It’s a error to think that pointing to patriarchy is blaming men. It is not. Everyone but the very top echelon suffer under patriarchy. The difference is that men are better positioned to dismantle it. Yet they consistently refuse to engage in smashing the mechanism of their own oppression because it would require redefining themselves as men. How they define their own worth and value all the while decrying the damaging expectations they are expected to uphold, like sacrificing themselves for a woman, is in large part the frustration of women toward men.

You’re not telling us something we don’t know. We see it. We’ve been trying to get you to see it for years.

The reason that scenario has become so ingrained is not because women are more valuable than men. They are not. Perceptively, they’re less valuable by society’s standards. That scenario playing out has nothing to do with the woman at all. It’s because that’s how manhood is defined. Therefore, it will go away when men learn to define themselves beyond being protectors and providers. Beyond all the metrics of patriarchy.