To The Girl Who Believes “All Men Are Trash”

I was where you are. I was you. As a person who has experienced this same hurt, I’m sorry. I’m sorry it’s gotten to this point to where you’ve been hurt so badly you believe the worst in men. You deserved better out of the men in your life, and you deserve better from the current men in your life.

I don’t want to diminish your wounds or let you believe that you’re responsible for what has happened. I do want you to know that yes, there are fallen men who do not live up to what they are called to be. However, there are good men who seek to meet those standards. I’m not going to sugarcoat this and say that man will someday be your future spouse, because I’m not here to prophesy your future. You, and all women, deserve to be around men in your life who will uphold the gift of who you are, regardless of whether they are in a relationship with you or desire a relationship with you or not.

I know the feeling that “all men are trash” comes from a place of experience. You probably know all too well what it feels like to be an object used by a man. You probably know what it’s like to feel your dignity squandered, your body used, your emotions played with, or your femininity rejected. For all this, I am sorry. As someone who knows your experience, I weep knowing you haven’t experienced the proper ways you should be pursued, cared for, reverenced and protected by a man.

You can let the phrase “all men are trash” become your anthem and your attempt to regain power that was robbed from you, or you can heal. You can begin to reevaluate the men you surround yourself with and ask, “Is this how I want to be treated? Is this how I want to be seen?”

I get it. The idea of a man who wants the best for you, wants to protect you, and wants to affirm your femininity, and not just for the sake of being in a relationship with you, seems lofty. Do men like this even exist? 

With tears in my eyes, I say yes. It’s understandable that, having experienced what you have and seeing men not live out their masculinity appropriately, you can start to believe good men don’t exist. Even if they do exist, you might think there are only a few.

Good men are real, they exist. Unfortunately, many of them are hurt by this very phrase. This idea that “all men are trash” makes them believe we think too little of them, and that our minds are already set and that we wouldn’t even be able to see a good man when he’s in front of us. A wise man once said, “We can allow our hurt to transform us, or we can transfer it”. In this case, we can heal from the wounds of men that have hurt us in our lives. Yes we are hurting, yes the ways we’ve been affected are real and painful, but we do not have to live from that hurt. We can abandon the anthem of “all men are trash” and live in the truth of what we deserve out of men in our lives. I’m talking about all men; our fathers, our brothers, our boyfriends, our male friends etc. We can even call the men who have hurt us to treat us and other women better. We can live out of our hurt, or we can let that be what drives us to make sure no women has to ever experience what we’ve experienced ever again. 

Transform your hurt, call men on, and heal. There are good men who desire to affirm the gift of who you are, believe me.