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Part I
Masculinity and Identity
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When it comes to gender, we are living in interesting times. Warrior masculinity is reinscribed and reinforced through military conflicts around the globe.1 At the same time, the term “metrosexual” rolls easily off our tongues and we're no strangers to the gender-policing phrase, Dude, you're a fag.2 Violent video games and combat sports like mixed martial arts encourage an aggressive kind of masculinity, while TV commercials are full of grown men acting like developmentally arrested twelve-year-olds, and pop culture foists lad lit on us, replete with bumbling male incompetence and failures to launch.3 There is serious, ongoing male-on-male gang violence at the same time as more American men are contentedly doing domestic work.4 Advances in medical technology make it easier to sync up our bodies with our genders, and we know that masculinity is not only for men, but music videos like Nelly's “Tip Drill” remain infamous, and a credit-card swipe down a woman's backside is still not an unusual video move. Then there is Eminem's depiction of interpersonal violence in “Love the Way You Lie.”The chart-topper glamorizes and normalizes men's violence toward women while, in real life, patterns of sexualized and gendered violence are stubbornly resistant to change.5 The first national study on eating disorders reveals that 25 percent of all anorexic, bulimic, and binge-eating adults are now male.6 So what, exactly, does it mean to be a man in the twenty-first century?
The essays in this section are written by men from many walks of life who explore the issues of power and masculinity. They dispel homogenous stereotypes about what it means to be a man.
These essays are timely since there is growing interest in the subject of masculinity. There is increasing curiosity about how it might be possible for men to “do” masculinity differently; that is to say, in ways that are not limiting or harmful to any of us. Susan Faludi's book, Stiffed: The Betrayal of the American Man,7 drew mainstream attention to the subject. Bitch,8 a magazine of feminist response to pop culture, devoted an entire issue to masculinity. Rebecca Walker's book, What Makes a Man: 22 Writers Imagine the Future and Daniel Jones's The Bastard on the Couch: 27 Men Try Really Hard to Explain Their Feelings About Love, Loss, Fatherhood, and Freedom9 explore questions of manhood and masculine identity. Feature film rights for Michael Kimmel's book, Guyland: The Perilous World Where Boys Become Men, have been optioned to Dreamworks. With a shaky economy and shifting labor patterns at work and home, there is much emerging debate about what it means to be a man in the twenty-first century—and whether our boys and men are somehow failing. Morgan Spurlock's documentary film, Mansome, insists that men are bewildered about their current condition and unsure about their masculinity. Hanna Rosin's book, The End of Men,10 proposes that dominant manhood, as we know it, has come to a screeching halt. I'm not convinced.
That said, there is good reason to continue critical investigation into the meanings of masculinity and the social rewards or penalties that come with it. In academic circles, critical gender studies, masculinities studies, queer theory, and post-queer theory are dissecting the assumptions of biological essentialism. Genetics may explain a lot, and biological arguments about how men and women's behaviors and traits are “hardwired” are in vogue. But we also know that culture has deep effects on the social construction of gender and masculinity.11 In Manhood in America: A Cultural History, Michael Kimmel makes the case that manhood is a constantly shifting cultural construction. Cordelia Fine's Delusions of Gender debunks pseudo-scientific myths about hardwired differences between men's and women's brains to explain, instead, how our minds, society, and neurosexism work together in creating sexual distinctions.12 Raewynn Connell's Masculinities complements the recent stream of publications, offering suggestions on how we might study masculinity in the interest of progressive gender politics.13
Connell proposes that there is not one true version of masculine identity. Rather, there are many aspects of, and multiple ways of performing, masculinities.14 But there are also tenacious mainstream assumptions about what it means to be a man. Conventional manhood—and its close cousin, hegemonic masculinity—can be summed up in three short words: no sissy stuff.15 This imperative for masculine leadership dominates our collective imagination by invoking unrealistic expectations that men are by nature stoic, unemotional, aggressive, and interpersonally detached. In keeping with these stereotypes, physical contact is never okay unless it takes place on the wrestling mat, on the football field, or in a fight.
This picture of masculinity is restrictive to men and oppressive to all. Moreover, it is just plain inaccurate. Conventional masculinity is a style of manhood that many men (and women) are complicit in upholding, although few actually embody. There is nothing traditional, universal, or eternal about our current conventions of masculine gender. The more pertinent issue is, rather, “how particular groups of men inhabit positions of power and wealth, and how they legitimate and reproduce the social relationships that generate their dominance.”16
The default setting for a masculinity defined by male dominance and aggression also makes the invalid assumption that all men are white, heterosexual, American, able-bodied, and middle class. Yet masculinity comes in many forms and packages and these multiple masculinities are informed, limited, and modified by race, ethnicity, class background, sexual orientation, and personal predilections. As Kimmel points out, hegemonic masculinity not only involves men dominating women, but men exerting power over other men, as well.17 This particular version of manhood may use force or violence to uphold itself, but force is not necessarily required. Iris Marion Young explains how oppression or submission of the target group requires only the threat of violence to be effective.18 By the same token, men—as members of the dominant group—can also be harmed by hegemonic masculinity. Experiencing harm is different, though, from being oppressed or subjugated because although “sexist notions of masculinity prevent men from showing emotion, for instance … failure to cry does not routinely cause men to lose out on the best jobs or receive lower pay.”19
Dominator versions of masculinity continue to exist by recreating situations where men can exert power over women in general and various subordinated groups of men: immigrant, gay, or effeminate men, for example. The interplay between the powerful and less-powerful “is an important part of how a patriarchal social order works,”20 but this isn't the end of the story. The dominance of any group of men is open to challenge and to change.21
Standards of masculinity are a cultural ideal, not a reality. The images of “real men” that public media show us do not correspond to the actual personalities of most men. Let's face it: How many guys are John Wayne, Rambo, James Bond, Barry Bonds—or even want to be? Yet many of us are complicit in upholding the masculine mystique. Doing so results in perceived gratification or the promise of a positive reward such as camaraderie, or vicarious aggression, or a passive sense of accomplishment. Going along to get along can also help guys avoid such negative sanctions as ostracism, ridicule, violence, and discrimination.
There is also the possibility that hegemonic masculinity, which is usually defined with fixed, negative connotations, might be transformed into a positive force. “It is quite conceivable,” writes Connell, “that a certain hegemony could be constructed for masculinities that are less toxic, more cooperative and peaceable, than the current editions.”22 Scholars such as Demetrakis Z. Demetriou disagree, however, cautioning against prematurely celebrating the improved forms of masculinity that Connell claims are possible at new historical junctures. Patriarchal masculinity has a long history and is more persistent and sly, he claims. The hegemonic bloc may appear to change but in very deceptive ways through negotiation and appropriation, and “through the transformation of what appears counter-hegemonic and progressive into an instrument of backwardness and patriarchal reproduction.” In other words, Demetriou explains, we ought to “avoid falling into the trap of believing that patriarchy has disappeared simply because heterosexual men have worn earrings.”23
bell hooks's theories indirectly modify these arguments. She highlights the politics and patterns of domination—not of men or masculinity, per se—as the core area of concern for liberation struggle. The sociopolitical dynamics of exploitation and subjugation describe a broader abuse of power that is not necessarily limited to individual practitioners, although there are certainly individuals whom we can hold accountable for bad behavior. For hooks, social, political, economic, and cultural domination is predicated on what she calls white, supremacist, capitalist patriarchy.24 This model of masculinist power is played out by dominating groups on the backs of subjugated peoples.
The presence of multilayered patterns of subjugation is why some people prefer the term “kyriarchy” instead of “patriarchy” to describe sociopolitical structures of domination and the abuse of power. Patriarchy refers literally to “rule of the father,” but all men do not have the same access to power and privilege. All men do not dominate all women equally, in the same way. Theologian Elisabeth Schüssler Fiorenza coined the term “kyriarchy,” which comes from kyrios, the Greek term for “lord” or “master,” and archein, meaning “to rule or dominate,” explaining that kyriarchy points to how the structures of domination are intersecting and “multiplicative.” It is a system “of ruling and oppression,” explains Schüssler Fiorenza. It is not the case that men always have privilege even if they are at the center of power structures in various instances. It is possible for men to simultaneously inhabit many worlds with different degrees of privilege and powerlessness. Some men experience masculine privilege within a family setting or on the job, yet they may also experience disadvantage as, say, a black man in white-dominated settings or as a Muslim man in white, Christian communities.25
While we continue to question the assumptions that accompany privilege and subjugation, we do well, however, to remain concerned about the effects of hegemonic masculinity. It harms women—and all people—because it is the strategic institutionalization of men's dominance over others. Maintaining this more complex political and social definition of power and subjugation is important in creating a more accurate understanding of identity and what it means to be a man.
The men writing here about masculinity build on popular trends and academic groundwork. But they are also creating an invigorating history of their own by speaking out about how gender ideals can operate in constricting ways, and the limitless possibilities for change. This section on masculinity and identity explores the myths and realities, and the doubts and certainties, of men's lives. The voices are those of real men reflecting on their own experiences. These essays put an active face on what Rachel Adams and David Savran describe as the process of unsettling assumptions “that govern dominant understandings of masculinity.”26
Men Speak Out opens with Byron Hurt—hip-hop head, former college football quarterback, and creator of the acclaimed film Hip Hop: Beyond Beats and Rhymes. Hurt explains that as he learned more about sexism, violence, and homophobia in hip hop, he became more conflicted about the music that he loved. This conflict led Hurt to turn on the camera and create his documentary about masculinity in mainstream hip-hop culture. In his essay, “Daytona Beach: Beyond Beats and Rhymes,” Hurt chronicles the hypermasculine behavior, the crude objectification of women, some women's complicity in the game, and the complicated issues of race, gender, violence, and sex that he sees played out while filming in Florida during BET's Spring Bling celebration. The limitations of hypermasculinity and the violent crime and homicide rates affecting young black men are serious issues.Yet the corporate media continues to record and distribute monolithic images of masculinity, providing limited models for becoming a man. Perceiving few options, many continue to go along with it.While the rap-star images we see on TV are slick and well edited, Hurt reveals the more complex gender politics behind the scene. Back from filming the crowds and interviewing fans at the Spring Bling in Daytona, Hurt got eight hours of footage in the can and a story to tell.27
In “The Enemy Within: On Becoming a Straight White Guy,” Jacob Anderson-Minshall writes about his transformation from a young girl growing up in rural Idaho, to an adult lesbian woman, to becoming a straight white man living in the Bay area. Anderson-Minshall's sexual trajectory has taken him deep undercover: He's had intimate access to the worlds of both heterosexual men and lesbian women. Since for Jacob, sex and gender have been transitional states—not biological givens—Anderson-Minshall is able to raise provocative questions about both masculine and feminine identity.
In their essay, “The Bullying Demands of Masculinity: A Genderqueer Escape,” River Willow Fagan extends the topic of sexuality and gender, honing in specifically on queer identity. Although “queer” may have once been a term of insult, this is no longer the case. Queer theory breaks down binary categories that presume there are two sexes (female and male), two genders (feminine and masculine), and two sexualities (homosexual and heterosexual). Fagan, who grew up in a fundamentalist Christian family, was a kid who loved reading, drawing, comic books, and creepy-crawly bugs. Over time, Fagan began to realize that social demands about being a boy and liking girls were not features that fit them well. Fagan faced bullying by peers and other forms of pressure to conform to The Man Box (and The Heterosexual Box), and they began a process of sorting out their gender identity and their sexual orientation in searching for a genuine sexual and gendered self. As Fagan so aptly demonstrates from their personal life, to be queer means seeking the freedom of authenticity and self-creation, independent from the limitations or expectations of society.
In “Redefining Manhood: Resisting Sexism,” Ewuare X. Osayande also tells a profoundly personal story: Osayande's father was murdered in January 2000. The killer was the abusive ex-boyfriend of a woman who was dating Osayande's father. Osayande details how the murderer “resorted to the most violent expression of male domination. In his sexist mind, the woman was his property. She had no agency or capacity to create a life outside of his desires.” When she started dating Osayande's father, this violent man struck out at both of them in the most extreme manifestation of sexism and hegemonic masculinity. An activist and writer from Philadelphia, Osayande ties together male entitlement and domination, feminism, and the black liberation struggle. Complicating efforts to resolve sexism, Osayande explains, has been the racism of some feminist white women. Osayande points to this as limiting the radicalizing potential of feminism within the black community in part because “sexist black men” have successfully used racism within feminism “to trump any real discussion of sexism within the black community.”28 Osayande's commentary draws from his personal observations of sexism and racism in the black community, and speaks directly to the need and possibilities for improving feminism.
On a different note, Nathan Einschlag recounts his life-changing and heartbreaking experience playing college basketball at a school filled with privileged—and in many ways protected—young students. Growing up in the immigrant neighborhood of Jackson Heights in Queens, New York, Einschlag saw things that the guys on his team “only read about in magazines, or saw on TV.” During high school, playing ball kept Einschlag off the streets and out of trouble. Now in college, Einschlag finds himself surrounded by teammates who think that excessive drinking and sexual conquest are equated with their ability to be a guy and play the game. Einschlag faces a difficult choice: to play college basketball and go along with the expected sta...
