Gendered question, I know. If you don’t identify as a man, please feel free to answer with whatever you want. I meant to post it in the Men’s Lib sub but somehow it always bugs for me.
Let’s spill the tea lads
I like painting my nails.
I like gardening and I take great pride in my plants and upcoming indoor veggie and herb garden.
I dance when I go out.
I like bright colors.
I like candles that smell nice.
I like flowers.
I like Harry Styles.
I like crocheting.
Whatever you like, be proud of it. There is no such thing as liking something unmanly. Nothing can harm your manliness. Do what you want.
I’ve had a bad case of anhedonia the past few years, so I don’t find myself enjoying many things, manly or otherwise. However, I can say some “manly” things I don’t like.
I never cared for professional sports. I could maybe get it if the teams actually had ties to the cities they’re in, but trading players between teams baffles me. Then you get to fantasy sports, where people basically just track numbers and bet. People tell me sports teams are a great way to find common ground with strangers, but all I can see are brands being used to shove ads in peoples’ faces and encourage people to gamble.
I think the term “manly” has been so polluted. I don’t think there is nothing “unmanly” with:
- Loving nature.
- Loving your neighbor (even Jesus said to).
- Loving culture (and accepting other’s culture).
- Showing emotion (except for you narcissists who use this as an excuse for abuse. Fuck you).
- Dancing.
- Going outside just to feel the wind gently blowing your hair and caressing your face.
We are capable of very complex modes of existing. There is no reason to keep being the same hateful person every day. It takes courage to go out of your confort zone. It takes courage to be a “man”. Whatever it is that word means. Love you all. <3
Edit: Guys, are comments like this valuable? On Reddit I felt the need to write this way, but everyone seems so chill here…
soaps/shampoos/conditioners marketed at women are always somehow better than the “Badass” manly ones by Adidas or whatever.
I use whatever happens to be in the shower. Many times it’s marketed towards women.
I write poetry, garden in the spring and summer, and enjoy the likes of Animal Crossing, Stardew Valley, and Tetris; all of which it puzzles me how those games got classified as ‘girly’. Like mf, I’d like to see YOU manage a hundred lines at TGM 20G with steadily-rising garbage lines; see how ya do
🥁🥁🪇
(Imagine the maracas are cymbals.)
Poetry is a strange one. I also write some and when I mention it I get the strangest looks and have had some awful responses.
I usually refer them to Akala when I hear the gendered shit. If you haven’t heard of him, he’s a British rapper. He wrote a great book about race. He works with the Royal Shakespeare Company (I think) and goes around schools putting Shakespeare to a beat and explaining how e.g. Tupac rapped in iambic pentameter. He has videos on YouTube and his Fire in the Booth rap is great.
I want to say keep rhyming, Reggaelater Demoman, but my poems don’t always rhyme and yours might not, either. Keep writing!
My problem is I can’t not write rhymes; and it didn’t always used to be that way. In elementary, thanks to the teacher who passed along that proclivity to the whole damn class, my bestie was always the one who could write fluent, metered bars; and I just sorta e.e. cummings’d my shit. Liked using the formatting of the lines for aesthetic purposes, but never really had a handle for fitting rhymes to how I was feeling.
…Then I started dipping into UK grime(talm like, Kano, Skepta, Dizzee Rascal, Jme, Tempa T, and them), used that as a springboard to start swimming through the kinds of music my family wanted to keep me away from. (Ironically, my own damn culture, or what shoulda been.) On the other side of a crippling clipping, JPEGMAFIA, Saul Williams, and Stormzy addiction, though, all of my stuff comes out rhyming nowadays. My compositition book looks deadass like a backpacker’s lmfao
I love adorable animals, I’ll squeal with delight whenever I see a video of one. Alpacas are my favorite.
atta boy
Girl, actually. She touches more grass than I do.
Reptiles are my favorite and every time I see some lizard or tiny snake, I let them crawl on me
When I visited Disney World as a kid I loved the little lizards running around the resorts. Those lizards are the only good thing about Florida.
And alligators
i like music that tends to appeal to women but most guys wouldn’t be caught dead listening to… and I like to sing in a high pitch rather than lower
i do the laundry and the vacuuming in our house… my partner is tiny and it’s hard for her to vacuum and i don’t mind it
Since I am a man, everything I do is automatically manly
Playing the flute
