In the 1979 classic, “Being There”, Peter Sellers plays a simple-minded man named Chance (later re-named “Chauncey Gardiner”) who’d spent his whole life working as a gardener for a wealthy man. Chauncey’s entire existence unfolded inside the walls of the estate. He had no interaction with the outside world, and learned everything by watching television. When the wealthy landowner passed away, Chauncey was free to roam. Through a hilarious series of events, he somehow made his way into the Oval office, where his utterings – all snippets he’d picked up by watching television – were interpreted as allegorical wisdom sayings. This turned Chauncey into an international celebrity, and eventually one of the most powerful men in the world. The truth was that Chauncey himself was an empty shell, simply parroting phrases and mannerisms he’d picked up on the idiot-tube.
The National Center for Fathering says, “More than 20 million children live in a home without the physical presence of a father. Millions more have dads who are physically present, but emotionally absent. If it were classified as a disease, fatherlessness would be an epidemic worthy of attention as a national emergency.”
In the absence of emotionally available fathers and role models, every generation since the 1950’s has grown up like Chauncey. For generations, this is the milk we’ve nursed our sons with, training them in what it means to be a “man” in American society: John Wayne. Dirty Harry. Stallone. Steven Segal.
Somehow, we’re hypnotized into believing that a man capable of profound tenderness and love suddenly becomes an emotional invalid.
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All of these guys are the same person. Quiet, stoic, unemotional, withheld, not the least bit generous with empathy, tenderness, or compassion. But they’re not “real” people. They are cartoons. The range of emotions shown by every single one of these characters is limited to 1) rage, and 2) no emotion. Almost all of them have the same tragic story line about having lost a woman and then went on a vengeful rampage. (Dracula, anybody?) Somehow, we’re hypnotized into believing that a man capable of profound tenderness and love suddenly becomes an emotional invalid, incapable of working anything out without violence. Watch this enough times, and these wires get fused in our brains. We start believing this is what a “real man” is. But in the real world, a man who represses his grief and channels it into rage is not a man in touch with his masculine soul. He’s just..a dangerous dude.
Nobody’s born dangerous. We learn to become this way.
Unlearning it takes intention, courage, maybe even some desperation. Sometimes life kicks a man long enough, he starts to evolve. In order to fully mature, a man has to open himself up to the feminine. It sounds trite but it’s much harder than what we’ve been doing. It’s easy to punch someone, even easier to bully. A man’s got to learn to channel his energy from his brawn through his heart. But it takes a certain level of confidence and security for a man to allow the feminine to find expression through himself. A man who disowns his inner feminine is divided. That’s the sort of man who speaks with “forked tongue”: a tongue that makes two points, not one. Meanwhile, the arteries harden and the heart becomes a rock.
The “reserved” man who is able to hold his tongue rather then be driven by impulses is a mature man. My father was such a man. He rarely talked until he had his emotions in check. But that is different than keeping ones range of emotions blunted. The man who shoves his masculine soul into shadow is the kind of man our culture has elevated to hero status. Men who don’t talk much but when they do, someone’s getting hurt. Clinging to this Hollywood macho-man myth is now infecting our politics. We’ve got one running for President of the United States. Clearly this is a guy who learned about masculinity by watching Rambo, and the collective psyche of the white American man thinks it’s looking at a hero.
Moving through the childish stage of machismo into the Deep Soul of Masculinity requires a willingness to let go, to embrace fear, and face oneself without distortion.
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The “masculinity” of 2016 is not the same as the “masculinity” of 1950. Why would anybody expect it to remain frozen in time? It is the natural trajectory of all things to continue to evolve, and re-define itself as new challenges rise to the surface. Masculinity has a life-span that’s supposed to unfold developmentally as the individual matures. Moving through the childish stage of machismo into the Deep Soul of Masculinity requires a willingness to let go, to embrace fear, and face oneself without distortion. It is about becoming transparent and, at times, vulnerable. It is about being able to say, “I’m not really sure what I’m doing here. I don’t really understand your culture. Can you help me understand your experience?” How refreshing would that be if our candidate stood at the podium and actually said, “I’m not really sure what the fuck I’m talking about here, but I’d really like to learn because I really want to be of service.” A man who can’t do that is a man driven by his Inner Boy.
Trump needs to sent to the corner as much for these reasons as any other: He represents a collective shallowness within the American psyche. He represents a particularly ugly dimension of American culture that is clinging by their fingernails to the edge of a cliff, petrified they will fall off into oblivion. Here’s a Zen saying for you guys: Let go, or be dragged. Y’all need to fall into oblivion in order for the next wave of evolution to manifest. This shameful lack of concern and compassion for others must to be eradicated, because in the long run it threatens the life of our planet. Not just humans, but ALL life. It is anti-ethical to the progression of evolution. When men lose touch with their masculine soul, and instead choose to live through the surface layer of their macho skin, they rot from the inside out. As they rot, so does society. Nobody is safe.
We need our leaders to be men & women with courage; unafraid to live from their HEARTS; alive with compassion and concern for the welfare of all. We need leaders that are willing to stand out there and admit we’re interconnected and need each other; willing to do the hard thing and confront their shadows, to restrain their tongue when they want to say something hurtful, to take responsibility for their mistakes and the outcomes of their lives.
We need leaders that are committed to honoring their word and living from a place of honor as a central tenet of their personality.
We need MEN with broad minds that are able to think well beyond the elementary school ethic of “let’s beat up everybody who we don’t understand.”
We need men that are committed to creating safety for women and children and minorities and anybody who is different.
We need men who are alive and mature enough to give life to the masculine soul, men who are not afraid to weep, to grieve, express fear, and not afraid to admit they are sometimes lost.
We need men who are not only willing to make the world safe for women, but to make the feminine safe within themselves.
We need men that are willing to honor their vows to their spouses, to honor their promise to be there for their children, and raise their children with principles like compassion, fairness, and critical thinking.
These are trademark characteristics of “masculinity”. We don’t need a scared little boy running our country. We cannot have a leader so driven by fear that he needs to frighten the bejesus out of us, then pretend he can beat everybody in the world up. Um, no. You can’t beat everybody up. We don’t live in this kind of world anymore. The world has changed. Get over it.
This is REAL life. Not a movie.
Come out of hiding, Chauncey. We need a leader.
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Photo: Getty Images
That Greg Liotta puts John Wayne on the same level as Steven Seagall and Sylvester Stallone indicates he has no idea of what he is talking about — on any level. The conservative thrust of John Wayne’s films and the culture of his time was all about service to God, country, and family, most notably in his best, film, “The Searchers,” where he spends the better part of a decade rescuing his kidnapped niece after her family was slaughtered. But then, Liotta’s piece is a jumbled mass of confused archetypes and ideas; Chauncey Gardiner, Dracula, and Rambo are three wildly… Read more »
Wow!!!! You know me, I’ve always been a fan of your writing. I still am. Speak my brother!