Warren Farrell

Notice that much of what men do is also done by single mothers so appreciating what men do also helps us appreciate what single moms do.

The hard part (of communication) is hearing criticism so it can be easily given.

Schools currently excel in encouraging children to express opinions, but are deficient in encouraging children to say, for example, “Oh, that’s different from my perspective – tell me more.”

Men tend to put all their emotional eggs in the basket of their wives (or womenfriends), it is difficult for a man to communicate feelings of disappointment to his wife because, if she withdraws, it feels to him like his entire emotional support system has collapsed.

The first instinctive response to any criticism is a defensive response. (The quicker the response, the more defensive.)

Even men who share their personal experiences find that, instead of empathy, they get the response Dear Abby gave this man: “Women have it worse.” This belief is so strong that over the past quarter century, women’s old fantasy of marrying a man-as-protector has been tainted by women’s new nightmare of husband-as-batterer.

No legend told its children of beautiful princesses falling in love with conscientious objectors.

The best way to use these lists to replace anger with love in real life is to nurture each other by doing for your partner what your partner normally does for you.

Women are socialized to take advantage of four informal options for emotional support: husbands; womenfriends; children; and parents. Men are socialized to take advantage of only one of these informal options: their wife or womanfriend.

We had affirmative action programs to help women help themselves economically. Is it now time for affirmative action programs to do for men’s feelings what the government did for women’s economics?

Listening is self-empowerment via the empowerment of others.

Hochschild’s biggest mistake, though, was one made by almost every popularized housework study: not adequately measuring men’s contribution to work around the home. For example, if mom drives the children to daycare, it’s called housework; if dad drives the family to grandma’s, it isn’t called housework.