u/CosmeticSplenectomy

I have known this fellow for over 10 years in the context of a shared hobby where we spend a lot of time together with others. This hobby is 100% devoid of any gender-related concerns. He's a grandfather who has been married to a woman for decades, so presumably he's not gay.

Over time, he shared stories about his experiences with men's group that seemed a little bit cultish. Expensive retreats (his wife gets upset about the cost BTW), guru-like figures, collective crying, getting naked and dancing at the end. It seemed pretty harmless overall. Sterling Relationship Seminars, they were called. For about a year he would tell us stories about arguments with his wife where she would demean it, and we encouraged him to divorce. When he found out he'd have to split half his pension fund, he totally stopped complaining to us about her.

Once he told an audience of a few people that in one of those retreats, he was sharing a bed with some guy who he apparently spooned "mistaking" him for his wife, and the guy had jumped off in horror. It took it with a grain of salt, maybe it's true maybe it's not, but that's the story he told.

Lately he's been made leader of some other men's self-improvement circle but he hasn't shared details other than there is a member who is a genius self-taught physicist who is trying to convince the academic world of some Theory of Everything that he's developped.

I don't know if it's age or memory loss related but the past few years he's been obsessed with making generalizations about gender and gender relations, as well as a fixation on trans stuff. I don't connect with any of it because, you know, I'm past menopause and I am enjoying freedom from any reproductive encumberments, I don't see genders, I see people. I gently try to steer him away from these generalizations and reinforce that people are individuals first.

The trans fixation is puzzling. I don't know if he feigns ignorance about transitions, or if he's truly ignorant, but he sometimes drops questions with answers everyone knows, such as the definition of transvetism. He brings things up when you least expect it, or will pounce on the tiniest opening in the conversation to express some weird blend of disgust/disbelief/incomprehension of the whole phenomena. It's so puzzling... I really don't care what lurks in people's trousers but for him, it's some central truth of life or something.

My husbands swears he must be suffocating in the closet. A couple of times I jokingly/seriously told my friend that's it's 2026 and it's okay to be gay and he didn't deny it so maybe that's it?

He did all this again today and come to find out... he listens to "podcasts" and watches youtube for "truth" about his favorite topics, and he added that "young women today are raised to hate men" and he was really worked up over this. Like, man, you're 74, why are you listening to manosphere podcasts, are you trying to get laid??? It's a little late for that... don't worry I didn't say that to his his face but wow... it's bizarre.

I'm not his therapist, just an observer and unwilling pair of ears when it comes to these weird ideas of his.

Thanks for reading, I don't have anyone to tell this to.