We pick up from the first half of our story in the Decentering Men movement. Is the position ‘extreme’ or understandable?
Social-media influencers and content creators are discussing, popularising and encouraging the Decentering Men movement. Search Decenter Men on Tiktok and you’ll find 28.5 million posts.
In one popular video there, there’s a clip of a man saying ‘Listen ladies, ya’ll have no choice but to settle’ [for men]’. Then the woman making the video chips in, saying “how long do you think we need to wait for them to get the message that maybe they should at least try to be better?”.
Perhaps the most prominent voice of the movement is that of Charlie Taylor, a social-media influencer, content creator and podcaster who has two master’s degrees that focus on human behaviour. Her website-turned-media company Charlie’s Toolbox provides resources to champion women’s autonomy, transformation, and foster a positive shift in societal expectations of women. In particular, Charlie wants to “empower women who often find themselves sabotaging their potential for the sake of men”.
On her webpage How To Decenter Men, she writes that “I wrote a book called Decentering Men and then an article ‘Decentering Men: Why you should let go of men’.” That article has these arresting words: “You do not feel like a full human being unless an adult male wants to f**k you or hang out with you. This is how much patriarchy has the world f**ked up.”
Charlie wrote the book and the article because, although she had a fun life, she often felt gutted that she didn’t have a boyfriend – and her life revolved around trying to meet one.
Enter the Decentering Men movement. “Decentering men is a lifestyle,” she says, “where you subvert and unlearn patriarchal norms. This looks like not tying your worth to your role as wife, mother, girlfriend, or any other relationship where women are expected to labour.”
“When I say ‘decenter men’, I think about it as an ongoing practice. It’s a practice for which you examine all the ways you dwindled yourself, held off, stopped your pleasure, did not peruse a task, nor reach a goal” (because you were waiting for a man to come along).
Charlie has a popular podcast; Episode 42, available on YouTube, is called ‘What Does it Look Like When You Are Decentering Men?’. She also offers a Decentering Men online course.
There are, of course, also Reddit threads, like this one; and this one about decentering men.
The Decentering Men Spectrum
Arguably, you could look at the Decentering Men movement as a spectrum, with the 4B movement at one end.
Arguably, at the other end of the spectrum, are women not letting the presence or absence of a man define a woman’s identity. Women who aren’t seeking out men as romantic partners (some for good, some right now) but are putting the focus firmly on themselves, their career goals, experiences, aspirations and female friendships.
Mel, the woman from Part 1 of this story, says “I understand the desire to put everything on a spectrum as it makes things neat, tidy, more readily digestible. But actual life is far messier and more complex. A spectrum is not a neutral tool. In fact, it encourages division and judgement.” She says that if someone is pigeonholed at one ‘extreme’ of the spectrum, there’s judgement attached to that.
“In different places, there are a need for different behaviours, and in South Korea, these women need to take that tough stance – anything less will mean they’ll get sucked straight back in to where they started.”
“I really respect what those women are going through compared to my own journey, which is not as difficult as theirs. It’s a privilege for me to be able to take a less ‘extreme’ position. If I was in South Korea, perhaps I’d feel that I’d need to do what they’re doing.”
“So, instead of a spectrum, how about we focus on the big picture: what do women want? This movement of ‘decentering men’ is a whole lot of women saying, to differing degrees and in their own manner, that they want to live freely, to make decisions freely, to have autonomy over their own lives and bodies, to be safe, and to have children who are free and safe.”
“It’s not even, at its heart, about men at all. The movement is part of a bigger picture of women standing up for ourselves, and also longing for a different, non-patriarchal world.”
Men Are Thinking About This Too
Mel’s been influenced by various writers, particularly by people of colour and women, including bell hooks, the late, black American author, educator, and social critic. Also, the book Invisible Women: Data Bias in a World Designed for Men (which we have written about here) by writer and campaigner Caroline Criado Perez was very influential for Mel.
Mel subscribes to a Substack newsletter from a black writer, Robert Monson. “It was helpful to me to discover a male writer who is thinking deeply on these issues, as it makes me feel hopeful that other men could think like this too. He writes about masculinity needing more softness. Like, him crying at the gym because he heard a song that affected him. He’s like, ‘why can’t men do this?’.”
“So the patriarchy negatively affects men, too, particularly about what they have to do to, and not do, to be a man, and around toxic masculinity. Mel, who is part-Māori, says “His writing about softness is quite transferable to, say, Māori culture with the warrior culture or macho culture for Māori men. They have to be tough and not express emotions.”
“Although I have sympathy for how the patriarchy affects men, I don’t want to overstate that because, women [are most affected]. Statistically, our likelihood of being assaulted by a male in our lifetime is through the roof. It’s women being assaulted and killed by men around the globe, while men worry about their feelings being hurt by what women say about them.”
Basically, if men are offended by how women live their lives, or what women say about them, so be it.
Is Decentering Men Extreme?
Does Mel think people who read this article might see her position as extreme or be shocked?
“Them being shocked – that’s shocking to me!” she says. “Can anyone deny the role of the patriarchy in women’s lives and the negative impact it’s had? Can anyone deny all the ways in which women are subjugated to men’s wants and needs?”
Mel wants to closely examine the word ‘extreme’, because this is a criticism levied at the Decentering Men movement – particularly in reaction to the 4B movement, she says.
“The Cut article talks about women who are part of the 4B movement in South Korea, and that amongst other decisions they’re choosing to shave their heads, stop wearing makeup and also sometimes choosing to live with other women instead of male romantic partners, and to not have children.”
“Is this extreme or not? Choices around how their own hair should look and what they put on their own faces. Decisions around who they choose to share a house with. Choices about whether to carry a child in their bodies, and then give birth to and care for that child. These actions are up for judgement – are they ‘extreme’ actions? Wanting autonomy over your own face, body and your own living situation is not extreme. What is extreme is even asking ‘is this behaviour extreme?”.
“What’s also extreme is the reaction of some men – some of these South Korean women have received harassment and sexual threats, as well as physical attacks. A physical attack over a woman’s hairstyle and living choices is extreme.”
“The choices these women are making for themselves are reasonable, inherently gentle, and well-considered choices that affect only themselves, their own bodies and their own wellbeing. It says a lot about the strength of the patriarchal system that holds all of us in its vice that we would even ask the question: ‘is this extreme behaviour?’.”
Mel says that seeing white friends working to decolonise their thinking gives her hope that, one day, “men will show a real interest in dismantling the patriarchy”. Meanwhile, she’d like to see the discussion of decentering men to be more normalised. “I think talking about it is probably the only way for change to really happen.”
