Different Names, Same Pain

Every day, I wake up

Every day, I hear the same two words uttered in different ways

 

Every man

All men

 

What follows next is not always the same

But in the end they have the same hurtful meaning

 

Simple-minded

Sex-crazed

 

And when someone utters the words not all,

they get called different names with the same pain intended

 

Misogynist

Anti-feminist

 

Every day I hear what they proclaim that I am taught

Taught in the name of a privilege derived from a penis

 

Raping 101

Blood Spilling 101

 

Yet people wonder why I shun the names they embroider on their hats

When all I am told is that I am the source of a problem I never caused

 

Sinful

Guilty

 

What crimes have I committed in this world that deserve such scorn

When the only crime that I am guilty of is being born with a penis

 

Patriarchy

Monster

 

My whole life I spent without a father, and yet I still had male influences

But each day, the lessons I had learned remind me what I am not

 

Coward

Garbage

 

Each day I step forward, I step forward as myself

As a human that loves and not as a monster that hates

 

Hateful

Useless

 

Each day I do not stay my hand because I do not strike to cause pain

I reach my hand out to give hope to those that need it

 

Liar

Scum

 

And each night when I go to bed, the words still float in the wind

All I can feel for those that spill the verbal bloodshed is not hate

 

Degenerate

Incompetent

 

All I feel for them is pity to hold such useless fear and anger towards men

When I can see them becoming the monsters they wish existed in me

– Jacob S. Hanes, Paperfan

I wrote this poem based on experiences that I have had with women using the words All men can/can’t do/don’t and I wanted to write this piece because of the effects it had on me. I always disliked hearing these words and being a child at the time, unable to tell the person to stop saying them around me. A child can’t tell an adult to do a thing. Or at least that is what I thought until I told the person why I disliked them. I still remember their reaction, them crying and telling my parent that I need to be forced to apologize for saying that I hate them. My parent is a 2nd Wave Feminist and told the woman that they wouldn’t force me to because I didn’t say that I hate her and what did she expect with all that she had said in front of me to feel. Now with 3rd Wave Feminism spewing what I swear is the same woman’s words, again I have the same feeling for them as I did her. You see, I did dislike her, but I also felt pity because with using her words as careless as she was, she was causing pain to me. Instead of hating her, which I could have done, I choose pity because she is just as human as I am. I consider myself a humanist because I believe in rights for all human beings as well as equality. Hope you have a good day and a good life. Keep up the work, the signal can never be stopped.

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