The "Act Like a Man" Box

 

 

My wife, recently came up with this song for our Fikri:

Strawberry Shortcake, Blueberry Pie,

When you're feeling sad, its ok to cry

When you are done crying

Wipe away your tears

It's time to get moving

Time to face your fears!

Yay!! (followed by exaggerated facial expressions of joy and insane clapping).

I simply love this rhyme she created.

Just the day before I had coincidentally stumbled into the book "Men's Work" by Paul Kivel, an author who was recommended to me by one of my classmates from my recently completed Masters Programme. It talks about how men grow up within a box of expectations of how we should behave, as well as important qualities ascribed.

 

Men...

Yell at people

Have no emotions

Get good grades

stand up for themselves

don't cry

don't make mistakes

know about sex

take care of people

don't back down

push people around

can take it

 

Men are...

Aggressive

responsible

mean

bullies

tough

angry

successful

strong

in control

active

dominant over women

(Kivel, 1992)

As men, we grow into this box, and are called names if we attempt to act differently, and this is a process that begins early in our lives. These practices foster homophobia and discrimination of women. At the same time I remember how difficult it is to behave differently out of the box, for fear of being ostracised and bullied.

Being told to "Man up!" is tough, especially in view of the many benefits of not doing so. We then allow ourselves to propagate a culture where violence and aggression are deemed as important traits to achieve power and dominance over others. As a social worker, I face immense difficulties when responding to different variations of the following statement:

"I admit I was wrong to hit my wife, but what else can I do? She was not behaving as a wife should. As a man, don't you think it's my right to discipline her?"

Unpacking these dominant discourses become more onerous when we realise that some of these men went through many many years of having been forced, bullied, slapped and kicked into the "Act like a Man" box not only by their loved ones, but also by peers and society.

How then, can men take responsibility towards making important changes. Perhaps the most important first step is to start with our children.

 

So Fikri, thank your lucky stars that Mummy is doing things "out of the box".

Reference

Kivel, P. (1992) Men's Work: How to stop the violence that tears our lives apart. Minnesota.

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