Dearest Patrons,

I "wrote" this piece (via audio message transcribed) a few days after the white supremacist insurrection of the Capitol. I'm drawn to share it with my Patrons as a raw expression of what's moving through me in these times, and to invite your feedback, impact, questions, and curiosities as I hone and clarify my work in the world on this day of transition. Whether you comment below, email me, or give me a call, I'd love to hear what comes up for you in reading - or listening to (I included the original audio above) - this declaration of purpose and accountability. 

with fierce love and longing,

Joshua

_________________________

Donald Trump's duplicitousness, as well as Lindsey Graham's and so many other male men and powerful politicians, are part of the reason why it's hard for me to receive trust from women partners. Because they have so many examples of men in their life who have done, and are doing to them, what we see Trump and these other politicians doing to the public: saying one thing one day, then turning around and apologize on another, and then saying something else that contradicts it behind closed doors (or in a different context) on a third day. So how can we possibly know what the truth is, what to trust? And that behavior, which is toxic, which is all too common - for men in power in particular - finds its way all the way into the bedroom - of my bedroom. Because I am held accountable, and I'm compared to that legacy of white men. I look like these men. In some ways I act like them - I'm still working on undoing my own conditioning and patterning, so I remind women who I want trust and closeness and intimacy with, of these men who continue to act in ways that don't deserve, or garner trust. 

And therefore, when folks like Donald Trump and Lindsey Graham gaslight by changing their tune too often for us to know what's up and what's down, I struggle to have trust in the relationships that I want trust in, and that outrages me. And that's part of what motivates me to push back against this pattern in this culture: the socialization (that some don't like to be called but many know needs to be called) toxic masculinity. Or, The Man Box (Tony Porter). Or imperialist white supremacist capitalist patriarchy (bell hooks). Whatever you want to call it, this is what it looks like. 

And I feel its impacts - a fraction of the impacts that the women that I'm wanting trust with feel - but it does impact me. And I want all the other men out there, especially white cis hetero men like me who long for a world where trust and intimacy and vulnerability and care and love is possible (especially with the women that we're trying to love, not just our lovers but also our friends, also our sisters, also our co-workers) that we reject - and not just reject with words but that we work to undo in ourselves the same patterns and call out and lovingly hold accountable the men we love in our lives to do the same. 

Because otherwise, that means we're leaving it up to the women, to the women of color, to the queer and the trans folks who are actively being harmed by this in ways that are more direct, more embodied, higher risk, to do that work. And that's just not fair. And I'm hearing from them publicly and intimately that they are fucking tired. They are fucking tired of this shit. And that's exactly what it is - it's shit. It's, it's waste. It's byproduct. And we have the privilege - part of our privilege is having some sense of semblance of comfort, of ease in our lives (and that's not to say every white cis hetero man out there has had an easy life - of course not). But when I compare myself to the queer folks, to the people of color, to the Black and Indigenous folks, to the women who've survived sexual violence, domestic violence, verbal, emotional, psychological, physical abuse, and state violence, I can say that I have lived a life of privilege and ease and comfort. And that privilege brings me more resource, more capacity - on some level. And that's the capacity, the resource, the privilege that I want to leverage to do something - to do many things! - on personal levels, on communal societal social levels, and on political levels, to transform masculinity, to transform the culture, the dominant culture of what it is and what it means to be a man, what it means to be a white man in particular. It is masculinity, it's white supremacy. They are both intertwined and they act separately. Male privilege, male domination, male violence is much older than white supremacy, but white supremacy is arguably more overt or (I don't know... I'm not gonna try to make one more or worse than the other). They're both here. 

So if you're a man, no matter what your race, there's work to be done. If you're white, no matter what your gender identity, there's work to be done. And if you're like me and you're white and you're a man, there's a lot of work to be done. And I hope you'll join me, because I am also tired of not being able to be at ease, and loving peaceful trusting connection with those people in my life, so many who are actively traumatized and re-traumatized by this pattern on display in the public, and in their other relationships. And I am tired of the ways that my own body and my own spirit is smushed, squeezed into that man box, squeezed into that white box. I want to be able to express feminized expressions of being: to wear a ring or an earring and not worry about being bullied; to sing; to dance; to wear a dress. I want to be able to express whatever wants to come through me without worrying about being violated or violenced against some man who doesn't like that, who's internalized misogyny and supremacy lashes out in verbal or physical violence against me. 

I know what that feels like. I went through my early and mid-teens experiencing a lot of that humiliation and bullying. I'm tired of it. And I'm only a quarter as tired of it as the ones who are on the margins. And I want to put them in the center and create a ring of us with more privilege and power in this given system, protecting them and pushing out against the tide. To create more freedom and liberation for all of us, because how can I sleep at night -comfortably, easily, deeply, or feel at ease, or peaceful in my body during the day - knowing that my Black friend is being terrorized by white supremacists daily, or knowing that my queer friend is struggling to know how to find love in a world that tells them the way they love is an aberration? When my lover, and my partner, a survivor of violence from white men is terrified when she sees images of angry mobs of white men, reminding her of the harm that her body knows is possible when that continues, or when that goes unchecked, or when that happens behind closed doors? How can I possibly actually be at peace as long as I care about anybody that doesn't look like me? How can I possibly consider doing anything but working for our collective liberation? 

I hope you'll join me. 

Transcribed by https://otter.ai

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