| Yipes, how to begin?
It's my guess, *without* hard data to back me up, that a large number
of Americans still hold true to an ideal of masculinity which dates back
to the Eisenhower years ("me breadwinner, you housewife") or a reflection
of manhood as depicted in mass media (pick your own macho icon). Even
though it's easier to find more progressive, or at least different,
examples of masculinity, still, deep in the ROM part of our phyche (oh,
what the hell -- MY psyche) is all that gender role conditioning.
I used the vague phrase "mass market magazine poll" to describe one of
the places where this kind of retrograde thinking can be found.
LARRY'S THEORETICAL MASS MARKET MAGAZINE POLL
Question: Which attributes must be exhibited to be considered
masculine?
- Always in control.
- Agressive.
- Loves sports (football, NOT gymnastics).
- Earns more than the woman in his life.
- In a constant state of sexual readiness.
- Always in control.
- Never cries (if you really have to, then always alone).
- Embraces other men ONLY on the playing field or the battlefield.
- Might makes right.
- Proud of his bodily secretions (.1 nailed that correctly).
- Always in control.
- Always in control.
- And so on ...
Question: What attributes absolutely should not be exhibited to be
considered masculine?
- Reverse all of the above and add:
- Apologizing.
- Not owning a car past the age of 21.
- Understanding, let alone enjoying, opera.
- Having more treble than bass in your voice.
- Showing distaste for sexist, racist or homophobic humor.
- Being unemployed for any reason.
- And so it goes ...
I wrote the above with the same lack of insight and complexity I think
you'd find in PeopleRedbookReadersDigest. Comical perhaps, but what
isn't so funny is that I can easily click off the names of dozens people
I know who wouldn't disagree with the list above. The rules have
changed so much and so frequently in my 32 years on this planet that my
friends and I (young/old, gay/straight, men/women, Dem./Rep.) can't keep
up with them. And so we don't try. What I try, with varying degrees
of success, is to integrate what I consider to be the most nuturing and
most assertive abbributes into my live and do the best I can. It's
much harder than applying a checklist to each male I encounter (and
playing the unspoken "Do I Measure Up" game) but do sure makes life
much more interesting and rewarding. Confuses the hell out of my
parents but who said file-altering change can't be entertaining, too.
Allbest,
Larry
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I've been away for a couple of weeks, and though I was hoping for more
replies to this note, I'm pleased to have found the following
statements made:
>>The rules have changed so much and so frequently in my 32 years on this
>>planet that my friends and I (young/old, gay/straight, men/women,
>Dem./Rep.) can't keep up with them. And so we don't try.
Boy, that's a mouthful. When I stop and think about how society's
"view" of masculinity has changed from the time my parents were growing
up to when I was growing up to now, it's pretty amazing. Behaviors
which are relatively common place now (helping around the house,
assisting with children, to name two) were much less common 40, or even
15 years ago. A person who insisted (or allowed themselve) to be stuck
in their own or someone else's mould of "this is what how you have to
behave to be seen as masculine" would probably end up with a schizoid
view of themselves and the world in general.
>>What I try, with varying degrees of success, is to integrate what I
>>consider to be the most nuturing and most assertive attributes into my
>>live and do the best I can.
^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^
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That's all anyone can ask, and, hopefully, we all continue to get
better as we mature and gain more experience.
GJD
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