We go out and build and hunt and produce value to bosses who don’t appreciate our work. We conquer the elements in order to pave the roads, weld the pipes, and grow the food.
We are expendable. Only the strongest amongst us survive the times of war in order to breed and pass on our genes to the future generation. In times of peace, we are selected based on baffling attraction standards for reproduction.
We are lied to. We never know if the children you bear are truly our own. We risk our financial well-being to settle down and spend our lives with you. We find ourselves antagonized in popular culture and in family courts. In divorce, our financial well-being is largely dependent on you.
Many of us don’t know your touch. We insufficiently manly enough to do so, as there are only a fraction of us who are sexually desirable. We take it with pride and hold up our chins as we eventually accept you when you finally decide to settle down before your beauty is completely gone.
Sex is work for us when we get it. When we do not, we turn to pornography to fill our base needs and are spurned as perverts for the alternative. But we’re monsters if we pursue you.
At work we are constantly on eggshells in fear of unfounded accusations. We find ourselves bombarded with useless trivia and gossip, all the while desiring only to build and create.
We are suspicious when we are out and about, especially around children. We are judged to be the most vile of monsters before we are even given a day in court.
And still we suffer in silence. We pay the bills, earn the money, and impose proper discipline on the children. But we are called oppressors because we are stingy with the money, don’t buy the right things, and are too hard on the children.
We live a life without appreciation. We sacrifice health and financial independence for your comfort and when we ask for a little bit of pleasure in return, we are often rejected.
To top all of that off, we are told to worship you and that any failings you have are the direct result of us, not you and that it is our sin, our inattentiveness, and our apathy which causes you to fall.
I refuse to accept this. I refuse to go through life as a sycophant who regards you as my “better half”. And I refuse to take the blame for sins I don’t commit.