Masculinity: Does it need to man up?

Hello there dear reader, and welcome to From Deep Within the Patriarchy, where we have a crack at understanding the modern world according to the modern man, from the perspective of a modern man that has no idea what’s going on.

Today we’re going to be diving into the turbulent, fetid waters of masculinity.

I once saw a man (fail to) jump from a hotel balcony into the swimming pool, breaking his leg and ruining his holiday in the process. Is it masculinity that drives that kind of decision? I receive raised eye-brows and questioning comments when I tell people that I work part-time so that I can look after my son whilst my wife works. Am I lacking in masculinity somehow? What links these things, and so many others, to form this notion of what makes a man a man.

If gender dysphoria is, rightly, challenging our perceptions and assumptions of the nature of our sex, who better than someone who is constantly aware that he ticks none of the “man’s man” boxes to guide us through his own ignorance of such concepts?

A clever person once said that Aristotle’s Metaphysics can be broken down into four simple questions:

1. Does a thing exist?
2. To what degree does it exist?
3. What is its relation to other things?
4. What is it for?

Now those are some fun questions to throw at just about anything – the colour red, for example, or Westlife – but today we’re going to steal/borrow them as a template for trying to understand the phenomenon of masculinity.

Does masculinity exist?

For once, with regard to abstract concepts, the definitions of the dictionary and the person on the street are pretty much the same: It’s the characteristics that make someone a man. The stuff that makes you man-like. It’s manly stuff.

Traits google claims are masculine include strength, courage, independence, leadership, violence, and assertiveness.

All of those, um, ‘qualities’ are quite abstract in themselves, which isn’t very helpful. It is also worth acknowledging that the ideas of masculinity have been in a state of flux over the centuries, from the dandies that used to strut like peacocks in the finest finery, to the bicep-bulging of today’s fitness enthusiast.

In terms of recent interpretations, I give to you a quote:

“At the beginning of the twentieth century, a traditional family consisted of the father as breadwinner and the mother as homemaker. Despite women’s increasing participation in the paid labor force and contributions to family income, men’s identities remained centered on their working lives and specifically their economic contributions.”

So, can’t a woman be masculine?

Well, if you have to go there this early, then yes. One of the progressives progressions has been the integration of women into the workforce, and a lessening of that dependency on the man to “provide.”

That’s why I feel comfortable in my masculinity, whilst allowing my wife to have a career: we work as a team, which means assigning roles, but in a way that affords us greater flexibility.

So isn’t your wife just, you know, being the man in your relationship?

Hang on, I see what you’re trying to do there and I like the constant questions, but you don’t get to emasculate all men in my situation by merely pointing out that women can do these things too. If that were the case, then I could eat a stick of bamboo, give up sex and call myself a Panda.

That would be pretending though, right? So are women just pretending to be men when they do masculine things?

Well, no. Think of a something generally considered to be a manly thing to do –

Wait a minute, “generally considered”, when did they start knocking on doors and asking these questions?

There is a body of assumptions held by the general population, known as public knowledge – alright look, we can’t keep up this ‘multiple personality disorder question and answer’ thing for the entire blog, we’ll never finish an answer…

Ah good, they’ve gone.

Anyway, if something is to exist, it must be perceived. To be perceived it requires qualia, or qualities that are recognised by the sensory perceptions of the mind. Can you see masculinity? Well, how about a beard?

Growing a beard of thick androgen hair, is commonly a male quality, because of genetically induced hormonal balances particular to the male. Yes, women can grow beards, in fact if you want to be pedantic, most women grow beards (it’s just that the hair is thinner and lighter that we don’t see it more) and hair-dye companies make a fortune out of it. Some men are unable to, most notably those men who have been born into a female body. There are hormone therapies and even beard implants – it’s a thing, check it out – for those that feel that their physiological structures have let them down.

It is a common self-consciousness among men unable to grow beards that this inability indicates a lack of masculinity.

Other sensory proofs exist, of course, such as a deep voice or a pungent smell, but the beard should suffice to prove masculinity’s existence. It also has the bonus of upsetting pogonophobes, which once included Maggy Thatcher, so… that’s a win.

Your beard’s kind of patchy.

Yeah, I know… what’s your point?

To what degree does masculinity exist?

Harder to answer this one, since qualitative questions only need the presence of something, whereas quantitative questions don’t ask which quantities I’m supposed to be looking for. How luxurious must a man’s beard be? How many muscles on his forearm? How many pints can he down?

Luckily, the question has also been posed by potentially the most quoted country song of all time, and the answer my friend is blowing in the wind.

You struggle with pints, don’t you?

Yeah, more of a gin and tonic guy myself.

Starting to add up isn’t it?

What is?

What is masculinity’s relation to other things?

There are some big questions here. First of all, without wanting to ignore the men completely, a huge part of masculinity is a response to, or a performance for, women.

When I work out – those twiglet arms aren’t gonna flex themselves, right? – I don’t do it because I want to be able to lift weights. As far as I’m aware, there are no evolutionary requirements to be able to hoist heavy circles off the ground using a long pole. I might be wrong, but I think it’s much more about aesthetics.

There’s nothing wrong with aesthetics. Nor, and I cannot stress this enough, is aesthetics strictly a masculine problem. At least lifting circles might have secondary uses; what high heels might be useful for other than masochism I have no idea.

We go back to the qualia of earlier (which is, incidentally, what I shall call my autobiography).

The very idea of the beard is connected to sexual attraction. To quote Wikipedia:

“Markus J. Rantala of the Department of Biological and Environmental Science, University of Jyväskylä, Finland, said the existence of androgen dependent hair on men could be explained by sexual attraction whereby hair on the genitals would trap pheromones and hair on the chin would make the chin appear more massive.”

I don’t know about you, but that sentence gave me tingles.

Tingles, really?

Manly tingles, obviously.

This performance is not limited to a female audience. Not only might the man be being manly for the sexual attentions of another man, but also for himself. Those guys in the gym checking themselves out are doing the old Hegelian thing of looking at themselves through someone else’s eyes, they’re just imagining themselves as someone else and checking themselves out. Skips the middle man and goes straight to the admiration.

After all, they don’t always admire you as much as you feel you deserve. That approval is what feeds the ego, and – according to Sigmund Freud – “The ego is the true location of anxiety.”

You spend a lot of time anxious, don’t you?

Well, yeah, but that just means I’m more masculine. I have must have more of an ego to be so anxious.

Ha, that shut them up.

Unfortunately, I cannot move on to the final question without raising the elephant that isn’t so much in the room, as sitting atop this whole topic, with us having this discussion in the generous berth of its ass crack.

One of the more dangerous relationships between masculinity and the world is through misogyny. Now this blog was originally going to be on that topic alone, but in the end I just got so depressed and ashamed of my own gender that I had put it off for another time, a time when I feel that I can approach it with more objectivity.

If you’re not sure what I could possibly get so worked up about, and in preparation for that blog, please see this video made in 2014 of a woman walking the streets of New York.

There are various causal factors attributed to misogyny, from oedipal complexes to the hatred of mothers, but when you see it in the world, performative masculinity and misogyny walk hand-in-hand down the road, gazing into each other’s eyes.

The hatred of women and the sense of masculinity are linked in palpably social behaviours: the banning of women from men’s sports, and locations associated with them (golf and golf clubs, for example); the assumption of superiority in the face of evidence (the Mercury 13, or the “battle of the sexes” tennis match between 55-year-old Bobby Riggs and 29-year-old Billie Jean King); or any of the huge quantity of relationships where the female is the dominant partner.

The emasculation of man is most easily accomplished by a woman, so the hatred of women may be little more than the fear of being exposed as non-masculine.

What was it Freud said about the ego being the location of anxiety?

What is this, a bit of diversionary tactics, mixed with a healthy dose of virtue-signalling? A dislike for misogyny cannot mask your fears. You’re not manly, you never have been.

Right, well, it’s also worth mentioning that in his 1995 book Masculinity reconstructed, Ronald F. Levant described “avoidance of femininity; restricted emotions; sex disconnected from intimacy; pursuit of achievement and status; self-reliance; strength and aggression, and homophobia” as being masculine norms.

Check out that last one again. In our society, being afraid of homosexuals is being masculine. Let that sink in. Loving men is literally the adoration of… but that means… to be masculine we have to dislike masculinity?

My favourite example for the ridiculousness of masculinity was this brilliant quote by social theorist Erving Goffman:

“In an important sense there is only one complete unblushing male in America: a young, married, white, urban, northern, heterosexual Protestant father of college education, fully employed, of good complexion, weight and height, and a recent record in sports.”

Everyone else is a failure.

That includes you then.

Well, yeah. Along with loads of others.

How convenient.

What is masculinity for?

Oh boy, the billion dollar question.

I mean as a social construct it is a reflection of our heroes, so its purpose would be to encourage a particular, dominant type. Everyone getting the same eyebrows as Kim Kardashian is the only example that springs to mind, but imagine that with men.

Eyebrows huh?

Oh sod off.

In anthropology and sociology it is harder to pinpoint a motivation for masculinity, because the definition is constantly shifting with social pressures and needs.

The best question I can ask really, is whether or not masculinity does anything useful. During ancient times it encouraged things like integrity, honour and bravery, but it also created expectations of virility, power and wisdom. Such expectations can and will lead to a failure to meet them, more often than not.

As for modern man, well, I can only speak for myself.

For me, masculinity is a little voice that stays forever on the periphery of my consciousness.

Hello there!

He’s always ready to point out what I’m not doing, or in what way I should have behaved. He’s often given me bad advice, but he’s most fond of popping up after I’ve made a decision and letting me know how rubbish it was.

I have little courage, dislike beer – even the trendy craft stuff – haven’t had a fight since school and would rather read a book than go down the pub on my own. I do love football, but I don’t get all the tribal crap that people get really passionate about, I don’t hate other clubs anymore, and I don’t enjoy travelling to games.

I’m the least manly person you’re ever likely to meet.

That said, I do have a penis, and my balls have worked at least twice. So I’m not quite a woman yet either.

But what if that pressure isn’t entirely personal? What if masculinity serves little purpose except to generate colossal, social pressure for men to behave in a specific way? One statistic in particular might argue that men are struggling to cope with what life demands of them than their female counterparts.

According to the Office for National Statistics

“Males accounted for three-quarters of suicides registered in 2017 (4,382 deaths), which has been the case since the mid-1990s.”

The suicide rate for males being 15.5 per 100,000, as compared to 4.9 per 100,000 for females.

Without crying out in defence of men, or the heinous acts that men appear disproportionately capable of doing, it seems impossible not to be influenced by those figures.

What pressures could possibly make so many make such a final decision?

Could that same social inertia be influencing the flocking of young (and old) men to white supremacist causes, or to be shooting up schools in America?

Is there reason enough, in an unfair society, to be attacking MPs in England, running countries into the ground for their personal wealth? Could it justify that they (we) form the vast majority of rapists, paedophiles, murderers and the entirety of the genocidal warlord catalogue.

Actually, no.

We are in power, we are the ones creating this pressure. The powerful profit from it, uncaring of those that crumble under its massive weight.

Masculinity kills thousands, directly and indirectly, and it feeds itself with itself, perpetuating systems of privilege and power.

It has turned our leaders into power-hungry, profiteering, insecure men, and it is trying to do the same to us.

If we want to be providers, we need to learn that we provide all kinds of things, constantly, and that money doesn’t make a man.

Fathers are caring members of the family group, not tyrannical patriarchs, there to administer violence.

Men can be men: strong and weak, clever and dumb, sports or books, or both or all of it. Men are just men. Like women but with protruding genitals and a wide variety of physical and psychological traits mostly unique to our gender.

We don’t actually need a masculinity that tells us what we should be, and we don’t need anything that tells us what we must be.

How many roads must a man walk down, before you can call him a man? Just one, Bob, and you don’t get to call him anything. That’s his job.

Through the lens of a COWARD

Hello there dear reader, and welcome to From Deep Within the Patriarchy, where I consider the issues surrounding masculinity, feminism and – you guessed it – the patriarchy, as seen by a man who has a young son and a little girl on the way.

Today I’m talking about what it means to be a coward, by which I mean someone that is almost constantly afraid, and by which I mean me. What do people consider as cowardice? Is it simply being afraid? Are we all cowardly at some time or another, or is it just a social construct to get rid of the weak?

First off, let’s just dilute the murky waters of opinion with the fragranted bubble-bath of nuance. I know it’s hardly controversial to say at the start of a blog that everything here is subjective, but I think with a subject as broad as cowardice it is worthy of discussion.

You see, there are exactly as many versions of cowards, cowardice and cowardly behaviours as there are people on this planet.

It is akin to asking how many opinions there are about The Last Jedi, or where people stand on Brexit.

No two people can have exactly the same cowardice, so I won’t bother diving into the psychological affects of fear. I Googled it, and there were 467,000,000 results. For context, there were 65,500,000 results on Concorde.

Yeah I know, I struggle with context.

I shall instead focus on the broad sweeps, the universals concerning cowardly behaviour, rather than overcoming one’s own fears.

For the time being, I shall rule out anxiety, depression, and other pathologies that can cause fear to affect behaviour, not because they are without merit for discussion, but because they are a separate topic, in my opinion.

Having suffered panic attacks in droves at different points in my life and for different reasons, I do recognise a distinction between pathological patterns of flight-or-flight reflex and, shall we say, a simple disinclination towards situational conflict.

I shall not talk about what it means to be a coward, or the strange ways it can affect your life, but instead confine myself – for now – to a coward’s place in society.

First of all, what is cowardice? I don’t just mean fear, fear is virtually omnipresent in such forms as pessimism.

Instead let us assume that cowardice – as we shall use the term – is defined by contrast with the definition of courage. Courage, as stated by many a wise person, is described as being afraid, but not letting that stop you.

Therefore, cowardice is allowing your fear to control what you do.

This is important, because it doesn’t just mean allowing your fear to cause inaction, but also causing you to do something that you would otherwise have not done, perhaps even to prove that you are not afraid.

If that is the case, then suddenly cowardice encompasses a wide swathe of human behaviours, potentially including (please read my blog concerning control) a great deal of routine, self-management and the way we treat others.

So if a lack of control is a source of fear, then power over others is cowardly and a necessary consequence of collective cowardice.

Woah, woah and for the love of all that is holy, woah.

This can’t be right, cowardice is a social sickness, so it is not an individual perspective that matters. People don’t give a hoot if you think a coward is something else, because they already know what a coward is, right? What matters is what people think.

Well sit back, relax, and let me tell you something you definitely already know: Public perception surrounding cowardice has never been great.

Let’s dive into the rabbit hole without our climbing gear, and check out a 2015 study by Jill Walker Rettburg and Radhika Gajjala, looking at imagery displayed as negative under the hashtag #refugeesnotwelcome:

“Another dominant theme in the images shared in anti-refugee hashtags is that of the Middle-Eastern man as coward. One image shared several times shows a crowd of men in a train station, walking between two blue trains, some with their hands up in a way that looks more anxious than threatening, with the text: “2200 immigrants arrive in Munich. No women no children. Apparently only men flee ‘war zones’?” This argument that presents the refugees as cowards who flee rather than staying to fight is expressed in text-only tweets as well, for instance: “If you’re a military age male who flees violence and leaves behind his women and children, you’ll never be an American! #refugeesnotwelcome.”

Okay, so it’s no surprise that those who oppose the taking in of refugees are keen to portray them in a negative light, but of significance here is that this portrayal was used to persuade others to join their ideological cause.

They saw cowards as so fundamentally negative that it is a universal ethical wrong. “Everyone thinks cowards are bad, so everyone will agree with our cause when they see these people as cowards.”

To give this quote some unnecessary context, other common examples of portrayal were those of rapists and terrorists. A coward, someone who allows their fear to control their actions, is portrayed as ethically comparable to rapists and terrorists – people who physically harm others either for sexual pleasure or to generate public fear.

Now, far be it from me to suggest that people actively trying to encourage others to be as afraid as they are of refugees is in itself a form of cyber-terrorism or, by our definition, a clear case of cowardice, because that is not what this is about.

After all, I am a coward.

Yet the very fact that someone whose fears define their actions can be so morally comprehensible is a strange phenomenon. It is also, of course, not a particularly new phenomenon.

The Bible goes strong with Revelation 21:8

“But as for the cowardly, the faithless, the detestable, as for murderers, the sexually immoral, sorcerers, idolaters, and all liars, their portion will be in the lake that burns with fire and sulfur, which is the second death.”

Or the more well-known but less brimstone Proverbs 28:1

“The wicked flee when no one pursues, but the righteous are bold as a lion.”

History is strewn with not just the vilification of cowardice, but the outright emasculation of its owners.

The German slang for coward is schlapschwanz, or limp… you get the picture.

Nothing offends a man quite as much as the suggestion of impotence, and as if by magic, we’re back to power. Power as control, control as cowardice, power as cowardice. Perhaps the name-calling hints at something deeper, a fear.

Perhaps people are simply afraid of being cowards themselves.

“For all men would be a cowards if they durst” said English poet John Wilmot.

That’s what I don’t understand. I’m a coward, and it’s scary to think of myself that way, but it hasn’t exactly made my life unlivable.

It’s more of a kind of annoying defect, like having a lisp, or taking four seconds too long to get a joke.

Chris Walsh, author of Cowardice: A Brief History, described himself as “…pretty averse to conflict, agreeable to a fault, adept at changing the subject, at delay and dodge.” All of which hums resonantly with how I see my recurring failures.

When I was young I struggled to talk to girls. One of them even – after a female friend had done so on my behalf – suggested that if I had been brave enough to talk to her myself she would likely have said yes. Upon hearing that news I didn’t rally and have at it, I didn’t reach into my deeper reserves for the fortitude to do what was necessary, because I didn’t have any. I was a coward.

Now that I am a man, with a family and a black belt in karate, I will still shy away from any form of confrontation. It is sickening to watch, and believe me, I watch it. Over and over and over and over and…

Sometimes I’ll replay these conversations or confrontations in my head just after they’ve happened. Sometimes I’ll be doing something completely unrelated, then the memory of it will sneak up out of nowhere and surprise me, only to latch on like a limpet, for as long as it takes for me to come to terms with what I’ve done/not done.

Okay, so now you’re wondering “How does this connect to masculinity, feminism and the patriarchy?”

Well, the masculinity thing is obvious – and I do love me some obvious – but actually the reason I think it all ties together is the potential for a great, big shift in the global, social consciousness.

Not to make cowards cool. That’s a big leap, and would not – I think – be beneficial.

Cowards are outsiders, on the periphery of society. Sure, we’re not as persecuted as minorities and LGBTQ – almost all of whom, whilst I cannot envy the resistance they face, I applaud and admire their bravery – but we are starting to realise that with a changing world, comes an opportunity to stand up (quietly, and not too aggressively) and say “We too, have a place in this world.”

Individualism – the idea that we are all just individuals, bouncing against each other in a cosmic pinball machine – has many faults, but it has awoken over the last hundred years or so a beast that has slumbered for too long: our higher purpose. We are not hunter gatherers anymore. We are not even necessarily procreators, or conduits of genetic strands. Civilisation has taught us that we need not be savages and individualism has shown us that even our social behaviours are not compulsory.

You feel like a man in a woman’s body? That’s fine, be who you want to be.

You like playing computer games and living with your mother until you’re forty? Who gives a monkeys, over-population’s got you covered.

Technocrats in Silicon Valley are introducing surrogate parenting to maximise their work-life efficiency. People have sleep apps.

If what you do doesn’t hurt someone else, you shouldn’t have to be afraid.

Sure, this level of nuance is scary for most of us, particularly as our power centres have failed to keep pace with the changing world around them. Now that power, the people, and the people with power are more afraid than ever before.

I for one would welcome a world where my boy can play Netball, if he so chooses, or where my daughter grows up with Megan Rapinoe, or Lucy Bronze pictures on her wall.

No, not all of individualism is good, in fact most of it needs to go.

Yet there is one aspect that I would keep: personal freedom. Freedom to be you, even if that you didn’t fit the old society. Freedom from the responsibility of being what your fear, and the fears of others, says you should.

Freedoms that perhaps our children, or our children’s children, can enjoy within new social collectives, within new power structures. Perhaps they can be free to be as cowardly as they want, without being compared to rapists and terrorists.

Perhaps being afraid need not be so scary after all.

BATMAN: “I’ve got something for that. Always.”

Hello dear reader. Welcome to We Could Be Heroes, where I take a pop culture icon and break down what I think makes them resonate with audiences.

Each post, I’ll boil down, deconstruct and dangle damsels in distress directly at our favourite heroes, heroines, idols and idolesses until we can ascertain exactly what it is that makes them stick around in our hearts and minds.

Today, I look at perhaps the most iconic character in comic book history, Batman. The Caped Crusader, the Dark Knight, the World’s Greatest Detective and perhaps the only character in all popular culture that could make a Lego movie franchise to rival The Lego Movie’s own Lego movie franchise from which it was… er, built.

We all know the story: Bruce Wayne witnesses the brutal murder of his parents as a child and grows up to become the masked vigilante that strikes terror into the hearts of Gotham’s criminal underworld, but do we know why this character keeps popping up whenever a new zeitgeist needs be darkly reflected?

Sure, he’s hugely popular, but he’s not the most popular. Spider-man wins the superhero merchandise wars by a land-swing. We’ll get to Spidey one day, but truth be told the Spider-man fan-base has something going against it besides double hyphenation – age. You see, Spidey is extremely popular with younger audiences, with his vibrant colours and (sorry Bruce) super powers. Youthful audiences enjoy simpler themes, more palatable metaphors and less nuanced structure. Bombast and bamboozlement win out and who’s to say they aren’t in the right? It is enough that the hero is just like one of us, but with super abilities.

Yet I believe that Batman has the greatest power of all, and it is that power that connects with its audience, permeates their subconscious and transcends the traditional tropes of idolatry.

Batman is never not in control of a situation. Ever.

Hell, his main weapon is a belt of utility.

People always describe him as being ready for anything, but I think that circumvents what makes Batman special, as if the reactive. Humans are all about controlling their environment – or, as I should say, are all about pretending to themselves that they can control their environment.

Take parenting for example. Now, most parents will concur that kids have a tendency, perhaps a propensity, or even a talent, for finding those spots of relatively calm, placid minds that can turn them into their very own Mr Hyde. We’re talking instant rage. No other kids can do that, in fact very few people can do that. Siblings perhaps, maybe your partner or a roommate, your parents used to be damn good at it too. What do they all have in common? They share your space, your home, your environment.

Have you also noticed that, as our environments expand, the quantity and type of people that can enrage us are also expanding? Suddenly politicians infuriate, film directors err on the side of controversy and that singer you used to like can make you see red quicker than a narcissist strawberry at a matador’s accessory convention.

Or how about the last time you got angry whilst you were driving? Were they not signalling? Did they cut you up? Did they do something, anything that contravened the universally accepted mandate of road rules?

Why stop there? Ever wonder why racists don’t like minorities, or why homophobes don’t like anyone from the LGBTQ community? Why people post comments full of rage and spite to an uncaring world? Why parents (and teachers) used to use violence against their own children?

Let’s go deeper. Are you afraid of spiders? Rats or mice? How about the dark?

Does high or low level intellect unnerve you? How about people of a different social class? Does change upset you? Just how meticulous is your routine? Do you defend the correct use of grammar against those that would proliferate gobbledygook?

If you answered no to all of those questions then you’re not paying attention because not all of them were closed questions, but even if you were able to answer no to those that were: congratulations! That’s awesome. You’re likely either in denial, or you don’t like Batman.

Maybe – just maybe – we place too great a value on control.

I have heard it said recently that our lives have gone from being lived or experienced,to being managed.

We manage our bodies, our health and our facial structure. We manage our opinions, our passions and our relationships. ‘Micromanagement’ is the new ‘care’, actual care being reserved for the mistreatment of our elderly.

How many of our vexations and petty grievances are rooted in our lack of control being exposed?

I’m a huge fan of words. Words mean things. Yes, I know clever pants, I meant that words can be powerful indicators of social and personal persuasions. The word ‘they’ took on greater significance in the wake/woke of transgender rights being a prominent public discussion. The word ‘Chernobyl’ went from being an innocuous proper noun to a word of hugely varied feelings and connotations, in almost no time at all.

Is it significant that the age of individualism, of Thatcher, Reagan, Blair and Clinton, of neo-liberalist consumerism coincides almost exactly with the age of the gaming console, and its focus on the controller?

Yeah, probably. That one is a bit of a stretch, but it strikes a chord with me.

Too political? Let’s look somewhere else. Here’s a quote from Clinical-depression.co.uk:

“It is common for depressed people to feel helpless, with little control over things. Or, alternatively, to feel that everything relies on them.

This extreme perception of control, either too much or too little, helps maintain depression in the following way.

• Too little control – the person stops doing things that could improve their situation, perhaps ceasing activities they used to enjoy.
• Too much control – person tried to control things they can’t and may become angry or anxious when they realize things aren’t happening the way they wanted. They may also take responsibility for things outside their control. This adds to the emotional arousal that maintains depression.”

 

I would have liked to add citations from an article called “Controlling Self and Others: A Theory of Anxiety, Mental Control, and Social Control” but unfortunately that article was restricted by its particular strata of academia, and would have cost me $36 to access. This societal control – the access and distribution of information – is possibly the most egregious and self-damaging of all privileged gatekeepers, but that’s another blog for another day. The restriction at least furthered my point.

In lieu of academic citations, let’s get deep.

Let’s talk about real powerlessness. Let’s think about people wrongfully imprisoned, like the central park five, or the victims of rape, bodily or psychological assault. I hope you have never and never have to hear a doctor say something like “I’m afraid you’ll never be able to have children” or “It’s cancer” just as I hope you never find yourself fighting a war or living in the abject poverty that so many of our global neighbours do on a daily basis.

Hey, I’m not trying to say you haven’t lived until you’ve experienced these situations, because I genuinely wish for a world where none of these things is a viable reality, but the context it wraps around our view of control, of desperately trying to pretend it exists and that we are the powers that maintain it, can’t help but put things in perspective.

So, back to the Bat.

Batman faced tragedy, he experienced the powerlessness of being able to do nothing as his parents die in front of him, and he decided to conquer that powerlessness. He would be in control.

Whatever the situation – be it becoming the hero Gotham needs him to be, or repelling sharks with a spray – Batman can cope, will cope and does cope with anything the world throws at him.

That is the power that everyone wishes they had, and that is why the world can’t help but adore the billionaire psychopath that could’ve solved all of Gotham’s problems with infrastructure and social funding, but felt the need to instead perpetuate a system that allowed him to physically attack those he deems ethically inferior to himself.

Hmm, maybe he’s not so in control as we think.