September 23, 1999
Web posted at: 4:00 p.m. EDT

(CNN) -- Susan Faludi, author of Stiffed: The Betrayal of the American Man, among others, is joining us today from New York City! CNN Interactive is providing a typist.

Chat Moderator: You're a well-known, well-established, and well-recognized feminist. Now you've written a book about the problems men have (and it's not just pointing out their flaws!) How does this fit your role as a feminist?

Susan Faludi: It fits exactly with feminism because feminism is about understanding that what makes us a woman or a man is not just our hormones or our genes, but also the society in which we live and the kind of cultural messages we get. So Stiffed is an extension of my feminist principles, an attempt to apply feminist analysis to men's situation.

Question from semit: Who gives us our first cultural messages?

Susan Faludi: Probably our parents. But one of the big problems we face more and more is the fact that cultural messages are increasingly generated from commercial consumer sources. Instead of taking our signals from experienced adult human beings and benefiting from their experience and wisdom, we're increasingly surrounded by non-human commercial images that tell us how to be masculine and feminine.

Chat Moderator: Do you think that, in single parent homes today (lead by the mother), children are not developing necessary bonds with a male figure that can effect them later in life, thus causing a disturbance in the way society views males?

Susan Faludi: Well, sadly, paternal invisibility in the home is not a new development. In previous generations, men have been saddled with a life-long pain of having fathers who were either literally or emotionally absent from the family. If anything, younger fathers, the newer generation, have a more open caring relationship with their children. And that is largely due to the women's movement, which championed such roles for men.

Question from Eggplant: Yes we do get messages from the media. How much time do you spend a day watching TV and how much talking to people in your community?

Susan Faludi: Well I'm probably the exception that proves the rule. I watch television mostly for research purposes, as ludicrous as that sounds, lol. And I have the good fortune to live in a neighborhood where my neighbors on each side have lived there for more than 40 years. So I have a real relationship with them. But looking beyond that circle, I see a community that's hardly a community anymore. Up and down the street are people who moved in a year ago and will probably move out a year later.

Question from auds: How does consciousness of gender relate to legal notions of "private power?"

Susan Faludi: I’m not sure how to answer that question because the law covers public power not private power. But the failure to be conscious of gender discrimination or the ways we make assumptions based on gender can have damaging public effects. It's only in the past few decades that we have challenged those assumptions that underlay much of the so-called "neutral" body of law. By not being conscious we wind up perpetuating unjust stereotypes

Question from Toni: What about the entire pink v. blue thing at birth? Before we have as much of a difference between us (as humans) we are RAISED differently/have different expectations of us.

Susan Faludi: I agree and what is so absurd about the pink/blue divide is how arbitrary it is. Before WWII, the color code was reversed. Pink was seen as a boy’s color because it was hot and strong. Blue was seen as the softer feminine color and babies were dressed accordingly. Before that babies were all dressed in white

Susan Faludi: So pick your decade and pick your stereotype, LOL.

Question from Philo: The title is intriguing. Who is doing the "stiffing" or who is betraying the American Man?

Susan Faludi: Well there is not a "who," there is a "what." That's part of the difficulty for men. It would be a lot easier if men could define an enemy and defeat that enemy. But men are being stiffed by a profound cultural shift that has undermined a society that needs and values men based upon their youthfulness. And it has increasingly replaced that with a commercial celebrity saturated culture in which men are measured by their appearance, their image, and how they rate as almost marketable objects.

Question from marfalite: So if men are feeling emasculated now, what are they doing to compensate these days?

Susan Faludi: Some men are finding scapegoats by blaming feminists or illegal aliens or Hillary Clinton. A few lash out with verbal and even physical violence. But most are quietly frustrated, confused and distressed. And a lot of men try simply to meet the demands of such a culture, and find themselves frustrated because those demands are so impossible to meet

Question from MarcinSF: We have seen a more socially liberal tenor in generations X and Y, especially with respect to bisexuality. Do you see that these generations are less prone towards sexism?

Susan Faludi: It is hard to generalize about a generation, particularly at a time when this less and less of a common experience. That said, there is definitely, in some quarters, hopeful, encouraging signs of a genuine relaxation about sexual identity, sexual preference, and a much wider range of defining what constitutes manhood. Or even beyond that, putting the manhood question aside and concentrating on the more important question which is "how do you lead a more meaningful life as a human being?" On the other hand, among the younger generations, exist a subgroup of men who feel threatened by those social changes and lash out. Witness the increasing violence toward gay men and the horrific slaying last year of the young man murdered in Wyoming.

Question from auds: Aren't the fears of men mostly related to globalization and removal of power from things over which men have had control--public institutions? When power moves from the public to the private, don't all people--both men and women--feel emasculated?

Susan Faludi: I agree. That is my book's message in a nutshell, with one caveat; even before this change, most men were not the powerful men at the controls. That entitlement is really accorded to only a few. What men have really lost is the sense that they have a real stake in society, that they have a way of participating meaningfully, that they have a way of taking care through serving a larger world.

Question from Philo: What should the culture be, that wouldn't betray American men?

Susan Faludi: What's really missing is a public society. So much of our culture is simply the product of multinational corporations who have no one's interest at stake other than perhaps the shareholders.

Question from aguy: Do you think women have too high an expectation for men: sensitive, protective, masculine, strong, caring, etc.?

Susan Faludi: Over and over again in talking with men, those are qualities that they themselves would like to embrace and experience in their own lives. But the problem is that that message is drowned out in a world where men are expected to be the lone wolf dominators at all times. And because that is the prevailing cultural expectation men and women both fall prey to it.

Question from marfalite: When you were interviewing for this book, did you find any men reluctant to chat it up with a notorious feminist?

Susan Faludi: Surprisingly, a very few. Outside of the Citadel, which is notoriously reluctantly to chat it up with anyone who is not wearing a cadet uniform, most men were willing and eager to talk because most men don't feel listened to.

Question from Teratorn: Ms. Faludi, your premise assumes that nurture only is responsible for public societal behaviors. But that idea is turning out to be a myth. Have you ever thought of turning your attention to THAT myth with respect to gender related behaviors?

Susan Faludi: Of course society over the sweep of history has served many pernicious disruptive purposes. What I'm talking about is the society that we should be striving for, not the sad facsimile of a society that we so often wind up with. Social justice and social welfare should be at the heart of society. And people, whether male or female, have a basic human need to feel validated for their contributions and their care.

Question from Ducky: Dad used to be where the buck stopped,,...Has that changed?

Susan Faludi: The role of the father has been a distressed one for a long time. But more and more both fathers and mothers take a back seat in a commercial culture, to the roving and essentially empty eye of the camera and the consumer market barometer that does not guide or teach or impart authority, but simply values people briefly for their salability, ephemeral popularity, and momentary image. The father has, in essence, has been replaced by a camera.

Chat Moderator: Unfortunately, Susan Faludi is going to have to end this session a few minutes short. Susan, do you have any finishing comments?

Susan Faludi: Thank you for the thoughtful questions. My main objective in writing such a book is my hope that we can get beyond the long standing standoff between men and women to a point of mutual understanding.

Chat Moderator: Thanks for joining us, Susan Faludi!