- What's up guys, welcome back.
My topic for you guys today
comes from the annals of Twitter.
Yes, you heard me correctly, the annals.
I was scrolling along minding my own business
when I noticed nearly one million tweets arguing
about a man wearing a dress.
And not gonna lie, it kinda made me feel nostalgic
for the great gender war of 2016.
Do you guys remember that?
I remember that.
In fact there are still some corners of the internet
who know me as the girl
who believes in nine million genders.
This is my legacy.
And not even what I said in those videos,
but that is beside the point.
The point of internet wars is to argue with each other,
and scream into the void,
and never actually modify or question our own beliefs.
And as an American, it is my God given right.
In all seriousness, I don't know why,
but when it comes to this specific topic
everyone just like loses their mind.
(intense music)
It's almost like the word gender is this weird key
that just goes into people's brains
and then we just all become zombies.
To some extent, it's understandable.
But part of me just wants to prove that
it doesn't have to be that way.
That we, the noble citizens of the internet
are capable of talking about things in a way
that isn't just a massive echo chamber
of everyone patting themselves on the back about
how right they are, or a giant dumpster fire.
So I need your guys' help.
Help me make a point that there are parts of the internet
where people come together and can agree, and disagree,
and have conversations that actually
help people understand each other.
Or we can just flame each other, because internet.
All right, so I wanna share some thoughts
about the "Vogue" cover,
things that I haven't seen anyone say yet.
And then I'm gonna respond to a couple of arguments
that I disagree with.
(cheerful music)
Something that I've found interesting
since I was in high school was the realization
that something as simple as clothes
can communicate so much more than just like,
this is cotton, this is black.
When I was in high school,
this was a symbol of coolness and status.
If you had Abercrombie, you were pretty legit.
And status is a really big one when it comes to clothes.
It's why people pay so much attention
to what celebrities are wearing,
by copying or channeling what the wealthy
and powerful are wearing,
maybe I too can get a slice of that social status,
and all of the rewards that come with it.
So at first that's what the "Vogue" cover says to me.
(laughing)
It's just another rich celebrity showing off
how cool and cultured they are,
saying, look at me, look at me.
And then we all look at them.
But honestly, I'll take this over that weird trend
where celebrities tried to look poor, and that was edgy too.
Like I'm not a fashion person, okay,
you've probably realized that by now.
But my understanding is that fashion
is about pushing limits.
It is very trendy now, and it has been in the past too,
to wear clothes that violate assumptions about gender.
It gets clicks, it gets views and likes, it sells magazines.
And so in some ways, all of this hubbub,
me talking about this right now, is like the very point.
(laughing)
Gender nonconformity has become
a tremendously profitable aesthetic.
And it makes sense, right?
Men wearing makeup, and nail polish, and dresses,
and whatever else doubles the consumer market
for those items.
So why wouldn't the fashion
and beauty industry embrace this?
The modern gender revolution, whatever you wanna call it,
is 100% capitalists approved.
And in my opinion that's why we're seeing more of it
in the media.
And honestly, more people should talk
about the economics of these cultural issues
because money talks.
That's my spicy take.
But I wanted to understand people who see this
kind of thing and find it very disturbing, very upsetting.
You know, what's on their mind.
(upbeat music)
The most viral tweets that I saw about this
suggest that people worry it's a warning sign
of cultural decay,
it's a sign that we're not placing enough value
and emphasis on strong traditionally masculine men.
And that's bad because we need masculine men.
Historically, they protected us from harm,
strong men win wars.
Without them a nation becomes weak and vulnerable.
I understand this perspective to some extent,
it is our most basic instinct to survive.
And throughout history men and women
have played different roles in the survival of humanity.
The role that women has played has been to have babies,
to raise children who are healthy and strong.
The role of men has been to provide for their families,
for their wives, and their children,
and to protect them from outside threats.
I think there's space for men and women
to continue doing just this if that's what they wanna do.
But we should also acknowledge that the world is changing,
and so our rules might be changing too.
For instance, military experts say that future wars
won't be fought with muscle,
they're going to be fought with technology.
Even now only 20% of military work has a physical component,
and that's a number that just keeps falling.
So in that sense, it seems unlikely that we're facing
down a real risk of a tough guy, or tough lady shortage.
That said, when it comes to the military,
Americans are vulnerable.
but it's not because of a failing of masculinity,
it's a failing of education.
the Modern War Institute at West Point
which is a very prestigious military academy warrants,
"One thing is sure,
"the future of America winning its wars
"won't be dependent on how many pushups--"
Every shoulder, every shoulder can do.
(laughing)
"Every soldier can do.
"It will rely on the ability of the American
"educational system to produce young men and women
"equipped to serve as electronic warriors,
"strategists, and expert tacticians capable of employing
"the most technologically advanced weapon systems
"in the air, land, sea, cyber domains."
Wow that is a really long sentence.
And then they go on to note
that when it comes to skills that matter,
which is science, technology, engineering, and math,
AKA STEM, the U.S. is falling gravely
behind the rest of the world.
So in theory, people who are very concerned
about protecting the country, protecting their families,
should also be concerned about our STEM education.
To be fair I do know many people
who are in the traditional masculinity camp
who also are worried about STEM.
So it's not like those people don't exist
but it rarely makes the news, so to speak.
But then I was like, well,
maybe it's not just about the physical manliness.
Maybe it's about emotional toughness.
The traditionally masculine traits
of resilience and courage.
I mean, even if our wars aren't physical,
that doesn't mean that they're easy.
Society needs strong leaders of all stripes.
So are men changing in this regard?
Are men today becoming too soft?
I think that's fair to question whether we are rewarding
or encouraging behavior that is too emotionally fragile.
Actually talked about that a bit in my video about stoicism.
If it is the case that we're becoming less resilient,
as a society, I still don't think that therefore
it's a problem for men to wear a dress.
And that's because in my point of view,
anybody can put on any piece of clothing,
dress or otherwise, and it doesn't change who they are.
And I think that is the point where I started to find myself
in more substantial disagreement
with some of the takes out there.
(upbeat music)
I wanna show you a clip from Ben Shapiro
that I hope will represent his argument.
I don't wanna play the whole video,
but I'll also link it down below
if you want the full context.
- All right, this is a category error you morons.
To suggest that because men wore something
like a kilt in Scotland, that if you transfer it over
to America would look more feminine.
Therefore, a man wearing a skirt in America in 2020,
is just the same in the male female paradigm,
as a man wearing a kilt in Scotland in 1590
is insane and idiotic, and ridiculous, on its face,
and we all know that.
And pretending that men dressing like women
is not about feminizing men is ridiculous.
Because they are overtly celebrating
the fact that Styles is feminizing masculinity.
So this is all a big gaslighting effect.
The left will do this, the left's routine is this.
Look how important and magical it is
that Harry Styles is wearing a dress.
He's subversively undermining masculinity.
By bringing the effects of femininity to the masculine.
And that's real masculinity, dude wearing a dress.
And then people on the right are like, yes,
men wearing dresses does undermine masculinity
by making it more feminine, and that is a bad thing.
And then folks on the left don't respond by saying
well, why is it a bad thing to feminize masculinity?
Because then they would lose the argument,
because masculinity has very many good things
and ought to be upheld.
Instead, what the left does is this
weird gaslighting shop routine where they say
how dare you say that wearing men wearing dresses
undermines masculinity.
- So Ben describes this as a category error
by blurring or mixing up the categories
of masculinity and femininity in America.
And he says he feels like he's being gaslit
by people who espouse contradictory views,
and then deny that one or the other
is what they actually believe.
Now, I wanna acknowledge that the feeling
of being gaslit is valid.
I believe him when he says that,
because I also think there are logical contradictions
in some of the lefty ideas about gender.
Especially those that get a lot of play online.
But I also came away from this feeling like,
okay, maybe some people are misunderstanding
a pretty important part of this particular view of gender.
Most liberal feminists, this is not everyone obviously.
Don't want to redefine masculinity to be more feminine.
They want to build on traditional masculinity,
adding traits to the bucket rather than subtracting them.
So one of those things is what we're talking about now,
the freedom of men to just wear feminine things,
to wear what they want.
But the aesthetic freedoms aren't even a key issue.
Despite all the play that it gets in the media
what it is about is asking men to learn more life skills
that are relevant to the modern world
so that men can be effective protectors and providers.
Things like making dinner for the kids,
or knowing how to understand and communicate
about his feelings so that we can resolve conflicts
in a relationship.
And maybe in Ben's paradigm and experience of the world,
these things aren't even on his radar.
They don't apply to him,
they don't exist in his world.
But for me, they do apply to me,
and they do exist in my world,
and they exist in plenty of people's worlds.
And so it's possible that we're just experiencing
different realities here.
That's why I think it's important for all of us
to engage meaningfully with what other people are saying,
to consider that maybe their reality
is a little bit different than ours.
There are concerns and pain points
that people you disagree with are expressing.
And you may not be able to, I may not be able to hear them
because they're not what my world is like.
And I also wanna reiterate that the category
that Ben is describing, the traditional masculinity,
it's still here.
It's still valuable, it's still important.
I want my partner to make me feel
protected and provided for.
Albeit we might see those things differently.
Part of that sense of safety for me is knowing
that my partner has the tools he needs
to move through the world emotionally as well.
I wanna close out here with a final thought,
which is about the authoritarian tendencies
of this particular ongoing conversation.
Is it really fair or reasonable to demand
that the entire world adopts one particular view of gender?
Where I think we run into problems
is where any particular faction tries to impose their view
on other people in a way that interferes
with their ability to live their life
however they wanna live it.
At the end of the day,
this single, British dude Harry Styles wearing a dress
has absolutely no bearing on my life.
(laughing)
And so it's stuff like that that's like,
am I missing something?
Am I crazy?
Am I secretly a positive libertarian or something?
I have no idea.
Who has any idea what is happening in these wild times?
Thank you for joining me my dears.
Please do let me know your thoughts down below.
I know that you probably have thoughts
on this, and I wanna hear them.
I like to read what you guys write me in the comments,
even if I can't respond to everyone,
I do read most of what is written.
Take care of yourselves you guys,
enjoy your holiday.
Be safe on your holiday.
I'll see you next time.
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