> The traditionalist system you refer to is a construction, if a long-standing one.

All social systems are constructions, and yes you are correct, we can observe and critique them. The sky is also blue. I like oranges. Snails are slow.

> To argue that stoic fathers tend to produce better sons requires evidence.

Likewise, to argue the opposite also requires more evidence than saying that "there is quite a bit of evidence" for your point. Saying that there is evidence is not evidence.

That's not what I am saying. I am saying someone has to play the role of a father. As a boy, someone needs to teach that boy how to become a strong man but also a man who lives correctly and fulfills his duties. If it was me, I would teach my son to be honest, honorable, to defend the weak and to understand different types of strengths (including intellectual), to treat his romantaic partner right and to learn how to make male friends and make others be comfortable around him and most importantly to understand his place in society and how to succeed as a man. Only a father can do that because a father understands what it is like to be a man and only a father understands the hardships a male child will encounter specifically because he is male. The same applies to mothers and daughters.

Being stoic is not what I mentioned but being strong and masculine, except in certain modern western societies is not optional. To put it differently, I wouldn't want my child to be violent in any way but I would also want him to be strong enough so that he wouldn't become prey to bullies and anyone trying to take advantage of him. But also to be strong enough to defend the weak and if the time comes, to serve in the military to defend his homeland and people.

Think of it as a job opening. Someone has to be masculine and someone has to be feminine . If your argument is that a boy should not have to be masculine, although horomones and generics disagree, I say that's a different topic because my argument is that both masculinity and femininity are required and for parents who wish to raise a masculine child, unless the mother is masculine and knows what growing up as a boy and becoming a man is like, the father is the only person that can do that.

> There's quite a bit of evidence that men who don't understand their emotions and have not been supported in expressing them safely

I did not suggest that. What I said was that it is not a father's job or rather, if a mother is available then she is best suited for that job. Boys want their mothers to comfort and emotionally support them and their fathers to teach them how to be a man and to be proud of their progress. I did not support toxic masculinity, just masculinity.

> We might ask, "Better for what?" Better to be a disposable cog in a rich man's machine, perhaps

Better equiped to succeed in life and be able to care for themselves and others. To live a long and likely happy life and find their place in society.

America's prisons are filled with men who never had a father model. Mothers, hard as they may try, at some point their inability to understand what their boys are going through makes it impossible for the child to trust them with emotional support.

A well rounded upbringing with all emotional, social and psychilogical needs met is all I advocated.

> A well rounded upbringing with all emotional, social and psychilogical needs met is all I advocated.

Fair enough, but then:

> What I said was that it is not a father's job or rather, if a mother is available then she is best suited for that job.

Who says that she is? Plenty of women suck at nurturing. Plenty of men are good at it. Why not have both parents capable of providing emotional support and guidance? What about single dads? Why assume that dad is better than mom at training a kid for fitness and to stand up for themselves. There are a lot of women jocks and soldiers. Have you ever seen the arms on a bread baker? She could punch you through a wall and go back to kneading without missing a beat. Why assume that girls don't need to throw a punch? They deal with both bullies and rapists. You are falling into the trap of gender essentialism. There are sex differences, but they are not the straightjacket traditionalists say they are. Did you think Neanderthal women laid around on fainting couches waiting for some dude to hand them a hankie?

If you want to know what men and women can actually do, don't look at traditionalists, look for us iconoclasts. The fags, the dykes, women athletes, men that stay at home with the kids. We are living examples that essentialism is dangerous bullshit. If you want to see true bravery watch a drag queen walk down a city street past all the people who want to kill her. Balls of fucking steel. Talk to the girl coder in a room full of coder bros trying to either fuck her or drive her off. Imagine being Madeline Albright in a situation room full of generals. That's bravery.

My grandmother was a pioneer in computing and women's liberation. When her husband was off in the merchant marines under the constant threat of U boats, she wanted to do something for the war effort. She saw a sign for engineering classes. When she went to sign up the man told her, "Sorry honey, engineering is for men." The instructor happened to overhear and replied, "Let her take it Harry. Then she'll learn her place." Of course, my grandmother took the class, did better than all the other guys, and went on to a long career designing nuclear torpedo circuitry and keeping the mainframe running, while raising four kids alone, and dealing with a constant stream of sexist men. Pure bravery. On the flip side, she couldn't cook to save her own life, thought Sanka in tepid tap water was coffee, and was hopeless at nurturing her kids, who have the emotional scars to prove it.

My father is an example of a boy who was never taught emotional intelligence. He simply doesn't understand his emotions or why they change. If I say, "Dad, it seems like driving is making you anxious. Do you want to switch?" He doesn't recognize the category of "anxious". All he knows is that something is wrong, it could not be him, so it must be mom's fault. On the flip side, dad is one of the best people in the country at programming cultural events for college campuses and single-handedly transformed student life for generations of students and is one of the funniest guys you'll ever meet.

Humans have evolved to be flexible and resilient. A big brain frees us from the monorail of instinct. Men and women can be whatever we need to be. This period of reaction to progress will pass like so many others have. You can't stop a good idea forever. And we who know freedom will NEVER go back.

> Who says that she is? Plenty of women suck at nurturing. Plenty of men are good at it. Why not have both parents capable of providing emotional support and guidance?

You talked about a lot of things but I don't think this forum is best to discuss most of it, but let me reply to that statement.

I did not imply that all women are excellent nurturers or all men are great at being masculine. But whether you believe it is nature or society, parenting is many jobs packed into one. One person has to teach a child how to be masculine or feminine or if you are one of those people inventing thingd the whatever non-masculine/non-feminist thing I guess? But a father teaches his son how to be man, now you take that and make it about some ideologicial/political culture war and that isn't right. What's wrong with a mother providing emotional support? If a father is providing that then is that father also teaching the boy how to be a man? What is the woman doing then? Someone needs to do both jobs. If the mother can do the father's job then so be it. I don't get this obsession with reducing everything into politics or whataboutism. As a child I needed both types of support, to be understood as a male and thaught how to handle myself as well as to be taught how to be kind, caring and intouch with my emotions, to avoid burying them. Women don't have testestrome and society has it such that if you are feminine, you spend most of your life being emotional and being in touch with your feelings, so you're an expert at that.

You talk about what can be and hypotheticals. Ok, if you work hard enough, maybe a woman can teach a boy how to be man and a man can learn how to provide what a mother provides? But why are you talking about that? Why are you insisting that men who only know how to be men and have no interest in becoming women pretend to be something they are not? And if a woman is not great at providing motherly love and support, I say she should talk about it with her spouse and let them figure out the best way to meet the needs of their children. I hope we can at least agree that whatever socio-political winds may prevail, the needs of children should not be neglected.

> I hope we can at least agree that whatever socio-political winds may prevail, the needs of children should not be neglected.

Absolutely. Have a great night.