I am on a desert island, it is hot and beautiful and the only internet access is over a telephone line. Plus I am very busy swimming, sleeping, eating and reading. All together – the brain melted and is currently working on “the island mode”, so writing a regular blog is kind of a serious challenge. Please, bare with me through those “tough” times which will last till the end of September.Reading Croatian newspapers is a crucial part of the island life but not really inspiring. Still few days ago, I came across an article about the “New Man”. Yes, just another article about how poor men are today because they are expected to be sensible and tough in the same time. Well, if you ask me, they are in the exactly same position like new women who are expected to be educated, have a career, look beautiful, stay eternally young, work hard, be independent and in the same time be dedicated wives and mothers. I thought about this strange situation in which men are expected to be like women and women are expected to be like men and then the part of my brain that didn’t yet drown in the Adriatic Sea started thinking beyond the gender topic – actually, aren’t we are all expected to become EVERYTHING? Not only are women becoming men and men women, we are becoming citizens of a few countries simultaneously, we are multilingual, we are either switching careers or have parallel careers. But look at this: we also becoming both eternal children and eternal seniors. We are prolonging our childhood and the state of singlehood to our late thirties. Even when we become parents (and partners), we still allow ourselves toys, flexibility and adventures. (Interesting book on this topic: Pascal Bruckner “The Temptation of Innosence”). In the same time, the brutality of turbo capitalism is pushing us into (professional) responsibility, reliability and hard work typical for experienced adults from the very beginning of our work life – forcing us to become (professional) “old people” already in our early twenties. (Here, I am touching the topic of Richard Senett’s “The Corrosion of Character: The Personal Consequences of Work in the New Capitalism”, another highly recommendable book about how capitalism is influencing our character, turning us into endlessly flexible beings (the German translation of the title is “Der Flexible Mensch”). So little by little, starting with the “New Man” I landed on the aliens as we know them from SF: highly developed beings for which the difference between old/ young, male/female, Austrian/Croatian no more exists. But ugh, I have to admit that I really do prefer the “Old Man” to E.T…..

Tags: Commentary, Feminism, Men, Relationships

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