At times I wonder if I should go for the “medieval/Victorian classic” look or the street modern contemporary outfit for a retelling of “Red Ridinghood”, after all the gender violence and toxic masculinity issues back then are still issues of today as well.

In the recent news regarding the war crime in Ukraine, people killed with their hands tied behind their backs, bodies of women showing signs of being raped, bodies of the dead being run over by tanks, it really shows a concerning trend of the state of the modern man. And this is not just Russian soldiers either. In other parts of the world, the US including, there seems to be pushback from the male and masculine culture. In a chaotic world, these men acted in a way to dominate other people and it makes me wonder even if these men are able to survive all this if their mothers have known what they have done if they can still look them in the eye.

Men in the US also have acted violently towards some, women of color, and Native American women as well. Are there really no parents to teach men how to grow from boy to man? Is being a good man consider weak? Or is learning to be good and worthy of love actually something very hard and difficult to be in one’s own personal journey?