What does it mean to be man enough

i just wanted to fit in with the other

guys

that’s what 15 year old mike told me

said if i had nudes to show off

they’d like me and i’d be one of the

guys wouldn’t make fun of me anymore

he also said he wanted to be popular

later in our conversation

he’d admit feeling bad for the girls his

classmates some of them friends for

years whose trust he betrayed

by sharing those pictures he lost those

friends

and a year later some were still

avoiding him both in school and on

social media

it also sullied his reputation with his

teachers and coaches

he’d gone from being a nice kid to a

potential sexual predator

over and over he’d talk about how he

believed having nudes would make the

other guys

like him and think he was cool then

they’d hang out with him

he provided the goods but he didn’t get

the payoff the other guy still didn’t

hang out with him

mike had sacrificed his reputation and

his female friends privacy

for nothing i understood immediately as

a therapist who has worked extensively

with male youth and written about their

development

i knew mike was caught in one of

masculinity’s traps

he’d decided he was willing to take some

risks in order to be one of the guys

but mike didn’t really understand all

the risks he was taking

or the potential consequences that he

might find himself in

now mike had lots of advantages you

might call them privileges

and yet he was struggling to fit in or

to feel like he fit in

he was white good-looking and

upper-middle class

mike was athletic but he wasn’t

interested in playing football or

basketball so he was playing the wrong

sports

he was a pretty good student he had to

do some work to get those a’s and b’s

he was also a little socially awkward he

would misread people and he often said

the wrong thing

or sometimes he didn’t say anything at

all to avoid saying the wrong thing

but nudes mike could get nudes and with

pictures he really wouldn’t have to say

anything he could just show the pictures

and then he could get in with the cool

guys the guys who ruled his grade and

his seniors

the guys who would rule the school mike

never had a chance

masculinity wouldn’t allow it he was

both man enough

and not men enough here in 21st century

america

we all understand the guy needs to act

in a certain way to be seen as masculine

he needs to be independent tough and

ambitious he shouldn’t show his feelings

or be too concerned with his appearance

promiscuity and violence are allowed and

even encouraged in some circles

masculinity which i’ll define as our

culture’s expectations for boys and men

requires all guys to prove their

masculinity by conforming to these

expectations

these stereotypes or risk being seen as

not man enough

but once a guy is proved his masculinity

the target moves

and then he needs to prove that he’s not

just a man but a real man

and that’s where mike failed where he

started to be not man enough

see mike was an athlete but not a jock

and for masculinity that’s a very

important distinction

athletes are people who play at least

one sport jocks play at least one sport

but there’s more to it than that

they wear the jock uniform every day

sweats

clothes with the logos their favorite

teams even their own jerseys from the

teams they’re on or maybe a varsity

jacket

they also have a certain attitude and a

way of being a persona if you will

they talk about sports all the time

downplay the importance of academics

and they’re expected to engage in

so-called locker room talk that

denigrates women by positioning them as

sexual

objects and denigrates gay men by

positioning them as weak and effeminate

if you’re like andy from the breakfast

club on screen here

seeing a guy who’s fat and slow in your

locker room

maybe you tape his buns together because

you just find him

disgusting but in the world of boys and

men particularly teenage boys in

american high schools

these are the guys were at the top of

the pyramid these are the guys who

proved their masculinity

beyond a shadow of adele they’re the

real men and that’s the guys we’re all

supposed to want to be

in the world of masculinity scholars and

yeah that’s a thing

we talk about jocks as having the

hegemonic form of masculinity

because it’s presented as the ideal form

of masculinity

now as the people at the top of the

masculinity pyramid

jocks get certain perks they get high

status and the ability to influence

others

people want to be liked by the jocks or

at least be on their good side

jocks can also get the benefit of the

doubt from other kids and from the

adults around them

in theory jocks also get access to the

most attractive dating and sexual

partners

there are other forms of masculinity

that are also idealized here in the u.s

in the early 21st century

like tough guys and superheroes guys who

use violence to get their way

usually but not always in the service of

good

rebels who demonstrate their

independence and highly successful

business types become rich and powerful

and in today’s america one of the things

that distinguishes real men

from guys who are just man enough is

their attitude

the same way that attitude distinguishes

jocks from plain old athletes

that attitude says there’s no limits and

every approach should be considered

nothing is out of balance and that

attitude is why tony stark’s iron man is

cooler

than steve rogers captain america why

elon musk founder of tesla and spacex

is better than bill gates founder of

microsoft sure

they’re all men enough in many ways but

some of these guys

are closer to our image of a real man

than others

now any system that says some men are

real men

and others are just man enough leave

some guys

in second place we don’t think much of

guys who are average joes or family men

guys like ray romano from everybody

loves raymond

phil dunphy from modern family or even

chidi from the good place

they’re fine sure and they’re mad enough

but we don’t think of them as

real men because they’re well average

they’ve earned masculinity’s

participation award

their masculinity is categorized as

complicit not hegemonic

because they support masculinity

structure and occasionally get some of

the perks

or at least they hope they will now

there are other guides that don’t even

fit that

at least not in popular culture and not

in the lives of american high schoolers

nerds are the iconic image of guys who

aren’t man enough

we could also talk about soft boys and

emo guys among others

they’re at the bottom of masculinity’s

hierarchy masculinity scholars talk

about

their versions of masculinity as

subordinated even though nerds aren’t

men enough

they don’t really challenge the

definition of what it means to be a man

or be a real man

they play along subordination even

complicity can be subtle

the nerds we loved for all those years

on the tv show the big bang theory

they made fun of nerds and thus they

upheld masculinity structure

they were always putting themselves down

maybe we’re not so concerned about the

nerds because the nerds and the adults

around them

are all pretty clear those guys will do

all right as adults and some of them

like elon musk and bill gates may even

surpass the boundaries of nerd hood and

become

regular guys but other guys aren’t

allowed to compete for masculine status

at all

they’re not even in the system they’re

prevented from proving their masculinity

to begin with

may never have the opportunity to prove

that they’re real men

we talk about these guys as having a

marginalized masculinity

for example having a black masculinity a

but a masculinity that is rooted in

black culture instead of our mainstream

predominantly white culture

that’s one example the u.s has a history

of slavery

segregation and jim crow era laws that

are focused on keeping black men

on the margins this positioning of black

masculinity contributes to higher rates

of school suspensions of black boys

which starts as early as kindergarten it

also contributes to the relatively high

rates of arrest and

incarceration of black men and even

their relatively higher rates of being

homicide victims

including the killings of black men like

george floyd and trayvon martin

and if you stand up for those men as nfl

quarterback colin kaepernick did

you might find yourself moved from the

top of the pyramid

out to the margins although the recent

public reaction to mr floyd’s death

appears to be moving mr kaepernick back

towards the top of the hierarchy

but that’s not mike’s story mike wasn’t

marginalized in any way

he’s a 15 year old boy who doesn’t have

a severe medical condition or severe

mental health issue that makes him

obviously different

mike is required to participate in this

competition that we call masculinity

every day he receives reminders from his

parents his teachers his peers

including anyone who might want to date

the media and even retailers

about what he should and shouldn’t do

because he’s a guy

i didn’t ask mike but i’m pretty sure

he’d have told me that being a

vegetarian

playing clarinet liking taylor swift or

lady gaga

would all prevent him from earning

status as a real man

the competition is brutal even for a boy

like mike who fits many of our society’s

preferred or privileged categories he

paid with his reputation

he also did some serious damage to his

friends reputations

for mike the cost wasn’t that bad

because his parents

in the society that we live in provide

him with a safety net

at one point his parents even asked me

if they should have him change school so

he could start over

it’s good to have a safety net not

everybody gets that he wasn’t

at any risk of being reported to the fbi

or the police

as a sexual predator at age 15 he still

had plenty of opportunities to change

his life

think about what kind of man he wanted

to be

this system called masculinity applies

to almost all american boys and men

forcing them to first prove that they’re

men enough to qualify

and then man enough again to be seen as

real men the cost for other guys can be

much worse than they were for mike

we might imagine a 23 year old unmarried

man

who lives in his parents basement maybe

he’s employed although he doesn’t earn

enough to live on his own or with

roommates

maybe he’s not spends all his free time

online

23 he’s an adult but he’s definitely not

financially independent

so he’s not man enough maybe he’s just

down there playing video games and

hanging out with his friends online

but maybe he’s also a troll who vents

his frustrations

by targeting any member of a group he

thinks might have somehow contributed

to his difficulty finding a job that

pays him what he thinks he’s worth

we might also imagine a 45 year old

married father who’s always been

something of an average joe or a family

man

what happens to a guy like him when the

factory that he works at closes

or the stories manages closes or

otherwise he loses his job

there’s no other way for him to make a

living wage does he see himself

is no longer man enough because he can’t

provide for his family

and does he worry that’s how his family

sees him

perhaps we should ask if those opiates

that he started taking are about

physical pain

or if they’re really about the

psychological pain of failing to be man

enough

and what if we imagine a guy with a

marginalized masculinity

someone who’s never been able to prove

that he’s man enough let alone a real

man

that might be about race or ethnicity

but it might also be about being

atypical in some other important way

or maybe it’s just about family income

if we imagine a boy from a low income or

poor family

then we’re probably imagining he’s

attending an impoverished school

that won’t get him very far on the

educational system

if that boy lives in a big city there’s

a good chance the neighborhood also

features a high crime rate

higher than average rate of black and

brown families but if we imagine that

boy is poor

in rural america then we’re probably

imagining a white boy

we might call him a redneck your own

perspective will determine if that term

is positive or negative

but those rural areas have very few

programs that might help a guy overcome

the negative effects of poverty

leaving him with a strong sense that

people need to pick themselves up by

their bootstraps

whatever race or ethnicity he is

whatever his family’s economic status

wherever he comes from

when our culture forces him to stay on

the margins instead of being part of the

mainstream

we limit his ability to earn a decent

wage and must fulfill one of the basic

requirements of masculinity

providing for himself and any family he

might have without that

he and we will probably never see him as

man enough and certainly not as a real

man

so maybe that boy turns to sex and

becomes a player in order to find some

claim to being men enough

but without good access to birth control

or maybe with an explicit desire to get

on welfare

he runs the risk of becoming a teen

father and like

teen mothers teen fathers are less

likely to finish high school

less likely to start college and less

likely to finish it by age 25 in fact

a teen father is more likely than other

young men his age to be unemployed

and to have been in jail maybe he turns

to crime

because that’ll provide some type of

income allowing him to claim he’s man

enough because he’s got money

but that’s risky and he could end up in

jail or dead

maybe he just gives up he could turn to

drugs to dull the pain of failing to be

mad

or maybe he commits suicide the second

most frequent cause of death among males

age 50

15 to 24. male adults in the u.s

take their lives at two and a half times

the rate higher than women

perhaps this is part of the reason why

but it doesn’t need to be this way

today’s expectations are relatively new

having coalesced in the 1980s

that’s when the term real man became

part of mainstream culture

but in the 1950s we had a very different

set of expectations for boys and men

back then we encouraged and expected

them to be good guys

to fit in and do their part instead of

prescribing ambition

earnings and doing whatever it takes to

be number one american culture wanted

men to be good and to act morally

we wanted them to be honest respectful

and decent

we highlighted men’s character instead

of their achievements

in the workplace we rewarded men who

were hard workers and loyal to the

company

if you did it right you’d move up the

ladder and ultimately earn rewards for

being a 30 40 or even a 50-year man of

the company

back then we expected men to

simultaneously recognize their

independence

as well as their connections to their

community they demonstrated

independence at home where quote unquote

father knew best

while also being expected to participate

in their communities by coaching little

league

joining a fraternal organization being

an active member of their house of

worship

a man who fit this description was

called a good man or a stand-up guy

and today those criteria might qualify

him as

qualify him as having passed that first

test of being men

enough but in the 1950s it was just that

one test and any guy

or almost any guy could meet that

standard of masculinity

by almost any guy i mean anyone who was

white male and heterosexual

white men in the 1950s could be good

while also being sexist

racist and homophobic because the

culture allowed it

the times have changed and here in

america in 2020

we can update our expectations of being

a good man to reflect those changes

those good guys were capable of change

when confronted with the problems of

inequality by the civil rights movement

the women’s rights movement and later

the gay rights movement many of those

good men

and their kids who were also good men

lived up to their values and recognized

the justice in those movements

some gave money some joined protests and

some

opened doors to power that had

previously been closed

mike and i spent a lot of time talking

about masculinity and its rules

instead of striving to be a real man or

even dangerous

he focused on being a good guy he still

wanted to be liked and popular

and he realized there were other ways to

achieve those goals without hurting

anyone else in the process or being seen

as a jerk

mike also realized he could play the

strengths that he devalued

such as being loyal and being

compassionate the traits that had gotten

him those female friends in the

beginning

he didn’t decided he didn’t have to try

to fit into some kind of box

the man box if you will that made him

sacrifice parts of himself that other

people genuinely valued

so if we want to change masculinity both

the content of what men should be

and this two-part challenge of being men

enough that we need to make different

choices

every day here in 2020 we know that

every click

every decision about what to watch on

screen serves as a vote of some sort and

that the algorithms will give us more of

whatever we’re choosing

and make similar recommendations to

other people when we’re at the ballot

box we can also choose between good guys

and real men we can also create change

by using some media literacy techniques

and asking about the guys we’re watching

on screen

for example you might ask your son if

you’d rather be like steve rogers

also known as captain america or his

work buddy tony stark also known as iron

man

maybe you use the characters from a tv

show like two and a half men charlie and

allen

which of these guys do you want to be

like son and why that guy

why choose him if you’re talking with

someone who dates boys or men

you might ask them who they’d choose as

a dating partner and why that guy

and we don’t need to stick to fixed

fictitious characters

anyone in the public sphere performers

athletes prominent businessmen

politicians

they can all be used times have changed

and so is our definition of what it

means to be a man or to be masculine

the good guys of the 1950s gave way to

the real men of the 1980s

and our culture has continued to change

we can resist the idea that masculinity

is a competition

that all guys are a part of but only

some will excel at

and instead change our definition so

that any guy can be men

enough when we stop pushing boys and men

to the margins

because they don’t fit our stereotype of

masculinity we’ll see lower rates of

teen fatherhood

crime drug use and even suicide and by

using our good

guy standard most guys will be able to

achieve an important personal milestone

being man enough