(Picture from Picturing Men: A Century of Male Relationships in Everyday American Photography)
In 2008, I was taking Advanced Writing Practicum with a particularly flamboyant and fantastic professor at the end of my freshman year at college. I had just recovered from a tough first semester with a super-serious-Jesuit writing professor and a huge dickwad of an Ancient Philosophy professor. This piece is incredibly corny and perhaps getting dated too, but at the time, I was proud of my writing. Fortunately for me, while it appears to be missing from all my back-ups, I uploaded it on livejournal (dear lord I’m old--where all the ladies in their late 20s be at?). If you’re interested in gender (masculinity), sports and hammy academic writing, this might just be your cup of tea.
Where has the Touchy-Feely Man Gone: Masculinity Confined and Shaped by Society’s External Forces
Adrenaline and pure excitement takes over tired, cramped limbs, the feeling of winning permeates every air particle, and all that you can hear is, “We won! We won!!” Teammates run towards each other, grabbing each other’s laughing faces, their mouths open in astonishment and glee, happiness written into their eyes. Limbs tangled around each other, men piling on top of each other, the footballers amidst celebration show no inhibition. These are men, men whom the world exemplifies as the “truly masculine” with their incredible finesse, skill, talent. Yet amongst the very sport that defines them as masculine men, they sing, they cry, they embrace, they carry each other in their arms, they kiss each other on the cheeks and lips. They candidly display emotion and love in front of millions of people, supporters and rivals alike. The image is different but touching: men are not afraid to truly express themselves with each other and with the world.
Football (or soccer, as the Americans call it) is considered to be a masculine sport around the world, a sport where its players best portray the manly man image. But interestingly enough, it is also a sport in which its players show the widest range of emotion. In society today, there is a perceived concept that masculine men do not show emotion. While football seems to cross that boundary, excuse the behavior that is often not praised or encouraged, and somehow redefine a broad yet dominant concept of masculinity, this is just one sport in which men can express themselves more freely than elsewhere. But masculinity is much more complex than everyday men merely appearing aloof and withholding emotions on the inside. Experts and researchers say masculinity is a hybrid of social construction, historical and traditional definitions passed down through time, and cultural demands. All three ultimately create a mirage of stereotypes and the socially acceptable image that men should follow. More accurately, the socially acceptable image of masculinity is what we refer to as hegemonic masculinity. Though many societies and cultures around the world hold similar views on masculinity, America holds a certain ideology of masculinity that opposes anything resembling its anti-thesis, femininity, and other deviating identities like homosexuality¹. Anything that goes beyond the code of “socially acceptable” masculinity shocks us and leaves us perplexed. As a boy grows into manhood, he learns and follows the hegemonic code of masculinity, which his home, his homosocial enactment with other males, the media, and sports enforces but such factors also concurrently suppress a more intimate, alternative form of masculinity. These external factors ultimately contribute to a mostly American fear of any male behavior that may transcend heteronormativity. We all have some stereotypically influenced perception of how men should act and how men should behave. Michael S. Kimmel, a sociologist whose field focuses on men and masculinity, argues that in society, the dominant culture, “white culture,” holds significant power. From this concept, he states that our collective perceptions come from “the hegemonic definition of manhood [which] is a man in power, a man with power, and a man of power” (57). The language fits perfectly: dominant masculinity equates to power, having power, showing power. Psychologist Robert Brannon has summarized what manhood should basically be: “No sissy stuff!”—Men have nothing to do with anything that suggests femininity, “Be a big wheel”—masculinity equates power, success, wealth, and status, “Be a sturdy oak”—never show emotion, for boys do not cry, and lastly, “Give ‘em Hell”—men are daring and aggressive (58). The four rules stated are the “elements” that men desperately, vainly, chivalrously try to measure up, and ultimately makes masculinity a “relentless test.” Not all men try to live up to this narrow idea of masculinity but many who do, find it almost impossible to achieve. Though it is impossible to achieve, society continues to firmly code, imprint, and enforce messages of hegemonic masculinity. In society, the most popular modes of enforcing the macho male ideology are through the media and sports but the first place that prepares boys to become “men” would be at home amongst his parents. Richard L. Meth, Director of the School of Family Studies at the University of Connecticut, comments that boys need to “develop the acute…ability to discriminate between masculine and feminine behavior, and typically avoid anything associated with femininity” (11). In order to acquire the ability as Meth states, Kimmel remarks that a boy starts by “renouncing his identification with deep emotional attachment to his mother and then replacing her with the father as the object of identification” (59). This is the beginning of the social upbringing that effects boys’ perception of masculinity and femininity: the family strives to emasculate boys so they take flight from the feminine (the mother) and embrace the masculine (the father) to affirm themselves as real men. The detachment from dependence leads him to believe that he has to be consistently strong, independent, and confident, or else he would be laughed at, teased, and considered “not manly.”² This social upbringing leads most boys to see femininity as the antithesis of masculinity. The fear of being branded as “unmanly” is not lessened by external forces such as the media, sports, and the expectations and scrutiny of other men and even women to some extent. There is no better way to truly demonstrate one’s maleness than in front of other men. Meth points out that “boys often like to boast about any kind of sexual activity, in part to inform their peers of their progress but also as a means of validating their emerging manhood” (24). As stated, during childhood and adolescence, boys must not only learn how to separate themselves from their mothers, but they must also learn how to assert themselves over woman. The easiest way is to share or boast about sexual experiences with the other sex. But it is not only boys; men, well into their adulthood, may also insist on holding onto their bragging rights about their sexual progress regarding women. Meth singles out boasting about sexual performance but Kimmel also notes that men can boast pretty much about any accomplishment that “parade[s] the markers of manhood—wealth, power, status, sexy women” so they could “improve their ranking on the masculine social scale” (61). Though bragging may be done in good play or fun, the obsession with proving potency in sex and performance marks the beginning of heteronormativity, in which dominating the feminine is the norm for men. When a man does not boast about his sexual activity as much as some may expect, there is speculation concerning his “hetero” reputation. The true test of maleness determines the rules of expected male behavior but at the same time, it makes room for immense competition with other men, ridiculous amounts of machismo talk, and most importantly, fear of failure, fear of not being seen as a real man. In our society, it is not rare that many people mix up the terms that label the different types of relationships between men: homosocial, homoerotic, and homosexual. Homosocial merely relates to the social interaction between men (i.e. playing sports together, hanging out with each other, etc). Homoerotic involves desire for other men, which society often leads men to believe that such desire is feminine and may even grow into homosexual tendencies. Bob Pease, professor and researcher in the field of Self and Society and Men and Masculinities, suggests that “one of the main obstacles preventing more intimate relationships between men is homophobia—the fear of being, or appearing to be, gay is deeply embedded in Western culture” (qtd in Singleton 10). Psychoanalytic historian, Geoffrey Gorer, supports Pease’s claim: “The lives of most American men are bounded, and their interests daily curtailed by the constant necessity to prove to their fellows, and to themselves, that they are not sissies, not homosexuals,” (qtd in Kimmel 63). The constant need to prove this fact is the reason why we hear the phrase, “Oh, but I’m straight” or “Oh, but I’m not gay or anything” so often from men. Bounded by what Gorer calls the constant necessity to be straight, homosexuality becomes the “negation of masculinity” as social scientist Bob Connell puts it (qtd in Sabo 103). Not all boys may find the need to assert “straightness” but most boys in America grow up to believe that masculinity equates homophobia. From the fear of being not manly enough, homoeroticism and homosexuality become affiliated with femininity. The worst part is that this irrational fear has obstructed men from truly sharing their inner feelings and thoughts with each other because they are afraid that they would cross the boundary from homosocial to homoerotic and/or homosexual. The masculine code often enforces the competitive drive in which men resort to fulfill in sports. Aggression, rivalry, and dominance; sports is the ticket to being masculine. If showing off in front of other men is the true test of maleness, playing a sport is the ultimate action that would construct a rock-solid image of manhood. Dominating a game of a head-to-head sport and succeeding as the winner is an achievement that most men want, not just to show that they are athletically talented but to also show that they have acquired some unnamed, unspoken token of maleness. In Messner’s “Becoming 100 percent straight”, he argues that among the competitive spirit, men use sports as an act of what Herbert Marcuse calls, “the sublimation of homoerotic desire into an aggressive, violent act” (183). Transferring sexual desire into violence is acceptable because the world of sports has established itself as an arena of aggression and competitive drive³. Messner claims that ” for a closeted gay man, “the decision to construct his identity largely within sports was to step into a fiercely heterosexual/masculine closet that would hide what he saw as his ‘true’ identity” but for straight men, it was like “stepping out into an entire world of heterosexual privilege” (185). This theory of sublimation relates back to the fact that we live in a heteronormative world, a world that accentuates “normalcy”. There are many exceptions to this case because most men find sports as a means for them to prove their athletic abilities and talent. They might engage in sports to show their aggressive, daring side, a side that is enforced in the hegemonic male ideology but not always to perform expectations of a hyper-heterosexual identity. If our world is of heterosexual privilege, insisting that male behavior should replicate heteronormativity, then American films from the past century are doing their job: emphasizing straightness among male relationships. Film critic, Joan Mellen, notes that in movies where two male protagonists collaborate together (i.e. Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid, 1969), they may prefer each other’s company yet they “indulge in excessive display of machismo to convince everyone that despite their exclusively male grouping they are really heterosexual” (qtd in Doty 45). Excessive displays may include verbal banter, competitive insults, or any teasing behavior that would result in what cultural critic Anthony Easthrope identifies as “explicit antagonism between two masculine egos [to] cover the implicit male bond” (qtd in Doty 45). The homosocial relationship is purely friendly, a positive relationship that helps men connect with each other. But as Gorer and Pease claims, American society has conditioned us to believe a homosocial bond between two men might border too much on erotic intimacy that could be potentially homoerotic and/or homosexual. Not to mention, when there are no obvious male friendships in televised or film media, the male figure is often portrayed as the quintessence of “male self-reliance…often referred to as ‘rugged individualism’” (Doty 44). The male is either independent, battling adversaries on his own or if he has a fellow male comrade, he must not be “too” friendly. The issue at hand is that our culture distorts homosocial, homoerotic, and homosexual together, making no distinction when they all have different definitions. Though motion pictures focus more on the attempts to not convey male-male friendships as anything but straight, we as an audience, have a homophobic temptation to sexualize nonexistent homoerotic aspects in a homosocial relationship due to our inability to differentiate. Homophobia is one of the main factors that affect homosocial relationships but competition is also another contributing factor. Clinical and Organizational Psychologist, Robert S. Pasick, states, “As boys, men were taught to view other boys as potential competitors, which rendered close friendship very difficult to sustain. We came to see friendship between men in win-lose terms” (117). Competitiveness is one of the main attributes of hegemonic masculinity (look at sports) so it becomes hard for men, who are conditioned by the need to appear invulnerable, powerful, and in control, to have a relationship with other men who are potential rivals or competitors. Pasick argues that this obsession with competition also manifests in men’s excessive devotion to work. In the job setting, men with the drive to compete and achieve “are hesitant to place trust in others, lest they get taken advantage of” (120). The work setting is the place where men must be cautious of others for this is the place that determines their financial and economic success. Whether it is sports or on the job, men’s aggressive spirit continues to run the course of their lives. Once again, the hegemonic code, upheld by society, obstructs men from successfully seeking closer friendships with other men. The main underlying issue with hegemonic male ideology is that our government, our social norms, our culture imposes hetero behavior: men like women; women like men; that is the way things work around here. Alternative identities such as homosexuality do not co-exist with the hetero-structure of our society and makes us uncomfortable. Sixteenth century essayist, Michel de Montaigne, stated, “…the customs and practices of life in society sweep us along. Most of my doings are governed by example…I was led there, brought to it by external considerations” (275). During a young boy’s childhood, he learns from his parents that there is no better example than his own father. At school, he follows his fellow male friends; he watches them as they watch him. He may meet a boy who accidentally catches his eye, and he, distraught by his attraction to another boy, rashly turns to sports, because everybody else has taught him that it is the “manly” activity. From sports to work, he sees that in order to achieve, he must have the same competitive drive as other men. By the time the boy is a man, he has already been immersed in a media culture that establishes the identity of the 100 percent straight, successful, confident, aggressive male. “We think of manhood as innate,” Kimmel states but as innate as maleness is, Montaigne has pointed out that there are external forces that condition its development, its identity, its essence (51). While some may deviate from the stereotypes enforced in these “ external considerations,” most men believe that “what he wears, how he talks, how he walks, what he eats, is a coded mannerism to show the world that no one could ever get the ‘wrong idea’ about him” (Kimmel 64). The wrong idea is the fear of being branded as gay, the fear of not being “manly” enough. It is a fear that has grown into men’s hesitation to form a healthy homosocial relationship with other men and has manifested itself in men’s exaggerated replication of societal standards. These external forces have become more than examples; they have become the “how to be a man” rulebook for men to follow. Though we may believe that society has been uptight about male expression for centuries, men have not always been like that. John Ibson, American Cultural Studies Professor at California State University Fullerton, compiled photos from the Civil War to the 1950s in Picturing Men: A Century of Male Relationships in Everyday American Photography. His book records how men once touched each other with no inhibition: men sat on each others’ laps, held hands, embraced, expressing not always erotic but platonic love for each other. What has happened so that the past expresses more male intimacy than modern society? Eric Anderson, writer at Outsports.com, proposes that as society grows increasingly aware of homosexuality, we have concurrently become more homophobic and in turn, men have become wary that they may be seen as homosexuals (par 5). The thought is depressing but perhaps it is true. The more we know homosexuality exists, the more we overanalyze simple platonic gestures as homoerotic. Though some may argue that we have become fearful of alternative identities, at least we know them. With awareness and knowledge, we can fight for alternative identities and against an embedded irrational fear of ideologies that deviate from our hegemonic code. But there is hope for the male identity in American modern society. There is hope that we will bring back the not-as uptight outlook on platonic male-to-male affection. Maybe we do see male intimacy. Maybe some might be more paranoid today than in the past. But maybe, through football, where male camaraderie in celebration has already been established within its game, we can continue to reshape and remold the modern male identity. Montaigne stated that society’s external forces heavily influence our beliefs, in this case, concerning masculinity, but according to Diane Barthel, Associate Professor of Sociology at State University of New York, “The meaning of masculinity…is of society. It can be altered, shaped and molded” (153). Because we are part of society, we construct society just as much society constructs us. Today, there are boys and men who are not afraid to display signs of affection with each other. There are male groups where men are encouraged to open up and share their emotions and thoughts with each other. The modern male image is slowly changing and transforming: more men are confident enough to be openly friendly with his comrades without being ashamed or afraid of other’s opinions. America may still be uptight and paranoid about the changing image of masculinity. But through time, through our contribution to social construction, through social construction conditioning us in return, masculinity will gradually become a collective embrace of a less fearful, a less stereotype-dominant, a more open, a more intimate male identity.
¹ Other cultures around the world do hold traditional roles for men but those men are not as constricted by the fear that they would be seen as a homosexual as American men are. But that is not to say men in other cultures are not confined or influenced to act in a certain “hetero” way as American men are. ² Freud calls it the, “Oedipal complex” in which if boys do not learn how to separate themselves from their mothers, they would soon affiliate with the love and desire their mothers have for their fathers. So instead, the emotional detachment from their mothers is encouraged so that boys would replicate their father’s heterosexual love for their mothers, which symbolizes women for the boys. The desired effect is so that boys would learn to desire women and not men. ³ In this context, the sublimation that takes places refers to a man-on-man or team sport in which physical contact between men occurs (i.e. mainly basketball, American football, European football, hockey, water polo). There are many exceptions like archery, track, cross country, high jump, javelin, swimming, and more that do enforce the competitive drive in men but are not sports in which men might use as means to transfer homoerotic tendencies into aggressive acts.
Citations separate.
