Successful Manhood

    “What do you do?”, “What career do you have?” these questions are some of the first things asked when people are introduced to each other, especially men.  The competitive nature of industrialized, individualistic culture in America has created an unobtainable standard of “success”.  But what is success if you aren’t happy? 

    For men, their masculinity is almost exclusively their career.  The breadwinner expectation has evolved into a constant climb to the top of the social hierarchy.  This has led to 80-hour work weeks, high divorce rates, and high rates of male suicides.  Men are now literally and metaphorically killing themselves to be better than the next guy all in order to be “successful”.

    What if men flipped the script? What if the first thing people asked each other after being introduced was not “so, what do you do?” but rather “are you happy?”.  In my opinion, that should be the measure of success.  If a man can come home to either his family, or if he chooses to be single, and be truly happy, I believe that men’s mental health and relational health would be much healthier.  If you are a man, I will leave you with this thought: Does being a successful man mean being successful on other’s terms or on your own?

No Homo Bro

    “But no homo” uttered the teenage boy after expressing his gratitude towards his male friend for being there for him after he lost both his parents.  After all this boy has been through, he finally became vulnerable enough to express his feelings towards his friend, but he still has a seed inside of him that any acknowledgment of emotion would mean that he has is attracted to men.  

    Modern men face a treacherous outcome in their same sex relationships.  Feelings are feminized and misunderstood to mean that the man expressing the feelings has a sexual attraction to the other. This has left men with stoic, cold, and shallow friendships with other men.  Furthermore, the phrase “no homo” deepens the segregation between heterosexual and homosexual men.

    The taboo that straight men have created around homosexuality has not only severed their own relationships with themselves but also ousted homosexual men.  When a man must assert that he does not sexual preference towards other men due to one action or another, it creates a sharp divide.  In the man’s mind, after saying a comment like “no homo”, it is translated as oh no I am not gay, that would be a bad thing and I am not that.  What happens when heterosexual men meet a homosexual man? To me, it seems that there would be a tension as if the homosexual man is completely unlike them and somehow a “bad” or “weird” man.  When saying such as “no homo” are eliminated from men’s verbiage, maybe it will lay the ground for authentic man to man friendships and furthermore, create a climate for inclusivity of homosexual men into heterosexual men’s circles.  

Be a MAN

    Have you ever heard this expression before?  Maybe you have heard it said to a friend, a son, a boyfriend...heck, maybe you have even said it yourself.  Being told to be “a man” materializes the societal stereotypes of manhood including, but not limited to, being tough, strong, successful, smart, stoic, and the breadwinner.  However, do we ever stop and ask ourselves what happens to men when this phrase is uttered?  

    For centuries, men have been put in this so-called “man box”.  Inside of this box is everything a man “should” be, at least according to the historical archetypes.  In books, movies, and advertisements, men are portrayed as dominant, unrelenting, unemotional, athletic figures.  When a man’s life is constantly inundated with these images from the popular media, it is difficult to deter these expectations of who he should be and live up to be.  

    Furthermore, the phrase “be a man” further suggests the firm dichotomy between male and female, implying that there is no grey area.  The firmness of the perceived boundary between feminine and masculine determines the polarization of the two.  Men are more drawn to traditionally masculine qualities as means to solidify their identity as a man. It is my opinion that men should learn at a young age that being a man doesn’t hold them to only masculine characteristics, instead when men learn to embrace their femininity they are even more “manly”.  Imagine a world where men are not driven strictly to be what the man box tells them they should be but rather who they are authentically and holistically.