are called to travel.
To put in in outline, straight men experience the feminine primarily in women while gay men often experience it in themselves.
So, here it is. One of the differences between men and women is emotional lability. Which is shrink lingo for wide and rapid variations in feeling. Men have a hard time keeping up.
When women move quickly from one feeling to another, we often just assume that she's being a woman. A man who does that is likely to be judged unstable.
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Because feminism has come to dominate any discussions about gender, it is uncommonly difficult to talk about male and female differences without people blowing up. You can find these differences played out all over the place, especially in comedy, but in "serious" discussions, there is more heat than light.
Doing pro-male psychotherapy and counseling in this atmosphere sometimes requires boiling things down to simple starting points. One of mine: whatever a man is, he is not a boy, he is not God, and he is not a woman. So the differences between men and women are important. Humans are not just generic "persons". They are specific. And one of the most basic specifics is gender.
By the way, although gay men have a relationship both to actual women and to The Feminine which is quite different from other men, they are still men. Their path through manhood is not the same as it is for most males, but it's a path they are called to travel.
To put in in outline, straight men experience the feminine primarily in women while gay men often experience it in themselves.
I will give in a little to the contemporary minefield of political correctness by saying two things first.
One, I am generalizing, not universalizing. Although generalizing is absolutely necessary for any kind of adult thinking, people indoctrinated in our collective culture leap very fast to accusations of "stereotyping". Let me give an example of the difference with the statement: Men die sooner than women. While this is not true of every man all the time (a universal) , it is true of most men, most of the time. Check the stats. It's a general truth. There are exceptions, but the rule works. Wives and insurance companies assume this.
People who have no grounding in logic will sometimes react defensively to a general fact they dislike, as follows: That's a stereotype! Suppose a woman dies before her husband? Does that make her a man?! ...Uh, no. That makes her an exception. You can see the problem.
Second, there are cultural variations involved. Different peoples, places and times modulate our common human nature. So I am not talking about Japan or Yemen, a small tribe in New Guinea, or the eighth century in Poland, but about contemporary North America. Even here there are differences, but I am making a point, not writing a doctoral thesis.
So, here it is. One of the differences between men and women is emotional lability. Which is shrink lingo for wide and rapid variations in feeling. Men have a hard time keeping up.
When women move quickly from one feeling to another, we often just assume that she's being a woman. A man who does that is likely to be judged unstable.
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