In defence of "Guyland"

As I said in a post a few days ago, Michael Kimmel’s new book, Guyland: The Perilous World Where Boys Become Men hit bookstores this week. Kimmel has been doing the rounds talking about his new research: he did an interview on the Today show, which you can watch here, and he has a bunch of appearances around the country coming up later this month.

Jezebel.com posted the video of the Today show interview and then let their readers have at it in the comments section. And oh my goodness, did they have at it. Most of the readers latched on to the one mention of women in the entire interview, which was Kimmel’s comment that the changing role of women over the past few decades has left men feeling confused as to what their place is in the world. Jezebel’s readers interpreted that statement as anti-feminist, and as blaming men’s troubles on women’s new-found independence. They mocked Kimmel’s stance as a pro-feminist and pretty much ignored everything else he said in the interview, except the bits that could easily misconstrued to sound like he was blaming women.

If only they’d had bothered to read the book, rather than watch the abridged TV version.
If only they’d thought to do a quick Google search to familiarize themselves with Kimmel’s career, the past twenty years of which have been spent writing about masculinity and sexuality, before shooting off, “don’t blame your issues on women for having careers”-type comments.
If they had, they would have realized that Kimmel presents the changing roles of women, and therefore of men, as just one of the many reasons why post-adolescent men are struggling today. Just one of the many. Kimmel provides us with many other explanations for why today’s male youth culture isn’t functioning the way it should, and men themselves get quite a bit of the blame. That’s right, ladies: it’s not always about you.

And as for Kimmel’s credentials as a male feminist? I know Michael Kimmel. I love Michael Kimmel. And as a card-carrying, whole-book-reading feminist, if I ever have a son, I want him to be just like Michael Kimmel.

Check out Guyland, and form your own opinion (what a novel idea!) here.
Read about Michael’s career and other books here.
See Michael in person:
Sept. 9 - Reading at Borders! NYC
Sept. 13 - PhiloctetesCenter (NYC)
Sept. 23 - Manchester CC and East CT StateUniversity
Sept. 30 - CentreCollege (Danville, KY)