opinion & features

'I'm a man.' I can't say that out loud without clenching my cornhole. 'I'm a male' is no problem. I'll even flash my junk to prove it. But the word 'man' implies qualities like confidence, success, status, and strength. By those criteria, I'm a wash out. I'm a self-conscious, unconfident, often self-pitying social dud. Even Justin Bieber is more 'man' than I am.

Reproduction is oversold in our culture. birds do it, bees do it, octomoms do it.

The problem is I never trained for the job. I was intensely shy as a child, frightened and disgusted by the homosocial world of noisy, dirty, dangerous little boys. They assumed I was a snob. They were right. I made myself believe I was superior to those dumb turds while secretly wishing one of them would play monkey bars with me.

When we hit the 'uncontrollable boner' years, my appearance remained androgynous and the other boys relegated me to 'fag.' They were right, again, but this time–according to our culture–they were now superior to me. They were masculine. I was feminine. They were normal. I was deviant.  

They were 'men.' I was inhuman.   

It was only eight years after the decriminalization of homosexuality. Enlightenment hadn't wound its way up the dirty back roads and into the tiny towns of Northwestern Ontario. So my life became a constant series of manoeuvres to avoid bullies. I took the long way home. I skipped school. I choked off my feminine mannerisms and stomped down the urge to speak. I killed off a part of myself.

Sometimes, I mourn for the flamboyant little kid I could have been. He swallowed so much cruelty. He also learned to despise extreme models of heteronormative behaviour.

When I was a pariah, my imagination stepped up and saved me. I found ways to express myself to the world, even if the world wasn't listening. I learned how to write.

So, let's get bitchy.

Reproduction is oversold in our culture. Birds do it, Bees do it, Octomoms do it. Our culture rewards good breeding stock, those people successful at inflating (ahem!) secondary sexual characteristics and representing the gender role assigned to their birth sex.

Ask yourself, did Sarah Palin earn the confidence to enter politics by mastering an understanding of geopolitical affairs or by entering beauty contests? She's the perfect candidate for the Republican image machine. She appeals to 'fauxminists' (She's a real lady!) and to sexist hogs (Lady parts!).

Then there's Conrad Black, an intelligent and learned fellow attached to an ego the size of a Macy's Thanksgiving Day Parade balloon. Unlike other tycoons happy to roll around naked in piles of money in the privacy of their own home, Black is a cock of the (perp) walk.  

If money is power, and power is an aphrodisiac, than capitalism is foreplay. For those so inclined, Black is capitalism personified. He loosens our morals, slides his chubby fingers into the dark moist folds of our soul, and fondles our greedy, grasping nature.  

Think I'm overstating the masculine mystique? The number of women elected to the House of Commons has hovered around 20 per cent since 1993. That's a serious symptom of our deferred authority to 'man.'

In a culture where hetero normative privilege affects a country's political direction–be it a foxy Alaskan governor or a Parliamentary sausage-fest–is it any wonder people feel threatened by a no-man's land between the opposing sides of the sacred man/woman binary? A bimbo/himbo limbo?

– Charles Melvin is a Toronto-based freelance writer. He is currently in rehab overcoming his addiction to Jimmy Dean Chocolate Chip Pancakes and Sausage on a Stick. To comment on this or any other article in Outwords, write to letters@outwords.ca