Yesterday, two things happened that made me empathize with boys and men who are drawn to the manosphere.
The first was that I had a friend – who I’ll refer by the pseudonym Hayden, for his privacy – disclose an instance of sexual harassment that happened to him in a place where he normally feels very safe.
Growing up, telling the heroes apart from the villains was easy.
The good guys were good, and the bad guys were bad. The odds were stacked against them, but the good guys always won, and the bad guys went away.
Everything was enviably clear.
The villains and the monsters, the Voldemorts, Saurons, and evil Emperors, they were all concrete, consistent, and always separate from ourselves.
In 2019, a clip of Miami Dolphins Linebacker Jerome Baker went viral.
In this clip, he’s searching for his mother in the stands of his football game, repeatedly asking “Where is my mama?” as he scans the crowd.
