Well, what about men? Caitlin Moran’s love letter to masculinity

Gender writing that’s gracious and full of hope. Krish Kandiah reviews Caitlin Moran’s What about Men? Part of the Problem with Men series.

Krish Kandiah

Krish is a social entrepreneur partnering across civil society, faith communities, government and philanthropy. He founded The Sanctuary Foundation.

Four men stand silhoutted against a sunset, One stands apart on their phone.

Meilisa Dwi Nurdiyanti on Unsplash.

The first time I met the award-winning Times columnist Caitlin Moran, it was in her home, and she cooked me soup. She couldn’t have been more hospitable, which was particularly appreciated as we had met to talk about advocacy and hospitality for refugees. I found her personable, funny, helpful, and extremely well-connected.

Despite my deep respect and appreciation for Moran and her writing, I have to admit to being sceptical about her latest book What about Men? published by Ebury Press. It’s a brave thing for a woman to write a book about men. As a married Asian man I wouldn’t dare to even consider writing a book about what it means to be a woman, or white, or single. Yet somehow Moran has done the impossible: she has written a book that is both feminist and masculinist, both refreshing and disturbing, both gracious and frank.

For a start Moran makes no apology for being a woman, or for writing a book aimed squarely for white straight men, or for dropping the “F bomb” on almost every page, or for speaking explicitly and frequently about sex, genitalia and orgasms. She delves into thorny and controversial issues such as toxic masculinity, rape culture, false allegations, and pornography, as well as giving her opinions on men’s health, communication, loneliness, friendships and fear of death. Moran writes with unshockable candour and yet somehow does so with a lightness of touch, humility and generosity.

Moran shows us that we don’t live a zero-sum game: in order for women to win men don’t have to lose and vice-a-versa.

Here are the five main things that I appreciated about this book:

1. It is laugh out-loud funny

There’s no denying it, Caitlin Moran is a brilliant writer. Some of the chapters read like observational comedy resonating rather too accurately with my own experience. Moran has made great use of her large Twitter following and wide male friendship group to provide testimonial and anecdotal evidence for the issue in question, inserting their stories with the perfect comic touch.

2. It is uncannily resonant

Despite being born in Des Moines, Iowa, Bill Bryson has become a national treasure in the UK, writing not just one, but numerous books about the English. His outsider perspective helps us Brits to see ourselves through the eyes of those around. Similarly, Moran’s book about masculinity is so brilliant exactly because she is not a man. She cuts through what others would overlook, asking more interesting questions, and pointing to wholly different ways forward.

3. It makes peace in the gender war

Moran’s honesty and humility offers us a model of how to transcend the culture wars without avoiding the difficult conversations. Her book suggests that men and women can bring the best out of each other by celebrating our differences. Moran shows us that we don’t live a zero-sum game: in order for women to win men don’t have to lose and vice-a-versa. She offers a vision of a different way for men and women to relate to each other. As a firm believer in the power, possibility and pursuit of peace whether in the Russia-Ukraine war or the politically-driven culture war or the subtleties of gender war, I sincerely appreciated her efforts.

4. It celebrates good masculinity

Moran believes our society will be happier and healthier if men and women find ways to celebrate and appreciate one another. It was this line in her book that struck me as a vital perspective:

“There should be no shame in being a man. Being made to feel shame for how you are born is something every other progressive movement is trying to remove and trying to impose it on the one group that didn't until recently feel shame; straight white men, benefits no one.”

5. It is hopeful

It’s been a long time since I have read something about gender which was as full of hope as this book is. Sadly, many books in this field are written in a bid to fight one’s corner, including those coming from the church. Moran’s posture offers us a much-needed challenge. If an outspoken feminist, who claims to have only stepped inside a church once in her life, (apparently for Rev Richard Coles’ last service in his parish) has no fear of showing support to men and their rights, or of promoting a Christian sexual ethic of commitment before sex, or of seeking to find a peaceful resolution to the gender wars, how much more should Christians be willing to do the same?

My one and only issue with the book was when it tended to lapse into stereotypes. Being the sort of man who doesn’t like to fix things (I wish I did and I could), and who doesn’t find it hard to express emotions (have I overshared already?) and who does care about my appearance (check out my latest charity shop find!) I sometimes felt a little misunderstood. Or even worse, unintentionally pigeonholed as not really being Caitlin’s idea of what a man is. This is one of the biggest challenges of anyone writing about gender, how to do so without either reinforcing stereotypes or ignoring genuine difference.

My overall impression is that this book reads like a love letter to masculinity. Take this powerful paragraph from Moran’s last chapter:

“I wish for any man, or boy, everything I have wished for my daughters: that they can be proud of who they were born as; that this will never be a burden to them; that they can appear as they like; that they understand both their own pain, and that of others; that they can love out loud with their whole hearts, because they understand that love is a verb – a doing word; and that they never belittle or destroy what they envy, but recognise it for what it is: almost certainly, a future you wish for yourself.”

That quote reminded me of St Paul’s defining of love in a letter to Corinthians. It sets a high bar, but I believe it is both aspirational and achievable. I would love to see sentiments like this coming out of the church too, with similar books that can transcend the cultural flashpoints and offer great hope to all who need it.

Article

Attention

Culture

Digital

22 April 2025

5 min read

Let me level-up about playing games on my phone

Like all art, there's no standard for 'good', but good art doesn’t leave you puzzling over how you wasted an hour.

Mark Gilbert

Mark is a research mathematician who writes on ethics, human identity and the nature of intelligence.

Onur Binay on Unsplash.

Earlier this year I got a bit too into a mobile phone game. In the game, I was master and controller of a small virtual grid of assorted shiny objects. By the flick of my finger on the screen, I’d swap the objects to try to match groups together. If I did this in the right way, then the matching objects would merge into shinier ones which would help me win the game. I’d want to know what the next shiny thing would be and how I could use it to beat the next level.

I first started playing on my commute to work – usually I like to read or write and listen to music and sometimes to catch up on emails – but on that day I felt too tired for any of that. The puzzles started easy but got gradually harder. They were challenging enough to occupy the mind, but never felt too taxing, and the satisfaction-hit from each small win along with the visuals and sound-effects made me really want to keep playing. On the train home, it felt easier to just open the app and play a few levels than do anything else. I’d start the journey by telling myself I’d do a few levels and would do something else, but I’d easily spend the best part of the journey rearranging shiny objects.

I knew this wasn’t ideal. I’ve come to see my commutes as a rare unfilled moment, each a scrap of time, a space to read and think, and I was filling this gift with a pixellated dopamine hit. I’d try to stop and bargain with myself – setting a limit of say five levels per journey, but knowing this to be an arbitrary number, I’d blow straight through it. There are other empty moments, waiting for the bath to run or once the children are in bed, but these other scraps are empty only in appearance, and I started to play in these too.

My phone has a ‘sleep mode’ which tries to mitigate the by now well-documented negative effects of phone use on sleeping – lower sleep quality, duration and interference with circadian rhythms. In sleep mode, you choose a time – after this the colours of your phone will be replaced by black and grey. I started using this feature, thinking that at least if I dulled the bright colours to greys then I’d take the enjoyment out of playing and it’d be harder to tell the shiny squares apart. It was a good try, but it didn’t work. I learnt to tell the grey objects apart, and played on.

Mainly, what I'm not doing when I’m glued to my phone is engaging with life.

You’ve heard it before, but our devices are not that good for us – excessive smartphone use fuels depression, anxiety and insomnia, and the average teenager spends seven to eight hours a day in front of a screen. Smartphones are closely related to social media - a recent study found one in six adolescent girls showed signs of social media addiction. Smartphone use has become a well-worn topic with a familiar set of talking points: How lucky we are to have all the world’s knowledge in our pocket; how bad we should all feel about being so distracted; how smug we can feel about the fools stuck to their phones. These discussion points aren't new - many of the concerns about smartphones and screen-time started decades earlier in response to TV and video games.

These concerns are certainly valid, but I find it easier to consider what some of my smartphone habits are stopping me from doing. I'm not sure I'd advocate that we all stop using smartphones - having easy access to the Internet is a huge convenience, but I do pause to think about what I'm not spending time doing when I obsessively scroll or click. I'm also not convinced that all mobile games or even all social media use is bad. Computer games can be entertaining and thought provoking. Like all art, there's no globally agreed standard about what's good, but good art doesn’t leave you puzzling over how you wasted an hour. What differentiates social media and certain phone games is their business model – your time and attention is their revenue stream.

Mainly, what I'm not doing when I’m glued to my phone is engaging with life. If I put the phone down, I could be more attentive to the people I'm with – be able to listen to all the subtle ways we tell each other how we are – in short, I could be more fully present. I could read books, and I could read whole magazine articles or news stories on my phone, actually stopping to read rather than scrolling from headline to headline. Or I could do nothing and just be, undisturbed. If I’m commuting, I could enjoy the scenery or just let my mind wander. And I can remember that even in the quietest moments I'm not alone - God is always alongside us, and we can always spend time and speak to Him in prayer. Even for a few short moments to lift up the joys and troubles of the day.

“Well”, you may say, “That's all very nice hearing about these possibilities I could enjoy if I clawed back time from social media and freemium games. But how do I actually do it!?” Most of the answers I’ve found to this involve either stopping the habit completely – deleting the app or even not having a smartphone, or else they involve enforced periods away. Some have found that a digital detox of several days or weeks has helped to reset their relationship with tech, others set fixed times in their day when they can and can’t use their devices or certain apps, and some observe a “digital sabbath” where they intentionally avoid or reduce technology use for a full day each week.

As for me, my only way out was to delete the shiny object game, losing all record of all 1,500 completed levels. Given that I rejected my own help by outsmarting “night mode”, I doubt moderation would have helped. Unsettlingly, my fingers and part of mind really seemed to miss it. As I unlocked my phone, I’d feel a tinge of absence, as though checking my emails or messages didn’t have the same grip as matching colourful blocks

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