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Angry White Men
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June 12, 2025
AN ASSESSMENT OF WHY SO MANY TODAY FEEL ANGER AND DESPAIR
Author Michael Kimmel wrote in the Preface to this 2013 book, “Whenever people have asked me about the subject of my new book, I’ve barely managed to tell them the three words of the title before they’ve regaled me with stories of blind rage being directed at them, daily incivility witnessed or experienced, outrage they’ve felt, heard, or expressed… And they’ve told me that they’ve found themselves angrier than they’d been… This rise in American anger has been widely… noticed. Pundits… mostly blame ‘them’---some group, organization, or institution that has acted so egregiously that outrage feels justified, righteous… the scapegoating has become a national pastime.
“And I admit, I’ve been angry too. I’m outraged by the arrogant religious sanctimoniousness of churches shielding pedophiles… Often I get angry about politics… I’m incensed by intransigent, obstructionist Republicans in Congress who won’t admit the mandate that the president received … and irritated by a feckless and spineless Democratic majority that can’t seem to seize that mandate…. There are other emotions besides anger… anguish when I read of young black boys shot by the police; heartsick for gays and lesbians still targeted for violence by hateful neighbors…
“On the other hand, I’m also aware that, despite all, it’s probably never been better to be a person of color, a woman, or LGBT in the United States… whether by race, gender, or sexuality, America has never been more equal… To be sure, I’m temperamentally an optimist. As both an academic and an activist, I often think of optimism as part of my job description… Surely, the arc of history points toward greater equality…
“And that comment leads me to… the book’s subtitle… what era, exactly, is it that is ending? And why is it ending? And is ending a good thing or a bad thing?... I’m describing a change that has, in most respects, already happened. It’s a done deal. The era of unquestioned and unchallenged male entitlement is over. This is a book about those men who either don’t yet know it or sense the change in the wind and are determined to stem the tide… This is a book about those men who refuse to even be dragged kicking and screaming into that inevitable future. They are white men who aren’t at all happy about the way the tides have turned… It’s about how feeling entitled by race or gender distorts one’s vision… those angry white men… who experience a sense of what I here call ‘aggrieved entitlement’---that sense of entitlement that can no longer be assumed and that is unlikely to be fulfilled.” (Pg. ix-xiv)
He adds in the Introduction, “I’ve travelled all over the country, all to take the pulse of angry American white men. I’ve sought to dissect their anger, their anxieties, the feeling they’ve been cheated out of their birthright… I look at the ways that middle-class suburban anger is beginning to converge with working class resentment and the agonizing cry of a declining lower middle class. All of these groups of men… are experiencing a rage at what they perceive as dispossession.” (Pg. 9)
He continues, “[This book] tells the story of the other side of the American Dream: the futility, the dashed hopes, the despair, and the rage… Economic and social changes that are bewilderingly fast and dramatic are experienced as the general ‘wimpification’ of American men---castrated by taxation, crowded out by newcomers who have rules bent for them, white men in America often feel like that are presiding over the destruction of their species.” (Pg. 14) He adds, “It’s a book about the mobilization---and manipulation---of a wide range of emotions into a politically motivated anger. It’s a book about how these normal, everyday guys… are today also signing up for rural militias, opposing women’s participation in the military, and shrugging off harassment and assault.” (Pg. 26)
He explains, “The fear that America is under siege contains several layers of anxiety among white American men. The fear that ‘they’ are taking over is an insult to ‘our’ manhood---for they will take our jobs, our homes, and our women if we are not vigilant. The fear that they are taking what is rightfully ours… The fear that we are being emasculated---by these less than fully manly hordes and by a feckless government utterly in their thrall.” (Pg. 57-58)
He observes, “These particular white men feel like victims. These ideas also reflect a somewhat nostalgic longing for that past world, when men believed they could take their places among the nation’s elite simply by working hard, and applying themselves. Alas, such a world never existed: economic elites have always managed to reproduce themselves despite the ideals of a meritocracy… It is the American Dream. And when men fail, they are humiliated, with nowhere to place their anger.” (Pg. 112)
He acknowledges, “The fathers’ rights movement is not a movement of deadbeat dads—anything but. It consists largely of distressed and unhappy divorcés who feel the divorce courts… system rests upon antiquated notions of women’s participation in the workforce and men’s participation in the family… the laws involving marital dissolution and postdivorce family relationships are stuck on an anachronistic sandbar…” (Pg. 164-165)
He notes, “The truth is that men also have choices, and even angry white men can move beyond those feelings of impotent rage and aggrieved entitlement. If these men can choose different directions, then it’s possible that some of the other angry men can find some ways to deal with their anger, too…” (Pg. 195)
He points out, “But the white supremacists are at least half-right---they HAVE been forgotten in the rush to the global marketplace… It hasn’t been black people who have foreclosed on their farms, or feminist women who have outsourced their jobs and closed the factories… or immigrants who opened the big-box store with massive tax breaks… that forced them to close the small hardware store their family had been operating for generations… their misdirected rage has led to sporadic outbursts, clandestine terrorist conspiracies, and paranoid political thinking.” (Pg. 276)
He concludes, “in many cases---especially the working-class and middle-class guys who feel unable to support their families any longer… only to feel screwed by a system that ignores all their ‘inputs,’ or the dedicated workers who suddenly lose their health benefits or are downsized by a company that cares more about its CEO’s offshore accounts than it does the lives of its own workers---these guys have a legitimate complaint.” (Pg. 284)
This book will be of keen interest to any concerned about the modern American society.
Author Michael Kimmel wrote in the Preface to this 2013 book, “Whenever people have asked me about the subject of my new book, I’ve barely managed to tell them the three words of the title before they’ve regaled me with stories of blind rage being directed at them, daily incivility witnessed or experienced, outrage they’ve felt, heard, or expressed… And they’ve told me that they’ve found themselves angrier than they’d been… This rise in American anger has been widely… noticed. Pundits… mostly blame ‘them’---some group, organization, or institution that has acted so egregiously that outrage feels justified, righteous… the scapegoating has become a national pastime.
“And I admit, I’ve been angry too. I’m outraged by the arrogant religious sanctimoniousness of churches shielding pedophiles… Often I get angry about politics… I’m incensed by intransigent, obstructionist Republicans in Congress who won’t admit the mandate that the president received … and irritated by a feckless and spineless Democratic majority that can’t seem to seize that mandate…. There are other emotions besides anger… anguish when I read of young black boys shot by the police; heartsick for gays and lesbians still targeted for violence by hateful neighbors…
“On the other hand, I’m also aware that, despite all, it’s probably never been better to be a person of color, a woman, or LGBT in the United States… whether by race, gender, or sexuality, America has never been more equal… To be sure, I’m temperamentally an optimist. As both an academic and an activist, I often think of optimism as part of my job description… Surely, the arc of history points toward greater equality…
“And that comment leads me to… the book’s subtitle… what era, exactly, is it that is ending? And why is it ending? And is ending a good thing or a bad thing?... I’m describing a change that has, in most respects, already happened. It’s a done deal. The era of unquestioned and unchallenged male entitlement is over. This is a book about those men who either don’t yet know it or sense the change in the wind and are determined to stem the tide… This is a book about those men who refuse to even be dragged kicking and screaming into that inevitable future. They are white men who aren’t at all happy about the way the tides have turned… It’s about how feeling entitled by race or gender distorts one’s vision… those angry white men… who experience a sense of what I here call ‘aggrieved entitlement’---that sense of entitlement that can no longer be assumed and that is unlikely to be fulfilled.” (Pg. ix-xiv)
He adds in the Introduction, “I’ve travelled all over the country, all to take the pulse of angry American white men. I’ve sought to dissect their anger, their anxieties, the feeling they’ve been cheated out of their birthright… I look at the ways that middle-class suburban anger is beginning to converge with working class resentment and the agonizing cry of a declining lower middle class. All of these groups of men… are experiencing a rage at what they perceive as dispossession.” (Pg. 9)
He continues, “[This book] tells the story of the other side of the American Dream: the futility, the dashed hopes, the despair, and the rage… Economic and social changes that are bewilderingly fast and dramatic are experienced as the general ‘wimpification’ of American men---castrated by taxation, crowded out by newcomers who have rules bent for them, white men in America often feel like that are presiding over the destruction of their species.” (Pg. 14) He adds, “It’s a book about the mobilization---and manipulation---of a wide range of emotions into a politically motivated anger. It’s a book about how these normal, everyday guys… are today also signing up for rural militias, opposing women’s participation in the military, and shrugging off harassment and assault.” (Pg. 26)
He explains, “The fear that America is under siege contains several layers of anxiety among white American men. The fear that ‘they’ are taking over is an insult to ‘our’ manhood---for they will take our jobs, our homes, and our women if we are not vigilant. The fear that they are taking what is rightfully ours… The fear that we are being emasculated---by these less than fully manly hordes and by a feckless government utterly in their thrall.” (Pg. 57-58)
He observes, “These particular white men feel like victims. These ideas also reflect a somewhat nostalgic longing for that past world, when men believed they could take their places among the nation’s elite simply by working hard, and applying themselves. Alas, such a world never existed: economic elites have always managed to reproduce themselves despite the ideals of a meritocracy… It is the American Dream. And when men fail, they are humiliated, with nowhere to place their anger.” (Pg. 112)
He acknowledges, “The fathers’ rights movement is not a movement of deadbeat dads—anything but. It consists largely of distressed and unhappy divorcés who feel the divorce courts… system rests upon antiquated notions of women’s participation in the workforce and men’s participation in the family… the laws involving marital dissolution and postdivorce family relationships are stuck on an anachronistic sandbar…” (Pg. 164-165)
He notes, “The truth is that men also have choices, and even angry white men can move beyond those feelings of impotent rage and aggrieved entitlement. If these men can choose different directions, then it’s possible that some of the other angry men can find some ways to deal with their anger, too…” (Pg. 195)
He points out, “But the white supremacists are at least half-right---they HAVE been forgotten in the rush to the global marketplace… It hasn’t been black people who have foreclosed on their farms, or feminist women who have outsourced their jobs and closed the factories… or immigrants who opened the big-box store with massive tax breaks… that forced them to close the small hardware store their family had been operating for generations… their misdirected rage has led to sporadic outbursts, clandestine terrorist conspiracies, and paranoid political thinking.” (Pg. 276)
He concludes, “in many cases---especially the working-class and middle-class guys who feel unable to support their families any longer… only to feel screwed by a system that ignores all their ‘inputs,’ or the dedicated workers who suddenly lose their health benefits or are downsized by a company that cares more about its CEO’s offshore accounts than it does the lives of its own workers---these guys have a legitimate complaint.” (Pg. 284)
This book will be of keen interest to any concerned about the modern American society.
September 7, 2025
The reader of the book was awesome! You could really envision the author of the book. I liked how the author travelled around the country and spoke with men about all of the changes and how they are handling them. It gives a perspective I can only guess about.
Displaying 1 - 2 of 2 reviews