Attack of the dead men…

I plan to make up a new game. A game where there are only losers. But everyone perceives themselves to be better than me… Who is minding my damn business. I will name it… Patriarchy.

Currently listening to some Swedish rock music (I feel like it is a genetic predisposition to love Swedish music….My mum is an ABBA “Superfan”) Its very blokey. The song is called

“The attack of the dead men”

Love the chorus.

Osowiec then and again
Attack of the dead, hundred men
Facing the led once again
Hundred men
Charge again
Die again

It basically describes the patriarchy. “Hundred men, charge again, die again.”

We forget that the patriarchy destroys everyone. People think that the Partriarchy has a set of men that it benefits. It benefits all men, but to varying degrees. All men benefit. However all men (and therefore women) are net losers.

I thought, if you are a “6ft blonde hair, blue eyed, middle class, able bodied, hetrosexual, middling intelligence, healthy man, in their 30’s ” You win the “Patriarchy” game.

Yet why don’t these men cry? Why do these men repress their emotions? Why do they glorify violence? Are you telling me none of these men grow old? Ever have a mental health issue? No poverty or disaster befalls them?

Until men realise that they are the primary victims of the patriarchy, will they will not dismantle it. They think they are better off with the Patriarchy than with equality and egality. Hence they cling to it. Black, Hispanic, Indian men all suffer for their proximimity to whiteness or lack thereof, but then get the same emotional beating of the patriarchy.

Poor men suffer for being poor. Even if you are blond, blue eyed, healthy, straight and in your 30’s.

Gay/Bisexual men suffer for not being straight.

Women suffer for not being men.

Suicide is still the biggest killer of men under 40. So if you think the patriarchy serves you, it is only when you want to commit violence against yourself that you will realise it doesn’t.

But the thing about this song that resonates with me so much on this point. is “Hundred men. Charge again. Die again” The pointlessness of it…

“Charge again…Die again”

We send out our sons to fight a war against their own minds, to carve out their own humanity…every day and our sons die a little every day… and we wonder when they retire at 65 years old we are viewing a breathing corpse. There is nothing left of the exhuberent boys, who climbed trees, brought flowers to their mothers, played in the dirt. They have been straight jacketed. So these men are unfailingly polite. But there is nothing behind their eyes and that should terrify you. When they have nothing left, that is when they commit the most heinous violence. They want the rest of humanity to suffer the same torture as is in their minds. They are capable of incredible cruelty, because they have been subject to incredible cruelty.

Masculinity is… Whatever a man does. Thor the epitome of manliness, The Norse God of Thunder wore a kilt. Or a polite term for a skirt on a man.

The Scots.. a warrior nation wore kilts. The Picts and the Brithonics, wore not just kilts but makeup.

Rameses the great… Alexander the great. Julius Cesar. All wore kilts. High heels were invented for men… to make them taller because women like tall men.

Henry the Eigth wore “Doublet and hose” so high thighs would look like a gym bro and he could show off his calves.

The point is that modern masculinity is a stupid concept. Masculinity is whatever men do… Fashions come and go. The things we think of as effeminate, were the height of masculinity. Not too long ago you put boys in pink, because its a watered down red and red is the colour of violence. Girls would be in blue becuase that was the colour of innocence.

the definition is…

“qualities or attributes regarded as characteristic of men or boys.”

Can we include….

• Sweetness.

• Protection (both giving and receiving.)

• Innocence

• Fragility.

• Discipline

• Exhuberance as opposed to arrogance.

• Duty

• Tradition

• Modernism.

• Creativity

• Tenderness.

• Strength of feeling

• Resourcefulness.

We need to dismantle the patriarchy, and stop equating masculinity with machoism. We need masculinity, machoism can burn in hell. Before all the good men die, and we are left with the “dead men”

One more time girl…

“And that’s when the dead men are marching again…

Hundred men
Charge again
Die again”

We can save them… They’re someone’s son after all.

Grace and Courage.

Annetta Mother Smith