Spread the Spores of a New Masculinity

I walked to the ad side, match point impending. I jumped a bit side to side awaiting the serve. “Step on his neck,” I said to myself in my head. “Put him away.” I rocked back and forth in my return position, bending my knees in preparation for my split step. Looking over the net, I could sense my opponents weakness and I knew now was the time to strike. The serve came and I ripped a return winner cross court. I let out a guttural yell in triumph. I had triumphed again. I now look back on this time and shudder.

Looking back now, I don’t recognize that version of myself who died long ago. He is a figure shrouded in the past. He is the walking embodiment of the bankrupt masculinity I was handed as a young man on the tennis court. He exemplifies the ruthlessness and zero sum sense of success that accompanies the capitalist patriarchy-dominated masculinity that we are handed as male identifying folx at a young age. The dearth of other stories relating to being masculine has real consequences for male identifying folk. We end up viewing others as an obstacle to goals, only relying on yourself, and being willing to dominate the weak to accomplish goals. Not coincidently, these are also features of our current society that stand in the way of a more egalitarian social order.

Pierre Bourdieu, a French sociologist and anthropologist, argued that the continuation of inequality in society is based on unequal relationships being built into one’s body and mind. In my example above, Bourdieu would note that the tennis court was the site where I Internalized the norms, values, and particular behaviors of that virulent form of masculinity. He would argue that it was in that seemingly innocuous game that my own body and mind became the continuation of a patriarchal, capitalist conception of masculinity. And so it goes and so it spreads like a virus among male identifying folk, parading around like there is no alternative.

So, yes, Sophie is right. The situation with masculinity is dire to the point that it has colonized our play, our bodies, and our minds. Even in my 35 year, what alternative masculinity have I been offered in my society? None. Ruthlessness, domination, emotional aloofness, overworking, and financial support as the primary form of parental support have been the only features of masculinity that I have learned from other men in my life. @cosmogyny is right that our dearth of alternative stories around masculinity has allowed a monoculture of capitalist patriarchy- dominated masculinity to thrive. I see it in many fellow dads and other men who are playing out the dictates of capitalist patriarchy without realizing that they are by the rules of a game that ensnares them.

Yet, there is an alternative and I have seen many counter examples of male identifying folk finding another way to live. Like @cosmogyny, I am interested in spreading the spores of a new conception of masculinity into the wind. Yes, Sophie is right, we male identifying folx need to create new stories to disrupt the hegemony of this cultural order. Through weaving, engaged fatherhood, and magic, I have tried to make my life into a sort of living experiment of what it means to practice alternative conceptions of masculinity. Most importantly, I aim to carve out space to blur the ideas around what it means to be male identifying in our society. I am trying to release the stranglehold that dominant stories have on other male identifying folk. Yes, it’s collective emancipation I am after through the simplicity of lived experience. Like @cosmogyny says, let my life and the lives of those like me be like so many spores that spawn countless other dramatic awakenings and populate masculinity with the the thousands of expressions it is missing. Let us find the space to be free of masculinity as patriarchal capitalism.