I totally agree that nearly everyone could benefit from therapy, and that it would really be good for men to have not been trained away from skills that are not really "feminine" so much as they are human. Some guys have a lot of EQ but it's not the norm because of the demands of the Man Box.

We desperately need a culture where masculinity is not tied up with domination and with controlling women. It drives rape and violence against women, but also against men. Too many men are desperately clinging to these antiquated norms that actually hurt them too in such a wide variety ways. And then they lash out at women for being fed up with that. It's a fucked up and very dysfunctional dynamic.

This is not to say that women are all perfect and angelic and they they don't uphold patriarchy too, but not to the same extent and in general, their gender norms are not the ones driving sexual and other types of violence. Their gender norms don't encourage stoicism, isolation, and never asking for help because you have to always seem in control. We need more men to realize this and to undertake shifting what's considered masculine away from all that stuff - and then blaming the depression and substance abuse and suicidal ideation it engenders on no longer being allowed to be "real men" and on women.

But part of the problem is that patriarchy is a zero-sum binary so too many men think that if they aren’t supposed to do the “masculine” things they always have it means they are supposed to be “feminine” but that’s not the case at all. Humans are highly social and cooperative animals. We aren’t meant to thrive in isolation and never being able to ask for help, without being able to have real friends, and other types of deep connections that aren’t sexual. Demands that we return to that are just so deeply misguided and harmful to men and to society as a whole.