Guys, I get it. I really do.
You’ve been taught all your life to avoid “girly” things. People have told you to be “be a man,” and possibly made fun of you for doing something that appears feminine. You’ve been given an innate fear of weakness, beauty, and other qualities that have somehow become only associated with the fairer sex.
Maybe this led you to play a sport you didn’t really care about. Or pretend to like an action movie you thought was actually poorly produced. Or hide your love of things like poetry, or the “Real Housewives of Orange County.”
You’ve gravitated towards things like man aisles in grocery stores, or sites like The Art of Manliness, because they’ve supposedly made it easy to tell what a real man does – to differentiate yourself from feminine things. New shows like Man Up and Last Man Standing appeal to you for the same reasons.
Enter the new site Gentlemint, which does the same thing online. You’ve heard about Pinterest, the wildly popular online pinboard where people can “pin” images and videos to curated boards for everyone to see your interests. But you’ve also heard that Pinterest is dominated by women, so you’ve hesitated. And now Gentlemint has given you an option that will clearly say, “I’m a man!” Everyone wins, right?
Wrong.
Here’s why I’m going to advocate that you avoid things like Gentlemint. The first reason – the most important reason – is that those assholes in high school (who, let’s face it, may have included your own father) who advocated for you to “be a man” were telling you that because of their own insecurities. The anti-femininity (and thinly-veiled homophobia) that is rampant in locker rooms and around dinner tables in America is a moral failing that not enough parents – not enough fathers – have the courage to address.
We need to be better than this. Because right now, we’re intentionally creating intellectual and cultural ghettos from which men are incapable of escaping. We’re ceding the marketplace of ideas and innovation to women out of a fear of becoming like them – no, out of a fear that other men will perceive that we’ve become like them. And in the process, we’re making the very idea of men a caricature that no one can take seriously.
This is a small window into why some are declaring the end of men. The ghettos we’re creating extend beyond television and websites – they include professional tracks and education. (“You want to be a nurse? That’s a girls job!”) Fear is leading men to a permanent place of second-class citizenship. Sure, we’re not there yet. But I for one don’t want to see my son growing up in a world of shrinking opportunities for men created by our imaginations.
This is one of the reasons why I created FWD – I want to get the marketplace of ideas back. I want to make it OK for men to think big again. And I hope you’ll join me.
{ 5 comments… read them below or add one }
I’m currently dealing with a work environment that is dominated by men who consider work “in the field” the only real “manly” work and those of us who have ambitions of getting positions doing office work are inferior. I have to hide my ambitions from them knowing that–ironically–the only way to work myself into that position is advancing myself within my current position and therefore in the good graces of the “manly field workers.” It has me so self-conflicted that I want to throw my hands up in frustration and just go back to school. Reboot.
As someone who currently does work in an office, obviously I’d take offense to that as well. Sorry you’ve got some dissonance with your ambitions and your current situation. Sucks.
“I have to hide my ambitions from them”
Don’t do that. Say this instead, the first time anyone snickers at you:
“What, you think I’m afraid of your mockery? You think I’m going to live in abject fear of what you *think*? I have bigger things to be afraid of. Like what will happen to my family if something Big And Heavy lands on my hand and I can’t work anymore. You don’t really think you’ll be able to do this when you’re 50, do you? *I’m* going to use my field experience to go into sales/management/dispatching/whatever the first chance I get! I’m not leaving that kind of thing to chance.”
This is a great topic to bring to the attention of men and women. I also think though that it’s important to not paint too wide of a brush stroke about sites catered to men, more specifically the Art of Manliness. Yes, it has its stereotypical “manly skills” but it also has advice on redefining what it means to be a man with advice that runs parallel to your ideas. (This, of course, all coming from a woman reading “men’s sites”)
I’m conflicted about Art of Manliness. On the one hand, what you’re saying is absolutely true. I’ve read a lot of thoughtful articles by men trying to be really reflective about how they are living their lives differently than the men around them.
But on the other hand, if it really does have the goal of redefining what it means to be a man, I feel like it shoots itself in the foot by focusing too much on comical perceptions of “manliness.” It becomes the very definition of caricature – especially when you start to add “like a man” onto everything you do, no matter how ridiculous.
I feel like AOM is trying to have it both ways, and in the process, is neutering any serious consideration of the issue.
Thanks for the thoughts!