This article was really enlightening in more than one way. The small section on Joanne stood out to me the most. I found it very interesting on how us as human beings protect ourselves in moments where we do not even realizing that that’s what we’re doing. For example in Joanne’s case she was protecting herself from her dad’s abuse by resisting. A quick example of Joanne’s resistance is getting a tattoo when her father clearly told her not to. As small as this example might be by her resisting and doing the exact opposite of what her father told her to do she was undermining his authority. All the different types of resisting she did growing up towards her father helped form the person she would ultimately become. Once she recognized everything she did and stopped feeling “weak” she was able to overcome depression and agoraphobia. Resistance is a type of defense that we do almost on a daily basis. We might do it in small situations like at the workplace with an entitled boss or in bigger settings like with an abusive husband.

This was an extremely interesting read because it made me think of things in a completely different way. I normally see things in a positive way and see how our society is ever so slowly changing. Men and women are being recognized as equals within our society which is great; however, the men that have been “trained” mentally to view things in a masculine way are having trouble with this change. They’re having so much trouble with this change that they’re letting their masculinity (pride) get in the way of finding employment. According to Weir, unemployed men would much rather stay unemployed than finding a job considered a “pink- collar” job. This is due to their masculine pride that has been embedded into their brains since birth. We have only now started seeing a significant change in gender norms and these men are suffering due to these positive changes. For example when I was younger my dad ended up being unemployed for awhile and my mom was considered the “breadwinner” for our household. For awhile he had a personality change and you could tell he was depressed because his pride was hurt. With constant talks at home between him and my mom and the reassurance that what matters most was that our family was okay rather than who was providing for our family, he started to slip out of his funk. That’s just a small example of a male having his masculinity questioned by a female resulting in depression. This example is very small and was quickly and easily resolved due to open-mindedness. The whole idea of some men refusing to take  pink-collar jobs due to  having their pride hurt is insane. These men would rather starve and be homeless than to have their masculinity questioned. It’s very important that as an ever changing society we promote the positive changes we are causing because regardless of men and women becoming equals the idea of this change is not acceptable to some people and they would rather self harm than  adjust.