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jimvahrenkamp:an.illustrated.journey
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The New Man The man of old is missing. In his place we find a man sporting tight artificial butt cheeks, a ripped tucked tummy, and the latest styles imaginable. He is the new man, rugged, caring, and compassionate. He is in touch with his feminine side. And each day he deals with the rigors of an undefined, and unimaginable new world. In the days past, the perfect man, it was thought, was the one who brought home the meat, and protected the household. He plowed the fields, got his hands dirty, and tried to give his faithful wife the comforts of home that he felt were within his grasp. Now as we come into a new age when women can and are forced to fend for them selves, and are “liberated”, men find them selves in a different role. I’m not trying to say that now the sexes have been equalized. This is true, but it simply means now that women work for competitive wages, seek mates, and fight and defend themselves. They fought to have the right to join the military and die alongside the best of our men. They are in high-ranking corporate seats, and fill places in the government that were once reserved for men. Women no longer fight for their livelihood against Indians, robbers, and murderers, but peers, and coworkers. They are no longer the quaint house wife who paitiently waits at home for her husband. Women are actively searching for, and finding their new role in the world. Men on the other hand, finding themselves in unfamiliar and uncharted waters are doing new things every day. They are getting plastic surgery, looking better, feeling better, and suddenly are not good enough just as men. Instead super models have replaced the common image of men as rugged bread winning warriors. Men no longer are good enough just as men. I myself have experienced the pressure to fulfill the expectations that I have placed on myself just because of the appearance of an American Eagle, or an Abercrombie and Fitch model. What could be farther from a woman’s desire than the men that she drools over in the quarterly magazines? The expectations are placed on men by the media however. Amazingly enough the pressure to look good comes not from women but from the media. My hair is a testament to the pressures of the society that we live in. I myself enjoy it at a short length, but after seeing the models in American Eagle, and hearing what the girls I know think of them, I decided to grow it long. Men’s ideas about their self worth have not changed. There still is the instinct to be more concerned about being the breadwinner, or having the ability to protect, and to care for their loved ones. But now the rules have changed. To be able to win the bread, and care for their loved ones they must look like the icons that we as a culture have elevated. Yes it is easier as a guy to fulfill the perfect man. Out goals are realistic, in the fact that being in shape, and well-dressed are about the extent of the requirement. But try being five foot two, and hoping to look like a ripped pro athlete. It’s not going to happen. Not every man is the rugged Brett Farve, or George Clooney. These men are the Barbie equivalent for guys. Women have not in the least lightened the burden on themselves, as far as equality goes. They have only found new responsibility, and labors. Take for instance the state of single mothers, and other single women. They are reduced to the state that men have trudged through throughout the ages. Finding their place in society. There are new options, what career to go in to, or how to provide for their family. Men aren’t expected to come alongside women and help them out. Women are now expected to stand on their own two legs and learn to walk. All too soon women are being expected to run, and we (men) need to remember that they are new to this. That is not to say that they cannot succeed, but we still can come alongside them and assist as best we can. We can pass on secrets to success, which have been learned and passed on from man to man through the ages. Thank goodness for the realignment of Barbie to the realistic doll she now is. The pro athletes that are women now give girls the icons to look up to that come from the same place as them and that have had the success that they want. They now have role models who are more than mothers, or secretaries. This I feel is what needed to happen. Realistic goals can be set, and a future as something “Real” and “Tangible” is now possible. For example Becky Hammon came to my high school last night and played basketball with the girls, and a few of us guys. She’s not only a pro athlete, but also a real person. With the same struggles as each girl her own age. The girls on the basketball team can see where she came from and how she got to where she is now. And they know that they may not make it, but now at least they have a chance to achieve their dreams as pro athletes, or what ever it may be. It doesn’t matter what subject you choose. There will always be people comparing apples to oranges, as I like to say, or men to women. They are not comparable, but instead created by God with specific purposes in mind. There is no new struggle, we (men) still find ourselves locked into the same social mêlée as before, how to find the perfect woman that wants to spend the rest of her life with us. It’s exciting as a man to work our way out into water that has never been tread before, but scary at the same time. We can succeed, and will like we have before, by failing. I may never be the pro athlete that I want to be, or the corporate executive with the lucrative contract. I may never be the perfect man. But this is no reason to become disheartened, only more so to press on into the bleak unknown so that I may someday find success and become the new man.
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