April 20, 2012--Men

"Men," she sputtered, "What is it that they say?--'You can't live with them, but you can't live without them.'"

This from a close friend who is not prone to expressing herself in such categorical ways. She has been happily married for 50 years and by every measure appears, in general, to be fond of men. Many of her best friends are men. Me included.

So I was surprised to hear how exasperated she sounded. We were having drinks at a local bar. "Anything I should know about going on between you and John? You still seem so . . ."

"No. Things with him are fine. He's such a dear. He would say the same thing about men."

"I'm sensing you may be feeling frustration about some of the political discourse concerning the state of gender relations."

"Spoken like the old professor you are. Discourse, gender relations. I thought you got out of college teaching long before everything was about discourse-this, discourse-that."

"Thankfully I did miss some of that. How everything is socially-constructed. But," I winked over my pinot noir, "I do try to keep current with what the youngsters are up to. The gender studies people who believed they had it all figured out must be feeling exasperated too. What with what goes for political discourse these days."

Sally chuckled at my again using the D-word. "I am not one of your gender professionals, but I am feeling as if I'm living in a time machine. One propelling me back decades. Perhaps even centuries. Not a day goes by when one state legislature or another, or one governor or another, passes or signs into law yet another restriction on what we as a nation thought we agreed were women's rights."

"I feel likewise."

"Can I have another?" she asked the bartender, sliding her glass toward him. "This time, make it a double. I think I need to tie one on. You're the designated driver this evening?" I assured her I was. The one glass of pinot would be my first and last.

"This is not just happening in Arizona where I would expect nothing less than a full rollback of access to reproductive healthcare, but in Wisconsin too. La Follett's state. Russ Feingold's state. Where Progressivism was born. What is going on?"

"I was about to ask you the same thing. I have my ideas but would prefer to hear yours."

"I think it's all about pent up frustration and even rage."

"Whose and about what?"

"Men's. About all the changes that have occurred during the past 40 years. Mainly descended from the women's movement. How do you think 'traditional' men,'" she made air quotes, "feel about all the women in the workplace? Having significant careers and maybe with a woman as a boss or supervisor? Including in places like investment banks and hospitals, your universities, and, lord help us, the military. I'm surprised we aren't seeing as much kicking and screaming about that as about gays in the Army."

"I think I know why that is."

"Why?"

"Because it's less politically correct to bash gays than women."

"My point exactly. And thus the frustration. In polite society--or not so polite society--it's more acceptable to make fun of gays than women. So there's no way to ventilate any misogynist steam. It stays in the system, builds up, and then, as we are seeing, explodes in a frenzy of anti-feminist behavior."

"I think you're right. I need another drink. We can always get a taxi to take us home."

"Women have also invaded one of men's last refuges--sports. There's an NBA women's basketball division and this summer you'll notice that the TV coverage of the summer Olympics will disproportionately favor women's events during prime time. There will be more women's gymnastics than men's weight lifting. And speaking of TV, until Katie Couric was not resigned at CBS, along with Diane Sawyer, two of the three network evening anchors were women. Dan Rather, Tom Brokaw, and Peter Jennings were nowhere in sight."

I nodded.

"More than half of medical school students are now women which means that the next decade's Marcus Welby will be wearing a skirt. And the next time these guys have their prostates checked it will be a woman doing you-know-what."

That I felt.

"And isn't it true," she said, "that in most sectors of the workforce that are projected to grow--like healthcare--female-gendered jobs are the one's most likely to increase in number? This in spite of Mitt Romney's distorted take on women's recent job losses. Actually, in this recession men were more vulnerable--most of the precipitous job losses that occurred during George Bush's last two years were men's and only now women are catching up by losing theirs. Obama's bad luck."

"And isn't it true that in some communities and ethnic groups it's easier for women to find work, and in many two-worker families women are earning more than men?"

"And how do you suppose that makes men feel?"

"Not good. And very resentful, which is where you began."

"Exactly." She paused to take a deep drink of her gin and tonic. "And then," she leaned closer to me and whispered, "how do you think it makes men feel when their women say they too want to have orgasms?"

"Probably . . ."

"Exactly."