• yucandu@lemmy.world
    link
    fedilink
    English
    arrow-up
    58
    arrow-down
    7
    ·
    2 days ago

    Did anyone study the opposite? I remember reading about a woman that pretended to be a man for a few weeks to write a book about it, and she described it as something like “soul crushingly lonely”.

    • Meron35@lemmy.world
      link
      fedilink
      English
      arrow-up
      25
      ·
      2 days ago

      Norah Vincent. She was particularly beloved by the manosphere because her experience pretending to be a man for 18 months (not just a few weeks) lead to her “conversion” from a feminist to realising that men too have their own problems.

      Thought, she personally was already libertarian, and highly critical of trans people, so she reads more like a TERF imo.

      Sadly passed away via assisted suicide a few years ago.

      Norah Vincent - Wikipedia - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Norah_Vincent

    • EldritchFemininity@lemmy.blahaj.zone
      link
      fedilink
      English
      arrow-up
      3
      ·
      1 day ago

      I don’t know of any studies, but I have heard anecdotes from trans men that say the same thing.

      I once read a very well put together comment by a trans man on the subject of their experience with this before and after transitioning, and basically, because men are never supposed to show emotion, their relationships lack a level of emotional intimacy at a fundamental level. They said that their relationships with other men felt hollow and largely superficial.

      It’s also why men seemingly mistake friendship from women as flirting so frequently - because women can have a true emotional connection in their friendships with other women, but men can only get that same level of connection in romantic relationships or life or death scenarios such as war. Women also often treat men more coldly than they do other women as a result of this to avoid being mistaken for flirting with every man that they talk to (or because they view men as dangerous).