itt blogs instruct you how to be a man

the less / fewer thing is nothing compared to how they said the exact opposite they were trying to convey

gentlemen math tells me that his drinks are costly

lol gentlemen math

"buy an umbrella with a solid wood shaft. it has fewer moving parts, so it will work like shit."

the less / fewer thing is nothing compared to how they said the exact opposite they were trying to convey

I thought that at first too, but then when reading the entire thing I do think they meant to say "buy an over-designed umbrella with as many moving parts as possible, because it won't ever break due to a strong gust of wind"

which, as someone who has been gifted expensive umbrellas in the past and has seen their spectacular implosions in Boston updrafts, is fucking stupid and wrong

"We believe that reviving the lost art of dressing, behaving and thinking like a gentleman benefits ourselves and the world around us."

"We watched Mad Men and found some old issues of Esquire and want to fetishize shaving products and treating women like fancy objects like every other gentlemen's blog"

gntlmn.com's front page is trying to sell me a $225 "tote bag"

hmmmm

can we start one of these

we can do listicles that start out with one seemingly rational piece of advice like "a true gentleman understands the importance of listening" and then accelerate into still-true-but-batshit advice like "a true gentleman does not insert the entire fist without warning or permission"

http://blog.gntlmn.com/post/26812519401/a-gntlmns-way-of-presenting-cheese-earlier

"A #GNTLMN’s way of presenting cheese."

unreadable scrawl. tags: "behaving"

please don't buy tote bags, guys

i mean, if you really want to, for a good cause, for food shopping, go ahead

here was the "teaser image" for the tote bag:
http://blog.gntlmn.com/post/26721167648/photo-by-brian-vernor-and-a-tease-at-what

I suddenly have a case of the giggles.

hahahaaaaa

"we're terribly excited"

on this cliff
with our magnificent tote bag

this has to be a joke

a noble tote, staring seaward, full of possibility

The French Lieutenant's Tote Bag

dudes need to advise me what sort of stylish spelunking-style head lamp I need to wear when I am as far up my own ass as they are

this reminded me, I meant to start a thread on ILS a few weeks ago:

recommend a new man bag for me

tbf that guy's bags are pretty nice but a tote bag is not really an urban man bag

mh, if he needs to see up there, a real man can start a fire in his own ass with flint and dry grasses

xp

this is why I need a consultant on being a man, obviously

dudes need to advise me what sort of stylish spelunking-style head lamp I need to wear when I am as far up my own ass as they are

― hot sauce delivery device (mh), Thursday, July 12, 2012 10:01 AM (7 minutes ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

haaaa

we can do listicles that start out with one seemingly rational piece of advice like "a true gentleman understands the importance of listening" and then accelerate into still-true-but-batshit advice like "a true gentleman does not insert the entire fist without warning or permission"

oh man, did i draw some attention from the office laughing at that.

whoops forgot to check back on this thread! definitely read the umbrella thing as advertising how a great solid single-piece-of-wood umbrella has the great feature of not standing up to the elements.

can we start one of these

yes

we can do listicles that start out with one seemingly rational piece of advice like "a true gentleman understands the importance of listening" and then accelerate into still-true-but-batshit advice like "a true gentleman does not insert the entire fist without warning or permission"

hey just to interrupt our regularly schedules hate-a-thon for a second, my neighbor (& potential friend? we were recently introduced and he is cool afaict) is writing a series of columns titled "self made man" about masculinity re: transitioning to living as a man, they are lovely and thoughtful and you should read some of them:

http://therumpus.net/author/thomas-mcbee/

elmo, my god, these are wonderful.

:D

Gonna bookmark those to read at work tomorrow, they look excellent.

all the more personal stuff is beautifully written, but the more general curiosity about masculinity is really interesting and contrasts so strongly w/ the sort of stuff in this thread.

I have so many mixed feelings from some of the posts! The idea that you need to know how to throw a punch, or fight, makes me want to yell that there is nothing to the masculine experience that demands that, but when you juxtapose it with the mugging and the fact the mugger shot men... I don't know, it's difficult. I like to think that we decide the person we are going to be regardless of gender but there are some things you're going to fight against or pick up regardless of intentions.

w/ the preliminary caveat that i'm v unsure about all this, i think, mb, someone transitioning is much more invested in some sort of notion of masculinity than a lot of cis guys... idk, i feel totally unable to express myself on this, but it is v v interesting to me.

http://gawker.com/5924960/when-gay-men-think-baseball-caps-make-them-masculine

teaches you how to be a stereotypical masculine man who is into men?

did u read the article? friend of mine posted it on Facebook and I think it's a little more nuanced than that

oh, I was being way reductive, yes. not criticizing this article as all, just interesting to me as an actually-good look at what masculinity means to people who aren't waspy dickbags trying to justify their sartorial and misogynistic sides.

i think about this a lot! when rich calls the term 'straight acting' as corrosive, i gather that he means it qualifies machismo & links certain modes of masculinity to being exclusively heterosexual, which I find really constraining. But there's also the idea that some gays who act "straight" are interested in 'passing' as straight, and the idea of someone performing the role and accruing the cultural privileges of being straight almost feels like a betrayal, or at least a shameful cop-out. But on the other hand, many closeted gay men perform these roles out of fear & perceived necessity, so I'm not without empathy for that struggle, having lived it myself. it's complicated.

I am not very "straight-acting" btw. Well, not consciously. I have no idea.

personally, i find that backwards ball caps tend to make guys look, well, really juvenile, and according to my own bonerometer, that is neither particularly masculine nor very attractive

bonerometer SAYS!

*descending slide whistle*

haha

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1ytCEuuW2_A

That self-made man blog is very powerful, and emotional, but also bringing up memories and emotions that I have kept stuffed in a box for 20+ years. Narratives around masculinity are so strange and twisted. And a reminder that no matter how badly I have always failed at Being A Girl, I could perform masculinity no better than I could perform femininity. Painful to be reminded.

everything according to one's own bonerometer scale imo

tee hee

SPECIAL NEW YORK TIMES EDITION

http://www.nytimes.com/roomfordebate/2012/07/12/are-modern-men-manly-enough/men-need-to-rediscover-the-don-draper-within

shit like this makes me want to sharpen my castrating knife & go a-hunting i mean what can you say to this except FUUUUCK YOOOUUUU

I got messed up by my feminist mom in the 1970s, who taught me that gender was a social construct. I can’t believe that social experiment went on as long as it did, since it’s clear by month six of having a child that William does not want a doll. Ladies do go first. We are not free to be you and me. We are born different.

Kill yourself & fuck the body.