The measure of man

It seems to be Testosterone Week here at my blog, but I'm still pondering the whole masculinity thing. Once again, I disclaim that I'm just a never-married chick with no special insight into the male psyche, so I speculate. But I've been thinking about a comment Sgt. Stryker made on the One Hand Clapping post:

Most of what passes for masculine culture is really just adolescence extended out into what used to be the adult years. In other words, "guy stuff". Wrapped up in the guy stuff is the posturing, the trash-talking, the need to prove one's toughness, the fetishization of sports and weapons, as well as what I'll simply refer to as the "Maxim" lifestyle. Those are guy things that have nothing to do with being a man and if you wish to defend that against "feminization," I can only wish you swift destruction at the hands of your enemies.

A man is someone who is quiet, thoughtful, respectful and harbors a deep sense of responsibility to others. He does not posture or overtly try to prove his toughness or "manliness" to anyone else. He doesn't have to. He thinks before he speaks, and when he does speak, it's usually brief and to the point. Moderation is his style: moderation in speech, in mood and in action. He is not quick to anger. He is fair-minded, yet firm in his application of discipline and adherance to rules. He works hard. He is strong in mind and body. If you wish to defend this against feminization, you have my support, yet this ideal of a man has suffered more at the hands of the "guy culture" than anything else and I'm afraid he's a dying breed.

I don't know if this would "feminize" it, but I'd venture to say those are good traits for women to cultivate too. (OK, we're limited in the bodily-strength department, but otherwise...)

Anyway, this seemed to me like an excellent point to add to the discussion of that Kim du Toit essay that started it all (for other good comments, see here and here). When I think back on the definitions of manhood I've read about from the past, they don't define it just as not-female, but not-child. In fact, probably the latter more than the former. A lot of cultures have some rite of passage marking when a boy becomes a man: a bar mitzvah, a ritual scarring, or a feat of derring-do. There are rites out there for women too (let's not get started on genital mutilation) but male rites generally have more hoopla.

Why? Male chauvinism is probably part of it. But I get the impression that for guys, growing up takes more effort than it does for women; it has to be maintained, as if one could slip back into childhood if you aren't on guard. For women, it seems to be more something that just happens. This may stem ultimately from their different experiences of parenthood. I've never had a baby, but I'd think that having a child grow in you, giving birth to it and feeding it from yourself could hardly help but change you. Men are more distanced from the process, have more option to leave, and are often expected to take on dangerous work to support the family (for 90% of human history, it was hunting), so one could see fatherhood more as an act of will.

When you define manhood in terms of fatherhood, it changes a lot of things. I remember a few years ago I asked my father why he stopped riding motorcycles. He used to adore them, but he abandoned them permanently when I was about two years old. He told me that it kind of hit him one day, when he was driving to work in really bad weather, that he was being stupid. "I have two kids now," he recalled thinking. "I can't afford to die."

Was this "wussification"? I don't think so. A child avoids risk because he fears for himself. A man avoids risk because others depend on him. It's not disempowering yourself -- just the opposite.

I think Stryker is right that, unfortunately, this grown-up definition of manhood isn't getting enough credit in our culture. One problem, as I see it, is that childhood has gotten so unnaturally stretched out in the industrial age. A century ago, there was no concept of "teenager." High school -- let alone college -- was not part of standard education, so after puberty (or even before) you took on adult responsibilities.

Teenage boys are officially minors and stuck in the dependent child role, but clearly they want to prove they aren't children. So without meaningful risks and feats of bravery to perform, they invent meaningless ones -- binge drinking, smoking, driving recklessly, etc. Not all of them do so, of course, but the more antsy and aggressive of them (of which du Toit was probably one) will keep running afoul of authority -- which, especially before college, is largely female. (Yule Heibel had a good post about the problems of institutional schooling recently, via Joel.)

I suspect that's why this type of guy often looks at egalitarian marriage and parenthood as a step backward, a return to a world ruled by mothers and pseudo-mothers. Unfortunately, a lot of society seems to support that idea, speaking of women as "taming" men, as if it were some kind of conquest. That seemed to be the insinuation of the Cheerios ad that got du Toit so incensed. (I haven't actually seen it though.) On the one hand, I see nothing wrong with saying stuff you did when you were younger was stupid. Stupidity is part of youth. But maybe a better way of answering the kid's question would have been, "Yeah, I ate stuff that was bad for me before I met your mother. But now I don't want to die before you grow up."

Noah Millman wrote about this issue in a post last year, concerning his attempts to educate teenage boys about date rape. Ultimately, he decided, boys want to know how to be men -- how to be adults. So what does that mean?

Being a man is fundamentally about mastery. A weak man tries to master those weaker than himself: he abuses women, dominates his children, picks on smaller boys. He's a bully, and real men should despise such a person. A stronger man tries to master those who are a match for him - or stronger. He tries to win at competitions, test himself against other men. And he does so fairly, in a sportsmanlike manner, because there is no honor in cheating. But a truly strong man tries to master himself. We are pretty consistent about telling our young people not to pick on those weaker than themselves, and we send strong cultural messages in favor of competition (however much the P.C. crowd tries to stifle them). But we do not send out a strong cultural message in favor of self-mastery; far from it. And that failure is at the heart of the incredibly poor relations between the sexes that obtain on our college campuses - or at least, they did when I was there, and by all reports they are as bad as ever.

Now, saying "being a man is about mastery" sets off some sexist alarm bells. But if you take manhood in terms of adulthood, and that this takes more willful effort for males than females, it makes a lot of sense. And Noah's right that self-mastery is drastically underrated. We tend to see acting with caution and prudence in childish terms of "following the rules," as acting from fear for self or obedience to authority. Seeing it as deliberate self-discipline, as a purposeful restraint of one's own recognized power to do harm, is all too rare.

I think that women, by the way, are not immune from these same forces. Really, this is a general human tendency, though it's more pronounced as has worse consequences in men. In fact, I think one reason I'm worrying this subject so much (and why I sympathized with Donna Minkowitz in the previous post) is that I have some of the same issues myself, hetero though I be. So maybe this post is one giant projection. Oh well, what are blogs for?

Posted by Camassia at November 12, 2003 03:58 PM | TrackBack