Rolling Maleness and Masculinity Discussion Thread

not really on board with the AC/DC dismissal ott tbrr

every discussion has to ultimately fall back on 70s hard rock vs. 00s teen pop, it's just a cross ilx has to bear

no one dismissed AC/DC though!

fwiw my old boss at the weed farm is the drummer in AC//DShe, the all-female cover band. They’re phenomenal live

awesome

When I was a teen, I listened almost exclusively to male-fronted groups. To listen to women was to invite ridicule. I still remember one of my friends teasing me endlessly about seeing the Pretenders on my 16th birthday. Well, it was the original lineup, and Ray Davies came out to sing "Stop Your Sobbing," so fuck him.

The notable exception to this, at least to me, was Blondie. Debbie was too punk, and to damn cool (not to mention beautiful, which counted for a lot to my adolescent brain), not to listen to.

As I have aged, I have found myself gravitating far more to female-fronted bands. I'd much rather listen to Joni Mitchell than Bob Dylan.

*too damn cool

My son’s first big concert, at his request, was Beyoncé on the Formation tour. He was in middle school at the time and already a little squeamish about going to see a big female pop show — he really wanted to go, but wouldn’t let me post any photos of him there or anything. Anyway, it was of course a GREAT show, and we were surrounded my mostly Black women who thought it was adorable this little white boy was there. Now he’s aged through whatever misgivings he might have had and is proud that that was his first concert.

*by mostly

This article about a now-state senator calling a 13-year old boy a homophobic slur during a public meeting is emblematic of the sort of brutality that I kept referencing above. I know how to fight back now— I have had chairs swung at my head after vocally defending myself and my partner from homophobic invective— but imagine being a young queer kid and this sort of behavior is on display all the time. Shepard’s lifeless body was enough to instill fear into me when I was a kid, but the ambience of homophobia and masculine rage was even more terrifying.

This article about a now-state senator calling a 13-year old boy a homophobic slur during a public meeting is emblematic of the sort of brutality that I kept referencing above. I know how to fight back now— I have had chairs swung at my head after vocally defending myself and my partner from homophobic invective— but imagine being a young queer kid and this sort of behavior is on display all the time. Shepard’s lifeless body was enough to instill fear into me when I was a kid, but the ambience of homophobia and masculine rage was even more terrifying.

― butt dumb tight my boners got boners (the table is the table)

my relationship to that slur over the past few years, to cis gay men in general, has been interesting. one of the things i've really had to grapple with is my internalized misandry. i thought manhood was categorically inferior to womanhood, i thought all men wanted to be women, because why wouldn't you? it's taken me a while to really internalize that no, that was a me thing, that a lot of men really _like_ being men.

even after that, i was really afraid of people thinking i was a man, that was the biggest slur against trans women, that we were Really Men. being an effeminate man is apparently shameful. being an effeminate woman makes you, uh, a tradwife, i guess. idk. i'd rather be thought of as being an f-slur than as a tradwife. the f-slur is closer to the truth.

it was kind of shocking, last year, when i started seeing my friends being called the f-slur more and more often. (nobody called me that, because i have this ridiculous amount of passing privilege). because my thought was... what's wrong with that?

actually, now that i think about it, it was before that. i was driving down TV Highway in Beaverton (no seriously everyone calls it TV Highway, no i don't ever think "television" when i see those initials) and i got cut off by someone with all kinds of gay bumper stickers and i kind of muttered the f-slur under my breath. that's my generation, that's kind of what i was taught. and then i realized, i said aloud, "wait, i'm a f-slur", and i laughed.

early on it was really important to me that i _wasn't_ an f-slur. like i wanted to carefully explain to bigots that actually, i wasn't at all. yes, i sucked dick, but it was only girl dick, which was a _completely different thing_. i was really confused, early on, when anti-trans legislation would go after drag bars and stuff. like i thought they were making a mistake. drag, by and large, isn't a trans woman thing, it's something that's associated with _gay men_!

of course it wasn't an _accident_. this idea that cis gay men had "made it", that they'd achieved social respectability because of, i don't know, _philadelphia_ or something - that was never true. for a while people had to pretend they didn't hate gay men, and then trans people came along and we get used as a pretext. we get used as a pretext to call anybody and everybody who's the slightest bit queer the f-slur.

so yeah, i'm an f-slur. sure. i'm an f-slur and a t-slur and a dyke and a sissy and all of those words that i wanted so badly not to be, back in the day. whatever. everything they say i am, i am. and i am very proud of myself. like a lot of us keep saying, patriarchy hurts men. i don't know for sure, but i suspect that the men it hurts first and hardest are queer men.

---

but the kids. i mean it seems like everything bad that gets done gets done "for the sake of the children", but when you look at it, it's actually being done against the children. "so yes, i would call that bad game design." - shigeru miyamoto

and when i transitioned... when i started, it was the fear of physical violence that was my biggest fear, but that doesn't happen that often, and when it does happen, well, it pretty much never happens to white queers. it's other stuff that's hard.

what's hard for me is that i'm not personally being threatened by this. i'm a white, cis-passing woman in one of the most trans-friendly cities in the world. i just have to watch. i have to watch what they're _doing_ to children, people who _can't_ defend themselves, and most cishets... _don't even notice_. it's not that they don't care, or that they're ok with it, they don't even fucking _know_ this is happening. when you're not the victim, it's really really easy to not notice, i've learned.

yes— I think that what you mention last is what has gotten me so wound up. I was a child and was made to feel like society’s refuse, and this is still happening today, and this is infuriating to watch.

yes— I think that what you mention last is what has gotten me so wound up. I was a child and was made to feel like society’s refuse, and this is still happening today, and this is infuriating to watch.

― butt dumb tight my boners got boners (the table is the table)

going from "I WILL NOT LET THIS HAPPEN AGAIN." to "oh it turns out it's not actually up to me, i guess i need to not dwell on it so much or it'll really fuck me up inside" has been a pretty rough transition for me.

there's this meme out there of the big hulking tank protecting the little level one dude from a hail of arrows, and there's a variation of it where both of them have the trans flag colors on them. i've had to find out the hard way that it doesn't really work like that :(

https://wapo.st/3OZDJSS

Gift link, in case you want to read what Christine Emba and 350 Washington Post readers think about masculinity

straight dudes talkin about straight dudes.

350 guys thinkin baout things

straight dudes talkin about straight dudes

it's not a very diverse sample, but at least a few ideas might have emerged that ever-so-slightly nudge the process of defining straight dude masculinity in a better direction, even if only accidentally. you can't create a better society by just trying to erase straight dudes from the face of the earth.

we won’t know unless we try

i knew that i'd get at least one answer like that before I ever hit submit. ilx is very predictable along those lines.

and yet the answer came after you hit submit, how does that work?!?

predictability is good, it’s why we come back to places we like, right?

i was just coming back to make a dumb crack about those goofy pre-internet “eracism” stickers you’d see but i suppose i’ve done enough damage to the discourse for one day

inspired by this thread i was listening to a lot of AC/DC and i think these fellows don't get enough credit for their enlightened attitudes towards masculinity and women. just have a look at T.N.T. from their first album

Women to the left of me
And women to the right

Ain't got no gun
Ain't got no knife
Don't you start no fight

surrounded by women, the singer is advocating an end to violence. but what about their famously cro-magnon sex jams? look closer. in 'rock and roll ain't noise pollution', from back in black, we hear these lascivious lines:

I took a look inside your bedroom door
You looked so good lyin' on your bed

but guess what? this gentleman asks for enthusiastic consent, and seems content - even kind of awed - to be told she isn't interested in sex, or at least not the type he's asking about:

Well, I asked you if you wanted any rhythm and love
You said you wanna rock and roll, instead

now, i won't even get into bon scott's famous cross-dressing but i think it suffices to say these fellas were a little more ahead of the game than we suppose

shirt for bonnet, which many people aren't aware of

short

ffs

Re "Rock and Roll Ain't Noise Pollution", that is credited to Young/Young/Johnson but there's a lot of people who think the band carried on using unpublished (and uncredited) Bon Scott lyrics for years after his death.

AC/DC were all about consent from the very start.

_straight dudes talkin about straight dudes_

it's not a very diverse sample, but at least a few ideas might have emerged that ever-so-slightly nudge the process of defining straight dude masculinity in a better direction, even if only accidentally. you can't create a better society by just trying to erase straight dudes from the face of the earth.

George Clooney: a man who exhibits the “traditional” aspects of masculinity but does so with a modern interpretation. He embraces all of the things men are conditioned to enjoy: sports, motorcycles, cars, a night out with “the boys,” attention to fitness/appearance, a passion for his career and an appreciation for beautiful women.

ew

Real men slay dragons. They also dance, express their emotions, cultivate friendships and write poetry. — Sean Nolan, Albany, N.Y., 37

Men sure love a bit of poetry.

"I’d say Captains Jean-Luc Picard, Jonathan Archer, Benjamin Sisko, Christopher Pike and, yes, even James Tiberius Kirk."

Aimless: there is an idea here.

"He served his nation in the U.S. Army beginning at the age of 17 for 21 years, and when he was called to serve in Vietnam near the end of his career, he went willingly, because that was his duty. While there, he was awarded the Bronze Star for physically carrying an injured soldier from an ordnance-littered field, thinking of that soldier before himself. He provided not only for his family but also others as he could afford. He wasn’t an easy man to know, but he embraced the core values that made him the man he was and that his three sons embraced."

Daddy loves imperialism!

"There once was a man from Nantucket...' (xps)

"Men should listen attentively, keep an open mind, use their strength for the betterment of all, use words instead of fists, not play with guns, and never, never, never strike a woman. Men are at their best when protecting and defending women. — Bennett Werner, 71, Cape May, N.J."

Men should know how to use their fists and make sure they know how to handle firearms safely before they use it.

I feel like that whole column is an exercise in “never read the comments.”

Frankly it makes most men look as toxic and shitty as some of us have been making them out to be.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zUQzQYv8J90

Didn't read it all but this was the only good comment:

"The very question of what constitutes ideal masculinity is, at best, a fool’s errand and, at worst, dangerous. It also might lie at the heart of why we are losing young men to cults of toxic masculinity. The minute you define this false ideal, you are falsely defining those who don’t meet the ideal. — Craig Culp, 63, Gaithersburg, Md."

And the end of this one:

"I look at myself, shrug at myself and walk away from the mirror, thinking, What does it matter anyway? We live alone, we die alone. Maybe that’s as masculine as it gets."

nihilism famously has no bearing on any of the online toxic masculinity we're witnessing

That's an acceptance of realities that person is facing.

Beats listening to Blur or voting Labour, imago.

Some of the guys in that wapo piece going to a Subway.

This is a masterpiece. No notes pic.twitter.com/IhSEtPsixQ

— Swolecialist (@BlackLanterrn) August 17, 2023

WaPo thing was very weird and kind of alarming. So many of the comments rest on the idea that men are stronger—and not even necessarily physically, more like a nebulous but inherent strength of mind and spirit—than everyone around them (not excluding other men afaict), so the good model is for individual men to protect others not dominate them. But an immutable natural hierarchy with the individual adult man on top is still assumed. The columnist's intro to the sole comment that brings up being gay is esp weird

i would argue that this is one of the inevitable consequences of seeking to define (positive) masculinity

yes, that's a good point. pressed to define masculinity as an "ideal" it's likely difficult not to reach for things that make being a man supposedly better than not being a man. so yeah, the first guy xyzzzz quoted above is otm

yup!

We live alone, we die alone. Maybe that’s as masculine as it gets.

The real masculinity is the friends we didn't make along the way

tbf to the article it includes these quotes:

I don’t think I have an “ideal of masculinity” precisely because I reject the term. When I hear the term “masculine,” I shudder because the likes of Josh Hawley and the incel movement have taken over the term. I see “men” driving enormous trucks — clean and sparkling because they’ve never been used for actual work — and I think, “He’s compensating for something.” — Peter Hornbein, 70, Boulder, Colo.

The very question of what constitutes ideal masculinity is, at best, a fool’s errand and, at worst, dangerous. It also might lie at the heart of why we are losing young men to cults of toxic masculinity. The minute you define this false ideal, you are falsely defining those who don’t meet the ideal. — Craig Culp, 63, Gaithersburg, Md.

Those two quotes surrounded by toxicity does not mean we have to be fair to it.

Fair.

I feel like avoiding the question of what masculinity is or should be is just not possible, not once the old answers to that question have been unsettled - something has to fill the space created, if it's not discussed that just means the answer is something implicit, or defined negatively by what is rejected?

It's like the "define British?" 'debate' you get here, it's a trap.

xp
the Culp quote is the one I said was otm. I think the other one ends up kind of problematic though -- as much as I also lazily mock male strangers for what their vehicular choices say about their insecurities -- why do men have to do "actual work" and how is that different from non-actual? idk maybe that guy is aware of all that, but, well, we're back to "this article sucks"

soref: I think we could instead discuss rejecting gender binaries? I'm maybe not sure what you're saying