Well, there’s manliness and there’s saintliness, and, as a man I’d sure hope there’s a nexus between them.
But we can’t all be saints, although the only alternative isn’t necessarily a ticket to Hell. I grew up working class, which had its own guidelines of masculinity same as @msmith537’s middle class strictures had for him (though both are equally heartless in their own way). At least once in his life a boy should hop a freight, swing on a cop (preferably a fat one), and, per Zorba the Greek, should a woman desire him (again, she should preferably be fat), he’d disappoint her at peril to his immortal soul. He may or may not have to actually face combat, but he would find himself not too far from other men who’d kill him if they got the chance. (working class men - and certainly women for that matter - made a grim confrontation with “disposability” centuries before the middle class recognized it)
So maybe it’s not necessarily about masculinity; success and security, but just the experience of having the red crap in your blood to spit in the eye of whoever or whatever was out to spoil your chances at success and security. I’ll shake the hand of any man, woman or otherself who’s happy to fight that fight.
Life’s a short, precious gift. You tell me: what’s the best way to show your gratitude?
My father was in his share of fistfights, hitchhiked his way to California during the Depression to find his fortune (he didn’t find it, and had to hitchhike his way back to Chicago), served in the Army, etc. As far as he was concerned, none of that was the mark of manliness. Here’s what he taught me:
Your word is your bond and a handshake is a contract
Take care of your family
Work hard and don’t steal from your company or your customers
Marry a better person than you are, and try to live up to her example
Character isn’t defined by race, religion or sexuality
Nitpick - Mandela was founder and head of the armed wing of the ANC when he was imprisoned. His strategy very much involved the use of violence when no alternative presented itself.
Chris Rock also does a funny bit how Mandela spent 27 years locked up in a harsh South African prison but after only 2 years being back with his wife he was like “I can’t take it anymore!” and they got divorced.
Just pointing out that the heroes that @Spice_Weasel mentioned are also men. Your attachment to a particular type of behavior model has nothing to do with an inherent man-ness in your position, but rather an inherent you-ness.
Which is where this whole thing gets horribly impossible to untangle. What do you even mean, or does one even mean by saying “as a man” or “as a woman” I feel a certain way. It seems to carry an implication that the way one feels is an integral and immutable part of being one gender or another, and it is a given that most others who share your gender agree.
I find discussions about ‘masculinity’ hard to identify with, because while I definitely feel anxiety and concern about meeting the expectations of other men (and other women) about how to move correctly through the world as a man, and many of my attitudes, likes and dislikes are rooted in culturally transmitted male behaviors, I’ve never felt like being a man was a particularly useful detail for understanding why I am X Y or Z, or why I am not A B or C.
I do think there is a sea of shared male attitudes and behaviors that manifest differently from female behaviors, but we hit a dead end of understanding when we assume that any given thing we feel can be explained by the fact of being male.
He talks about the use of violence in his autobiography too, though not in much detail. Based on my recollection he said something along the lines of, “yeah, we did resort to violence at times, but we tried to minimize human casualties.” It was less, “kill our enemies” and more “sabotage infrastructure and hope nobody dies.” But sometimes people did die.
It’s not that violence I admire, so much as his perseverance.
I was reflecting on the fact that I don’t have too many female heroes I hold up in a similar way, though they certainly exist. The only one I can think of is Dorothea Dix, a crusader for mental health reform. Far from perfect, but a very persistent woman. Oh, and Helen Keller, the ultimate example of using one’s privilege to help others. She took the attention she got for her disability and leveraged it for the least privileged. And she was not afraid to hit back at her critics.
I don’t admire violence but I would certainly not be opposed to violent action if it was the difference between freedom and slavery for me or my family.
I think for me it’s hard to say what I am actually capable of until I am actually in a situation like that. I’m already disappointed to learn what I would do if my government were sliding toward authoritarianism, which it is, and beyond writing some letters and finally attending a protest, I’m not doing much. But yes, I imagine if there were a direct threat to my family I’d not be passive about it. Hopefully I never find out.
Well I just mean I’m speaking as a man (in case it’s not obvious what my gender is).
I also think we hit a bit of a dead end by ignoring different male and female perspectives.
One example that comes to mind is being a SAHM vs a SAHD. In an ideal world it shouldn’t matter. But I feel like for most people it kind of does. I personally don’t really care what other people besides my wife think. But to me not working feels like putting a lot of financial burden on my wife.
I am reminded of decades ago in Thirtysomething an exchange between Michael, the words-guy and Elliot, the pictures-guy, the former complaining he can’t finish the Great American Novel.
“I’ll never be the next Hemingway.”
“Are you kidding me? Hemingway couldn’t be Hemingway – he died trying.”
My husband was a stay at home Dad for a few years. It was fabulous for me! I didn’t have to worry about anything other than my job. He took care of the kids, the house, the car… Those were the easiest years of my adult life.
There are a lot of ways a SAHS is a great system. As long as the one staying home is the one with the lesser W2 capacity, or they’re plenty happy living on the smaller of the two W2s.
Actually if that was the case with my wife I would probably be fine with it. Problem is her job is stressful and requires long hours and travel anyway and I think she just sort of resents that I don’t have a job.
Me, I sort have mixed feelings about work.
I don’t know that men really get an “easiest years of our adult life”. Unless maybe we get divorced or never get married in the first place. No matter how outwardly happy and content a man is, he has to be conflicted and stressed on the inside otherwise he’s not trying hard enough at life I suppose. A man who is both outwardly stress-free and inwardly stress free is viewed as a sort of dumb “golden retriever” of a man. Think Spicolli or Wooderson or Lebowski. Amusing characters that a lot of men may idealize but no one in their right mind would emulate.
We had kids, so there was a lot of child care, and he did essentially all of it when he was a SAHD.
I really can’t relate to “he must be conflicted and stressed”. I have lots of male friends: single, married, straight, gay, young, old, wealthy, impoverished. Some men drive themselves more than others. Some men have a clear goal and work towards it, others don’t. Some have a goal that’s career oriented, and others work to make a living, and their primary goals lie elsewhere.
I don’t know any human being that I’d compare to a golden retriever. That certainly didn’t describe my outlook. But when my husband was a SAHD, I wasn’t conflicted because i had clear goals that didn’t conflict with each other. The driven executive isn’t usually conflicted, he’s all-in on his job. I mean, we all have little conflicts, but when one aspect of your life gets priority, it’s just easier to make those decisions.
Maybe it’s because I’m not very good at juggling priorities and keeping lots of balls in the air. But it was nice for me when i didn’t have to worry about paying the bills (i mean, the physical act of making sure they get paid – i earned enough that we could pay for all our needs and many of our wants), or maintaining the car, or buying groceries, or getting supper on the table, or taking the cat to the vet. When he went back to work, we shared those responsibilities.