Do women really need men? Not really. At least not the way that most men think.

This question one must add its opposite…do men need women?  The answer to that one is a definite ‘yes’.  Let’s take a closer look.

What does the word “need” actually mean?  Here are the main definitions:

• A requirement, a necessary duty, an obligation, eg.: do you really need to go there?
• A lack of something wanted or deemed necessary, eg.: to fulfil the needs of an assignment

Needs must be distinguished from wants.  Specifically, a deficiency causes a clear adverse outcome.  A need is something required for a safe, stable, and healthy life (air, water, land, shelter, food, safety), while a want is a desire, wish or aspiration.

Let’s work with this. 

Society

When humans, different cultural groupings, create society, or different social models, they prove that there is no one way to organize humanity into community.  The differences between cultures prove this.  In other words, there is no one way.

The importance of this lies in the potential interpretation which is easy to make from inside one’s own culture, that a certain behaviour pattern, way of relating, or belief is sacred in one form or another.  For instance, in some cultures the feet are considered dirty.  Showing the bottom of one’s feet is a mark of disrespect.  In others, the feet are considered powerful.  Touching the feet of another is considered a mark of respect and can even be a way of greeting someone you respect. 

In some cultures, respect is assumed until disproven.  In others, respect is earned.

So far, so good.

But what of “female virtue” in Western Society.  This Christian concept that women must be virtuous, chaste, runs deep.  It runs so deep that socially many feel okay to criticise a woman who does not tow the line.  Her skirt is too short, her makeup looks slutty, she was asking for it, she’s a slut if she likes sex, and so on.  This judgement of the female runs so deep in our society, that it pervades everything.

[As an aside, as I have transitioned from male to female, people now comment on my clothes.  Some even tell me what to wear or what not to wear.  People I would never dream of making such comment, let alone actually doing so, now feel they have the license to do so.  What gives?].

Cultural rules become values and become deeply embedded in the way that we interact.  So much, that we barely perceive them.  We assume them.  It’s just the way things are.

How or Why do Such Rules Come into Force?

In many instances, these “norms” that we describe, come into being as a way to build and reinforce power structures.  That doesn’t mean per se that it is all bad.  For instance, in order to be a Certified Financial Analyst, you have to study a lot, and pass an exam.  Then you get a professional qualification.  We want this because we don’t want people who have no training giving us bad or unethical advice.  The regulating mechanism of qualification helps to manage that.

But there are often rules that are put in place which go beyond protection to exploitation.  In Britain, for instance, we refer to the Nanny State.  This is where the government overreaches into our personal and private lives.  Examples of this often stray into a grey zone where a society or community could or should have rules but has been deemed to not be capable of self-regulating.

Good examples are things like an open-container law, having alcohol in a public space.  Pub licensing hours is another.  Surgeon general’s warnings on cigarettes or prohibition of advertising cigarettes in general is too.  Mandatory helmet laws for bicycles or motorcycles.

We may all have views on these particular topics, but surely as individuals we are capable of choice of action.  Why is it okay for the US State of New Hampshire to say that it is okay for someone to ride a motorcycle without a helmet whereas in the rest of the country one must?  In a sense this is a perfect example of a smaller group carving out different rules in line with their own values.

But do any of these points actually have their origins in need?  It doesn’t seem so.

The Fundamentally Disenfranchising Effect of Rules

There is something insidious at work with the establishment of rules.  It is the State turning us into babies.  And I don’t mean this in a good way.  [On a personal and kinky level I might be able to ‘get off’ on the idea that laws are a way to infantilize me, but sadly, this is a step too far.  Joking aside, laws usurp our agency].

The rule comes into force because we are deemed incapable of behaving in a civil or civically responsible fashion.  Or worse.  We are deemed incapable of making good choices for ourselves.  Or that we cannot be relied upon to show respect to others in community with us.  All of these serve to disenfranchise us.  We are falsely comforted by the presence of the rules.  We are abdicating responsibility to them and take comfort in their existence.

[Cultural aside.  I am struck by the reverence and blind faith that the US American has for laws.  Drive on an American highway and you will surely see at some point a sign that shouts out, “buckle up, it’s the law!”  Seatbelt laws came into force in the US in 1968, when it was discovered that seatbelts save lives.  It was only 2020, however, that New York State joined the bandwagon and made it mandatory for all passengers in a vehicle to wear seatbelts.  Ironically, it was New York State that made it mandatory for vehicle makers to include seatbelts in cars back in 1968.  One might argue that the 1968 law was a step forward and the 2020 law a step back].  

Somewhere along the line it was decided that we could not be relied upon to think for ourselves and make the right choice.  More fundamentally, it was really decided that we would not make the right choice, so it was necessary to mandate it for us.

I “love” the joyous burst that is encapsulated in the phrase “buckle up, it’s the law!”  This blind reverence for the law, being what tickles me.  Because it is law, we must do it.

Social Laws are just as strong, if not stronger

I highlighted “female virtue” as a perfect example of a values system that comes into place and dictates with force in ways that regulate behaviour, be that dress, perceived promiscuity.  There is no difference here between seatbelts or smoking.  The probity is intended to remove choice.  To infantilize.  And so, we might be collectively infantilised by various manifestations of the nanny state, but much of human society holds a collective special place for the women among us.  Extra special treatment.

The Patriarchal System

Patriarchy exists in many different forms, practically, legally, and spiritually in different societies.  In Mexico, it is not considered murder, but rather a crime of passion, for a man to kill his wife if she is caught cheating.  In many Muslim societies, women do not inherit property in the same proportion as men do.  In some, women are not allowed to drive, or even to travel without the permission of a male relative.

A Muslim man from such a society might say, “she needs protection”.  If pressed, he might offer, “protection from men.”  He might eventually admit that the true meaning or importance of the protection is not for her, but for how her “dishonour” might dishonour him.  An extreme example of this is that a woman who is raped in some of these societies is considered dirty and might even be killed for it by her own family.

This is an extreme example of woman’s virtue being used to proscribe her behaviour and for cultural practice, or even law, to be enshrined around it to ensure adherence to it.  But surely the woman does not wish to be raped.  Ever.  How can it be that the victim of such an assault is the one deemed guilty rather than the perpetrator.  How is it that we have decided to regulate the behaviour of women when it is the men who perpetrate the crime?

It becomes more disturbing when one looks at the statistics of who actually does the rape.  On US college campuses, 85-90% of rape is committed by someone known to the victim, but only 5% of rapes are actually reported.  Both of these stats are horrifying, but reinforce the central theory of this post.

Rape is about power.  It is invariably committed by the strong over the weak.  It is intended to reinforce this power.  At minimum it takes advantage of a power imbalance.  That it is committed by people known to the victim most often, overall estimates across cultures is that 70% of sexual assault is committed within an intimate circle: friends or family.

Let’s go back for a minute to a point raised at the beginning of this post.  Female virtue is a tool to disenfranchise women and to enshrine respect for the cultural norms of a patriarchal power structure.  The effect of this, as with any such social rules, is to infantilize (or disempower) the person being ruled.

It is true that women tend to be physically weaker.  It is true that women are sexually more vulnerable than men.  For the same reason, sexual assault of males occurs almost exclusively before they reach the age of 18, when they are relatively powerless, still in awe of authority, and are relatively unsophisticated, more malleable, and not as physically strong.

Sexual violence, or just the threat of it, having to live in fear that someone might attack you, is debilitating and stressful.  The threat of violence is its own policing system.  Ask any woman about whether she is afraid to walk home alone, whether she pretends to talk on the phone when she has to do so, or that she makes a series of choices to avoid the risks.  That she is forced to make this choice is just a mild version of the brother or father who kills his sister or mother for sullying the family virtue.  The existence of male violence, of male entitlement is ultimately what is used to cow women into submission or worse.

Patriarchy and its Consequences

A patriarchal system on its own is not enough to achieve this social outcome.  It also requires men to act and women to succumb.  Some women will buy into the system and self-police.  I see this often in Christian communities, where women become more outspoken than men about “woman’s place”, “her submission”, or a “woman’s duties”.  I don’t say that to judge.  What I wish to point out is that the system itself is not enough to become a natural law.  It requires the threat of violence for non-compliance, the very real existence of discrimination.  I am amazed at how many men write to me and deny the existence of wage inequality, how it is possible to look at the statistics and pretend they don’t exist.  [I write about this in particular on the Medium Platform, as that is a great platform for stirring up lively debate.]

I am getting at something else.  The patriarchy breeds a sense of entitlement.  A man feels he has a ‘right’ to certain things.  Here, this extends to the female body.  To reproduction.  To reproductive rights.  Even to the wardrobe.

When my mother said to me recently as I headed out to a black tie event in a very elegant, but revealing gown, “you can’t wear that,” she was speaking of a kind of social conservatism that flows through and underpins the entire patriarchal system.

We might police ourselves.  But if we don’t, there is a man somewhere who thinks he has the right to do it for us.  And this extends all the way to the emergence of life, and the ownership of our own bodies.

The Patriarchy Exists Because of Male Weakness

These rules, conditions, results have come into existence because of male fear.  Men fear women.  Deep down, they are afraid.  Female vulnerability, whether that is perceived emotional vulnerability, or actual physical or sexual vulnerability is not a weakness but a symbol of her strength. 

Any man that thinks it is not the woman who chooses is living in denial.  Yes, it is possible for some men to have raw, animal power that attracts women.  But far more women possess this and live the overtures of many suitors.  The strong man sees this, ups his game, and keeps trying.  The weak man feels entitled.  The incel is the perfect example.  Entitlement leads to violence, the purpose of which is to disempower women.

The objectification of the female body, of female sexuality, does the same thing.  Being ‘pretty’ or ‘ugly’ seems to make little difference.  So many women are sexually assaulted growing up, it clearly has nothing to do with looks.  The irony of this is proof that it is about power, not sexual attraction.  And what is the exercise of power in this instance?  It is a cry of the weak to dominate.  

A truly strong man, one who is aware of his power, feels it, to the extent that he can live outside of the patriarchy, with no need for it, is not afraid of female power, of female sexuality, of raw woman.  Such a man would even encourage a woman, partner, sister, relative, friend, even stranger to step into her power, to be her power, to cultivate her power.  

The Patriarchy in Celebrating Weakness Brings out the Worst in us

It is the weak man who does the opposite, and falls back on the patriarchy to support him, to regulate behaviour, to provide rules.  Any society that relies on the subjugation and fear of any minority, and by this I mean any group, even one that is in the numerical majority, but is made to feel lesser, or is made lesser through any means, including wage inequality, discrimination, etc., is a society that is made weaker overall.  The strongest groups are the ones where every individual participates to the greatest extent of their abilities…and in a co-operative and collaborative way.  The disenfranchised minority, no matter who they are or what group they belong to, cannot be expected to participate in the broader social dialogue as a result.

Society suffers.  We become lesser.

What do Women Really Need?

It should be clear from all of the above that none of this, none of the patriarchal superstructure contributes to anything resembling a real need for women.  None.

The need for protection, my detractors might say, and this is what they do most often say, is an absurdity.  Women need protection from men.  Not from anything else.  And they need protection from men because in a patriarchal system, many men feel entitled to take or attempt to take from women in one way or another.

In other words, there is nothing in the patriarchy which meets a woman’s needs.  For over half of the world’s population, this system is dysfunctional.  It is more insidious, however, as men suffer too.  First, what happens to women can easily, and does, get applied to any minority group.  Why?  Because it is all about power.  The purpose of patriarchy is to reinforce the dominance of one group over another.  Just because this is possible, does not make it desirable.  It forces everyone into roles that may or not may not feel right or comfortable to any of the parties.  The issue with this is the structural rigidity that it creates, by this, I mean that sex roles, gender roles are an obvious example, but patriarchy requires victims in order to function, and those can be any minority.  Any system which enforces dominance of one group over another has this effect.

When a man or a woman thinks that a woman “needs” protection.  That she “needs” to have a man in her life, most likely to protect her from other men who might harm her, we are living in true dystopia.  The sick reality of patriarchy is that the only reason a woman might ever “need” protection from men, that any “weaker” party might need protection from those who wield the power, is because the system itself is the root cause of this need.  It is as if to say, “you need protection because if you don’t take it one of us will hurt you.”

It is circuitous.  It is sick.  It is a version of the Orwellian future, but it has been with us for centuries.

I believe, however, that we are entering a new age, a new era, and that we are shedding this ugliness little by little, once and for all.  It will take time, and it will be worse in pockets as it gets better overall.

The biological imperative

The blog post that I wrote that has generated the most traffic, most commentary, the most controversy, is the one where I argue that women do not need men at all.  That the best possible genetic outcome for society as a whole is that she have the freedom to exercise choice, and that she have the freedom to be non-monogamous.  Unsurprisingly, that post brought out a deluge of patriarchal vitriol and argument by supposedly intelligent men.

Several men argued that income inequality between men and women simply doesn’t exist, despite the overwhelming proof.  I had a Stanford Biology professor arguing that the patriarchal system was not about male privilege but a natural order of things, rooted in biological fact.  He was actually nasty to me.  When you strike a nerve like that, you know you have reached an uncomfortable truth.

Many men believe that the natural order of things is for a man to “own” a woman, to dominate her.  Many men have this foolish notion that the alpha male is dominant over a woman.  I believe the opposite to be true.  It is a weak man, a weak human, who equates dominance over another with strength.  Seduction is true power, not dominance.

Alpha and beta is a silly discourse.  It is not that an alpha male is dominant and a beta male is submissive.  Perhaps in the eyes of some.  But it is wrong thinking.  The truly strong man, the alpha man, is one who doesn’t need to dominate.  Such a man is capable of attracting, of seducing, not because he exercises his strength, but because he possesses it, and makes it available to someone who needs it.  A rock, as a metaphor which we often equate with this quality speaks of groundedness, unmoveability, inner strength, calm, constancy.  These are qualities that are admirable.  Many women are drawn to them.  Not one of them speaks of dominance.

A true alpha man is one who is able to evince these qualities without ever needing to exercise power or control which might stem from physical strength or access to privilege.  The true alpha male does not dominate a woman, but instead attracts the strongest woman around, the most talented, the most powerful.  A rock, in this sense, is confident, and this confidence is an aphrodisiac.

The man who argues that the right answer based on biology is that men be promiscuous, spreading their seed, but that woman be monogamous and select a partner based on his strength and ability to provide is founded on the patriarchal nonsense described above.  It is the self-justifying logic of the system itself, but it has no basis in fact.

Indeed, there are many social models from the animal kingdom that show co-operative living in community where an extended family group, of circa 100 individuals share in raising and caring for the collective young.  From a biological perspective, this secures the best genetic outcomes, particularly when paired with the copulating behaviour of this group, where the females will typically have multiple partners when they are fertile, and the males which belong to the group are not in a position of dominance, but in one of collective responsibility.  

Need for Love and Community

What is a woman’s true need?  And is it any different from the needs of any member of society?  I don’t think so.  We need love, we need to exist in community.  We need loose and tight bonds with those around us to anchor us.  And that is true for everyone.

We also need laughter.  Laughter is a tonic for the soul.  And our bodies need laughter.  Those who laugh live longer.  We also need to experience physical love…through sex…to experience pleasure.  Healthy and loving sexual relations deepen our connections with people and help us to live longer.  On a practical level, we also need good oral hygiene.  I’m not kidding.  When we look across a never-ending list of the things that lead to longer and healthy lives, the single thing which is most strongly correlated with longer life is a healthy regime of flossing and dental care.  Followed closely by orgasms.  The first has to do with the inflammatory response, which causes untold and hidden stress on the body.  The second is the value in release.

US President FDR was onto something with his Four Freedoms, all of which are fundamentals for a just society, but also for our general well-being:

• Freedom from Want
• Freedom of Worship
• Freedom of Speech
• Freedom from Fear

Within a social context, if a woman can be said to have “needs”, anyone for that matter, it is these.  The perverse logic of the patriarchy which simultaneously creates the threat in violation of the needs and then proposes to solve it by offering one group the tacit power to dominate another is positively nuts.

The submissive man and a template for an honourable life

My own path of travel through life involved submission.  I could not reconcile my life as a man with dominance.  It would be absurd to self-describe as weak.  When I think back over my partners, including of my soon-to-be-ex-wife, they all said to me that they were most drawn to me by my quiet strength, that I was always there.  When I think back over just how many of my partners were victims of sexual violence growing up, I find it uncanny.  Every significant partnership that I ever had was with a woman who had been assaulted.  In all cases but one, I did not know this until many years later, sometimes after our relationship had ended.  They have all said to me, and this has come out now that I have come out as trans, that there was something about me which was healing for them.  A man who was not very much a man at all, who was actually a trans woman lurking inside a male body, was the “right” partner for them, at least for a while.

By any measure I have had an extraordinarily “successful” professional life.  A public company CEO for the first time in my early 30’s, I haven’t looked back since.  I have a fundamental belief that it was my submissive nature, my inner feminine, which lead to my success, not my desire or ability to dominate a group, a room, whatever.  And yes, I am capable of dominance, very capable of leadership, but not by exerting power over others, but rather by seducing them.  By not tricking them into believing that it was in their best interest to follow me, but by coaxing common ground out of those around me.

The point is not about me.  The point is that this is a character trait which is somehow more natural in a submissive person.  The ability to listen.  To seduce.  And I don’t mean submission in a sense of kink, or submission to get something, or submission as a form of self-negation.  I mean a kind of conscious submission which involves being fully aware of your power and strength, and of harnessing it, putting it to work for those around you, perhaps for one person, or for many.  It is a conscious act of self-negation, or ego control, or reigning in the id, to make your gifts available for another or others, in a way that is mutually enriching, better for the group, not to have one’s own needs fulfilled.

The world of kink and BDSM is a gateway into this.  It is just as frequently corrupted as society in general.  So many submissive men are into the kink trope largely to have their own needs fulfilled.  This certainly drives the pro-Domme/sub-man trope.  I don’t mean this.

There is an emerging thread in the public face of BDSM, however, that speaks more fundamentally to these issues.  I see that kink practices which include chastity, cuckolding and other forms of taking patriarchal privilege from the man and giving it to the woman as symbolic of this.  Granted, it is often about some form of taking sexual pleasure from the denial of sexual pleasure, and is ultimately oriented around the sub.  I don’t personally like this, and books like Uniquely Rika speak of another way in the context of an FLR.  But they all offer a gateway to enlightenment.

When I think of the future, and see a fundamental optimism in a belief that more social equity is inevitable, even if it may take a revolution to get there, BDSM is just one of many ways that society is finding its way out from under the oppressive weight of the patriarchal system.

Bringing women into the workforce has been a social and economic good that has transformed the world economy.  And while it is stark to say so, more slave labour does bring benefits, but up to a point.  True transformation in society will come when all labour, all humans are able to participate equally in the creation and consumption of wealth.  

All of the ills of the modern world can be laid at the feet of the current system.  Income inequality, environmental destruction, the triumph of the strong over the weak…these are all the ugly consequences of a patriarchal system.  

I see change coming.  Even if it has to happen one submissive man at a time.