Whitebock

A lot of people are replying and saying yes, but I found this reply interesting!

"It's obviously making fun of men who pretend to have different political views and interest to get into women's pants. They don't actually like the things they own and do, hence the performativeness Why does everyone miss the point of this phenomenon and think men who fake their identity to sleep with someone are the victims here?"

I've been seeing young women approaching young men and saying "fake feminist" or "male performance" to guys who are just... (god forbid)... reading books on feminist theory. Or wearing scarves. And it embarrassed the guys!

Like, they're joking, right? But it got me curious about the whole thing and I really think it's just another generational re-skin of the "progressively acceptable" homophobia.

I get the qualifier is that these "performative males" are doing this to get a girlfriend, right? But when the qualifier is "man likes female singer, drinks a specific kind of coffee, and is reading a book written by a woman", your Venn diagram of 'potentially a performative male' and 'potentially a regular guy living a normal life without adhering to normal masc stereotypes' is a circle.

It's going to create an environment where men who actually are just Like That are going to feel shame in a world that already heavily criticizes being anything other than 'classically masculine'.

Again. I understand the whole 'problem' is that they're being inauthentic (i.e. lying about who they are as people). But the issue is the inauthenticity, not the 'look' or 'lifestyle' associated with this stereotype.