This comment was by Steve Winfield in reference to the post – Is the NFL’s Culture of Violence Causing a Crisis of American Masculinity?
I don’t think the NFL “culture of violence” CAUSES a masculinity crisis – I believe that NFL popularity, competitive sports popularity, market success of violent content from sports to music to film, are all SYMPTOMS OF a crisis of masculine identity.
Do you remember Stephen Colbert’s term, a few years ago… “truthiness”? He was describing statements (primarily by politicians) that sounded “truthy” without any actual truth. I think that most people don’t even realize that they have two totally separate, mutually incompatible concepts of masculinity. I identify these as, first, “manhood” (i.e., what it really means to be a “man”, all the things one might admire in their father or any male who treats others with dignity and respect, who keeps their promises, and generally makes the world and society better by their involvement in it). Against this, I recognize a second concept, “manliness”, which has nothing to do with a person’s character, but is instead all the macho BS posing that insecure frat boys do to “prove themselves” in the eyes of their peers. “Manliness” can be anything a group of guys decides it is – in one group, it might be the ability to ingest the most beer by deep-throating a beer bong hose. In another group, it might be showing the largest number of sext photos from their hottest girlfriends. Still, another group might measure “manliness” by its members’ ability to drive fast, or on the edge of control (i.e., “drifting”), or simply to drive the car with the most “bling”. Dominance in sports is a measure of “manliness” – it simultaneously stands as a surrogate for the athlete’s presumed ability to dominate and conquer reproductive partners, and for his ability to attract them by offering security through his strength.
The primary difference between “manhood” and “manliness is this: Real men do not demonstrate manhood in order to prove that they are men – they do these things because they (the things) are necessary, proper, noble and good. They do these things automatically, without even thinking about why. Conversely, guys who focus on demonstrating “manliness” are ALL ABOUT how their actions appear to others – they ultimately do these things in an effort to secure validation of their manliness in the eyes of their peers and desired partners. These guys have not yet developed enough confidence in their own status as men to realize that they have nothing to prove to anybody else, so they measure their own manliness by the affirmation and approval of others.
The crisis of masculinity that I see, originates in the fact that fewer and fewer males understand that their own value as men originates in themselves and is demonstrated by how WELL they treat others, leaving ever-increasing numbers of males performing jackass “manliness” stunts to gain the approval of their equally uninformed peers. Popular culture has responded to this masculinity crisis by feeding into and reinforcing it. This is a feedback loop. Men watch James Bond films because Bond is “cool”, and (or because..) at the end, he always gets the girl. Bond’s viewers want to be Bond – they want everything Bond has, even the magnetic wristwatch that unzips Jane Seymour’s dress. Because these guys want to be Bond, they go to see his films… so the studios keep making Bond films.
Sadly, “manliness” is so pervasive in popular culture, that women are buying into it and reinforcing it. Women say they want men who are more “civilized”, less “primitive”, more logical, less aggressively sexual, less brutishly violent… but in real life, many women turn their noses up at the college educated metrosexual and instead give their phone numbers to the brawny, hulking construction worker. I’ve had women dump me, telling me it was because I WASN’T constantly pawing at them for sex – all of their experience (and the majority of media messages) told them that if I was interested in them, I would show it through an insatiable interest in sex. If I was “manly”, I would hound them for sex… and I would be easy to control by the giving or withholding of sex. Because I did not conform to that “manliness” template, they judged me “too independent” and “not interested enough”. Because I did not satisfy these women’s preconceived expectations, I was “unpredictable”, which left them feeling insecure in their relationships with me.
Unfortunately… I don’t think we will ever eliminate violence, aggression, strength, or competition from society. It is something like a law of nature (I think it’s actually related to the law of increasing entropy) that negative forces overcome positive forces. Consider the thousands of manhours and billions of dollars (themselves created through billions of taxed manhours) necessary to build a battleship. Then consider that this battleship can be sunk by a half-million dollar torpedo. Or, it can be left at anchor somewhere, and rust will sink it in about 40 or 50 years without any human intervention. “Sink” is more powerful than “build”. You can buy 100 acres somewhere and painstakingly plant 10,000 saplings. Then you can watch this forest slowly grow over several decades. Then, I can come along with a match, and destroy it in two days. If you tell your partner “yes, I would like to make love with you tonight”… if their response is “No, I’m not interested in making love tonight”, then their “No” will supersede your “Yes”. A few men decide not to accept their partner’s (or total strangers’) “No”, so they wrap their own “yes, we’re having sex tonight” in a package of “NO, I’m not accepting your answer – NO, you can’t refuse me, I can force my will on you” – we call that RAPE, but it’s another example of “No” overpowering “yes”. Terrorism is a political tactic based on the fact that negatives supersede positives, that destruction, disorder, and fear can supersede peace, harmony and cooperation.
All of that is to say that as society strives toward a more respectful, positive, beneficial, good way for people to interact with each other.. as society moves toward the positive, it creates opportunities for those who would seek to gain advantage by accessing negative forces. AT THEIR BEST, violent sports, competitions of all kinds, are maintained in society as demonstrations to those who would utilize negative forces against us, that we are strong enough to negate the negatives they would employ against us. Until we can figure out how to invert this law of nature, making our society and all our works impervious to negative forces (while still preserving the individual’s autonomous right to say “no”) – I think demonstrations of strength, power, and invulnerability (a.k.a., sports, superheroes, action films, armies) will remain important fixtures in our culture.
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