How To Be A Man

 

TRANSCRIPT:

Ever hear that old joke about the Southern guy whose last words were, “Hey, y’all, watch this”?

When I was young, I’m sure I shouted those words myself and then did something stupid. And why did I do whatever dumb thing I was doing?

To prove I was a man.

I think many young males in the South were—and still are—brought up to believe that our willingness to do something risky, futile, or foolish confers real man status upon us. These days, some folks believe men should assert such behavior even more. Last year, a U.S. senator from Missouri even published a book called Manhood: The Masculine Virtues America Needs.

But we can no longer write off performative tough-guy behavior by saying, “Boys will be boys.” Sometimes these days, young men performing for each other results in stunts that have high body counts. I don’t think it’s a coincidence that six of the nine deadliest mass shootings from 2018 to 2022 were committed by boys aged 21 or younger.

I’m about to suggest a different book, but before I do though, here’s something that the man who wrote it said to Salvation South, the magazine I edit:

One thing you realize as you get older is that the men who were so influential were simply performing reproductions of a performance they had seen. The whole idea of masculinity, the whole idea of culturally prescribed gender roles, is BS. We should have tossed the script a long time ago. The women I grew up with weren’t performing a damn thing. They were doing. And they were outworking the men when it came to raising most of us.

I think that’s the truth. The man who said it is Ray McManus, the most recent winner of the South Carolina Governor’s Award for the Arts. He’s the author of four collections of poetry. All are great, but the book you need is the most recent one, The Last Saturday in America. It contains 39 poems that methodically shred the old Southern myths of masculinity.

The great Appalachian novelist David Joy wrote the introduction to Last Saturday, and here’s what he said:

These are poems about boys listening to men who were once boys who listened to men the blind, leading the blind through the dark. Some boys grow up. Some men never do. Ray McManus has chipped away at the pageantry and performance, the stupidity of the lie, the outright futility of it all.

I cannot, in a few words, convey the power of the lessons in Ray’s poems. You should read them for yourself. I’ll just say this to any young boys who might be listening to me right now. If you wonder sometimes how to prove that you’ve become a man, I think maybe you should stop trying to prove anything at all.

Instead, just aspire to be a decent human being, and then you will be man enough. I guarantee it.

Come see us 24/7, at SalvationSouth.com, where you can often find stories about how being a man does not require you to be an idiot, too.

 

Salvation South editor Chuck Reece comments on Southern culture and values in a weekly segment that airs Fridays at 7:45 a.m. during Morning Edition and 4:44 p.m. during All Things Considered on GPB Radio. Salvation South Deluxe is a series of longer Salvation South episodes which tell deeper stories of the Southern experience through the unique voices that live it. You can also find them here at GPB.org/Salvation-South and wherever you get your podcasts.