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The original was posted on /r/twoxchromosomes by /u/-ajrojrojro- on 2023-09-27 23:23:28.

I was going through a thread and the question was: “Men, what are some things about you that women don’t know?”

Most of the answers were things like “we want to be loved” “we want a hug” “tell us you love us”

And every time I read something like that I usually scoff and think sure, you’re absolutely right, but I just know that the next comment of the same person will bash feminism for it (which doesn’t even make sense because it’s a feminist issue - they are just uneducated and think feminism is exclusively about women. They don’t understand that their inability to show vulnerability as a man is a consequence of patriarchy)

But just now I realised something I hadn’t really thought about.

I was thinking about how I always feel the need to keep a distance from certain men (friends, colleagues, …) because otherwise they will think I’m interested and start acting inappropriately. The reason we are telling our female friends that we love them and not our male friends is because women are safe to tell this to. Men aren’t - some are, some aren’t, and there’s no way for us to know. So we usually refrain.

It would help if men started sharing those feelings with each other first.