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I tend to cringe when the word “toxic” is used to describe this or that. Ipse dixits and conclusionary epithets are not quite my thing. But in the case of Mexican machismo, toxic is not only apt but necessary.
In the 80's the word macho entered American English perhaps 10% as a perjorative but 90% as a compliment. It was if Americans discovered a word that suited their ideal of what a “real man” ought to be. As distilled by my college classmate, Tracy Turnbull, the ideal was: “be blunt, be loud, be crude.”
Americans have always had a hyper hardened ideal of masculinity, epitomized by the likes of Paul Newman, Marlon Brando, John Wayne, Theodore Roosevelt. What? Roosevelt? Yes. It goes back that far and further still.
Judge Learned Hand is recognized as one of the most thoughtful American jurists of the 20th century. Born around 1880 he was a young man when Teddy was King and was one of the leading lights of the progressive movement. For all that he was beset by a nagging insecurity that he just wasn't “man enough.” For what, was unclear. Certainly not “not man enough” for thought. It perhaps says much that I have to add that, no, he was not gay. He just had the misfortune of being born in the land of “blunt, loud and crude.” (Thank you, Tracy.)
But if the United States has a “toxic” concept of masculinity, Mexico exceeds it by miles. Of course, Mexico has its iconic macho models, like Pedro Infante -- boxer, womanizer, crooner. But it was subtler than that. Learning what a *Mexican* man did and did not do was rather like running an obstacle course. I once returned from a summer visit to the United States, bringing with me a new pair of bermuda shorts. When I was “caught” wearing them on our block I was violently accosted by my own chums. It was only on account of the fact that we were friends, and that I could be excused for being an ignorant American/Mexican half-breed (“pocho”), that I did not get the shit beaten out of me. Instead, I was informed in no uncertain terms that: men do not show their legs. Only women show legs. Punto y final!
Learning the intricate structures of morés, attitudes, postures, deberes y derechos of Mexican Malehood was half theology and half ongoing bootcamp. Next to the Mexican Man, American men were at best merely pendejos.
I have often wondered what it is about this hemisphere that makes American men so dedicated to hardness. European men are far more soft. Now I do not mean to say that they are less strong, less courageous, less capable of callousness and cruelty, or less penis driven than men over here. But, with the exception of English football hooligans, they are less driven to be and act like apes. Intellectual and aesthetic capability is not scorned as being “less manly.” On the other hand, there is something about the wildness of the Americas that “liberates” itself (toxically) from civilization. It has been my hunch that of all the countries in the America's only Chile, Uruguay and possibly Argentina escape the iron maiden of toxic masculinity.
In preparing this comment, I came across the map below, which absolutely confirms my intuition (except that I forgot about Canada, which is really just an appendage of England anyway).
I tend to cringe when the word “toxic” is used to describe this or that. Ipse dixits and conclusionary epithets are not quite my thing. But in the case of Mexican machismo, toxic is not only apt but necessary.
In the 80's the word macho entered American English perhaps 10% as a perjorative but 90% as a compliment. It was if Americans discovered a word that suited their ideal of what a “real man” ought to be. As distilled by my college classmate, Tracy Turnbull, the ideal was: “be blunt, be loud, be crude.”
Americans have always had a hyper hardened ideal of masculinity, epitomized by the likes of Paul Newman, Marlon Brando, John Wayne, Theodore Roosevelt. What? Roosevelt? Yes. It goes back that far and further still.
Judge Learned Hand is recognized as one of the most thoughtful American jurists of the 20th century. Born around 1880 he was a young man when Teddy was King and was one of the leading lights of the progressive movement. For all that he was beset by a nagging insecurity that he just wasn't “man enough.” For what, was unclear. Certainly not “not man enough” for thought. It perhaps says much that I have to add that, no, he was not gay. He just had the misfortune of being born in the land of “blunt, loud and crude.” (Thank you, Tracy.)
But if the United States has a “toxic” concept of masculinity, Mexico exceeds it by miles. Of course, Mexico has its iconic macho models, like Pedro Infante -- boxer, womanizer, crooner. But it was subtler than that. Learning what a *Mexican* man did and did not do was rather like running an obstacle course. I once returned from a summer visit to the United States, bringing with me a new pair of bermuda shorts. When I was “caught” wearing them on our block I was violently accosted by my own chums. It was only on account of the fact that we were friends, and that I could be excused for being an ignorant American/Mexican half-breed (“pocho”), that I did not get the shit beaten out of me. Instead, I was informed in no uncertain terms that: men do not show their legs. Only women show legs. Punto y final!
Learning the intricate structures of morés, attitudes, postures, deberes y derechos of Mexican Malehood was half theology and half ongoing bootcamp. Next to the Mexican Man, American men were at best merely pendejos.
I have often wondered what it is about this hemisphere that makes American men so dedicated to hardness. European men are far more soft. Now I do not mean to say that they are less strong, less courageous, less capable of callousness and cruelty, or less penis driven than men over here. But, with the exception of English football hooligans, they are less driven to be and act like apes. Intellectual and aesthetic capability is not scorned as being “less manly.” On the other hand, there is something about the wildness of the Americas that “liberates” itself (toxically) from civilization. It has been my hunch that of all the countries in the America's only Chile, Uruguay and possibly Argentina escape the iron maiden of toxic masculinity.
In preparing this comment, I came across the map below, which absolutely confirms my intuition (except that I forgot about Canada, which is really just an appendage of England anyway).
So... on the eve of the great Feminicidio Protest in Mexico, tomorrow, which has the government hiding behind hastily erected barricades, why do I bring up “masculinity” ?
I do so because I think there is something of a mis-focus in the whole protest. First of all, let me say that femicide has been endemic in Mexico since as long as I can remember. When I was a kid, newspapers competed to see who could come up with the most off-the wall, macabre, wacky headline to describe the latest murder. Editors quite literally thought it was all very funny. I take the protestors at their word, that the situation is at best the same if not worse and that something has to be done about it.
But, like all victim issues, the focus is on the victim or more precisely on the effect of the violence on the victims (women). The literature on the matter (to some extent cribbed from U.S. activists) is on the objectification *of* women, the exploitation *of* women, the demeaning *of* women, the abuse *of* women and the violence and murder *of* women. Of course a victim will always see things in the dynamic of the external operating on him or her (the “me” of the matter) and of the damage caused to the victim. But the other side of the dynamic is the cause: the male trapped in an impossible concept of masculinity, fueled and driven by an inescapable “male urge” --- an urge that cannot and should not be opposed because as Jung said “eros will not be denied.”
One has to understand the hierarchy of impulses and desires that make up human behaviour. Men have levels of aggressive impulses. The word ad + gradeo means to step forward. And stepping forward is (in my view) an essential and natural component of the male psyche, in sex, in sports, in battle, in civic life, in terms of creative challenge... and, most importantly, in model railroading.
In this regard, I have no problem with “traditional” concepts of masculinity. I like them and enjoy them. But the manner in which these impulses are acted out and the moderation and limits to which they are subjected is key.
In Mexico, (and to a lesser degree in the pendejo Norte), men are trapped and constrained into a concept of hyper machismo that constantly goads them to exceed limits, to be immoderate and to be disdainful of what they are taught to perceive as weakness. They are driven and tortured by these concepts much in the way that bulls are prodded and induced into enraged fighting.
In this, despite all their self-adulating blather about how heterosexual they are, men do not really “love” women -- they do not really appreciate the feminine virtues, just as much as some women activist deny that these virtues even exist.
So of course, Mexico needs to stop violence against women. But to achieve this, more than mere prohibition is required. Men need to be taught not to do violence to themselves in the necessary pursuit of manhood.
Those are my three cents. That plus: don't deface public monuments. If you want to vandalize something vandalize the headquarters of Citibank or something. I can assure you that will induce a swifter cave-in.
Now I should probably duck for cover.
In Mexico, (and to a lesser degree in the pendejo Norte), men are trapped and constrained into a concept of hyper machismo that constantly goads them to exceed limits, to be immoderate and to be disdainful of what they are taught to perceive as weakness. They are driven and tortured by these concepts much in the way that bulls are prodded and induced into enraged fighting.
In this, despite all their self-adulating blather about how heterosexual they are, men do not really “love” women -- they do not really appreciate the feminine virtues, just as much as some women activist deny that these virtues even exist.
So of course, Mexico needs to stop violence against women. But to achieve this, more than mere prohibition is required. Men need to be taught not to do violence to themselves in the necessary pursuit of manhood.
Those are my three cents. That plus: don't deface public monuments. If you want to vandalize something vandalize the headquarters of Citibank or something. I can assure you that will induce a swifter cave-in.
Now I should probably duck for cover.
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