On Tap

Over at Bitter’s place, I saw this post about fatherhood and manhood. Apparently this is the subject of a piece in Time Magazine, but here’s the post that got me thinking.

“Masculinity has traditionally been associated with work and work-related success, with competition, power, prestige, dominance over women, restrictive emotionality. . . But a good parent needs to be expressive, patient, emotional, not money oriented. Basically, masculinity is bad for you.”

That comes from Time, btw, not the blog I just linked to. But the blogger responds in part by saying:

The problem with ideas like masculinity and manhood is not that they are bundles of bad behavior. The problem is that they’ve been hijacked by half-men. The droves of males we see advancing themselves in their careers by neglecting their children should not rightly be called real men. They are boys playing at the game of man. It is a man-boy who thinks money is his measure. It is a man-boy who works long hours so he can win the approval of his CEO. It is the man-boy who thinks he is something because he can get women to do his bidding.

A real man, on the other hand, protects and provides for his family, and partners with his wife to train up his children in the way they should go. He isn’t necessarily gabby, but his children know in their souls that he loves them. He is patient and kind. He lays down his life for his family every day.

Fifty years ago, we all knew these things. Today, however, we are beset by a host of intellectuals who haven’t the sense to recognize that fewer and fewer males know how to become real men. The problem is not that masculinity is rotten. It is that so few men live up to it.

Yes, yes, a thousand times yes! This is why books like the “Dangerous Book for Boys” are so popular right now. Some of us recognize that our parents didn’t raise Generation X, they raised Generation Wuss.

But here’s the thing: you don’t get to be a man’s man by caring about being a man’s man. You don’t get there by reading Time freaking magazine say that masculinity is a bad thing. You get there by not caring. You don’t give a damn what the neighbors say, or whether or not your sister-in-law is going to cluck over your decisions. The only thing you care about is this:

“Is this the best thing for my family?”

Because being a man (once you’re a father) is all about your family. For the vast majority of us (Teddy Roosevelt not included), the legacy we will leave to the world is not our job, or our bank account. It’s our kids.

This doesn’t mean we drop everything in order to cater to the whims of our offspring… quite the opposite. If you’re lucky enough to be one of the few well-adjusted Americans that remain in this glorious Republic, you and I probably share some similar experiences from childhood.

- Our lives weren’t structured to every last minute of every last day. Sometimes we simply had to amuse ourselves.

- Our parents weren’t our friends. They were our mom and dad, and we clearly knew the difference. It was easier (and certainly more pleasurable) to imagine kissing our 2nd grade teacher Mrs. Wilcox than it was to imagine calling our mom or dad by their first name.

- We didn’t get our way. I don’t mean we didn’t get our way until we pouted for twenty minutes, or we didn’t get our way 20% of the time… I mean it was common for us to get told “No”, and that was the end of the discussion… unless we kept whining “please please please” and then we got punished for that.

- We knew our parents loved us. You don’t need a Ferrari on your 16th birthday to understand that. You need to be told, and you need to be shown. A hug and a kiss, an “I’m proud of you” or “You did a great job!” go a long freaking way.

We weren’t babied, we weren’t coddled, we had actual responsibilities and obligations even as kids. We weren’t abused, but bullshit wasn’t tolerated in large amounts. We were punished when we needed to be punished, and we got cool treats that were completely unexpected at times. And we turned out fine.

At least I think I did. Honestly, I really don’t spend a lot of time thinking about it. I guess I’m secure enough in my manhood and fatherhood that I don’t ponder these things. The sad thing is, apparently enough Americans feel differently that Time Magazine devotes an entire article to this phenomenon.

You don’t need a self-help book to be a better man or a better dad (of course, I reserve the right to disavow this statement if I ever write such a book). Honestly, it’s not that freaking hard. “Is this the best thing for my family?” That’s all it takes. Well, that and the ability to answer that question without lying to yourself.

This entry was posted on Monday, October 8th, 2007 at October 8, 2007 - 6:50 pm and is filed under Blatant Self-Promotion, Deep Thoughts, Get Involved!, Pop Culture. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.