The New Macho

Men are certainly under attack from all sides at the moment -- whether it's the endless list of celebrity bad boys or the sociologists who have come to fame by pointing out the statistical impotence of men at large. Apparently males these days watch porn 50 times a week, on average, play endless video games, fail out of school and are increasingly antisocial.

Those of us with testosterone and a well-meaning heart don't have much room to maneuver. For a good number of guys in my cohort (40s, white, from supposedly forward-looking backgrounds), the double bind of manhood predates the most recent attacks. Our feminist moms told us to be just like them to be loved. For our dads, the idea of macho got lost in some encounter group somewhere (except for Burt Reynolds in "Semi-Tough," when he is supposed to piss himself during a EST conference but sneaks in a catheder flask taped to his leg as back-up, which, ironically, I have a clear memory of going to see with my dad). So we just gave up on being macho.

If there is a gender war, men have just decided to gather up their marbles and go home. Virtual sex is better than real sex with a complex woman. Hanging with the boys over a beer and watching a game is better than getting your manhood wrapped around your eardrums. "Pass me the remote," is the mantra in response to getting kicked in the nuts.

So, The Good Men Project is about encouraging men to get their mojo back, to be proud of their manliness, to see good where we have been conditioned to be ashamed of our instincts, to ultimately define a new macho that does good in the world.

 ♦◊♦

I am not debating the statistics about manhood. I realize that we are, in the majority, a group of Internet-obsessed masturbators with deep-seated emotional issues. I'm proud to be a member of that group.

No, my issue is that we collectively, male and female, are obsessed with the worst of the worst when it comes to men rather than the best of the best. An 18-year-old kid gets drunk and does something stupid and disgusting, but frankly no more stupid or disgusting than I did drunk when I was 18 -- and dare I say most guys and a lot of women, too? Yet because this kid has even the hint of celebrity (he was one of 75 hopefuls on the U.S. Ski development team), it leads the national news and blows up into an international story.

Meanwhile 18-year-old boys we all sent to Iraq and Afghanistan to fight our wars (wars that, arguably, we will never win) lay down their lives in silence. Those guys are macho in my book, for sure. We just choose not to focus on them.

♦◊♦

"A real man doesn't lie or cheat or beat his chest, but stares down things that seem impossible -- like flying at the speed of sound or walking on the moon -- and doing them anyways," I recently wrote in a piece about astronauts, but I might as well have been referring to all men.

"The New Macho" is a guy who has an aggressive moral compass that prioritizes the things that he finds important: family, being honest, making a difference in the world. He goes all out to figure that out, yet he is also more apt to take risks "and stare down things that seem impossible."

Read the rest of "The New Macho" here.

 

Follow Tom Matlack on Twitter: www.twitter.com/tmatlack

Comments

[Deborah Moskovitch]

06:43 PM on 09/09/2011

Hi Tom,
I really enjoy reading your posts, and would love to interview you on my online radio show The Smart Divorce on Divorce Source Radio. Please email me at [e-mail] and I will provide more details.

Thank you,
Deborah

[GHarry]

09:39 PM on 08/25/2011

The macho level of any male generation is driven by popular culture -- especially advertising, TV and movies. The sensitive-guy movement in the 1970s was largely a media-driven reaction to the strong, silent stereotype of previous decades, which limited the media's ability to develop new images and fictional plotlines for men. Besides, everybody was bored with the strong, silent type. Unfortunately, the sensitive guys turned out to be pretty obnoxious, so retro macho came back. Now the traditional macho behavior is taken to absurd levels, fueled by ridiculously violent videogames, extreme violence of every sort on TV and in the movies, and America's war-without-end political culture. No strong, silent types here -- just lots of posturing and careful posing for just the right camera angles.