THANK GOD FOR THE STOIC MAN

I’M done with apologising for men. I’m done with this endless listing of male sins, as if masculinity were a disease. I’m done, after watching the latest video from the “comedy” channel of our national broadcaster, the ABC. Strange, I thought, how the ABC finds — and pays — six women to sarcastically list various ways women should apparently thank men for protecting them, only to indict men collectively as violent bastards.

In the video, even holding the door open for a women is savaged as toxic male arrogance, when it is in fact the opposite — a ritual act of humility to acknowledge that men, being generally stronger physically, have a special responsibility to use that strength protect and even defer to those weaker.

But no: “Thanks, men, for holding the door open for me, otherwise I’d stand outside in the rain for hours,” smirks one of the women.

Then comes a torrent of grievances. “Thanks, men, for listening to me when we say no,” sneers another woman. “You know I’m not strong enough to know what I want.”

A woman dressed as an ambulance officer joins in: “Thanks to all the men out there for so many domestic violence calls. It keeps me in a job.”

And the video ends with all six women associating the many men who protect them with the few who are rapists, drink-spikers and wife bashers: “Thanks for protecting us from men, men.”

Yes, strange, I thought. Is there really nothing good to say for men? See, if a woman needs police to save her from a holdup, odds are it will indeed be a man who risks death for her.

If a woman needs saving from a burning house, odds are it will be a man who defies the flames.

If a woman needs saving from drowning, odds are that it will be a man who paddles through the waves to her.

If a woman needs her children snatched from extreme danger, odds are that it will be a man who puts his life on the line.

If a woman needs an emergency operation, odds are that it will be a man who performs it.

And what have all the men of restless ingenuity and ambition actually provided?

If a woman needs penicillin to save her life, it is a man she should thank for giving it to the world.

If a woman must drive somewhere, it is a man she should thank for inventing the car.

If a woman turns on the lights, it is a man she should thank for taming electricity.

If a woman loves books, it’s a man she should thank for the printing press.

If a woman walks through art galleries admiring the astonishing works of old masters, odds are that it is a man who painted them.

Men don’t expect or demand such thanks, of course.

Nor do men usually complain about generally dying earlier, working longer, paying more tax, or being more likely to be killed while defending their country or a child from peril.

But I do think some men are getting tired of this fashionable antimale hatred.

Of course, it is in the culture of men to stoically endure while middle-class women, paid from taxes raised mainly by men, make videos railing at the men outside who are tilling the fields, building the homes, manning the factories, patrolling the streets and guarding the borders.

Silly activist women, we men may silently think. But most of us wouldn’t say it. A bit too gallant.

And we certainly wouldn’t make films on the taxpayers’ dime denouncing all women in turn as dumb and needy and ungrateful.

That would be unfair. That would be sexist. Besides, some of us, without our good male manners yet beaten out of us, still believe such vindictive whingeing is what only weaker and less responsible people may be excused.

It’s the privilege of the weak, enjoyed by the weak, knowing the strong still think it weak and men to respond in kind.

Besides, someone’s still got to stand strong, while the simpering rest, glorying in their victimhood, lovingly count their wounds, hunt avidly for more, and complain and cry for rescue.

That stoicism is what we still expect from men, right? To just stay strong and endure.

Thank God some of us still do, quietly grateful to know most women do stand with us, even while the paid whiners and whingers claim to speak in their name.