Why I'm Still Learning About Manhood
Why I'm Still Learning About Manhood
And Why You Probably Are Too
Key points upfront
The male experience is misunderstood, even by men
We’ve abandoned the traditions that used to preserve us
Progress will require that we answer some tough questions
This past Sunday, I had an opportunity to present to a group of men in a meeting hosted by Black Men Heal. This weekly gathering, called King’s Corner, features a new guest speaker every week covering a wide range of topics related to the mental and emotional well-being of men of color. Recent speakers have presented on emotional intelligence, relationships, culture, and purpose.
The Male Experience
I have enjoyed attending these meetings for the past few months and was honored to be invited to speak. First, because I was being entrusted with one of the rarest commodities on earth: a safe space for men. Men who are otherwise forced to wear their masks like superheroes (or vigilantes, maybe even villains), unwilling or incapable of revealing their true selves. Second, because unlike many of the speakers before me, I am neither a clinician nor an expert on men’s health. I am not even an expert on men. At best, I am an earnest student of this underappreciated field. A student who continues to be perplexed by it, even as I approach a half-century of study. A student, truth be told, who flunked some major classes a few years back, and has been forced to do extra-curricular activities to try to catch up.
So that was the backdrop for my invite to King’s Corner. A man raised by a single black mother in a community of single black mothers, as is so prevalent today, attempting to provide some guidance on the state of black men. In some respects, I would’ve felt more confident had I been tasked with discussing software development, entrepreneurship, or physical fitness, than I was in discussing something that is a hundred times more fundamental to my identity. I am, undeniably and unashamedly, a man who has battled with his fair share of emotional issues, and trauma, living in the age of hyper-liberalism, feminism, and progressivism, and (as a black man) in the legacy of slavery and systematic racism.
Over the years, my definition of manhood has always been more conjecture than creed. Like one who paints a scene from the faint, wispy remnants of a dream, my perception of manhood was always hazy at best, marred also by the random, unsolicited brush strokes of society and pop culture. The ol’ heads on the corner drinking and shooting dice, rap stars with their compelling lyrics, and even more compelling imagery, and older kids on the block setting the standard for cool.
I would argue this is the case for most men, even those raised with their fathers in the home. In the modern age, almost all males are forced to piece together the identity of manhood from clues strewn about society like a crime scene. We try, and mostly fail, to distinguish those pieces that are relevant and useful for our investigation from those that are not, and so often find ourselves hopping from one wild goose chase to another. More discouraging, this flawed detective work is not limited to our young adult years (teens and 20s), but continues well into our adult years (30s and 40s), and often later.
And that, not ironically, was the crux of my talk (and the basis of my research): that we’ve lost the plot lines on manhood. That manhood, as we know it, isn’t a well-defined standard, or a clear, high-resolution image, but rather something of a composite. A flawed one at that. Like a police sketch culled together from the descriptions of questionable witnesses.
The image of manhood has been poorly reproduced for generations and no longer bears much resemblance to the original. Each successive copy has lost more of the original’s integrity. The blurred details have been filled in by our imagination, or perhaps something more random, or even more insidious. And by the way, we’ve all been almost completely oblivious to this process. (To be sure, some of these changes have been for the better; reductions in misogyny and chauvinism were long overdue, but what of resourcefulness, work ethic, and servant leadership? Did we mean to reduce those as well?)
The State of Manhood
This past week, Philadephia, PA was shaken by two episodes of gun violence that illustrated how severe the crisis has become. In two separate cases, both in broad daylight, black males in their teens fired at other teens at public bus stops, injuring several bystanders, and killing one male, believed to be the target of one of the attacks.
This, in my humble opinion, is only tangentially a gun problem, or a gang problem, or even a poverty/social equity problem. It is first and foremost a manhood problem, which is to say that we’ve failed to bring these young boys up in a tradition and culture of safe, healthy masculinity that would nurture, and direct (forcefully where appropriate) their development. In short, we lack structure.
"The child who is not embraced by the village will burn it down to feel its warmth."
— African Proverb
Rites of passage used to be part of the traditions we practiced to embrace our youth, to help them understand the expectations of manhood and womanhood, and to enforce their compliance. That we’ve not only abandoned rites of passage on the whole, but have replaced them with trivialized and hollow milestones, is directly related to this widespread deviant behavior. (Note: it’s also related to divorce rates, teenage pregnancy and never-married, single-parent households, and a bunch of other things we don’t like, but I’ll have to come back to all of that later)
What have we reduced manhood to today? Get a job. Get a car. Get a home. Get a woman - in fact, get several. Have a beer. Fire a gun. It’s not until we’ve done all those things, wrestled with those responsibilities, and failed in some aspect of their care, that we even start to question those definitions of manhood. This was my experience. I did not even know that I should be challenging myself about these definitions until my marriage was in distress, and my career, though successful on paper, bore no fulfillment or joy.
Moreover, we’ve made manhood an individualized sport. Manhood (just like womanhood) is supposed to be a social activity. We are supposed to be raised in communities built to sustain relationships and traditions across generations. Communities that ensure consistency across all members, from young children to elders. Each phase having its own peer groups, teachings, and expectations. Yet so many men go through all stages of life with few close friends, if any, and often the people we call close friends are just those we’ve grown up with or grown accustomed to, that we feel some allegiance to even when our values and ambitions diverge.
Pressing Questions
During my talk, a young man in his 20s posed the question with some trepidation: what is a man? This question should be met with an easy stock answer, as rote and rehearsed as the Lord’s Prayer or the Pledge of Allegiance, but I must admit that I felt some anxiety in myself and in the room about the implications of the question. Not so much of the question itself, but with the idea that the answers might only be philosophical, and not factual.
Indeed, what is a man? How might we define manhood in the modern era?
Is it a cis-male that reaches an age of maturity? I would argue no. That is, as Dr. Myles Munroe once pointed out, an adult male, but we need something else, something more, perhaps qualitative and subjective, to achieve the status of manhood.
Maybe an adult male, then, who establishes some form of authority or influence in his home or community? Again, I would argue no. In and of itself, authority proves nothing, particularly when it is wielded poorly.
How about an adult male who possesses physical strength or power? Emphatically, no. Reducing manhood to physical stature debases its complexity, and risks us placing Neanderthals at our apex. Some might argue that we already have.
So what then? how shall we define it?
And once we’ve defined it, how might we maintain it?
In the post-industrial, post-urban, cyber age where we are all global citizens to one degree or another, where we live, work, and interact with people who don’t share our beliefs, how do we build and maintain traditions that respect diversity, and endure within it?
These are just some of the questions I’m asking of men and women, young and old, rich and poor. Indeed, this is bigger than black males, or even males. It gets to the very core of what we expect of humanity, and how we intend to mold society toward that ambition.
But we do have to start somewhere. For men that are interested, I’ve created a quick 3-min survey via Google Forms. It’s completely anonymous unless you want to be contacted, and I certainly hope that some will. The comments section is also open below if you want to share your thoughts and anecdotes, and as always, feel free to hit me up on socials. I’d love to hear from you.
Editor’s note: This was added after original publishing
Speaking of traditions, I forgot my new tradition of adding a song to each post. This week, I’m coming with the hip-hop legends, De La Soul and their 1996 banger, Stakes is High — because they are.