Empathy-Part Four

Men overload on aggression. I am completely floored every time I hear about a man being violent towards a woman. Most times I tend to want to believe that nothing, outside of being physically attacked, should be able to provoke a man to hit a woman.

I am talking about the attacks men display against women just because they can't control their need to strike. Men are aggressive and when they are wrong, they are more likely to be highly aggressive due to being unable to accept they are at fault for the feelings they are having.

In the book, Fire In The Belly: On Being A Man by Sam Keen, it states, "Men live under constant dread of being labeled a sissy , a weakling. a wimp, a queer. Most everywhere they live under pressure, stress, and the constant need to prove themselves by establishing mastery in the arenas of war, work, and women, a near universal creed linking manhood with socially necessary activities of protecting, providing, and procreating."

What he is saying is men all over the world have associated conquering others, their work, and the women in their lives, and have somehow made them a part of what it means to be a man, while simultaneously connecting the for mentioned with being protectors, providers, and the maker of babies. As we know, they are failing miserably and their level of aggression is getting worse toward women.

Men are killing their wives and babies and thinking nothing of it. A lot of times these men have wronged their family and their reign of terror is being threatened, because if the effects of the passage mention earlier, their role confusion assist them in making the wrong choice. So many are stuck in these holding patterns. Their women, because they don't understand how a man thinks, often misses the cues, and before you know it; he has an explosion and she never say it coming.

It is unfortunate so many males are not taught to express their feelings, or to even recognize they have them. The spend so much energy trying to prove themselves, they seldom get to be themselves, unless it is to express some negative aspect of their personality.

I know a lot of women who were upset by Steve Harvey's book, Think Like A Man: Act Like A Lady. To those women who do not understand the importance of trying to understand another, know that you will never be understood. You have to give what you want to get back in intimate relationships. Until we learn and practice this we will never have what we want.

We have to find more empathy for the human male species.