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It is August 2002 and one of Dr Christopher Forth’s lectures has just come to an end. Rather than follow their peers out for coffee, an early beer or perhaps to the library, two students hang back, keen to get find out what their lecturer, a specialist on masculinity, thinks of a new phenomenon they have just discovered — the metrosexual.
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Men's concerns about their bodies are not new, as this 1937 cartoon shows.
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“I actually hadn’t heard of the term,” recalls Dr Forth. “But when they explained it to me, I just sort of yawned. It’s really a non-issue.
“It’s hard to get excited about the metrosexual because I’ve seen it all before. It’s more symptomatic of ongoing male anxiety and a ‘creative’ media inventing new words for old ideas.”
The metrosexual, a straight man who displays an interest and expertise in fashion, grooming and consumer goods, has been around in some form or another for years (from 18th century dandies to the brand-driven yuppies of the 1980s), he argues, as have the questions about manhood that phenomena such as these provoke.
These questions are emotive and go to the heart of the complex problem of what it means to be a man. There is talk of a ‘crisis of masculinity’; of men desperately confused about their role in a society that is mannered and civilised, where success is defined less by physical strength than by cerebral and sedentary occupations, women are their professional colleagues and competitors, and the cults of appearance and consumerism are dominant.
Ideals
It is hardly surprising that men are confused: white collar professions demand a concern with appearances (whether through going to the gym, tasteful clothes, distinctive consumer items); yet both inherited gender ideals and mainstream culture also condemn as ’feminine’ a man who takes too much interest in such things.
“Though generally well-meaning, televisions shows like ‘Queer Eye for the Straight Guy’ exploit this perception, and reinforce the connection between consumerism, appearances, effeminacy and homosexuality,” Dr Forth says.
“Concepts like the metrosexual are concerned with how men engage with clothing, appearance and consumption in general. This obsession with appearance is not new. Historically speaking, the gentleman has been just as concerned about his appearance as women, but there is always the suggestion that he should not invest too much in it emotionally.”
Dr Forth argues that there is an inevitable tension between ‘civilisation’ and manliness (his forthcoming book Civilization and its Malcontents: Masculinity and the Body in the Modern West examines these tensions in the western world since 1700). In a time when martial skills are less relevant, work is sedentary, manners are important and life is generally less tough, there is very little space for traditional manly men.
"The idea of a crisis of masculinity suggests that at one time we were ‘OK’. I don’t think this time ever really existed"
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Men fear they are becoming soft (whether in their muscles, around their waists, or in their ability to resist comforts and conveniences) and the rise of team sports, bodybuilding and even beach culture can be traced to them feeling the need to bust a gut to maintain their manhood, according to Dr Forth’s research.
One of the problems with the crisis of masculinity is that it implies there was a time when men were not in crisis — but the model of a real man may never have existed.
“There is a certain idea of what real men should be, but it’s largely fantasy — existing only in a mythical world outside civilisation.”
'Womanish'
Concerns about a softening or feminising of men date back as far as the 18th and 19th centuries — a simpler time to be a man, one might think — with Dr Forth unearthing medical texts that warn shopkeepers are “more womanish”, owing to their mannered and sedentary profession.
“The irony of all this is the fact that most men in the elite had exactly the types of jobs or bodies that they were criticising.”
The body is key to much of Dr Forth’s research. Dr Forth has revisited the Dreyfus affair — a scandal in early 20th century France, where a Jewish army captain was wrongly accused of being a spy, and which has been traditionally viewed by historians as an expression of an undercurrent of anti-Semitism — and found that much of language used at the time railed against the puny or chubby intellectuals who were Dreyfus’s supporters, on the grounds of their deficient masculinity.
His most recent book, Cultures of the Abdomen: Diet, Digestion and Fat in the Modern World, a collection of essays co-edited with Dr Ana Carden-Coyne, examines the role of the stomach in society, how being fat has changed from being a sign of success to being a symptom of softness and effeminacy.
Men have found other ways to compensate for the lack of an outlet for their masculinity. The rise of fight clubs, inspired by the film of the same name, where men express themselves by sharing a bare knuckle pummelling is a particularly violent example of a response to the perceived crisis. In business, men have found linguistic solutions, adopting martial terms to describe their processes: takeovers are “hostile” and bosses are “chief” executives, for example.
While Dr Forth argues that the crisis is not a new thing, he does believe it is becoming more acute.
“The idea of a crisis of masculinity suggests that at one time we were ‘OK’. I don’t think this time ever really existed, but in a way we are in a crisis now because today’s man is more aware of it because he hears more about it.”
Suburbia
Australian society, he argues, where the masculine iconography is of tough pioneers, bush rangers, sheep shearers and rugged farmers with no time for manners, is an excellent example of the crisis in action. Partly this is a reaction against a mother country that is seen as excessively mannered, but it puts Australian men — most of whom live in comfortable suburbs and sip cappuccinos in air-conditioned workplaces — in an awkward position.
“We often see this emphasis on ‘real’ men in settler societies like Australia and the US, where they try to exert themselves by showing that they’re better than the mother country.
“What has happened in Australia is there has been a critique of English manners, with the English men becoming viewed as over-refined whingeing Poms. Australian men have invoked concepts like ‘mateship’ and try to identify with the tougher life of the bush, despite the fact that most of them rarely leave suburbia.”
So the question one has to ask is: what does it mean to be a man in these complex times? Dr Forth hesitates with a lengthy answer on his lips, then opts for a simpler response.
“Being a man means being prepared to deal with contradictory advice,” he replies.
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