Paper #2 Final

December 11, 2012

John Robertson

New Brighton Middle School

250 Washburn Avenue

Capitola, CA 95010

Dear John,

As a young man grows up in this United States there are important things he must be aware of.  Many societal standards and beliefs begin to be ingrained into the brains of boys in this culture from a young age.  As a middle school boy you face the daily challenges of meeting the expectations of your peers whether it’s in class, on the basketball court, or in the lunch room.  I write in order to pass on knowledge that I wish I had acquired years before I did.  As boys and men in this country, we are expected to act and appear a certain way or we might face great humiliation.  We are taught be tough, manly and better than the rest of the guys.  A big problem I find in the male-dominated United States society is the expectation of men to act and feel as though they have no emotions.  Instead of hiding emotions deep below the surface which can lead to aggression and violence, men must feel and express their feelings.

As a man in this society I can attest to the pressure that there is to suppress my feelings.  All my life I have felt that it has been a social norm that girls talk about their problems and guys express them through anger.  That’s just the way it is.  And it’s not “cool” in the eyes of fellow males to act like a girl.  Every male influence has taught me this whether it’s family, a famous athlete, or a movie star.  I can vividly remember one day in the third grade that I thought I would impress my sister and her friend by acting like my favorite athletes do on TV.  I thought that I was going to be cool and look just like the baseball coaches and players that I watch and look up to.  During a pickup baseball game after school, I got called out at first base just as my older sister and friend came to pick me up.  Not because I felt it was necessary, but purely in order to mimic my idols on TV, I began screaming and arguing with the opposing team that called me out.  I believed this was the proper way to handle the situation.  Clearly, young males have this idea of violent expression of emotions fixed into their minds.  In later years I played football in high school.  The coaches and fellow players would ridicule anybody complaining of pain or missing a practice. The insults would consist of anything from, “cry-baby”, “sissy”, and “pansy”, to “pussy, bitch, or faggot.  These insults conditioned the players to keep their mouths shut and not complain about anything out of fear.  It is the worst thing for a guy to get humiliated by his peers, so it’s better to just suck it up.  I clearly remember the fear of saying something wrong in front of the guys on the team who were also my best friends.  This sense of fear helped to train me to keep what I felt to myself.

Men in this society have unwritten rules and expectations that they generally follow whether consciously or not.  In his essay, “Bros Before Hos”: The Guy Code, Michael Kimmel discusses the exact unwritten rules that most males follow on a daily basis.  Of these rules, number 1 is: “No Sissy Stuff! Being a man means not being a sissy, not being perceived as weak, effeminate, or gay” (609).  American society tends to perceive any man that expresses his emotion as effeminate or weak.  Even worse, a man could be viewed by his peers as homosexual.  Kimmel explains the great fear that men have of being viewed as gay, “[h]omophobia- the fear that people might misperceive you as gay- is the animating fear of American guys’ masculinity.  It’s [...] what drives the fear that other guys will see you as weak, unmanly, frightened” (613).  Fear is the basis for internalizing ones emotions.  Men have a great fear of being judged negatively by their male peers and this is a large problem for the expression of emotions in our society.  Kimmel says, “[o]ur peers are a kind of ‘gender police,‘ always waiting for us to screw up” (612).  Guys aren’t scared of what girls think but rather, what other guys think.  They are the critics that matter because they have the power to judge and humiliate.  Nobody wants to be judged negatively by others and expressing ones emotions can make them feel very vulnerable to that negative judgement.  The truth is that everybody has similar feelings at some point or another, they just deal with them in different ways.  Some can easily express that they feel sad or hurt, but if a guy does this, he is usually viewed as girly.  Therefore, if a man wants to be a man, he can’t show that he has these feelings.  He must keep it all bottled up inside in order to maintain his masculine integrity.  

There is extensive research and evidence showing the negative effects of repressed emotion.  People who force their feelings inside as opposed to talking about them are far more likely to be aggressive.  According to Dr. Rick Nauhert, studies done at University of Texas at Austin that tested peoples‘ aggression after suppressing emotions found that, “[t]he research reinforces scientists‘ understanding of ‘ego depletion effect,‘ which suggests people who must keep their emotions bottled up- not reacting to a difficult boss at work, for example- are more likely to act aggressive afterwards”.  This has massive implications when thinking about the amount of men there are in this country that follow a cultural rulebook telling them that they can’t show how they feel and that they have to keep it all inside.  The boys and men grow up not knowing how to express internal problems which can result in unexpected explosions of anger and violence.  Think about the ratio of male to female violent offenders the U.S.  According to the Bureau of Justice, men account for 88% percent of the violence in the United States.  That’s almost 9 out of every ten violent offenders.  The inability to express their feelings in a productive manner creates situations where men act violently.  Aside from the violence, Kimmel claims that boys are “more prone to depression, suicidal behavior, [...] drop out of school and are diagnosed as emotionally disturbed four times more often as girls, get into fights twice as often, and are six times more likely than girls to be diagnosed with Attention Deficit and Hyperactivity Disorder (ADHD)” (617).  Many negative consequences exist due to suppression of emotions.   There is obviously a necessity to change the unwritten guy code and make it acceptable and safe for all people to express their emotions without judgement. 

Of the male violence in the U.S.,women are often the victims.  Men have suppressed emotions and often release them in a violent and aggressive way in some form of domestic violence.  The National Coalition Against Domestic Violence (NCADV) says that 85% of victims of domestic violence are women and that one in every four women in the U.S. has experienced domestic violence in her lifetime.  According to these statistics, women don’t have a safe place in the U.S.    Men have a difficult time talking about how they feel, repeatedly internalizing their feelings but not saying anything after disputes or a hard day at work.  Once this builds up, they don’t productively get rid of this built up stress but rather, it will be expressed through a violent or aggressive outburst which is often taken out on his intimate partner.  Thomas Scheff, sociology professor at UC Santa Barbara explains situations like this as the “Silence/Violence Pattern”.  He defines this as “Meeting threats with either silence or violence” and explains that, “this pattern seems to occur much more frequently in men than in women”.  Although there may be a problem, the man often won’t talk about it, instead reacting with “silence” over and over until finally losing control and reacting with a form of “violence”.  If men felt comfortable discussing what they felt instead of expressing it violently, domestic violence and male violence in general would be diminished.     

It is important for young men in this culture to know that it is good to talk about feelings and emotions.  There is a stigma attached to men expressing their emotions that needs to be erased.  The unwritten “guy code” has taught males in this society to not be weak by suppressing emotions because that is something girly or effeminate.  The truth is that this practice of emotional suppression leads to violence and aggression that must be stopped.  Everybody in the world, even the manliest men, feel emotions such as sadness, frustration, anger, and grief.  Young males need to be raised knowing that they can talk about how they feel without fear of being shamed by their male peers and superiors.  

Sincerely,

Daniel Eden

Rough Draft Gender Essay #2

Dear John,

As a young man grows up in this world there are important things he must be aware of.  There are standards and expectations that are ingrained into the brains of men in this culture from a young age.  I write in order to pass on knowledge that I wish I had acquired years before I did.  As boys and men in this country, it is expected of us to act and appear a certain way or we might face great humiliation.  We are taught be tough, manly and better than the rest of the guys.  One of the requirements of masculinity that I find is a big problem is how we are expected to act as though we don’t feel any emotions.  Hiding your emotions deep below the surface is not the way to deal with them and it can lead to aggression and violence.  It is necessary to feel and express emotions rather than suppressing them and pretending that they don’t exist.

As a man in this society I can attest to the pressure that there is to suppress my feelings.  All my life I have felt that it has been a social norm that girls talk about their problems and guys express them through anger.  It’s just the way it is.  And it’s not “cool” in the eyes of fellow males to act like a girl.  Every male influence has taught this whether it’s family, a famous athlete, or a movie star.  I can remember one day in the third grade that I thought I would impress my sister and her friend by acting angry.  I thought that I was going to be cool and look just like the baseball coaches and players on TV.  During a pickup baseball game after school, I got called out at first base just as my older sister and friend came to pick me up.  Not because I felt it was necessary, but purely in order to act like my idols on TV I began screaming and arguing with the opposing team that called me out.  It was what I believed to be the proper way to handle the situation.  Clearly, males have this idea of violent expression of emotions ingrained in their brains from a young age.  In later years I played football in high school.  The coaches and fellow players would ridicule anybody complaining of pain or missing a practice. The insults would consist of anything from, cry-baby, sissy, and pansy, to pussy, bitch, or faggot.  These insults conditioned the players to keep their mouths shut and not complain about anything out of fear.  It is the worst thing for a guy to get  humiliated by his peers so it’s better to just suck it up.  I can clearly remember the fear of saying something wrong in front of the team who were my best friends.  This sense of fear helped to train me to keep what I felt to myself.

Men in this society have unwritten rules and expectations that they generally follow whether consciously or not.  In his essay, “Bros Before Hos”: The Guy Code, Michael Kimmel discusses the exact unwritten rules that most males follow on a daily basis.  Of these rules, number 1 is: “No Sissy Stuff! Being a man means not being a sissy, not being perceived as weak, effeminate, or gay” (609).  American society tends to believe that anybody that expresses emotion is being effeminate or weak.  Even worse, a man could be viewed by his peers as homosexual.  Kimmel explains the great fear that men have of being viewed as gay, “[h]omophobia- the fear that people might misperceive you as gay- is the animating fear of American guys’ masculinity.  It’s [...] what drives the fear that other guys will see you as weak, unmanly, frightened” (613).  Fear is the basis for internalizing ones emotions.  This means that expressing ones emotions can make them feel very vulnerable.  The truth is is that everybody has similar feelings at some point or another, they just deal with them in different ways.  Some can easily express that they feel sad or hurt, but these people are usually viewed as girly.  Therefore, if a man wants to be a man, he can’t show that he has these feelings.  We have a great fear of being judged negatively by our male peers and this is a large problem for the expression of emotions in our patriarchal society.  Kimmel says, “[o]ur peers are a kind of ‘gender police,‘ always waiting for us to screw up” (612).  Guys aren’t scared of what girls think but rather what other guys think.  They are the critics that matter because they have the power to judge and humiliate.  Emotional suppression can have huge negative effects in many aspects of a persons well-being along with the well being of their surroundings. 

There is lots of research and evidence showing the negative effects of repressed emotion.  People who force their feelings inside as opposed to talking about them are far more likely to be aggressive.  According to Dr. Rick Nauhert, studies done at University of Texas at Austin tested peoples‘ aggression after suppressing emotions found that, “[t]he research reinforces scientists‘ understanding of ‘ego depletion effect,‘ which suggests people who must keep their emotions bottled up- not reacting to a difficult boss at work, for example- are more likely to act aggressive afterwards”.  This has massive implications when thinking about the amount of men there are in this country that follow a cultural rulebook telling them that they can’t show how they feel and that they have to keep it all inside.  The boys and men grow up not knowing how to express internal problems which can result in unexpected explosions of anger and violence.  Think about the amount of violence in this country and the amount of these offenders that are men.  According to the Bureau of Justice, men account for 88% percent of the violence in the United States.  That’s almost 9 out of every ten violent offenders.  We need to change the unwritten guy code and make it acceptable and safe for all people to express their emotions.  

Women are often the victims of the male violence in our country.  Men are angry and often release this anger in an aggressive way in some form of domestic violence.  The National Coalition Against Domestic Violence (NCADV) says that 85% of victims of domestic violence are women and that one in every four women in the U.S. has experienced domestic violence in her lifetime.  According to these statistics, women don’t have a safe place in the U.S.    Men have a very difficult time talking about how they are feeling, repeatedly internalizing how they feel but not saying anything after disputes.  Once this builds up they don’t productively get rid of this built up stress but rather, it will be expressed through a violent or aggressive outburst which is often taken out on his intimate partner.  Thomas Scheff explains situations like this as the “Silence/Violence Pattern”. He defines this as “Meeting threats with either silence or violence” and explains that, “this pattern seems to occur much more frequently in men than in women”.  Although there may be a problem, the man often won’t talk about it, instead reacting with “silence” over and over until finally losing control and reacting with a form of “violence”.     

It is important to teach our youth that it is good to talk about feelings and emotions.  We need to erase the stigma attached to men expressing their emotions.  The unwritten “guy code” has taught males in this society to not be weak by suppressing emotions because that is something girly or effeminate.  The truth is that this practice of emotional suppression leads to violence and aggression that must be stopped.  Everybody in the world, even the manliest men, feel emotions such as sadness, frustration, anger, and grief.  Young males need to be raised knowing that they can talk about how they feel without fear of being shamed by their male peers and superiors.  

Annotated Bibliography #2

http://researchnews.osu.edu/archive/violstres.htm

This is a great academic article that relates directly to my topic.  It talks about the Suppression of emotions and built up stress that an trigger violent outbursts.  The article is written by academics at Ohio State.  Violent men don't often show the regular symptoms of stress because they are suppressing their emotion.

http://www.soc.ucsb.edu/faculty/scheff/main.php?id=42.html

This is an article from Thomas Scheff from University of California Santa Barbara that goes deep into the subject of emotional suppression in our culture and the possible outcomes it may have.  It discusses violence and other negative side effects that the suppression of emotions can have.  It is helpful that the article talks about the psychological as well as the cultural aspects that I am discussing in my paper.

http://psychcentral.com/news/2011/03/24/suppressed-emotions-can-lead-to-aggression/24643.html

Another psychology article that discusses causes of aggression and suppression of emotions is the main one.  They perform experiments in which they tell the subjects to suppress their emotions while they are exposed to clips of films that create strong reactions.  They find very good proof of the effects of emotional suppression on aggression.

Proposal #2

The masculine gender holds expectations that are ingrained in the minds of people living in our culture.  There are unspoken rules that men are supposed to follow or they will face negative social criticism.  The media portrays the way a man "should" be and continues the social construct of the masculine gender in the United States.  The masculine gender is expected to suppress emotion and externally appear like nothing is wrong.  These suppressed emotions end up being acted upon in violent and aggressive ways.  Men cannot express who they truly are and this frustration is expressed in unproductive ways.  The pressure that men have in our society to act macho and follow the "guy code" causes violence and aggression.  I want to write this in order to raise awareness about the current state and view of the masculine figure in our society.  It is important that this trend is changed and we will have a less angry and violent culture.  I will use evidence from the textbook and other resources on the internet about male statistics on violence. 

RA #3 The Death Of Macho

     “The Death of Macho” is an essay by Reihan Salam about a big change in power that our world is experiencing; the change of power from men to women.  He discusses the enormous part that men have played in the global recession, stating that many economists refer to it as the, “he-cession”.  Men have played such a large part in the stock market and Salam claims that their “macho” attitudes have been the fuel to many bold investments.  This shift in power has the potential to help or devastate our world and economy depending on how the men react to it.

     Salam uses Logos frequently throughout the article, mentioning different facts about employment rates and wage differences between men and women.  He also brings up facts about the efforts of several countries, China for example, who are trying to save their male workforce by subsidizing manual labor that is predominantly worked by men such as construction, “[M]ore than 90 percent of the Chinese stimulus is going to construction: low-income homes, highways, railroads, dams, sewage-treatment plants, electricity grids, airports” (634).  Salam exemplifies his points about the attempt to save mens jobs by backing them up with facts.  China is using 90 percent of a $596 billion economic stimulus package to save jobs of physical labor for men because women are taking the majority of jobs that require an intellectual background.

     A main point that is brought up is the effect that this power shift will have on the world which completely depends on how men react to it.  He uses compare and contrast   in order to discuss the potential effects the world would face if men reacted by accepting the power change as opposed to resisting the change.  He states that, if men resisted, they would build up anger.  He presents examples of other countries whose men vented anger with extreme measures, “think of the KGB nostalgists in Russia or the jihadi recruits in search of lost honor, to name just a couple” (633).  This result could be devastating because the entire world is inevitably going to experience this power change and we could be in for a time of extreme tension and possibly a very violent resistance.  

     There is a very strong Pathos appeal used in Salam’s writing.  He discusses the concerns involved with this major change that is happening in the world.  At first he talks about the necessity of more control in the economy by women.  Men do not make reasonable decisions in many economic cases due to the high pride they have in our “macho” culture.  Although women may do a better job, the potential resistance of men to a changing culture may harm women because men will act out in radical ways in attempt to save their power grip on our world.  This can potentially be very scary when thinking about other ways men have expressed their anger in masses.

     Reihan Salam provokes the mind by talking about the inevitable changes our world will experience and the effects that these changes might have.  He presents two options for the men in our world and what he thinks will happen depending on which reaction men decide upon.  

RA Joan Morgan

        From Fly-Girls to Bitches and Hos, by Joan Morgan, talks about the impact that hip-hop has on black culture and what it reflects about that culture.  Rap is a huge part of the culture that it comes from, as well a big part of modern pop culture.  Morgan  stresses the fact that so much of the subject matter of the music is hateful from black people to black people.  There is lots of misogyny and degrading lyrics towards women.  There is negative criticism towards black feminist women that talk negatively towards hip-hop because critics claim the female black feminist is taking sides of the white culture.  

      This article presents very good points about the current struggles among the black people in the United States.  Morgan uses all of Aristotle’s appeals a good amount but I think that she uses Pathos the most.  She brings up points about how, in order to strengthen culture among black people, the music must change so that women are not victimized anymore.  A main problem is that black men don’t have a way they are socially allowed to express their feelings so they have to use violent and hateful ways such as harsh lyrics in the music.  This is a unique approach to most of the previous perspectives on rap music.  She is acknowledging the struggles that exist among the black culture in this country.  Morgan uses Ethos when she talks about her experience as a black feminist.  She tells about how her views differ from other black feminists and how she is is negatively criticized by some parts of black culture because of her unique viewpoints.  There is also an introduction before her writing that talks about what she has done as an author and activist.  Although Morgan doesn’t use any facts or statistics, her Logos is strong.  She discusses the history of influential artists such as Notorious B.I.G. and Tupac Shakur.  She discusses their lyrical content and the affects it has on its listeners.  

      Joan writes this article to her readers in order to raise awareness and bring a new perspective to the issue of sexism in hip-hop and black culture.  Many people have discussed these issues, but Morgan talks about how the black men are, “engaged in a war where the real enemies- racism and the white power structure” (604).  Most arguments don’t give the black males any slack.  They are generally blamed for being negative and not having respect but in this article, Morgan acknowledges that they, along with black women are victimized by the system.  They constantly have ideas, ingrained in their brains by society, that tell them that they won’t succeed and that they won’t live past their twenties.  Everyone needs to be able to love themselves before they can show love for others and this is the problem that exists among black men.   They don’t have the opportunity to deeply feel the pain from oppression and its turns into negative energy that is portrayed in the music.  

RR #2: Bro

     In “Bros Before Hos”: The Guy Code, Michael Kimmel discusses how our society and modern day world looks at masculinity.  He discusses the expected duties of a “man” including how he is supposed to look, act, and talk.  Society has unwritten rules that teach them that they need to be strong, tough, emotionless, stoic, big, and better than the rest of the men.  They can’t cry or talk about any potential problems they have; it’s better to express these feelings with anger or violence.  These ideas are the sad truths in our current society and they are instilled in the minds of our boys from a very young age.  It isn’t ok to be a “wuss”, a “sissy” or more popularly a “pussy”.  There is a huge fear of being thought of as a homosexual among male peers. 

      Kimmel brings up a good point that the only people that matter who judge masculinity are other male peers.  Men are so caught up with the judgement of male peers and have a great fear of being thought of as less than manly.  They need to have more and better material objects, not show any emotional vulnerability, and appear to have unfaltering strength.  

Kimmel brings up great points that wouldn’t come to mind naturally but make complete sense.  He is writing this in order to raise consciousness to how our modern society views how a man should be.  It is important to be aware of this so we don’t continue to pass down the trend of the narrow-minded idea of masculinity.  All of the young men that he interviewed expressed that they got their idea of how to be a man from another, usually older, man in their life.  Whether it is from a dad, coach, uncle brother, priest or somebody else it seems to be consistent that boys learn that they need to be tough and not become effeminate.  It is important that this standard of being a man is changed.  It can be harmful to a person emotionally if they can’t express their true feelings due to fear of negative judgement from peers: “No wonder boys are more prone to depression, suicidal behavior, and various other forms of out-of-control or out-of-touch behaviors than girls are” (616).  

     For the majority of the paper Kimmel uses pathos to express his points to his readers.  He brings up points about the sadness of the current state of how our society views masculinity and what is expected of men.  They are forced to repress their feelings that everyone should feel comfortable expressing.  Boys are raised to be emotionless, tough, and better than the rest by the men that they look up to in their lives.  Kimmel isn’t blaming these men because they too are victims of the system that they come from.  He just intends to raise awareness of the strict standards men have to pertain to.  We need to become more conscious as a culture and not judge the men in our society so strictly.