February 21, 2021 by Tessa Hughes
My ex-boyfriend and I ultimately broke up because of politics. It was the basis of our first fight, and most of our succeeding ones. I never got pushed over the edge from one incident, I just grew tired of trying to change someone that was so stuck in their ways and I did not want to be in a relationship where I felt the need to change my partner. But with how much he claimed to love me, getting him to see and agree with my political views seemed feasible.
When I first broke up with him, I was told I wasn’t being fair – that politics weren’t a legitimate reason to end things. This made me question everything that I was feeling, and I felt extremely invalidated. So, we got back together. However, the weight I had long been feeling still wasn’t lifted and something still didn’t feel right.
That’s when I knew that disagreeing about politics was a completely valid reason to not be with someone. Their political views are how they see the world, how they think it is okay to treat others and what they value in life. If these don’t align, someone in the relationship will always be sacrificing something.
We had many fights regarding “political matters” such as transgender rights, homelessness and racism, but the one that affected me the most was when he told me he was an anti-feminist. He believed that the movement was actively working against him, as a straight, white, cis-gender male. He feared that bringing other people up to the standard and privilege he had always been blessed with would make life harder for him.
This selfishness and entitlement astonished me. I was disgusted that he could so easily disregard people and be blind to his privilege. I subconsciously held him at a distance from this point on.
Looking back, it should’ve been so clear that he never loved me, only the idea of me – what I stood for and what dating me meant to him. He enjoyed having a girlfriend, but not me specifically. I could’ve been anyone. To him, I was merely an object.
I wish I was able to recognize this sooner so then every subtle act of disrespect would’ve been clear, but hey, hindsight is 20/20.
I wasn’t allowed to have my own friends during our relationship. He did not have many close friends when we met, so he enjoyed tagging along to everything I did with my friends. That pattern quickly turned into him becoming offended every time he wasn’t invited to every social outing with me.
He even became threatened by my relationships with my closest friends. If one of them had their arm around me or legs on me while sitting on a couch, he would remove them so he could do the same. The term “territorial” doesn’t even begin to explain his behavior.
My time was also never mine. Everything was on his terms. He would make me feel guilty whenever I felt overwhelmed and needed time to myself. He knew I was busy with school and extracurriculars, and that I was insecure about not making enough time for him or my friends, so he used that against me. He told me I wasn’t prioritizing him despite seeing him almost daily.
However, when he was busy with school or feeling stressed, he would tell me he needed a couple of days alone. I would respect his boundaries and he would not see or hardly text me during those times. The double standards were very clear between us.
My body also did not feel like mine for the duration of our relationship. The way he touched me half of the time made me feel uncomfortable. It didn’t feel cute or romantic, but like I was a piece of meat and he was a drooling dog. He would giggle like a 12-year-old getting away with something “naughty,” which was not cute or not mature but very objectifying.
Our first big fight, and the first time I considered breaking up with him, really irked me because it was the first instance I saw his selfish, privileged nature in the flesh. After we had relatively talked it through, he attempted to initiate something physical despite that I was clearly still bothered. My emotions are fairly easy to read and, if something is off, it’s clear. He knew that, yet he still tried to begin something with me that I was not in the mood for. When I finally explicitly verbalized that it was not going to happen, he told me that he was going to leave. Good, that is exactly what I wanted.
Looking back now, I gag at how I allowed myself to be treated. The level of disrespect and self-absorption present in him are appalling. My body wasn’t the only one he felt entitled to during our relationship either.
He consistently made threesome remarks whenever my friends were around despite his apparent jealousy. I passed them off as stupid jokes at the time, but my friends were uncomfortable by the remarks and I feel horrible for dismissing them. He only saw us as objects for his sexual amusement and pleasure.
He still attempted to use my friends as pawns with me post breakup and harassed them on end. He would text, call and FaceTime them. He accused them of bullying him in his hometown where none of us lived or visited. They had to send him their location just to prove that they weren’t in the same city to provide some relief.
He sent me a gift for my birthday right after we broke up. I tried to think it was sweet in the moment, but, deep down, it felt weird that he did this. It took me awhile to figure out why, but I eventually recognized this as another pattern in our relationship: the idea that I could be bought.
After every fight, he would buy me things. He acted like this was the way to my heart, even after I repeatedly told him I didn’t like the dynamic that it established. I think buying gifts for each other is cute when you’re dating someone, but the way that he was doing it wasn't out of kindness. It was instead an attempt to obtain a sense of control over me, once again making me feel objectified.
This was made clear directly after our final breakup. His former roommate told my best friend that, while we were together, my ex-boyfriend believed that he had control in the relationship – that he “wore the pants” He said outright that I was a thing that he could control, not a person with my own autonomy.
I consistently felt like an object around him. I was not a unique, individualized person. I was not seen for who I was. Instead, I was a generic girlfriend, that honestly could’ve been anybody. I was ordinary. I was an object that, in his eyes, was there for the taking.
Recognizing this pattern took me a while after we broke up. A weight was lifted off of my shoulders and I didn’t realize how big it was until I was able to identify why it was there: I dated an anti-feminist. That term, in and of itself, goes against my very nature. I am one burnt bra away from being a radical feminist, so how did I allow myself to stay in a relationship with someone who doesn’t respect women, and was I a bad feminist for doing so?
I grappled with both of these questions for months after we broke up. Not because I was not over him, but because I was not over how I let myself be with a person who thought so little of me as a human being.
I ultimately came to the conclusion that no, I was not a bad feminist for dating an anti-feminist, because I have learned since then. I have since been in relationships that I have left because I did not have my needs met and I was not being treated fairly. I have established boundaries and worked to become the best partner I can be for others. Reaching this point, however, took work and self-reflection.
The why of how long our relationship lasted really got to me. I realized that attempting to “fix” what was wrong with us and our dynamic is what I have been taught to do my entire life. As the woman in a heterosexual relationship, society ingrained in me that I am supposed to be the caretaker, the one that ensures things run smoothly and makes the relationship more comfortable for the man.
This phenomenon is actually common amongst women, who are often expected to be the emotional crutch for their significant other without anything in return. Women are taught to foster intimate relationships from a young age, which is not something passed along to men. Failing to build strong emotional relationships has isolated generations of men and fed into the larger issue of toxic masculinity.
My ex-boyfriend had this toxic masculinity so deeply ingrained in him that it was basically a personality trait. That is why I always had to invite him to things, but he didn’t for me. That is why he felt threatened by my other close, personal relationships with my friends. That is why I always had to make time for him, but never the other way around. He saw me as his person, but for me, I had other people.
Having others while he did not created a barrier between us because I never felt like I could go to him with my issues. He placed all of his emotional baggage on me, so I carried that weight on my shoulders and took it as a personal responsibility to not further burden him. Our breakup was so liberating because I was finally free of these expectations I had been holding for the both of us.
My ex-boyfriend’s sense of toxic masculinity and privilege shaped his view of the world and how he thought it was acceptable to treat others. That influence directly ties into political beliefs, and is a complete valid reason for me to have broken up with him. Just because it took me so long — and a political lens — to see that he was not changing does not make the issue any less serious.
Dating someone with differing beliefs can only work if one doesn’t directly inflict harm or fundamentally disagree with the other as a human being, which is what my relationship dynamic consisted of. His male sense of entitlement allowed him to see himself as superior to women. He felt threatened by the feminist movement thinking that leveling the playing field for men and everyone else in the country would make his life more difficult. This mindset is inherently sexist, racist, homophobic, transphobic... I could go on.
He would tell me that we can just agree to disagree whenever we fought about politics. This suggestion was a form of gaslighting. Our fights mattered to me because the politics were targeting me as a human being, but did not matter for him as he was content ignoring them and being complacent.
I am able to recognize the red flags that were present in this relationship easier now, and I have grown from this experience. The maturity that I gained from living through it and leaving has also given me a stronger sense of confidence that I can take into new relationships and life in general.
It was really hard to get here and I battled a lot of shame as a feminist dating someone so ignorant, but I am no longer defensive of why I stayed so long because it brought me to where I am today. Yes, it was hard, and yes, I wish I had enough self-respect to leave as soon as he showed me his true colors. But in the end, I did, and that’s what matters.
So no, I am not a bad feminist. I took this opportunity as a chance for growth and to become a stronger person. No woman should be ashamed for existing based on how society has taught them to; I just hope they will recognize where societal expectations are bullshit and work to remedy them.
Also, a pro-tip to protect other women from the same mistakes I made since I have seen my ex-boyfriend and others of his kind on dating apps: if his bio says he respects women, the odds are that he does not. ;)