Textual Poaching

Link to project: 

https://docs.google.com/document/d/1kACTEENHCoUUI7XAOR19N5fy-NJDLezcPsd2nvAs8h8/edit?usp=sharing

Barney’s reading is a great example of how to help students share opposing opinions (as mine might be) when discussing identities. She asks students to consider how the piece would make us “see, think, or act differently.” Thus, I thought I’d offer my experience with the many truly good men in my life to help others “see” what I “see.”

The SCUM Manifesto (Society for Cutting Up Men) is a scary and puzzling document. It is both irrelevant and relevant at the same time. To be honest (and not to offend anyone, truly), I am not a fan of any brand or wave of feminism, particularly the radical types. But even these radical ideas pop up in everyday conversations I overhear: Intense talk of men, as a general population, being stupid, carnal pigs, and a large slew of other explicatives I’d rather not name. “Toxic masculinity” is quite a buzzword these days too, but I truly don’t think any form of masculinity is toxic. Rather, things like abuse, violence, emotional apathy and the like are a result of less masculinity, not too much of it, or a particular brand of it. True men, in the most manly sense of the word, don’t hurt. They help. Meekness means having great power and restraining it. God tells us the value of meekness in Matthew 5:5, “Blessed are the meek: for they shall inherit the earth.” In my eyes, masculinity is meek. Good, true men are meek—capable of danger, but able to wield it righteously. In this way, my project contradicts notions from popular media that depict masculinity in negative lights.

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