In the midst of the heartless brutality of Putin's assault on Ukraine, here we are again at a root cause of aggression and violence. Toxic masculinity, chest-beating and obsessed with the ego, is responsible for the likes of Putin, the likes of Trump, the likes of vigilantes in Georgia and Wall Street warriors and industrial eco-rapists in every corner of the world. And the only solution for toxic masculinity is a softening of what it means to be male. A softening into love, a softening into permeability, a recovery of vulnerability, a dissolution of the rage that's born of shame, and the constriction of the heart that comes of rage.
So, at the risk of saying something that could sound trivializing, but isn't: what the world needs now--at least part of what the world needs now--is more men with their cocks in their hands and fewer with guns.
More men dropping into their bodies' capacity for pleasure that's not at the expense of anyone. More men creating zones of erotic and emotional safety for one another, and in doing so creating zones of safety for themselves. More men experiencing what it's like to be told, "You're safe. You're seen. You're sacred." It's the work men need to do for themselves and one another, instead of relying on the emotional attunement of women to do it for them, and then reacting with misogynistic anger when their needs and desires aren't perfectly met.
OK, it's a utopian dream. In the meantime, pray for Ukraine. Pray that Russian soldiers, and Russian police on the streets of Moscow and Petersburg, will just tell their commanders, enough, and walk away. The fall of the Berlin Wall was also a utopian dream, until the night it happened, and Rostropovich hoisted his cello up to the top of it to give a concert. The fall of Tsarist Russia was a utopian dream until the retreating soliders of World War I said, enough.
