Ann Barnhardt is constatly talking about the lack of masculinity in our culture.. and via instapundit today I find this:
"Didn’t I find, like Paul Theroux, “the quest for manliness essentially rightwing, puritanical, cowardly, neurotic, and fueled largely by a fear of women”? Yes, absolutely, and this belief did nothing to change the fact that I have wanted and sometimes tried in life to feel more manly. In fact, I was trying as I rendered judgment on the Wilderness Collective video, because one of the easiest ways to feel manly is to feel superior to other men’s efforts to feel manly."
If you are worried if you are "manly enough" then you should stop worrying. You aren't. Who the f worries about crap like this?
I am a pretty effeminate guy, raised by a Feminist mother in a "Free to be You and Me" playing household - and yes I am a bit of a pussy about a lot of things other men aren't. I am uncomfortable driving trailers, I don't like the adrenaline rush of jumping an ATV, I am not overly interested in guns, I can't watch sports of any kind ( take me to a game an I end up watching the crowd around me) and I generally have the female tendency to prefer safe, secure and non-dangerous activities. I understand my limitations.
But never once did it ever occur to me to take a hiking trip to "feel" manly, nor did I think I would feel more manly if I was compared my to weaker efforts of other men.
Men. Real Men. Couldn't give a sh*t. They are comfortable in their own skin, accept who they are, understand their limitations and work to change those limitations if they don't like them, and they don't whine or introspect about it like this little wuss. A real man pretty much never doubts that he can accomplish something he wants to accomplish. He just assumes its possible if he applies his effort, thought and will to the problem.
This Theroux guy also says "Even the expression ''Be a man!'' strikes me as insulting and abusive. It means: Be stupid, be unfeeling, obedient and soldierly, and stop thinking. Man means ''manly'' - how can one think ''about men'' without considering the terrible ambition of manliness?... "
Yeah. That is what manliness must seem like - to someone who has never experienced it.
The original article of course gets worse, and can be summed thusly
The pace of our hike that morning was largely determined by their documentation, as Larry led Casey, Steve, and Portland John ahead to set up shots of the rest of us coming up the trail. We were not simply men climbing a mountain to learn something about manliness. We were men playing parts in a multimedia project about men climbing a mountain to learn something about manliness.
All very Meta Meta. And not at all, in anyway, Manly. Just a bunch of castrated liberal Unichs wondering what it would be like to have balls and not care about what brand gear they had, what drinks they got to eat at night, and what bragging rights they would have when they returned.
Here is you answer guys: A real man would have climbed that Mountain because he WANTED TO. Because he thought he would enjoy the experience. Because HE LIKES being up there. And he don't give a crap if anyone else cares or approves. Its a foreign world to a liberal - whose entire life is consumed by seeking the approval of the other herd animals.
Now, in feminism’s wake, it’s a pillar of a liberal arts education that gender is a performance—hence academia’s preference for discussing it in terms of “gender roles.” And it’s the recognition of this performance as such, that allows some men to soften its edges without feeling any less manly themselves. It is, however, still a performance—and, like any performance, it can sometimes feel inauthentic.
Then stop acting morons.
