Idiot Men

   About a month ago, my ball hockey team won against a team higher in the standings than us. The game had been close and this generally leads to tight, physical battles during play. After the game, both teams ended up beside each other in the dressing room hallway, waiting for the rooms to be unlocked.

   I was a little late getting there but apparently something had been said by someone on one team to someone on the other team and this had led to a verbal altercation. It was one of those chest-pounding, my-brother-is-tougher-than-your-brother kinds of things, with the two teams sidling dangerously close to each other. Sort of like playground stuff. I stepped in between two of the main verbal combatants (fairly safe when you've got goalie equipment on), faced my guy and basically gave him the "let's knock it off" speech. The refs were also busy keeping the peace and so both teams retreated to their now-unlocked dressing rooms and the whole incident was over.
   Men, acting like idiots. Again.
   Not long after I got home (and possibly the next day) I came across an article in social media. It's a piece written by Margaret Wente for the Globe and Mail and it's called "When men behave badly." You can read it for yourself here. 
   In it, she refers to a British Medical Journal study in which they investigated male behaviour in regards to risk-taking, particularly low-reward risk-taking. The gist of the study was that men have a much higher propensity for doing stupid stuff than women, stuff which might not even offer viable rewards. Essentially, men are idiots. The study even coined the term "male idiot theory" (MIT).
   Okay, I didn't tell you anything you didn't already know, did I?
   For the purposes of this blog post, I am going to lump in the types of men Wente described (those who relish in silly stunts and risk-taking) along with men who see their maleness as a licence for power. I consider them all to be "idiot men". You may have an idiot man in your life and, if you're lucky, he's one of those idiot men who has a few other redeeming features and that is why you possibly still love and/or allow him to exist in your world.
   If you are un-lucky, however, the idiot man in your life is (at best) an albatross around your neck or (at worst) a threat to your life and the lives of the ones around you.
   My circle of friends has supplied me with examples, seemingly endlessly, of idiot men.
   These men treated their spouses or girlfriends with extreme disregard. The women were belittled, ridiculed, controlled, ignored and quite often kept away from their support groups. They were asked to conform to the man's idea of what he thought was good for them. In the odd case, women came face-to-face with physical violence.
   Most of this was reported second-handedly but some of it happened right in front of me. Each time it happened, my jaw dropped, at least figuratively. It was incomprehensible to me that one human being could be so disrespectful to another, let alone a man to a woman he professed to care for.
   Every time something like this happened, my list of idiot men grew. A brief sojourn through the daily news and the list becomes seemingly endless.
   It is the quest for power (or perhaps the irrational fear of losing it) which fuels idiot men, I believe. When we won that game over that better team, we stripped them of some of their power. Their power became our power, suddenly, and out of this arose the post-game conflict. 
   Losing your power to a woman is even more problematic for idiot men. In all the gradations of power conflict, the fact that most women are at least physically weaker than men (ignoring for the moment my own personal belief that most men would die during childbirth) makes losing power to them that much more inconceivable. An idiot man can rationalize his team losing or his male boss having control over him or a big loss on poker night but he will have issues when and if a woman strolls into his life in a position of viability.
   

So, from male idiocy on a global basis (think Boko Haram) to male idiocy on a national basis (think Jian Ghomeshi) to male idiocy on a neighbourhood basis (think that guy you know who referred to his wife as a stupid bitch), the world is rife with men acting like idiots. The irony, though, is that often when you give up that irrational need to be in a position of power you actually become more powerful! If one hockey team stands outside a dressing room voicing insults at the other team and that other team just goes yeah, whatever and marches into its own room then where does the true power lie there? 
   It is a freeing thing when you give up the trappings of male idiocy. When there is  no need to live up to some testosterone-driven hype or standard about the need for dominance, you become free to simply live your life. Threats will disappear or become diminished. People will work with you, rather than against you. And, chances are, you'll live longer!