Real Men

Emancipate yourselves from mental slavery;
None but ourselves can free our minds.
Bob Marley, “Redemption Song”

The sun finally poked its head through on July 4th long enough for us to remember what it’s like to have a summer, and with summer firmly in place my thoughts turned to the joys of summer reading. I always consider summer reading to be a special project, an opportunity to focus on some project or issue that has been on my mind and needs particular attention.

So as I was perusing my bookshelves to see which of the books were calling to me, I was drawn to The Prince of Tides whose 670-plus pages have been waiting for some attention since about 2005. I had finally seen the movie that year and, very much enjoying the other of Pat Conroy’s books I had read, I decided that the novel itself would be worth picking up.

I am so far some 300 pages in and I have not been disappointed. Conroy’s narrative is the very definition of sweeping and I am being reminded of vocabulary that I had considered long lost. The power of the story and the language keeps me turning the pages in rapt attention. I don’t think I’ve cared this much about a character in quite some time.

In this case, the character is Tom Wingo, former English teacher and football coach, who is in New York City because of a family emergency. (For those of you who may not have seen the movie or read the book, I’m going to try not to be a spoiler in this column.) As Wingo reveals family history to psychiatrist Susan Lowenstein, he comes face to face with his own demons, foibles and needs while under the guise of helping the doctor help his sister.

Meeting demons, foibles and needs of my own is part of the special project that I have set for this summer and I can journey along with Tom Wingo as he arrives at the center of his own pain – as he eventually will. If we know what’s good for us, we’ll all get to know what is at the heart of our own pain.

For me one of Conroy’s hallmarks is his ability to write about men’s pain with vividness and poignancy. In other words, he hits the nail right on the head.

In our society, masculinity is an awful burden – and I mean that in the old sense of ‘awe’ as terror. What a real man is has a narrow definition that keeps most of us jumping and trying to keep up even if we think we’re beyond the stereotypes of what makes a real man.

Let’s face facts: as bisexuals we fall – together with our gay brothers – right out of the ‘real man’ category. Furthermore, no matter how hard we try to ‘butch’ it up or flaunt the stereotypes by being flamboyant, it still hurts to know we’re outside the mainstream. In fact for some of us, issues of race, ethnicity, religion, class, age – as well as other considerations – only add to the alienation.

What’s a fellow to do – especially if you’re not white, wealthy, 25-40 years of age, and able to run at least one marathon a year?

First, we have to acknowledge our own pain and then we have to take a hard look at how masculinity is constructed. We can do that while respecting the fact that men can often deal and react to things differently from women – and that’s OK. We men tend to express ourselves more by doing than by saying, and we usually need space to think things over before launching into a discussion. We also tend to be very sensitive to what’s going on in our environment – in spite of what is out there. For the skeptics and naysayers, I refer you to Real Boys by William Pollack and I Don’t Want to Talk about It by Terrence Real, a book on male depression.

Real men – that is those of us living, breathing male human beings – have needs and can be quite vulnerable. However, as men we can get quite clever in how we mask it and how we displace it on others. Anger and competition, after all, are socially sanctioned. Anything is better, in the mainstream mind, than admitting weakness or expressing tenderness.

This then is the challenge for bisexual men: It is reinventing and negotiating relationships. How balanced can we be? Do we respect our female partner’s need to be assertive? Can we respect our own and our male partner’s need to be vulnerable and cared for? Answering these questions can guide us in approaching our larger families and our circles of friends. Answering these questions can also guide us to being more real.

About the Contributor: Peter Ruggiero: Peter Ruggiero writes the column “None But Ourselves” and reviews bisexual books for our Entertainment section. His work examines how bisexuals see and understand the world. Website: http://bisocialnetwork.com/category/columnists/none-but-ourselves/