When I was in college, a friend of mine and I were driving somewhere (I think it was back to our apartment) and we were discussing how it was difficult to be a man. It wasn’t that we weren’t complaining about being a man, just that we had no idea at the time about how to be one. And really, who could blame us.
For decades now, the definition of a real man has been dumbed down and made to look like it’s something to be ashamed of. These days, the only requirement appears to be something having to do with liking football and sex with women. If you like neither, you are not considered a man and people will question your manhood. When my wife told a former boss that I didn’t like football at all, his response was, “Is he a man?” (No she didn’t quit over that)
If I had been there, my response would have been, “Fuck you, I do what I want!” Yeah, I probably would have gotten my wife fired, but you know, I don’t think she would’ve cared since she always complained about him anyway.
It’s been six years since I was at college and I have a better idea. Still, I find it hard to define. Women do have things great these days, though. We have little girls that have T-Shirts that talk about how boys are stupid and girls are better. We have all these emotion-driven pusses in our entertainment culture who many men strive to be.
Maybe I’m just over thinking it all, again. Maybe I don’t know because it’s not something you are suppose to know in a rational sense, but something you just know. Sure, you could write all these books on the subject (Wild at Heart was actually quite good and got me grounded a bit), but mostly it’s about being who are you.
I think I’m just sick of the sensitive man and the stupid man that has become the accepted norm in our society. It’s like we aren’t allowed to be men anymore, just boys.
I know, this is a big rant that borders on whining. So I’ll stop the complaints right here and just say that I refuse to accept the stereotype. I don’t like football, I exercise regularly, I won’t take crap from my wife (or anyone else for that matter), and I won’t back down. And while none of these qualities are necessarily exclusive to a man (the football thing definitely isn’t), I am perfectly happy with them.
Perhaps the real answer is not so much the desire to be a man, but to be an individual first. Maybe my manhood will follow from there. We’ll see. In the meantime, I will say what I mean and I will mean what I say.