If you read my stuff, you understand that it is pretty eclectic. One week, I may experiment with adding TVP in a meatloaf; the next, I’ll ponder whether God exists; and the following, I’ll explore why I am the way I am.
The blog has never had a commercial purpose. I’m just a guy with a thousand interests, and I enjoy writing. I often tell my kids, “If this post makes a single person think about the topic, then that is a bonus for me.” However, the pure enjoyment of putting thoughts on paper is my primary motivator. Many people have told me repeatedly that more people would read my work if I shortened my posts. Very true, but what is the fun in that?
Often, my posts are stream-of-consciousness, but sometimes, I feel the need to push my personal envelope and explore a topic further. Like many, I dip into social media sites, including YouTube.
About a month ago, YouTube’s “For You” page featured a video about relationships. I can’t remember the exact title, but it was something like “What Men Need To Know About Women.” I clicked on it, which sent me down a rabbit hole of other men-centered videos, including many “Red Pill” ones. When you watch a concentration of them, they start to mess with your mind, and I felt I needed a balance, so I deliberately forced the algorithm to give me more female-perspective videos. These were equally horrifying.
Men bashing women, women bashing men, women treating men like objects to be exploited, men categorizing women along extremely narrow lines. It was pretty horrible. As an expert in behavior, I understand that these curated videos can significantly impact viewers, creating biases and prejudices that can have lasting adverse effects in the real world. I decided I had to write about it, but I couldn’t. I didn’t want to spread what I felt were false narratives. I wanted to offer an observation that would counter the rhetoric. Were people actually ascribing to this stuff?
I decided to approach the topic obliquely. I would write a more general post on the dangers of curated media, which I did on December 3rd. I then opted to focus on the forces of change in our society, and since I was leading up to a post on dating and relationships, I felt the feminist movement was fitting. As a person who believes in equality for all, it disturbed me greatly to see a shift in that movement that seemed to border on hate. However, I wrote that post on December 11th.
With those two posts serving as scaffolding, it was time for me to use the “Red Pill,” “MGTOW,” “Sprinkle Sprinkle,” and other videos to write about relationships in 2025. Based on the videos, the dating scene seems to be in horrible shape. We are commoditizing people (both male and female) in a way that will doom society eventually. Is this really what is happening to dating? Are we all becoming objects to be used and thrown away when we are no longer shiny new pennies? Have we all become narcissistic creatures where others are simply there to be consumed?
I decided to conduct background statistical research on the topic, asking questions such as “Are marriage rates declining?” “What are the percentages of men between 18-29 who are not dating?” “What are the statistics on divorce rates?” “Who initiates most divorces?” … and so forth.
Although I usually write with a stream of conciseness (as I’m doing here) when I want to remember numbers (like stats), I’ll often save them in a file. Guess what? I already had a file on relationships I started in November of 2023! Apparently, I was going to write a post on this very same topic then, but chickened out, as I’m doing now… so I apologize.
Why am I holding off on writing this post? My November 2023 data predicted a horrific future for dating, commitment, and society as a whole. The data that I just gathered suggests that things have gotten worse.
For those seeking a serious relationship, it must be an extremely frustrating and arduous task. Tools, like dating apps, don’t help; they harm. Social Media doesn’t join and educate, it causes fear and dissension. It is very sad.
I try to post things that improve people’s lives, even something as simple as teaching someone to slow-cook a pot roast. When I post something controversial, I try to add some hope, or even a solution or two. Right now, I can’t do that when writing about the current state of dating and commitment. Therefore, I’m holding off on writing the post that I said I would. It is all very sad. I’m very sorry.
Julie has always been a feminist, and I have always believed that diversity is not only morally correct but also a benefit to society as a whole. My opinion goes beyond gender and includes the rights of all people, regardless of race, religion, or sexual orientation.
However, there is one thing that Julie does that bugs me; that is when she retorts that the woes in the world are due to our paternalistic society and the oppression of women by men. This post is meant to present a different perspective. You are invited to accept or reject my ideas. However, please don’t condemn them without giving them a moment’s thought.
My wife is a very bright person. She holds two Master’s Degrees and has two PhD degrees (Clinical Psychology and Social Psychology). She works professionally and has helped countless clients. She successfully runs her own business. She is economically stable and lives in a wonderful community. She has no real wants. I do not see her oppressed or limited in any way.
She could have accomplished all of these things on her own. However, my unwavering financial, emotional, and physical support made those impressive accomplishments easier for her to reach. I am her husband; that is the way it should be. I am also a man. Does my gender automatically make me an oppressor? To be fair, if you asked my wife this question, she would say I wasn’t. However, blanket statements about paternalistic, oppressive men drag me into that category by default. Imagine if the reverse were true, if I generalized the actions of an individual and turned them into blanket gender statements about women. “Women can’t think critically,” “Women can’t do math,” “Women are too emotional for leadership positions.” Are there women who fit these generalizations? Of course, but not all women. Those statements would be considered inappropriate, but male-bashing, even when done innocently, is considered OK in our society.
I don’t have a million-dollar grant to survey the population. My dataset is limited to my experiences and observations. Therefore, it is restricted. However, that limitation does not make my arguments invalid.
Am I a male outlier? What about other males? Does my son have a bias against women? Absolutely not. How about my male friends? No, they have all championed their wives ’ and daughters’ efforts. What about the males in my family? Here again, they have supported their wives and daughters to reach their life goals. My wife’s sister has two daughters and a son. Did their father (my brother-in-law) raise his daughters to be inferior to their son? The answer is no. These are different groups of men from various backgrounds, religions, and generations. All wanted the same for their spouses and children: to reach their goals and potential.
How about if I go back further in time to a much more conservative and constrained culture? What if I go back to my parents’ generation? My parents were born early in the 20th century and married in the 1930s. Both come from large, conservative, ethnic families. Both sets of grandparents immigrated to the US at the turn of the last century from conservative Eastern European countries. Both sides were deeply religious and closely tied to the Catholic Church.
On the surface, they should represent the most traditional values and ideals, and in some ways, they did. How did my parents, aunts, and uncles raise their children? Was there a gender gap?
Both my grandfathers worked in back-breaking, labor-intensive jobs. One fixed machines at a book bindery, the other was a machinist for International Harvester. I don’t believe that either job was particularly rewarding or fulfilling. My grandmothers were housewives, which was also an extremely taxing job. They did not live in a mechanized world; everything from doing laundry to making clothing was done manually. Both sides had large families, and my grandparents faced the mammoth task of raising many children. Money and labor were needed, which kept them very occupied.
All the older siblings in my mother’s family were boys, but the last three children, including my mother, were girls. I know little about her older siblings beyond a few scattered facts. I know that many of her siblings became very successful. A number of them were engineers; one founded a savings and loan; another owned a profitable manufacturing company. Pretty impressive considering that they came from nothing. I have childhood memories of being in awe when visiting their houses. I recall being in one huge house that had its own real library. What was in that library beyond books? An elevator to the upper floors! Wow.
I knew more about my dad’s side of the family. Here, there was a more traditional path to earning a living. Two of my uncles were electricians; two worked in factories; one owned a small furniture reupholstering business; and my dad was the chief operating engineer at one of Chicago’s largest high schools.
My dad’s story illustrates the era’s expectations, which were very different than today’s. He left school after 8th grade to help support my uncle (his brother), who was attending college to become a priest. I think such sacrifices were not that uncommon during that era, as you could still make a living with a limited education. How did he feel about cutting his education short? He often said he was glad to make the sacrifice; yet he attended night school for years, eventually winding up at the Armour Institute (now the Illinois Institute of Technology), so perhaps he did have a feeling or two. Editor’s note: My uncle eventually left the seminary and married. Fortunately for me, that union produced several of my cousins!
Both families were deeply ethnic and traditional, and they held high expectations for their children. Everyone went to church. Everyone was supposed to get married and have kids. Everyone was expected to marry someone with a similar ethnic and religious background. However, these expectations were the same for both sexes.
My mother worked in various jobs after she graduated from high school. There were no restrictions on her working. I’m not sure whether she worked after she married, but I do know there was a significant external push to have children. This pressure was on both my mother and father.
What about my generation? Were there different rules for my sisters and female cousins than for their male counterparts? I don’t believe so. We were all expected to live moral lives. There was an emphasis on showing respect to our elders. There were also religious rules; for instance, we couldn’t eat meat on Fridays. Those rules were the same for both boys and girls.
During my generation, there was a strong emphasis on education. I have two sisters, and both hold advanced degrees beyond their bachelor’s degrees. My one sister didn’t want to go to college, but my father encouraged her to go. He bargained with her to try it for at least a year. If she hated it, she was free to choose a different path. In the end, she earned a Bachelor’s degree, then a Master’s, and worked as both a teacher and a psychotherapist. There was no double standard in my family’s education.
How about my female cousins on my mom’s side? I have limited knowledge, but I know one sang with the Lyric Opera and the other taught. I know more about my female cousins on my dad’s side. Of those I know, all hold Bachelor’s degrees; in fact, I believe most have master’s degrees. Additionally, two hold PhDs and were university professors. Lastly, my male cousins’ wives held jobs, mostly in health care and the corporate world. There were no restrictions on what they could do or become.
As far as societal norms were concerned, women were expected to run the house, and men to provide and protect. Generally, that is what happened in my family. But there were also many exceptions.
In my conservative, religious extended family, societal restrictions on women were ignored. In fact, the opposite was happening. Women were being encouraged to succeed, to become educated, to move forward. I don’t believe my family was an outlier; I saw other’s doing the same things.
Have fringe religious groups used societal rules to control their members, including women? Yes. Have abusive, manipulative men used societal norms to control their wives? Yes. However, both genders can have members who are manipulative and abusive.
When I was growing up, we had a family in our neighborhood consisting of a couple and their only child. The husband worked as a bus driver to support the family, and the wife was a stay-at-home mom. She was dominant in every way. She and their daughter lived in the main part of the house, but her husband was required to live in their unfinished basement. In fact, his wife made him eat off separate dishes, with meals left for him on a tray next to the basement stairs.
How about societal norm outliers with my aunts and uncles? These were individuals who came of age in the 1930s and 1940s, so you would think that their roles were set in stone. On my dad’s side, my one uncle never married. He supported my grandmother financially, and she provided him with a home, meals, and the like. Per societal rules, he should have married. He wasn’t shunned in our family; he was celebrated and held in honor.
On my mother’s side, three of her siblings didn’t marry, including her only two sisters. My two aunts lived together in a functional partnership. They had defined roles, with my one aunt being more dominant and the decision-maker of the two. She attended DePaul University and was an accountant. My other aunt was an telephone operator who retired early due to health problems. She was the more domestic of the two. My unmarried uncle was a bit of a lost soul. He spent his work life testing radar equipment for Western Electric and led a solo life. His health was failing, likely contributed to by alcohol use, so my aunts took him in, and he joined their untraditional family.
That uncle was a kind person, but a bit of an odd duck. However, my aunts were esteemed in the family. There was no stigma around being single. In fact, the only time that I heard my father say a sexist thing about them was when, in the late 1950s, my aunt decided that she and my other aunt should buy a house. “How in the world are two women going to manage a house?” my father said to my mother. They did, and in fact, my one aunt became quite handy.
I also had several aunts who continued to work outside the home after marriage, one for Sears catalog and the other in an office job. I don’t recall hearing any negative comments about them working.
I had an uncle who didn’t work. He was an athletic guy who played minor league baseball in his youth. The line was that he had a heart attack in the1950s, and hadn’t worked since. Something never quite made much sense with that story, as I remember him looking pretty healthy in the 1970s. His wife owned a beauty shop, was the breadwinner, and the more dominant of the two. No one questioned their atypical marriage.
This was the reality that I witnessed. Society imposed rules and regulations on both men and women in my family. However, there were many exceptions to these rules. Parents made an effort to improve the lives of all their offspring, but those paths were shaped by the resources available at the time. For my parents’ generation, there was an emphasis on stable jobs and solid marriages with a strong religious center. For my generation, marriage was still important, but with role modifications. Women were encouraged to become more educated and to contribute financially. Men were encouraged to become more involved at home. These changes should have benefited all parties. In reality, it meant more work and more burnout for both the husband and wife. Not all housework is drudgery, and not all work-for-pay is rewarding. When the expectation is to do both, it can be taxing.
Why did gender roles occur in the first place? No one can say for sure, but it is improbable that they happened due to some plot of men to oppress women. Enduring behaviors continue for a reason and serve a purpose. Patriarchies have developed independently in many societies, but a few societies are matriarchal in their foundations. This suggests that either system can work, but it has generally been more productive for a group to pick one side or the other.
Most of us are familiar with the norm that the husband is the head of the family and the mother is the head of the household, but was it men or women who determined this concept of the typical monogamous nuclear family?
Some may say that men designed this to control their wives. We do see this in some groups, for instance, the fundamentalist LDS cults, where women are raised at an early age to be submissive and to “be sweet.” But there is more to that story. Fundamental LDS boys are often poorly educated to the point that many are illiterate. At an early age, they are sent to work on construction sites to raise money for the church. A few elders control the population, notably the group’s Prophet, whose word is considered the word of God. Powerful men may have many wives, and they can forbid less powerful men from having relationships with their own wives; they can even banish these men from the congregation and claim their wives, if they so desire. This is not men oppressing women; this is a small group of individuals, who are men, abusing their power to oppress an entire congregation for their own needs.
If we go back in time, it is clear that surviving was a tricky proposition. Humans are relatively weak animals, and they found that their chances improved when they lived in groups. In fact, there is evidence that Homo sapiens (us) have lived in groups since our species’s inception.
For a species to survive, it must reproduce. We are driven to exchange genetic material and produce offspring. This biological drive supersedes any constructs about the benefits of having children. However, I’m sure early humans also realized the advantage of a continuing supply of younger members to their community. Raising a child is a labor-intensive and energy-intensive undertaking, leaving the caregiver extremely vulnerable.
Males have a variety of options to spread their genetic material. One male can impregnate a multitude of females and leave them to fend for themselves. This “playing the numbers” method assumes that at least some offspring will survive. Another option is a male controlling many females. Here, the most successful/powerful males would pass on their genetic material while having some responsibility toward the females in their harem, usually providing some resources and protection. There are also matriarchal systems, such as the Minangkabau of Indonesia, that have developed their own mores and folkways for rearing children. Evolutionarily, some of the above options could be more efficient than monogamy at passing on the best genes to the next generation (contrary, also true). So what are the advantages of monogamy?
Men had the advantage of size and strength and were well-suited to hunting and protecting. Women were generally smaller and weaker. They also had the additional burden of caring for infants and children, which required years of intensive work. Women had a greater need to enter into a union for these reasons. Offspring had a better chance of survival when females were protected and provided for. What did they offer in return? Beyond intimacy, women could take on additional tasks beyond child-rearing. This made the relationship valuable for both parties. In reality, it was to women’s advantage to establish traditional roles. Is that why these unions happened? Who knows, but that seems more logical than men’s need to oppress women.
Throughout history, most men worked under exhausting conditions, often performing backbreaking jobs. Women’s roles were different because men and women are not the same. I’m NOT saying that men are more capable than women, I’m saying that men and women are different from each other. Women were also working very hard, but they were doing different tasks. This division of labor was logical and most efficient for thousands of years.
My grandfather worked long hours in a hot and dangerous factory. My grandmother had to manage a million different tasks from baking bread to plucking chickens. His work was likely tedious and mind-numbing. Her work was varied and more creative, but never-ending. However, together they were stronger, and by assuming different roles, they achieved a significant goal: survival and a better chance for their children to survive.
Life for the average person was very tough, with vast amounts of energy spent by both men and women on essential tasks. There was a small group of privileged men and women who, because of their position, followed a different set of rules. With enough money, one could bypass real life and hire maids, cooks, nannies, and any other necessary job-doer.
Things began to change in the early 20th century, most notably in the 1930s, when homes were increasingly electrified. Then, many labor-saving devices were introduced, from washing machines to refrigerators. Jobs that once required an entire day of intensive labor could now be completed in hours. Radio was becoming commonplace, and this medium brought information, culture, and new ideas into the typical home. This medium could bring product advertising to consumers on a daily, unrelenting basis. New, less physically taxing jobs were also growing. New medical treatments emerged, and the need to have large families to ensure offspring’s survival diminished. Convenience food products, like Bisquick, hit the grocer’s shelves. Now there was time to ponder life. Advertisers saw this time as an opportunity to build sales, which were sold along gender lines. Advertisements are designed to make you feel bad, then offer a solution, their product. Ads of beautiful, impossibly thin women made happy with a new vacuum cleaner, or handsome men in fashionable suits demonstrating their prowess by driving a new car, were commonplace. People had more time and were encouraged to buy more. Is it any surprise that gender roles started to change?
Life was changing, but not everything was moving forward at the same pace. This led to increased dissatisfaction and to movements ranging from women’s rights to worker unionization. This also pitted opposing forces who wanted the status quo. Why? Because those in power want to retain it, they will use their power to influence others. Those in power tried to convince the populace that unions would ruin the country. Those in power tried to convince the populace that granting women the right to vote (won in 1925) was unnecessary and would lead to chaos… and so forth. However, I hope Ihave shown that the average man wasn’t the enemy of women. That he saw his wife and female offspring positively. Gender roles and expectations may have looked rigid in a textbook, but they were far more flexible in real life.
So, where does the women’s movement fit into all of this? I was going to explore key figures such as Simone de Beauvoir, Sojourner Truth, and Gloria Steinem. But to be frank, my neck is starting to go stiff from sitting and typing, and I suspect I have already written so much that the vast majority of those who began to read this missive have since abandoned it.
Instead, I think I’ll write about a single pivotal figure, Betty Friedan, who wrote The Feminine Mystique and who co-founded the NOW movement.
Betty Friedan was an intellectually gifted, strong-willed woman. When her high school newspaper rejected her application to write a column, she started her own literary magazine. In 1938, she matriculated at Smith College, an elite institution and one of the “Seven Sisters,” women’s colleges. She excelled at Smith, graduating with high honors. After Smith, she had a one-year fellowship at Berkley studying under the famous psychologist Erik Erikson. At every level, Betty Friedan was exceptional.
She married Carl Friedan in 1947. Carl was a theater producer, inventor, and advertising executive. Betty worked as a writer and freelanced for magazines. Based on the above, it sounds like Betty had a good and elite life. However, she felt that something was missing.
In 1957, she went to her college’s 15-year reunion and surveyed her former classmates about their education, experiences, and satisfaction with their lives. This was a population of women who were likely financially privileged. It should be noted that in 1940 (when these women were attending college), only 5.5% of men and 3.8% of women graduated, and Smith was not an ordinary college; it was an elite institution. I imagine that these women married successful men, who, by their very nature, worked a lot. It is also likely that their economic and social status afforded them more free time than the average housewife. Here was a situation of intelligent, educated women living routine, isolated lives. Is there any wonder that they were unhappy? In fact, Friedan talks about the “terror of being alone” in her groundbreaking 1963 book, The Feminine Mystique.” The book that launched the second feminist wave.
Friedan believed that women should be able to pursue meaningful work commensurate with their intellectual capacity. I don’t think anyone could argue with this. However, in an NBC interview, she made it clear that she disagreed with radical elements of the feminist movement that saw men as the enemy. She felt that men and women should work together to liberate both from obsolete sex roles. That is very different from the current stance of men vs women. The reality is that the typical man has been locked and bound in roles just as females have been. It is just that these roles have traditionally been different, as I discussed above. So why has it become so easy to blanket men in general, when most men suffered the same fate as most women? We may have had different expectations placed on us, but that doesn’t mean that we were less free. Did we have more choices? In the past, it was easier for a man to become a scientist or engineer, but those roles were reserved for a select few. Most men were stuck doing grunt work, often under cruel bosses, in horrible conditions, and with little praise. It was expected that men would earn money and support their families. Men who chose specific careers that were deemed too feminine were mocked and ridiculed. The reality was that old rules trapped both men and women, and these rules were changing more slowly than other societal changes. The most effective path would have been for men and women to join together, but that didn’t happen. Why? Likely because most of us want to have our cake and eat it too. Did women want to give up the good aspects of being a woman (yes, there were good aspects)? No, they wanted to keep them but gain new opportunities. The same could be said of men who wanted more freedom in their roles but feared they would lose their primary function: to provide and protect.
Additionally, it is always easier to find an enemy to blame, and the easier it is to identify the enemy, the better. “I’m not happy and satisfied because of men!” “I’m not happy and satisfied because of women!” In some ways, this mobilizes a cause, but it eventually becomes destructive, which I hope to illustrate in my next post.
But who is to blame for these rigid roles? In part, it is life. For most of the last thousand years, our goal was just to survive. People didn’t think about self-actualization; they thought about where they were going to find the next potato. Once roles are established, they become challenging to change.
Additionally, people in power want to stay in control, and they view any “other” as a threat to that power. Was the typical man in power? No, we were not. Most in power were indeed men, but most men were not part of this powerful minority. We accepted our roles, our fate, and carried out our jobs, even when we didn’t want to, just like women did. Did this one-size-fits-all work any better for men? Nope, but it was what it was. Yes, there have always been abusive husbands, but there have also been abusive wives. There have been religious groups that used their power to manipulate girls, but they also manipulated boys. At the same time, there have always been those who charted their own course, and I’m not talking about heroes like Emelia Eirhart or Madame Curie. Just in my very average family, some individuals bucked the norms because it suited their needs.
Our country has become progressively polarized into absolutes. Good vs. evil, men vs. women, Christian vs. Muslim, and so it goes. When it becomes easy to cast blame on someone else, it becomes challenging to make meaningful change. Why change when you are right, and the other person (or group) is wrong? They should change, not you! Such a stance not only strips the accuser of power but also alienates the accused, leading to stagnation rather than progress. That divisiveness may be what those in power want.
When both husband and wife were working to their limits to survive, there wasn’t much time for either to assess whether they were living fulfilling lives. The traditional husband-and-wife system worked, but it worked better for some than for others.
I stated at the beginning of this post that our society is better when we fully embrace all forms of diversity. This means we must find common ground, not common enemies. Some of us want to be astronauts, and others are content to sweep floors. Some women are happy in traditional housewife roles, while others seek to discover the cure for cancer. Some of us are happy despite our circumstances, and others who can bleed sadness from even the most joyful experience. We are all different, and we all have the right to live to our desires and potential. The problem we should solve is how men and women can work together. We need to let go of generalized statements designed to inflict harm on either sex. Societies chose paternalistic or maternalistic models for a reason; they served a purpose. They are not inherently evil, and we would not have the lives that we do if those models were not in place. Yes, rules need to change, but to blame all the woes of women on men is not only inaccurate, but it is also cruel.
We need to move past blaming entire groups. Just think about how much recent damage we have done to our society by castigating Muslims, Hispanics, Somali, Gays, and Trans people. What benefits were gained from these actions? None. What harm was done? Quite a bit, not only to those groups, but to our society as a whole.
However, it serves only the rich and powerful. By assigning blame, the country can focus on those groups rather than on other policies that will affect everyone in the future.
Betty Friedan identified a problem affecting her social group: wealthy, educated women. However, it shed light on a broader issue: rigid roles for both men and women. Somehow, that truth has been converted to men are bad, women are victims, while at the same time dictating a new rigidity for women, as witnessed by the backlash against Trad Wives, those women who embrace traditional values.
There will be individuals who use whatever they can to control and dominate others. However, that is not the case for most. A bigger problem is those in our society with ultimate power. The individuals who set the tone for the rest of us to follow. Instead of talking about toxic masculinity, it may make more sense to look at the power brokers who make it difficult for people to live lives. If you don’t believe this, just go to any social media platform, which is now the most powerful source of influence. With little effort, you will find countless influencers who will tell both men and women that the other side is wrong. That will be the topic of my next post. But for now, please stop using blanket statements that incriminate entire genders. It is wrong and hurtful. If you call someone an enemy for long enough, they will become what you conjure. Is that what we want?
When I watch one video on YouTube, I’m instantly presented with similar videos on my “For You” page. Facebook shows 6-7 posts from random sources it thinks I would be interested in before presenting any content from my actual Facebook friends. When I turn on the radio, it is easy to find stations that have one-sided political beliefs. If I were dating, I could load up apps to cherry-pick potential dating partners. Social media is full of unqualified, self-promoting influencers who gladly tell me what to eat, what to believe, and what to wear. My content is being curated, and information is presented to me on a silver platter. That’s good, right? I would say no. In fact, I believe this is one of the most destructive trends to have ever impacted individuals and society as a whole.
I clicked on a “short” video on YouTube titled “All men should know this about women.” This led me down a rabbit hole of more and more videos from the manosphere. A segment of content that typically shows videos of disrespectful women stating things like, “If a man won’t send me an Uber, pay for my babysitter, my hair and nails, and take me out to an expensive restaurant, he is not worth a first date!” The male commentators typically highlight these ridiculous expectations, noting how women see men as a meal ticket and nothing more.
There are an equal number of channels for women who examine how men treat them as sex objects or just want a mama to take care of them. These channels present men in a similarly disgusting and predatory way.
I have always been a fan of radio. In fact, radio changed my life when, as a kid. I fixed an old shortwave radio that I found in our basement. This allowed me to listen to English-language broadcasts from countries with vastly different views from the United States. It was incredibly educational for me to hear their logical opinions, which were sometimes the opposite of what I was hearing statewide; it started me on a path to become a critical thinker.
Occasionally, I will do an AM radio band scan, starting at 520 kHz and working my way down to 1710 kHz, while listening to content. AM radio has gone from a medium encompassing a wide range of interests to a narrow zone of mediocrity. Sports, some news, religious, and foreign-language stations are available, but the predominant focus seems to be political. This has been especially true when I have traveled to more rural areas of the US, locations that may be served by only one or two radio stations. Here, the majority of stations are very politically right, and they often carry the same syndicated programming. These stations are hateful with a common theme: the right is always right, and the left is always evil, corrupt, communist, or whatever.
What about cable news channels? If you want to hear that the left is always right, watch CNN or MSNBC. If you want to hear that the right is always right, click on Fox News. It is possible to find similar biases across just about any social media platform, including YouTube and Facebook. Both of these venues have figured out that I lean left, and they are happy to serve up tons of that type of content, with zero right-leaning information. I never see an opposing viewpoint.
I’m not in the dating pool, but my kids have told me that most dating is now done on apps, where you can swipe left to reject someone or swipe right if you are interested. This creates so many problems for both sexes, as women are presented with hundreds of choices, and naturally, they are going to cherry-pick the most exciting ones. Why is that a problem? Because many are choosing the same 10% of top-tier men, and rejecting the rest. Competing with such a large pool reduces an individual’s chances of success. Additionally, this selection process is done based on a few characteristics, like looks, and ignores other qualities that are more likely to indicate a quality relationship.
I remember treating a very nice patient who was suffering from rare panic attacks. This person was genuinely a good guy. He was a newly minted lawyer working in the legal field, but he was having trouble finding a decent firm that would take him on. He was good-looking, polite, stable, loyal, and had good values. He wanted a serious girlfriend and eventually wanted to be married with kids, but no one would click on him because he was on the shorter side, and (per him) women want 666 men: 6 feet tall, 6-figure income, 6-pack abs. Social media told women that 666 was the minimum requirement.
How many posts on social media have I seen where some pseudo-expert claims that we are killing ourselves because we are using peanut oil, or that we can avoid dementia by taking the special supplement that they are selling? You must believe!
Why is this curation happening? Is it to help us? No, it is to encourage continued engagement. The more outrageous and one-sided the content is, the more likely it is to command the viewer’s attention. The old newspaper line, “If it bleeds, it leads,” was true then and truer now. The more engaged and enraged a person is, the more they can be manipulated. This is especially true when an idea is cleverly paired with another one, often by misrepresenting information and sometimes by outright lies.
Combine universal healthcare with Communism. How about pitting public health policies against individual rights? Another common ploy is to pit religion against science. Although these examples may sound ridiculous, they have all been successfully used to shape opinion and to control others.
Social media can also suppress opposing information. Suppose I have the belief that pasteurizing milk was not implemented to prevent raw milk illnesses, like listeria, but was done by some evil science cabal that wants to control me. Social media allows me to find cult leaders and individuals with similar ideology easily. The more cult-like a group is, the more likely it is to demand social isolation and obedience. Such beliefs may be funny to others when the individual is convinced that the earth is flat, but less humorous when parents place their children and their community in harm’s way by rejecting proven vaccinations.
Confirmation bias is a psychological tendency to accept information that supports one’s beliefs while rejecting information that contradicts those beliefs. We all tend to have some confirmational bias. However, when severe, that bias prevents us from making good decisions and hampers our ability to think critically. In the past, we would hear opposing opinions from those around us. We then had to sort out the information by examining all of the variables. Media sources were required to present information as objectively as possible. This was especially true of radio and television, which used public airwaves. You could read the “National Enquirer” for gossip, but you knew that your local newspaper would give you the facts. Many news organizations had local news reporters and investigative units, groups that have now often been dismantled for various reasons. As reporting has become more centralized, it allows for more corruption and misinformation.
It is imperative that we, as citizens, regain our critical thinking skills and stop accepting biased information from self-serving individuals and groups. But how can we do this? The first step is to recognize the problem. If you are reading or watching content that consistently upsets or angers you, there is a chance you are being manipulated. If you belong to a group or organization, including a religious one, that demands that you think in a certain way and where questioning is considered disloyalty, you are being manipulated. If you can not have a rational conversation with someone with an opposing view, you have already been manipulated.
What can be done?
-Avoid curated content that biases you against any other group. I’m not saying that you shouldn’t stay informed or have an opinion; I’m saying that you should avoid editorial content on YouTube, cable news, and other sources. The vast amount of information on cable news is editorial, and therefore often biased. Much is designed to be rage bait, keeping you watching. Expose yourself to “the other side.” If all you watch is Fox News, dip into CNN now and then. Better yet, avoid both and go for a more neutral news source, like over-the-air news, which has to conform to anti-bias rules. An additional option is to pick unbiased sources like the BBC, which is now easy to access online. I tend to listen to US-based news summaries and supplement them with other balanced sources.
-Avoid all hateful channels on places like YouTube. The world is a better place when we work together, as we have for millennia. When it comes to dating apps, women are in control. Here I may sound like an old codger… but I guess that is what I am. Women, look past the superficial and focus on the qualities that really determine a good mate. Here is another true story. When I was in med school, I knew a woman who was trying to find a boyfriend (I was married at the time). I had a friend in med school who I thought would be a great catch. He was very average-looking, but a great guy. He was smart, kind, considerate, and thoughtful. He was motivated to succeed and (in fact) obtained a pharmacy degree prior to getting into med school. He had great earning potential. He wanted to settle down and was looking for a serious relationship. He had the potential to become a great dad. I arranged a blind date, and he took my friend to a very nice restaurant for dinner. I was shocked when she summarily rejected him as he gave her the “ick.” Why? Because he brought her flowers on their first date, and that was “too much.” Holy cow. I’m happy to report that he is now happily married to someone who saw him as he actually was. His wife scored a good one.
-Broaden your mind. Although I’m more liberal-leaning, I’m always willing to listen to opposing views in a civil conversation. Sometimes I change my views, most times I don’t. However, I leave knowing why a person thinks as they do, and by doing so, I know that they are not my enemy. It is OK to have a different point of view.
-Use your critical thinking skills. If an individual or group demands that you think uncritically, allow yourself to question their motivations. There are so many examples of this, from claiming that everything is “fake news” to impostor influencers peddling their lotions and potions, to “experts” with statements like “This food will cure cancer!” Our current best way of determining something is by studying real data and testing outcomes. Listen to the majority expert opinion, not some quack. Majority opinions are sometimes wrong, but quack views are often wrong and self-serving.
We all benefit when we understand and accept each other and work together. Those who want to split us based on hate rhetoric have their reasons, and those reasons do not benefit us; they only help them.
I recently wrote a post on hygiene hacks and confessed that I did not use a traditional antiperspirant. I use alternative measures to ensure I am “daisy fresh,” so there was no need to hold your nose in my presence.
I watched a new episode of “The Great American Baking Show” yesterday. I was bombarded by commercials showing people spraying a total deodorizing spray not only on their armpits but on their saddle area, feet, back, neck, and just about everywhere else. I always felt that these areas were handled with simple soap and water.
I remember the push in the 1970s to get women to use “Summer’s Eve” vaginal douche, which led to all sorts of problems, from dryness to infections. I was surprised to discover that vaginal douching, a bad idea unless medically necessary, had been pushed by advertisers for some time before that. Lysol (the cleaning product) encouraged the use of a Lysol douche with ads with titles like, “She was the perfect wife except for one neglect.” By 1911, there were several reported deaths and poisonings due to this practice. Lysol responded by telling women to continue using Lysol, but dilute it first! Keep those customers coming, who cares if you are poisoning them! Doctors will tell you never to use vaginal douches unless directed by a healthcare provider. You will mess things up.
My father was born in Chicago in 1910 in a home that initially didn’t have a modern bathroom. When he was younger, he remembers being bathed in a washtub. As he got older, he went to a community bathhouse where you could buy a sliver of soap and the use of a towel for a few pennies. This would be a once-a-week event. I asked him if people smelled in those days, and he said no, people did a daily wash-up to ensure they were clean.
The first time that I traveled to Europe was in the 1980s. I remember hearing that no one used deodorant and expected my nose to be assaulted. I did not encounter smelly people on that trip. They were doing other things to clean themselves. Today, most Europeans have converted to commercial deodorants, likely due to advertising.
Although modern bathing and showering are the result of indoor plumbing, keeping oneself clean and good-smelling has been documented as far back as Egyptian times and has been recorded among just about any group since that time. Some used religious cleansing as the reason to keep clean; others had communal bath houses where they could socialize and bathe. Egyptians used simple soaps, while the Romans and Greeks cleaned their skin with scented oils. Other cultures relied on water or mild abrasives to clean away the stink.
We often think of Medieval times as odoriferous, but people from then were concerned about cleanliness and tried to keep themselves smelling nice. Then, as now, the more wealth you had, the greater your access to hygiene options.
Yes, there have been times when people thought bathing was unhealthy or a sign of moral degeneracy, but many still did their best to smell better by wearing pungent spices or perfumes.
Dirty clothing often causes a stink; in the past, cleaning clothes could be difficult. People would beat or brush out dirt, air out clothing, and sometimes remake outfits to remove stains. There were no dry cleaners in those days!
Often, their clothes were made of wool or linen, two natural fibers that are bacteriostatic and odor-resistant. They also wore layers of clothing so that their outer clothes never touched their skin. Their “underwear” was frequently changed. If you were wealthy, it was changed daily. If you were poorer, it was washed several times a week.
Research gains in the late 1700s and 1800s made the mass production of inexpensive soaps possible. Pears translucent soap was introduced in 1807, and Lever Brothers (now Unilever Corporation) introduced Sunlight soap in the late 1800s. During this time, soap went from a luxury item for the elite to a product that just about anyone could afford. In Germany, detergents were invented in 1900 and found their way into multiple products, including self-care items like Dove soap, a syndet (detergent) bar introduced in 1955.
Dial soap, which has antimicrobial agents, was the first deodorant soap and was introduced in 1949 with ads that stressed, “Dial stops odor before it starts!” Deodorant soaps have used a variety of antimicrobial agents that have been banned over the years. More recent studies have shown that consumer deodorant soaps are no different from regular soaps in reducing skin bacteria and pose a danger to the environment. Dial is still a popular soap; it uses an anti-bacterial agent called benzalkonium chloride, and I’m unclear why.
Liquid soaps were invented in the mid-1800s, but most current liquid soaps are not soaps but detergents. Softsoap brand hand soap (a detergent) became popular in the 1970s, and shower gels (also detergents) became popular in the late 1980s.
There are several methods to deal with odor. The first one is to clean your body regularly. In the US, this means taking a bath or, more likely, a shower. In other places with less access, it could mean a trip to the river or a sponge bath. Other methods are to use a masking smell, like a perfume, to hide offensive odors or to block sweat production in odor-causing areas.
I went on a hiking trip with a close friend. I stayed at base camp and did day hikes while my friend and his son did a five-day trek over the mountains. My friend is typically very clean, and I have never noticed him to have an odor problem. However, he wore the same clothes on this hike and had minimal opportunities to wash. It was sweltering hot, and he sweated quite a bit. When I picked him and his son up, I could only describe the odor as similar to a garbage dumpster. After a shower, he was as good as new, but I suggested he burn his hiking clothes.
Our bodies have two types of sweat glands: eccrine glands, which are located all over the body. When you sweat, your body uses evaporation to cool itself off. Most people can’t smell this type of sweat, but some can, including me. Eccrine sweat doesn’t smell bad at all; it smells like people, and I rather like it.
The other glands are the apocrine glands located in the scalp, breasts, armpits, and groin. These glands produce an oily sweat that serves as food for certain bacteria. The waste products from these bacteria give people body odor, or BO.
Feet only have eccrine glands, but sweaty, unclean feet trapped in shoes can generate odors due to different bacterial by-products. That is why smelly armpits and stinky feet have different types of pungent aromas.
I remember TV commercials from the 1960s in which a person would be identified as smelling bad, and the announcer would say, “He has BO!” But instead of him saying BO, a loud fog horn would blast, “BEEEEE OHHHHH!!!” That had to be a pretty effective commercial because I was just a young kid, and I still remember it vividly. It let me know that BO was a bad thing.
A fun fact is that many East Asians (Chinese, Japanese, Korean) don’t wear deodorant due to a gene mutation that impacts their apocrine glands. They don’t produce oily sweat, so those smelly bacteria can’t grow.
This history of deodorants is fascinating and has modern and historical components. People have used various methods to reduce odor, from Europeans who wore masking perfumes and spices to South Asians using alum-based products like the Thai deodorant crystal and Filipino Tawas powder. Alum is bacteriostatic; in other words, it slows down the growth of bacteria. Fewer bacteria mean less odor.
Washing your body is the primary way to reduce BO. Additionally, there are two ways to control underarm smells: deodorants and antiperspirants.
Commercial deodorants used to have antimicrobial agents, but they have mostly been removed due to health and environmental concerns. Now, most commercial deodorants are just masking agents; they are cheap-smelling perfumes for the armpits.
Antiperspirants use aluminum salts. These salts plugged up sweat glands, so there is no sweat for odor-causing bacteria to eat, and so there is no odor. Antiperspirants are the most effective way to control malodorous underarm smells.
There is a fear that antiperspirants can contribute to Alzheimer’s disease and breast cancer. These fears have been debunked many times and are not true, but they persist from self-proclaimed health gurus, often for their benefit.
I can’t tolerate antiperspirants because they make me itch. However, dermatologists now say to put these agents on at night to plug up sweat glands and shower them off the skin in the morning to eliminate skin irritation. I have not tried this as I already have another odor-controlling method that works very well. I’ll talk about that in the next paragraph.
I mentioned that some Asian cultures have used alum salts for hundreds of years to control body odor. These salts were marketed in the US starting in the 1980s as magic deodorant crystals, and I started using them in the early 2000s. These contain aluminum in compound form, but it is a different compound than those used in antiperspirants. Alum salts don’t block sweating; they are bacteriostatic and inhibit odor-causing bacteria. For me, they work like a charm. Ads say to wet the crystal and apply; I rub a dry crystal on my damp underarms after I shower. This method wastes less of the mineral and gets the job done.
Commercial deodorants were introduced in the late 1800s under the Mum brand, and antiperspirants were marketed in the early 1900s under the name Odorono. Neither was very popular for several reasons. Victorian era people felt it was improper to talk about such things as body odor, and they also felt that washing their underarms and wearing perfume worked well enough to keep odor at bay. The early deodorants and antiperspirants had many drawbacks including being irritating and staining clothes.
Edna Murphy’s father was a surgeon who developed an aluminum chloride solution to keep his hands dry during surgeries; she saw its potential to stop underarm sweating. Due to Victorian sentiment, she wasn’t very successful selling her antiperspirant until the 1912 Atlantic City Exposition, where she had a sales booth. 1912 had an especially hot summer, and visitors were especially smelly. She sold enough products at the exposition to hire the advertising agency, J. Walter Thompson Company. They assigned a new hire, James Young, to the campaign. Mr. Young was a former door-to-door Bible salesman without training in advertising. However, he was the man for the job. James Young is considered the father of shame-based advertising and could make potential customers worry about things they didn’t worry about before. He started to run ads for women saying that men would not love them unless they used Odorono, and sales took off.
From a 1937 ad:
You’re a pretty girl, Mary, and you’re smart about most things, but you’re just a bit stupid about yourself. You love a good time, but you seldom have one. Evening after evening, you sit at home alone. You’ve met several grand men who seemed interested at first. They took you out once, and that was that. So many pretty Marys in the world never seem to sense the real reason for their aloneness. In this smart modern age, it’s against the code for a girl (or a man) to carry the repellent odor of underarm perspiration on clothing and person. It’s a fault which never fails to take its own punishment—unpopularity.
He applied the same strategy with men during the great depression, stating that no one would hire them unless they used Odorono. Men then started to use the product. He turned a product that no one wanted into one that grossed 28 billion dollars in 2025.
There has been some backlash against commercial deodorants and antiperspirants, which has prompted companies to create green-washed products and home cooks to develop DIY concoctions. Let’s take a look at the marketing hype and ingredients used.
One is to continue to promote false claims that commercial antiperspirants cause dementia and breast cancer. To repeat, this is not true.
The other is to create fear about “unnatural” chemicals used in commercial products. You may be sensitive to a random chemical, but it is not thought that these agents are more dangerous than other deodorizing methods.
The term Natural has absolutely no real meaning. Frankly, the often criticized aluminum salts used in commercial antiperspirants are completely natural as they come from nature. Please don’t get hung up on this term, as it is used to manipulate you.
Antiperspirants are the most effective way to control underarm and foot odor due to excessive sweating. Natural deodorants use a variety of other agents to control odor and bacterial levels. Some work for some and not so well for others. Men sweat more than women and frequently work in more physically demanding jobs. Therefore, it is much more likely to hear women in office jobs claiming good results from a natural deodorant, where a man working in the field may be less enthusiastic. Here are some common ingredients used in natural deodorants:
Baking soda is a natural deodorizer, but it may worsen your BO as it is basic (remember acids and bases from high school chemistry?). The bacteria that cause BO in your underarms prefer a basic environment, and baking soda can encourage their growth. Plus, it can be irritating.
Essential Oils- Some essential oils, like Tea Tree, have mild bacteria reducing properties and may reduce odor-causing bacteria. However, all fragrances, including essential oils, can irritate sensitive skin, causing skin breakdown and more problems.
Coconut oil is used as a base that also has bacteria-reducing properties.
Arrowroot powder is a moisture absorber that may keep the underarms drier.
Corn starch has the same function as arrowroot powder, but is likely more irritating.
Activated charcoal- can reduce odor, but it can be irritating and staining.
Alcohol is often used as a preservative, but it could have some bacteria-reducing properties.
Magnesium salts have some bacteria reducing properties.
If you are a heavy sweater, natural deodorants are likely to be less effective. Additionally, they often cost significantly more than mainstream deodorants. You can buy an antiperspirant at Dollar Tree for $1.25 or a name-brand antiperspirant for about $4, while a Native brand natural deodorant starts at $13 (Walmart prices as of 4/2025).
There are many DIY recipe hacks for making your own deodorant, many using coconut oil and baking soda (see caution above). There are also several deodorant substitutes. Here are some of them:
-Spray or scrub rubbing alcohol under your arms. It reduces bacteria, but it is skin-drying.
-Use essential oils directly; this mostly masks odor, but can be very irritating to the skin.
-Use baking soda directly, it may cause overgrowth of harmful bacteria and can irritate.
-Apply glycolic acid directly; it reduces bacteria growth as it is acidic, but may be drying.
-Milk of Magnesia may reduce bacteria.
Some people have bacterial overgrowth problems that aren’t controlled by typical methods, and some dermatologists might recommend washing underarms several times a week with an antiseptic agent like benzoyl peroxide (PanOxyl), chlorhexidine gluconate (Hibiclens), or povidone iodine (Betadine). They would be instructed to wash their underarms with these agents and then leave the solution on for a few minutes before thoroughly washing it off. These cleansers can all dry out skin, so they should not be used daily. Most would use a daily antiperspirant or deodorant on top of this.
Whole body deodorants were introduced in 2017 with the brand Lume. Lume’s active ingredient is mandelic acid, which (like its cousin glycolic acid) makes an area more acidic and less friendly to smelly underarm bacteria.
Lume created a whole new market using funny but shame-based advertising; there are now many competitors. I recently checked out some at Walmart, and most seem to just be rebranded deodorants. Marketing is everything!
The Lume commercial makes people worry that they have offensive butt odor.
I’m a psychiatrist, meaning I’m also a licensed medical doctor. In my years of practice, I have been the medical director of several inpatient programs that required me to do a comprehensive physical exams…that is a head-to-toe exam, when a new patient was admitted to my unit. My nose has been very close to several thousand people so I feel I can honestly assess the need for a whole body deodorant. In my opinion, they are entirely unnecessary and could potentially disrupt the skin’s natural biome.
The vast majority of patients I have examined over my 40-year practice have smelled fine with basic hygiene. The ones that didn’t smell so good resulted from being dirty or having dirty clothing (or most likely both). They returned to being non-smelly with a shower and clean clothes.
For your saddle region, use gentle soap and water (or sometimes just water for women’s genital region). Your body cleans your internal structures automatically.
For stinky feet, change out shoes allowing them to dry, wear fresh socks, apply absorbent foot powders, and consider antiperspirant creams for severe cases.
If the above doesn’t help in those regions, it is best to see a doctor to determine if you have something that needs medical attention, like an infection.
Of course, there are other reasons why some people smell bad. We all know what we smell like when we eat garlic chicken or have a few beers, but those are temporary problems. Additionally, some illnesses, medications, and infections can cause odor problems. These are best sorted out by a healthcare provider. Lastly, some individuals have metabolic issues where they excrete malodorous scents. These individuals are rare, and I have never encountered one during several thousand physical exams.
For most people with odor problems, regular soap and water and clean clothing is the place to start, along with the application of an underarm deodorant or antiperspirant. If you don’t want to use anything under your arms you can try “washing up” a few times a day.
I’m not here to change anyone’s mind or to get them to start or stop any agent. If you are happy with your current hygiene routine, so be it. I’m here to educate, inform, and hopefully tell an interesting story.
Peace,
Mike
Sources for this post include the Smithsonian web page and other internet sources. Images are from the internet, and all content is used only for educational purposes. This post is not medical advice. See your doctor if you have medical or odor concerns.
