I’m all for dating feminist, loving feminist, marrying feminist, and all variations therein. But when men are as varied in their approach to the concept of feminism as women are, what does a feminist boyfriend actually look like?
In a recent op-ed at the Washington Post, Lisa Bonos advises readers that, if they ever hope to have it all, they should dare to want it all, i.e., find a feminist boyfriend. She claims it shouldn’t be that hard. Bonos writes:
After all, as Aziz Ansari said on David Letterman’s show recently, everyone’s a feminist now. Unless you think Beyonce shouldn’t have the right to vote, should earn 23 percent less than Jay-Z and should be at home cooking rather than performing. And who would think that?
Few guys will proudly say no when asked if they’re feminists. Instead it’s a wholehearted yes, a lukewarm maybe or Can you define what you mean by “feminist,” please? As one 32-year-old put it to The Washington Post Magazine last month: “I respect the movement. I’m hesitant to call myself a feminist, but I guess I wouldn’t shy away from the term.”
Well, I can’t speak to her experience, and perhaps it’s due to the fact that I’m from a region that’s slow to change, but I knew, know, and have known many men who were perfectly a’ight—great, even—but who wouldn’t call themselves feminists, even if they agreed with the basic premise that men and women should be equal.
I’ve laid out my own criteria for male feminism before here, but I think that—just as is the case for women—there are all sorts of ways and degrees by which men embrace various aspects of feminism, and these characteristics won’t necessarily match up with how dateable they are. Wisely, Bonos gives the advice that searching for a feminist boyfriend means first defining your terms:
Is he a feminist if he proclaims, on a first date, that he could see himself taking his wife’s last name? (Maybe his own name is pretty generic.) If he insists on doing the dishes after you’ve cooked dinner together but proceeds to whip the dish towel at your ass, is that playful or objectifying? (Both.) Is he sexist if he cancels an Uber ride because a female driver is on her way to pick the two of you up? (Definitely.)
Does he need to believe that men and women, are equals and should be treated as such? (Uh, yes.) Does he need to be actively fighting for social, political and economic justice for women — and for all people, really — to identify as a feminist? (Not necessarily. But if he’s doing that, great.)
Bonos notes that this isn’t all about heterosexual coupling, either:
The challenge of breaking out of rigid gender roles isn’t limited to straight daters. “Both my partner and I have known butches who are so into being butch that it can be like dating a man who’s a bit sexist,” lesbian writer Donna Minkowitz, 50, tells me. “And I’ve known gay couples who are so rigid in their gender division . . . one man doesn’t want his partner to work, wants him to stay home with the kids.”
Minkowitz thinks that sometimes straight people fear that if they try to have an egalitarian relationship, sexual attraction will suffer. “That’s an unnecessary worry,” she says, “because you can still admire the way a person is masculine or feminine without buying into a whole socioeconomic package that goes along with that.”
In my experience, men can often be very feminist in some aspects and then stop at the point where the belief starts to change their behavior or threaten some cherished notion of gender identity. Many well-meaning men still struggle with not making more dough, or assume a man should earn as a primary part of his identity, or prefer to do the asking out. Is that still feminist? I don’t know. Do you want a boyfriend or a textbook?
Bonos ultimately defines a feminist boyfriend as someone “not constrained by gender roles,” wherein “anyone can do the asking-out, the feelings-confessing or the initiating of any kind.” And I would agree with that personally, too. But there’s theory and practice, and in the actual world, sorting out gender fascists—just like sorting out our own unique relationship to our own gender—takes a lot of work.
On the path to your feminist boyfriend, you may meet:
The Radical Feminist Boyfriend
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