What Men Want

A Substack meditation on the emotional lives of men has been making the rounds. Fruit of Drunk Wisconsin, whose timeline is one of those digital live traps that will keep you scrolling and surfing all day if you're not careful, Men Only Want One Thing (And It's Disgusting) is that rarest of things: a brief, well-written rumination on the never-asked question of what men want.

Given cultural assumptions on this matter, if you're not a man, you likely haven't the slightest accurate idea.

If, on the other hand, you're one of "those" men, you'll probably be disgusted by the whole thing. Look, brother, the writer warned you.

And if you're here among us left–overs, you may feel that welter of repressed, conflicting emotions that signals a direct hit.

For further proof, check out the comments below the Substack post. Important: read the text first, and only afterward the comments. If you reverse that order, you'll lose the ability to read the post at all.

Because bombarding a challenge with self-mocking parody is the jiu jitsu of the reflective male. (If you thought it was middle school insults embedded in dripping sarcasm… see "those" men, above.)

Let the author of this pithy, penetrating, precise manifesto be Exhibit A.

I'd say "I feel seen", but the truth is I feel x-rayed.


(Photo courtesy of Pixabay.com and a generous photographer.)