Go, Dudes! Via Trois Tetes @ Flickr.
Into this unhelpful clusterfuck struts one Tom Chiarella, who writes for that bastion of rich-white-dudliness, Esquire, with the latest word on how to be a rich-white-dude (like him, one presumes), under the highly poetic title: What is a Man?
Chiarella tries to define a man by discussing five different “essential characteristics,”* but actually just spills a lot of ink writing a ridiculous amount of short, repetitive declarative sentences (I think he’s going for “manifesto” style, but: FAIL) that have nothing do to with being a male or male-identified at all. For example, by Chiarella’s account, a man, among other things (I’m just picking these randomly; the rest of his suggestions are at this level of helpfulness):
–can cook eggs.
–can speak to dogs.
–owns up.
–knows how to ridicule.
–does not rely on rationalizations or explanations.
–is like a zoo animal: both captive and free.
Mm-hm. I had to sit with that for a little while, and now I’m wondering what the fuck I wasted my time for.
I’m bouncing back and forth between making my own “Man’s List,” or an equally stupid “Women’s List” that includes vague pronouncements that could be interpreted in more than one way, and yet are utterly lacking anything close to real insight (ex: A woman knows when to scratch an itch). I can’t for the life of me figure outwhat this article adds to the discourse about “manhood,” or what sort of desperately insecure Esquire readers are now freaking about mastering breakfast “over-easy.”
But Chiarella’s list is neither the first nor will it be the last generated on this topic. Obviously, this is an issue that some men, somewhere, find Very Important. So I’m gonna ask y’all to weigh in: what is a man? Does one have to have XY chromosomes? Does one have to have a penis? Does one have to have obtained a certain age or act a certain way? And what is it about men that they feel the need to set such arbitrary benchmarks in order to prove themselves all. the. time.?
And, lastly, ’cause I’m here for the women, do we play these “What is a woman?” games? And if we do, how are they different?
*I got an email from Chiarella late Saturday afternoon. He seemed remarkably un-douche-y for a guy who claims to be “like a zoo animal” (Hi, Tom! Can you get me a gig writing for Esquire?), and who noted that Yahoo! apparently did some re-editing of his original piece, and framed/titled it as “Five Characteristics.” In the interest of being fair, I thought I’d pass that info along. The Harpies are now waiting for interesting, good-spirited emails from Phyllis Schlafly and Helen Gurley Brown.
“Does not rely on rationalisations or explainations”, Hmm, and there was me thinking men were supposed to be the logical ones. In my opinion a man has the XY chromosone or an operation, is a decent human being and can handle a woman having more power than he does.
I’ve always been puzzled by Esquire’s relentless pursuit of manly self-definition. I mean, I basically like their premise: groom thyself, learn to cook, choose intelligent women over bimbos, read a book or two. And yet, there’s something irritatingly masturbatory and navel-gazing about it…
I’d say XY and a penis is a good place to start, although I know transmen who are as manly as those born with the genes and the dangly bits, so who knows?
We don’t play “what is a woman” games because we don’t have to. The Patriarchy has always defined women as the Other, i.e. “whoever is not a man is a woman” (usually referring to lack of dangly bits but also, pejoratively, to whoever doesn’t have overly aggressive testosteronal impulses or the urge to fuck women).
One thing I’ve learned is that primarily, men define themselves as Not Women.
Does not rely on rationalizations or explanations? What?
6. Deters all rational women within a 5-mile radius.
@Becky and Sarah
So, basically, men are defined as Not Women, and women are defined at Not Men. Sounds like a conundrum if I’ve ever heard one.
I don’t think women are defined as Not Men as much as men are defined as Not Women.
Women aren’t ostracized if they enjoy a “man’s” activity (action movies, baseball…) because men and men’s interests are “normal.” We are still treated like women within those realms but it’s expected that women would want to move up, so to speak, into a man’s world, whereas men who move down to the women’s sphere (chick flicks, ballet…) are really considered freaks.
(Where are HillRat and AspEx when you’d actually like them to weigh in?)
I’ma throw an adjective in there that I think is clearly implied, but never stated, in Chiarella’s article: “Real.” A real man can cook eggs and talk to dogs and so forth. ‘Cause there’s lots of XYs w/ wangs out there. That’s no proof of manhood: how do you prove you’re a REAL MAN? And when can you stop proving it?
@PhDork: Well, for that, I’m going to go with my rule of thumb for pretty much everything in life: Don’t Be An Asshole. The ideal REAL MAN is not an asshole.
(neither is a REAL WOMAN, IMO)
A real man has:
- Big arms to hold and protect me
- No knowledge of that superfluous clitoris
- A strong and mighty cock
- A bank account to support my frivolities
- An appetite for food that he will never cook himself
- Knowledge of sports that he will impart because I cannot figure it out myself
- A sense of humor to realize I am being sarcastic
Here’s mine: A real man doesn’t waste time wondering if he’s a man. He just is one.
BAM. Take that dudely writer.
(True story: I subscribe to Esquire. Yeah, some of it is crap. But there’s been really great reporting on the war, some really great profiles, and some pretty good short fiction. I often wonder why no women’s fashion mag manages to be half as good.)
@funnyface: I subscribe too, for all the same reasons. Their writers’ style is very distinctive and while it occasionally seems a little affected to me, it’s way better than what women’s mags (or other men’s mags) are offering.
Funnyface, your answer is my ideal answer as well.
Well, we don’t get into “what is a woman” games, but there is a lot of BS “what is a real feminist”…
A REAL woman:
-knows the difference between the time-dependent and the time-independent form of the Scrödinger equation
-is not afraid of liquid nitrogen
-always wears latex gloves when manipulating chemicals
-doeans’t start crying when her data doesn’t make sense
-thinks puppies and kittens are cute.
There, everything you always wanted to know about being a woman but never dared ask from a perfect stranger on the internet.
You’re welcome and I accept your apology.
Uh-oh, Marie. I am no longer a REAL woman. (You lost me at variants of Schrodinger, although I’m pretty good on the other stuff.)
Well, PhDork, a REAL woman owns a copy of Richard Feynman’s Lectures on Physics:
http://www.amazon.com/Feynman-Lectures-Physics-including-Feynmans/dp/0805390456/ref=pd_bbs_sr_2?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1239548905&sr=8-2
I mean, the cover is pink.
Now I have Flight of the Conchords stuck in my head.
“What man? Who’s a man? What makes a man a man? Am I a man? Yes, technically I am.”
Well, Marie, Feynman did luuuuuv the laydeez. (Maybe not so much with the respect though…)
I’m not surprised. There are many, many male scientists like that (I won’t get into detail, but as a woman in research, as soon as you’re trying to do something more taxing than being a glorified technician, you just can’t win).
I just wish I could persuade a few girls and women that, yes, your wee little lady-brain is perfectly capable of handling integration and screw-drivers, now get your ass into physics.
I mean, it’s insane. There are lots and lots of women in biology, and plenty in chemistry, but as soon as you’re into something that requires a bit of math or computering, poof! It’s an all-male environment.
It’s just depressing: whether it’s my mother, my grand-mother, my friends, the pupils I had when I was doing private tutoring, the comment-section on Jezebel… They’ve all internalised that “math is too hard!” Math is just logic and rationality. Everybody can do it!
Oh, well, maybe I should just be thankful that nobody ever told me I was stupid, or at least that my parents had sufficient faith in my abilities that I never doubted them either.
Sorry to go on such an off-topping rant like that, but it’s just a big old pet-peeve of mine. Maybe that’s one of the ways we could define real women: a real woman always knows the difference between fact and bull-shit, and always sticks with the former.
(Where are HillRat and AspEx when you’d actually like them to weigh in?)
A more sensitive soul than myself might take offense at that, but I choose to believe you’re joking.
how do you prove you’re a REAL MAN? And when can you stop proving it?
I guess I felt like I needed to prove my manhood to my Dad, but he signed off on it pretty early on so the real test was proving it to myself. Once you convince yourself that you’re a real man, making the argument to others becomes simultaneously easier and less important.
However there are still (at least for me) situations where I feel the need to send off signals and markers of manhood. As I think about it, many of those situations and markers are at least as much about class as they are about gender; such as dressing appropriately for job interviews or deciphering the dress code on invitations to social engagements.
Hill Rat, you took it in the spirit with which it was intended.
But my question remains: what does one actually DO to prove this “real man” stuff? Punch people? Get a job that makes you sweat? Write your name in the snow?
Because “dressing appropriately” isn’t gender specific. If I show up in chic black velvet to a swank Xmas party, that doesn’t make me a Man. That makes me Not an Idiot.
But my question remains: what does one actually DO to prove this “real man” stuff? Punch people? Get a job that makes you sweat? Write your name in the snow?
Manhood, defining manhood, and proving manhood are different depending on the penis-holder in question’s race and class. So for me as young Black man with professional, college-educated, and married parents who lived in the ‘burbs, defining my manhood meant something different than it did to a young Black man with parents who are divorced, work in blue collar jobs, and lives in a rural area and basically any boy who’s race/class background differed from my own.
WHO you are attempting to prove your manhood to also varies, in my case it was my Father and other men in my family who I felt like I had to prove my manhood to. For boys that don’t grow up with a man (it could be a Father or Step-Father or members of your extended family like uncles, grandfathers, or older male cousins) in their home or a strong connection to their Fathers may be attempting to prove their manhood to other boys or just older males they know. It could be someone with a positive influence on a boy’s life like a sports coach, teacher, or employer or someone less positive like a gang or dopey guys hanging out in front of a bodega.
Here’s an example from my own life about a fucked up conception of manhood. I was about 25 and was living with my folks temporarily when I hooked up with a softball team in the sleepy town of Petersburg, VA. One night we sitting around talking and the topic of who had kids came up, someone asked me if I had any children and I responded that I did not. The response was, “What’s the matter with your nuts?” It was inconceivable to these guys that I considered myself a man and hadn’t produced any offspring. So someone who grows up with that kind of thinking as a social norm will probably feel the need to try and impregnate a woman so that he can “prove his manhood.”
In my particular case, my “manhood” was established when I spent a Summer digging swimming pools. It wasn’t just that I had a manual labor job that bestowed the mantel of manhood on me; it was also the fact that I wasn’t making much money, I got my own ass out of bed at 4:15am to make it to work on time, and I refused to quit even when it became clear the situation was no good. I didn’t complain or whine, I just did what I needed to do until one day when I got home from work at 11pm my Dad told me that it was OK if I quit that particular job.
Dad told me that he was proud of me and I conducted myself as a MAN in the face of difficult circumstances. No one had to tell me to get a job or help me get one, I handled business like a mature young man should. Strangely, as proud a moment as that was for me, one moment in my life that equaled that was one Saturday that Summer when I had got done doing my weekly cleaning of the guest bathroom and my Mom told me that she didn’t need to inspect my work because she knew it was done properly. There was an accumulation of little things that I did that
Summer that I showed that I was past being a little kid and my parents were quick to point them out and also in turn tell me the increased privileges and discretion that I was afforded as an adult/Man were balanced by increasing responsibilities to myself and to my family.
Of course once you leave home there’s a whole ‘nother thing you go through with your peer group of newly minted young men.