September 11, 2024 • 44 mins
Iyanla shares the show today with her incredible guest Tony Porter. Tony Porter is an author, TED talk speaker, and activist working to deconstruct and reconfigure masculinity. This episode is all things men: how they relate to themselves, each other, women, and the larger community. In this episode, Tony highlights the sometimes dangerous and unhealthy aspects of the collective socialization of men.
Tony is working to create a better world where men can voice their feelings, express vulnerability, and redefine what it means to be a man. He offers perspectives and insights for all genders to work together to help redefine masculinity. You can watch his TED Talk here.
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Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:03):
I am a Yamla. I had a baby daddy relationship.
I spent time in a relationship with a married man.
I had to learn the skills and tools required to
make my relationships healthy, fulfilling and loving. Welcome to the
r Spot, a production of shandaland Audio in partnership with iHeartRadio.
(00:34):
Welcome to the Our Spot. I am Eyambla, delighted, honored,
and privileged to be your support, your facilitator, your host,
your teacher, sometime your adversary, because I want to step
right up in your world and take a look at
how you do relationships. And we come here to the
(00:55):
Our Spot to learn how to be better, how to
do better, how to create better relationships, all kinds of relationships.
I know we've talked about everything, but today we are
talking about something that is near and dear to my heart. Men.
(01:18):
And I'm sure every woman out there have a story
about a man, her father. What's your relationship like with
your father, your son? What's your relationship like with your son?
So a few months ago when we were doing I
was doing a class for men. I just started doing
some research around you know, what men are saying and
(01:42):
what men are doing and I bumped into a jewel,
a jewel, and then I realized I had this book
doing that research. They sent me over to a tent talk.
I went over to the tent Talk, which is rated
one of the top ten talks that every man should see.
(02:05):
And when I got over there, I fell in love. Okay,
I fell in love on the ted Talk. Okay, first
of all, because my guest today.
Speaker 2 (02:15):
Is a New Yorker.
Speaker 1 (02:16):
Okay, I come from the nation of Brooklyn, all right,
so I'll forgive him for living in between the Bronx
and Harlem. I don't even know what that is?
Speaker 2 (02:26):
Is that?
Speaker 1 (02:27):
But that's okay, boogie down.
Speaker 2 (02:29):
You know. I got you, Haller, I got you.
Speaker 1 (02:31):
But when I went and pulled the book out and
saw all the notes I had made in the book,
I fell in love all over again. My guest today
is Tony Porter, the author of Breaking out of the
Man Box, and he talks about men and allieship, men
(02:54):
being allies with women, men being allies with each other,
talks about fatherhood and doing his work with men and
breaking men out of the man Box. Tony said, helping
to create a world where all men and boys are
loving and respectful and all women, girls and those at
(03:16):
the margins of the margins are valued and safe. My
guest today Tony Porter, creator of The Man Box, a teacher,
an author, and activist working to advance gender and racial justice,
creating a more equitable society. A father work with the NFL.
(03:39):
Welcome Tony.
Speaker 2 (03:40):
It's so good to be in your presence to just
on a privilege. Thank you for having us. I've been
excited since I've been told. I was told that I
was going to have an opportunity to be on your
show here, So thank you so much.
Speaker 1 (03:54):
Well, thank you for agreeing to be here. A call
two men? Tell me about a call to men? What
is the call? What is the call?
Speaker 2 (04:08):
We're a national organization and as you mentioned with birth
out of New York, I'm born in Halem, raised in
the Bronx.
Speaker 1 (04:14):
I'll forgive you for that.
Speaker 2 (04:17):
Yeah, But we started the organization about twenty three years ago,
both myself and the other co founder, Ted Bunch. I
was a social worker working in a substance use program
about thirty minutes north of the Bronx and town called Nayak.
I was in the hospital here at Nayak Hospital, and
the folks I served came from the boroughs. I met
Ted who was working at Safe Horizon running there. Back
(04:41):
in the day, they would be called batteries Intervention programs.
Today they may be called the Fender classes for men,
things of that nature. And I was volunteering at one
and him and I met, and I got to a
point in time when I realized, I said, you know,
this stuff that we're talking to men who are abusive about,
we really need to be sharing this information with all men,
(05:02):
because while all men are not abusive, and there's a
minority of men who are in comparison to the rest
of us, the problem is we're silent to the abuse.
For me, the question became, what is it about we
as men collectively that an epidemic of violence against women
and girls can be happening on our watch? And it
(05:23):
is that epidemic portion. You know, organization of like the
Center for Disease Control have said that, you know, one
of the leading coups is an injury to women in
our country is men's violence against women. You know, we
know one out of six women will be raped. We
know every three to six seconds a women's a victim
of domestic violence. We know one out of three women
(05:44):
will experience some kind of assault in their life. One
out of two, out of one out of five women
during a four years in college, it's going to be
sexually assaulted. You know. We know trafficking is a multi
billion dollar industry and an average AI if a person
in traffic is a girl, it's thirteen fourteen years old.
(06:06):
Fifty percent somewhere between thirty and fifty percent of female
homicides our results of domestic violence, and we know women
are abusive too, but the numbers is no comparison. And
at the moment, I'm talking about men. So we know
there's an epidemic of violence against women and girls in
our society, you know, and I've been I was baffled
(06:28):
by that and the way that women love us, take
care of us, live in community with us, and then
have to protect themselves from us all at the same time,
and in many cases that love for us, women don't
even tell us the ways in which they're protecting themselves
from men on a day to day basis. I became
(06:50):
really invested in knowing more and understanding more about this issue,
and the thing that was resonating for me most was again,
while men, most men are not abusive, we tolerated, was
silent to the abuse? And how do we then create
(07:11):
a critical mass of men that say no more, no more,
not on our watch. How do we normalize healthy manhood
in a way that it also includes decreasing and ending
this epidemic of violence against women and girls. So it
was that vision that led to starting a.
Speaker 1 (07:33):
Call to men, and the call is to not be silent,
to not not ignore it. As you were speaking, I
was just wondering how many men even know or recognize
or understand those statistics that you that you offered, because
(07:57):
you know, it's easy to think, well, it's just a
little over here, or it's just a little piece over there.
But when you look at the world and you know
one in five women being raped, a one in four
dieing of homicide in their own home. I know two
women whose husbands took their lives.
Speaker 2 (08:20):
So again, most men are not violent. But was silent
to the violence?
Speaker 1 (08:26):
Isn't that a violence, Tony?
Speaker 2 (08:29):
Isn't it is the form of violence? Yes? And I'm
glad you said that, sister, because we have to expand
our definition of violence. We have to expand it. It
has been too narrow focused. Yeah, And you know, domestic
violence continues to be the number one call for police
(08:49):
departments across the nation. Right, no particular community or cultural
group you know, has a lock on this thing across
the nation. Its remains the highest and number one call
for the average police department in our country. We know
that the scariest moment for our daughters, which should be celebrated,
(09:10):
is when they go off to college. So our work
with men, when you speak about that call, we are
and the fact that, as you mentioned that most men don't
know those statistics, and that's very true because we're the
first generation of men really having a responsibility to take
(09:34):
a very active and intentional role in addressing these issues. Right,
so we don't even have a voice for it many
of us. A lot of our work is engaging men,
mobilizing them, but educating them and helping men to develop
a voice to speak to these issues because it's new
(09:55):
to many of us, really helping men to understand their
influence and how they then use their influence to create
platform platforms, meaning what we choose to elevate to really
use their voice in this space. See, we believe firmly
(10:17):
that if women could end the violence on their own,
they would have already. We also that that only makes
sense to me. And while as a minority of men
in comparison to the rest of us here it's still
a lot of men, but it's a minority in comparison
to the rest of us. Somewhere twenty twenty five percent
(10:37):
of menace, so as a minority in comparison to the
rest of us, are perpetrating the violence. Now, sell those
men we love and care about, and we also have
to look into the history as to what led toward
them becoming who they are. That's also important in our work.
(10:58):
We know hurt people, heard of the people. We know
trauma breeds trauma from generation to generation. We actually know
that eighty percent of men who perpetrate violence against women
and girls who were victimized themselves as boys. Right, we
know that to be true. So while we can't count
(11:20):
on these men right now, when I go back and say,
if women could end the violence on their own, they
would have already, And then we have this smaller percentage
of men we really can't count on right now, but
we're not throwing them away right particularly in the black community.
(11:40):
I can't speak wholeheartedly for other community, but I could
speak about our we're not throwing men away. We have
to address this, but we're not throwing our men away.
But while we can't count on them at the moment,
you have this group of men that may be many
of your listener, the large majority of men or the
(12:03):
women listeners, the men they partner with, the large majority
of them don't perpetrate the violence. But we have to
really dig into the collective socialization of manhood. That's why
we got that little catchy term the man box. We're
talking about the collective socialization of manhood. What's in our
collective socialization that we don't know? Those stats that we have,
(12:28):
that we have this lack of interest in these type
of experiences women have because we were interested in the
women in our family. We love them, we care about them,
we do all we're supposed to do in those spaces.
But this general understanding of the experiences of women, we're
very lacking as men in that respect. And men who
(12:50):
are abusive at the end of the day, they really
rely on that because that contributes to our silence. So
our job is collectively as men no longer be silent,
to become educated, to teach other boys, other ways to
be men, to redefine some of these aspects of manhood.
(13:10):
And you know, from a sports and knowledge, get off
the sidelines right, get in it, right, get in the mix,
and really find our place and our role and responsibility.
And that's a great part of the work of a
Called Men.
Speaker 1 (13:25):
All Right, I want to talk about the man box,
but I want to back up for just a moment
because I hear the women out there screaming. Okay, So
you know, for many, many years I've worked with women, men,
mostly women, and my assignment this year, twenty twenty four,
(13:45):
what's the work with men? And okay, I'm going to
be obedient. So I've offered a variety of things for
them showing up, Tony. But my question is for me,
for everybody, what do we say, how do we let
(14:08):
men know those who are use as those who not
who are not, that there's work to be done, that
they have to do and they got to show up
to do the work.
Speaker 2 (14:18):
How do we do that? That's a great question. And
over these years of doing this work, these twenty plus years,
we're constantly reevaluating that when we first started doing the
work of a Call to Men, we were just talking
about men's violence against women, and we got to figure
(14:39):
out how to disruptive stop it, et cetera. And that's
like you know, you know, that's like preaching to the choir. Right,
you have those five six men that always show up,
and that's it. See what we learn, what we learn
in this this thing we call the collective socialists of manhood,
(15:01):
also known as a man box. Men are taught to
define what it means to be a man by distancing
ourselves from the experience of women and girls. Doesn't mean
we don't care about the women and girls in our
circles and our family, et cetera. Of course we do.
But we define what it means to be a man
by distancing ourselves from what we perceive to be the
(15:23):
experience of women and girls. Right. Also, we're not taught
to be our authentic selves as men. This man box
really forces us to be a role self rol e
instead of our whole self whl Right. And so when
you take this lack of interest we then define then
(15:47):
as a result, you have distancing and you take this
inability to be your authentic selves. Right, It could be
challenging to get us to join certain spaces, right, even
when you talk about like a healing space. For most
of us, we've been taught ain't nothing wrong with me,
(16:09):
that's right, I can't talk about I can't talk about see.
A big part of this man box is men are
taught that men are strong, dominating, women are soft, gentle,
and weak. Yes, that's in the teaching. We're then taught
(16:30):
to define what it means to be a man by
distancing ourselves from the experience of women and girls. So
by virtue of distancing ourselves, we as men don't admit
it to weakness much at all. The word weak is
not even in our vocabulary. Even when feeling weak, we
come up with other ways of saying that, I'm a
little tired, and I'm a little stressed. I'm not feeling
(16:52):
too good today, I'm a little wore out on burnt.
We never use the word weak in association with ourselves.
Now you couple that with being taught that asking for
help is a sign of weakness. Now, just mathematically speaking,
(17:12):
we find ourselves as men. We don't ask for help,
we don't offer help far to offer, and we don't
accept help. Right, and then it's amenability to ask for, offer,
or accept help is healing us as men. So when
you talk about healing circles and those kinds of spaces,
(17:34):
they are not attractive to us because they lean into
that space of help, and we resist anything in many
cases that look like help because then it starts to
look having us look or believing that we're weak. And
(17:54):
if we're weak and that distancing, we're closing up that gap.
You feel the way I'm coming from. All of that
we run from as men.
Speaker 1 (18:05):
Absolutely. One of the brothers that I worked with, he said, Iyamla,
vulnerability and inadequacy are chrystonite to a man.
Speaker 2 (18:15):
Well, yeah, we don't do vulnerability right, and vulnerability is
risk taking in many respects, and it's risk taking that
really leads toward accomplishment, even when you're talking about healings.
But we're taught to be in control as men, not
to be vulnerable, right. And you know, as I shared
(18:37):
with you, the impact is having on women in this
epidemic of violence is hurting us as men too. Yes,
absolutely we You know statistics tell us that six million
men go undiagnosed annually for depression and anxiety because we
(18:58):
don't ask for help or we try to cover it up.
We don't go to the doctor on a regular basis.
We don't practice preventative medicine. Again, this issue around asking
for the help. Men who are partnered, by the way,
are much more healthier than men who are not. And
it has very little to do with the man. It's
(19:18):
that partner that's constantly ensuring that he takes care of himself.
Right now, I go for a physical exam twice a year.
I see my doctor on a regular basis. But I
wasn't always that person. And as I get older, I'm
more invested. But my wife has been behind me all
(19:40):
these years. You know. Look, I got a vitamin box.
That's one of those big old boxes. I don't even
know half of what I'm taking. I just do what
she tell me to do, and in some cases because
she's a student of it, you know. And so I
noticed the true that personally and otherwise, that men who
(20:04):
are partner have a tendency to be healthier, and a
lot of that has to do with the person in
their lives. They even tell us that, you know, not
only does that person in our lives insist upon us
going to the doctor and all of that, but even
when at the doctor's office, they asked the questions they
(20:27):
have to because we will not tell We'll be right
in the doctor's office because we came for one issue,
but we're not going to tell them about that pain
that's been nagging us and decide that we will literally
this this really you know, we can laugh at it.
I've seen things every now and then on social media
(20:47):
making fun of men, but seriously thinking when we think
about it, very seriously and critically, you're in the doctor's
office to address one issue, and you've been having this
nagging pain in your side for weeks, and you leave
that doctor's office and don't mention that you know, there's
(21:08):
something about that that really has to be addressed amongst
us as men. And that's this issue of health, the
inability to ask for help. So when you talk about
a mental health crisis amongst men, right, this inability to
ask to help. Men complete suicide three and a half
(21:29):
to four times that the rate of women. Women live five, six, seven,
eight years longer than men on average. So this whole
issue of really addressing Now we've been socialized to define
what it means to be a man. We have a
(21:50):
tendency to call the men to say by addressing this
disease issues, we will increase healthy, respectful manhoods. And in
that increasing of healthy respectful man we will also decrease
this epidemic of violence against women in the girl. It's
a win all all the way.
Speaker 1 (22:11):
Around, and we'll talk about that when we come back.
Welcome back to the R spot.
Speaker 2 (22:26):
Let me ask you a question.
Speaker 1 (22:27):
You talk about the socialization of men. How do mothers
play a role in that deficit, dysfunctional socialization of men?
How do mothers play a role and how do fathers.
Speaker 2 (22:42):
Play a role. Well, there are three aspects of manhood
that we intentionally address at a call. The men that
we feel contribute greatly to the socialization that we want
to challenge and change. As men, we're taught to have
less value in women, right, And it's all collectively speaking,
And this is not about individual men. There are individual
(23:05):
men that will act and operate differently, but what we
do know this is the collective experience of men. And
even those individual men that act and do differently, they
understand this collective socialization as well. In this collective socialization,
we're taught to have less value in women, right, Which
is why the easiest way to tell the boy he's
(23:27):
not playing up the standards in sports? Is it telling
me he's playing like a girl? Oh my god? And
he will immediately try hard. Why because when you tell
him he's playing like a girl, you are telling him
he's in this place of less value and he needs
to get out of there. And that's why it works, right,
because we're taught that women and girls are less value
(23:49):
than men. We work with coaches all the time to
help them to learn other ways to motivate boys. Right
Because coach, every time you tell the boy he's playing
like a girl, what are you in essensaning about girls? Right?
So you got to think about the language you're using.
But the reason why coaches use that language is because
(24:12):
collectively speaking, we're taught to have less value in women
and girls. So less value is one aspect of socialization
we put a lot of tension on. Another aspect is
the issue of women as the property of men. While
we know that there was a time that was true,
it's no longer true today, but it's tolerated throughout our community.
(24:34):
It is also why domestic violence flourishes. The issue of
women as the property of men. Third area that we
put a lot of attention on is the socialization of
women as objects, particularly sexual objects, which is why we
unfortunately still live in a rape culture. Those three aspects
of the collective socialization of manner and if you put
(24:57):
them in an equation less value us property, thus objectification,
it equals violence against women, right, this whole thing. If
you couple that with as I talked about men not
having permission to be their authentic self finding manhood by
distancing ourselves from the experience of women and girls, we
live are still in the state of a binary heteroonormative
(25:21):
as far as our society is concerned, not a lot
of room for self expression as it relates to gender
or sexuality. All of this is part of this collective
socialization in a male dominating society which we still live in.
Many men are challenged by the notion that is a
(25:41):
male dominating society, Well, it is you will find women
as men. We all have women who are authorities in
our lives. Right, we have a woman right now running
for president in the United States. We do know women
are in leadership. But when we say a male dominating society,
if you put all the men in our country on
(26:03):
one side of the room and all the women in
our country on the other side of the room. It
then becomes very clear that men run control and dominate
this nation. Now, women who are raising sons or boys,
they're raising sons and boys based on what they've been taught.
(26:24):
That is important in respect to men. So what we
as men respect is what women will raise their sons
to be right, So whatever we respect as men collectively speaking,
And you're raising a son and you want him to
(26:45):
live in concert with men, to be respected and appreciated
by men, you're going to teach him what men say
he needs to know. Now as men, and I've been
around many men will say, you know, well, this ain't
about us. You know, women do the same thing, or
women teach the same thing. Yeah, they do. They do
(27:07):
teach the same thing. You know why. It's how we
as men collectively define what it means to be a man.
To a women's gonna teach that to her son so
he can be on part with us, and we collectively
as men begin to redefine manhood. Women themselves would teach
that to their sons, and boy, it still comes down
(27:30):
to us as men, in my estimation, we can blame. Now,
there are many women who are going against the grain
of that and saying, I'm not teaching that to my sons.
I know it doesn't work, I know it's not cool,
but they'll find themselves at times that are disadvantage because
(27:51):
they'll be teaching their sons one thing in a home,
and then when he hits the community, it's the door.
We got a whole him, and we're putting a lot
of pressure on him not to really conform to what
he may be learning from his mother. Right, and then
there are the women who are teaching him exactly what
we are saying it means to be a man. So,
(28:14):
because it's not my most important point here would be
it's not so much about blaming women. And that's where
we will get off on as men. You know she's
teaching it to her son, Yeah she is, But let's
let us as men redefine or reimagine at least what
(28:36):
healthy man who looks like, and that she may have
the opportunity to comfortably teach that to him because in
her mind also it's safety, right, What are we going
to respect? How is her son going to be saved?
She might already feel like she's a disadvantage, particularly if
she's a single bomb raising a boy. She may already
feel like she's at a disadvantage by not being a man.
(29:00):
Safety is always paramount for her. That he got to
go out this door, go to school, go here, go
here on his own. He got to be able to
handle it right, handle what handle what we collectively has
to find what it means to be a man. So
it's really really not about her. It's about us that
we begin to reimagine what healthy man who looks like
(29:22):
she would gladly teach that to us.
Speaker 1 (29:24):
Son, Now you have raised so many things. We're gonna
be here for the rest of the week. But the
couple of things I have to say, because I really
want the mothers to get this, the women to get this,
because we are raising sons, many of us are raising
them alone. And I always say to women, you are
raising somebody's husband and somebody's father. So when you're talking
(29:45):
to that child, that boy, that young man, you have
to remember that this is what he's going to hear,
this is what he's going to expect, this is what
he's going to respond to from his wife and his daughter. Okay,
so let's go on and talk about the man box
what's in the box.
Speaker 2 (30:04):
Yeah, so we use the box again. The man box
is actually the collective socialization of manhood. But to teach
it to men, particularly the teacher to boys. When you
say the man box, you know that that sounds kind
of cool. Actually, you know you can get men. You know,
we was talking earlier about getting men to pay attention,
(30:25):
to have some interest in what we're talking about. When
you say the man box, a lot of men will
sit up and say, well, that's interesting, what's that? And
it will ask men, you know, what are all the
ingredients that define what it means to be a man?
All right? And every time they define one, we can
just drop that in the box. And so actually, when
(30:46):
you're engaging with men, they themselves will fill up that
man box. And you get men into a space to
have the conversation, we will gladly have the conversation. The
challenge is, and you alluded to this earlier, is getting
us into the space. But when you talk to men
(31:06):
about the man box, in the box a men a tough, strong, aggressive,
dominating in control. We don't do vulnerability. As I mentioned
in earlier, we're taught to have less value in women.
Women is a property, amendment of women as object, particularly
selfual objects. We're taught to be protectives. We don't share
our feelings any emotions, with the exception of anger is
(31:28):
the only emotion we give each other permission to express.
We're not our authentic selves with more of a role
self than our whole self. These are all the things
that make up this box. We also say that homophobia
is the glue. Homophobia, meaning the fear of being perceived
as gay, is the glue that keeps this man box together.
(31:52):
Many of us are being held hostage to this box.
We've had enough of it, but we may fear more
being outside of it than in side of it. You know,
many of us are picking, choosing our moments to be
outside the box and be comfortable and free. And then
there are other times where we find security in the
box based on what's going on in our environment, and
we might it might be safer for us to be
(32:15):
in a box, and that's where we become more performative,
because in our art, this is not who I am,
but based on my situation, this is how I have
to be right. So this is how this box pretty
much operates. The box teaches men don't be too nice,
don't be too caring, don't be too loving, don't be
too concerned, don't be too any of that, right, All
(32:38):
of that can be viewed as weakness. Right, And for us,
you know, it's very, very important to never appear weak,
even though there are many, many times when we are weak. Right,
And this piece around limited emotional intelligence. The only emotion
(32:59):
we give each other permission to express his anger. Most
of us don't even know what anger actually is. You
know that anger is a secondary emotion, is a response
to the emotion. Every time you get angry, you were
either scared or your feelings hurt. But as men, we
don't do fear. No fear, right, And we don't talk
about feelings in a way to say my feelings are hurt.
(33:21):
We never say that to each other. But when I
get upset with you, I'm upset with you because you
hurt my feelings. Right, But we can't talk in that
kind of language. As men. We've been taught to define
what it means to be a man. Okay, by distancing
ourselves from what we perceive to be the experience of
women and girls. Women and girls do all of what
(33:45):
we're talking about ten times better. Than men. Women and girls,
selectively speaking, are much better representative of how we would
define emnity. By distancing ourselves from the experience of women
and girls to the fine what it means to be
a man as men, we are, in essence, distancing ourselves
(34:10):
from our own humanity. We are when you say why
we are simply on remote control doing tradition, We're just
passing tradition down from one generation to the next. And
we're not doing enough questioning of what we're passing down
to our sons and other boys. We're not doing enough
(34:31):
critical thinking of what we're passing down to our sons
and boys. We're just doing tradition on remote control. And
our job is to get men off the remote control.
And let's be more critical in our thinking. What we
were doing as men one hundred years ago is not
necessarily what we should be doing today. And that's why
(34:53):
we talk about reimagining manhood. Let's reimagining men and at
a call to men, our bagline is the next generation
of manhood. And so while there's an urgency of now,
we have a huge focus on the next generation of
manhood and getting off of remote control. And that's our
(35:14):
work right now. Of their men listening. My hopes is
to get them off of remote control and start thinking
more critically about what we're doing, what we're teaching. Every
time you tell a three to four year old boy
to stop crying, you are, in essence telling him to
stop feeling. We can have we can have a discussion
(35:36):
around why you're crying, right, but to not even have
an investment in what's going on when you just stop crying.
By five years old, the average boy has already been
taught that crying is off the table, and sharing what's
going on with you is off the table. What is
he doing with all that and.
Speaker 1 (35:58):
With that peace? It's not the crying, it's that what
is going on with you, what you're feeling, what you're experiencing,
doesn't matter, it's not important or you know, cannot be shared.
And then when he gets a wife and kids, he
doesn't know how to share what he's feeling. We'll talk
about that right after this break. Welcome back to the
(36:28):
R spot. Let's get back to the conversation. I want
to go back for a minute. Women ask property of men.
Here's a question, no heat, no judgment, I promise you,
and women particularly as sexual objects, is that what is
leading to the just the astronomical rate of men creating
(36:51):
children and then walking away from them because the woman
was just the sex object. You don't have any connection
to her and therefore no responsibility for the gestation of
his seed. What is that, Tony helped me. What part
of manhood is that?
Speaker 2 (37:07):
Well, you nailed it, right. If we look, if you
look at less value, property and objectification, it's in its
a tirety is a dehumanization process or a dehumanization issue
or experience as it relates to men and women. Right,
If she's of less value, we can see what that means.
(37:28):
She's a property, So she's not really even a person,
even though we know, but she's not in our socialization,
and she's an object, particularly a sexual object. Right. Well,
that's why when men break up with a woman, we'll
tell them in a minute, you know, just let's go
to the club. Right. I mean, when I was a
young man, I remember that term they should have, you know,
(37:50):
it's more efficient to see or something like that. Get
over it, right, get over it and move on. We don't
even allow men to grieve. Right, Women will say to
other women and nothing's one hundred percent here right. This
is not an exact science. I don't want anybody to
think that. But women will say the other women, a girl,
take a time out, get yourself together, take a break,
(38:12):
and I'm gonna be right here with you. We don't
talk like that as men. It's like, let's replace her
right now. Put some clothes on, We're going to the club.
That's what we get your behind uh out of this house.
Stop laying around here crying and carrying on like or whatever,
whatever whatever. Get yourself together. You know, I introducing you to
(38:36):
my girlfriend's cousin. We want to do something right, and
we and then that's just what we're gonna do this.
We're simply gonna replace her, right, That's what we're gonna do.
So we don't even have a recognition collectively as men
that you actually need degree this is a loss in
your life. We don't. It doesn't. We don't see it
(38:57):
that way. So yeah, yes, And I'm not saying that
we're not in pain and hurt as men when we
make those decisions just to walk away, whether it's from
children or partners or whatever. But based on what we're
todd's easier to do it right. And I'm not here
(39:18):
demonizing man. There's a lot of men who are sticking
and staying and doing the right thing. And brothers, we
are not talking about you in this moment. We're just
talking about the impact of this collective socialization that will
make it easier for us to walk away. And I'm
a big fan. You can be a great non custodial parent.
(39:40):
You just got to put time in, right, You got
to put time in. It requires time. It also requires
you to have an appropriate relationship with the mother of
that child. Right. You can't demonize her. You can't. You
cannot demonize the person that you're yow loves more than
(40:01):
anyone in the whole wide world and have a good
relationship with that child. You've got to figure out a
way to be in conctant with her, to be kind
and in some cases to be loving and caring. Is
a level of maturity that's involved in doing that, and
then you can be a great non custodial parent.
Speaker 1 (40:22):
Let me say this because I want to go back
to this object again. You know, there's a man box,
there's a woman box too. And one of the things
that concerns me right now that I see growing and
I don't know if this is the collective socialization of
women or I really don't know what to call this,
but how women are objectifying men meaning what can he
(40:48):
give me? What can he do for me? What can
he buy me? And he's got to come to the
table with, you know, X amount of dollars or X
kind of job because that's what I want.
Speaker 2 (41:00):
How is that.
Speaker 1 (41:03):
Either keeping men in the box or creating a new box.
I don't even that's a collective socialization of women. My
question to you is how is that impacting men?
Speaker 2 (41:17):
Well? I think what comes up for me is when
we say women see them ass, there may very well
be a selective group of women that see them ass. Yes, absolutely,
I would say more in general, it's a lot of
things that in front of us when we think about that,
(41:40):
when we think about capitalism, right, I got mind, you
get yours. When we think about living in a capitalist society,
when you think about the impact of gender on women.
You know, right now today women makes eighty cents to
the dollar for men doing the same job, and a
black or brown woman makes a sixty five cents to
(42:01):
a dollar doing the same job. When you think about
issues of equality, issues of equity, when you think about
trauma that women have experienced at the handsome men, and
now you got women trying to figure out and so
might be doing a little sideway, but I'm still not
gonna be but so mad at them trying to figure
out how to have some power, yeah, right, and some
(42:27):
respectability in this world that if you're a woman, you're
going to have less. If you're black or brown women,
you're gonna have less if your dark skin could we
live in a society rooting an anti blackness, if your
dark skinned black women, you're gonna have less. Right, if
you don't fit into the box of how we have
(42:48):
society to find what's physically attractive, you're going to have less.
And within all of that people are trying to find
way to make it right. So, yeah, you're going to
I have those experiences. Maybe, and maybe it is more
of a a younger woman's game than an older woman's game.
Maybe younger women's saying I ain't doing what putting up
(43:11):
put up with right, you know, So I get it,
and I can see the challenges it creates. But I
can also see how they got there. And most of
the time, when you look at how they got there
is less their responsibility in all ours more hours collectively,
(43:33):
unless say people don't have any responsibility for their decision
to live. Course they do. But there's something going on
within our society that's also fostering orstering that as well.
Speaker 1 (43:47):
Tony, we are about to run out of time, but
I don't want to end this conversation, so I'm going
to ask you to stick around and we're going to
do a part two. So to all of thesteners, if
you heard something today that's helpful, if you've got more questions,
I want you to be sure to tune in next
(44:07):
week for Part two.
Speaker 2 (44:09):
I'll see you then.
Speaker 1 (44:10):
In the meantime, stay in peace and not piece fine.
The R Spot is a production of Shondaland Audio in
partnership with iHeartRadio. For more podcasts from Shondaland Audio, visit
(44:31):
the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you listen to
your favorite shows.
I am a Yamla. I had a baby daddy relationship.
I spent time in a relationship with a married man.
I had to learn the skills and tools required to
make my relationships healthy, fulfilling and loving. Welcome to the
r Spot, a production of shandaland Audio in partnership with iHeartRadio.
(00:34):
Welcome to the Our Spot. I am Eyambla, delighted, honored,
and privileged to be your support, your facilitator, your host,
your teacher, sometime your adversary, because I want to step
right up in your world and take a look at
how you do relationships. And we come here to the
(00:55):
Our Spot to learn how to be better, how to
do better, how to create better relationships, all kinds of relationships.
I know we've talked about everything, but today we are
talking about something that is near and dear to my heart. Men.
(01:18):
And I'm sure every woman out there have a story
about a man, her father. What's your relationship like with
your father, your son? What's your relationship like with your son?
So a few months ago when we were doing I
was doing a class for men. I just started doing
some research around you know, what men are saying and
(01:42):
what men are doing and I bumped into a jewel,
a jewel, and then I realized I had this book
doing that research. They sent me over to a tent talk.
I went over to the tent Talk, which is rated
one of the top ten talks that every man should see.
(02:05):
And when I got over there, I fell in love. Okay,
I fell in love on the ted Talk. Okay, first
of all, because my guest today.
Speaker 2 (02:15):
Is a New Yorker.
Speaker 1 (02:16):
Okay, I come from the nation of Brooklyn, all right,
so I'll forgive him for living in between the Bronx
and Harlem. I don't even know what that is?
Speaker 2 (02:26):
Is that?
Speaker 1 (02:27):
But that's okay, boogie down.
Speaker 2 (02:29):
You know. I got you, Haller, I got you.
Speaker 1 (02:31):
But when I went and pulled the book out and
saw all the notes I had made in the book,
I fell in love all over again. My guest today
is Tony Porter, the author of Breaking out of the
Man Box, and he talks about men and allieship, men
(02:54):
being allies with women, men being allies with each other,
talks about fatherhood and doing his work with men and
breaking men out of the man Box. Tony said, helping
to create a world where all men and boys are
loving and respectful and all women, girls and those at
(03:16):
the margins of the margins are valued and safe. My
guest today Tony Porter, creator of The Man Box, a teacher,
an author, and activist working to advance gender and racial justice,
creating a more equitable society. A father work with the NFL.
(03:39):
Welcome Tony.
Speaker 2 (03:40):
It's so good to be in your presence to just
on a privilege. Thank you for having us. I've been
excited since I've been told. I was told that I
was going to have an opportunity to be on your
show here, So thank you so much.
Speaker 1 (03:54):
Well, thank you for agreeing to be here. A call
two men? Tell me about a call to men? What
is the call? What is the call?
Speaker 2 (04:08):
We're a national organization and as you mentioned with birth
out of New York, I'm born in Halem, raised in
the Bronx.
Speaker 1 (04:14):
I'll forgive you for that.
Speaker 2 (04:17):
Yeah, But we started the organization about twenty three years ago,
both myself and the other co founder, Ted Bunch. I
was a social worker working in a substance use program
about thirty minutes north of the Bronx and town called Nayak.
I was in the hospital here at Nayak Hospital, and
the folks I served came from the boroughs. I met
Ted who was working at Safe Horizon running there. Back
(04:41):
in the day, they would be called batteries Intervention programs.
Today they may be called the Fender classes for men,
things of that nature. And I was volunteering at one
and him and I met, and I got to a
point in time when I realized, I said, you know,
this stuff that we're talking to men who are abusive about,
we really need to be sharing this information with all men,
(05:02):
because while all men are not abusive, and there's a
minority of men who are in comparison to the rest
of us, the problem is we're silent to the abuse.
For me, the question became, what is it about we
as men collectively that an epidemic of violence against women
and girls can be happening on our watch? And it
(05:23):
is that epidemic portion. You know, organization of like the
Center for Disease Control have said that, you know, one
of the leading coups is an injury to women in
our country is men's violence against women. You know, we
know one out of six women will be raped. We
know every three to six seconds a women's a victim
of domestic violence. We know one out of three women
(05:44):
will experience some kind of assault in their life. One
out of two, out of one out of five women
during a four years in college, it's going to be
sexually assaulted. You know. We know trafficking is a multi
billion dollar industry and an average AI if a person
in traffic is a girl, it's thirteen fourteen years old.
(06:06):
Fifty percent somewhere between thirty and fifty percent of female
homicides our results of domestic violence, and we know women
are abusive too, but the numbers is no comparison. And
at the moment, I'm talking about men. So we know
there's an epidemic of violence against women and girls in
our society, you know, and I've been I was baffled
(06:28):
by that and the way that women love us, take
care of us, live in community with us, and then
have to protect themselves from us all at the same time,
and in many cases that love for us, women don't
even tell us the ways in which they're protecting themselves
from men on a day to day basis. I became
(06:50):
really invested in knowing more and understanding more about this issue,
and the thing that was resonating for me most was again,
while men, most men are not abusive, we tolerated, was
silent to the abuse? And how do we then create
(07:11):
a critical mass of men that say no more, no more,
not on our watch. How do we normalize healthy manhood
in a way that it also includes decreasing and ending
this epidemic of violence against women and girls. So it
was that vision that led to starting a.
Speaker 1 (07:33):
Call to men, and the call is to not be silent,
to not not ignore it. As you were speaking, I
was just wondering how many men even know or recognize
or understand those statistics that you that you offered, because
(07:57):
you know, it's easy to think, well, it's just a
little over here, or it's just a little piece over there.
But when you look at the world and you know
one in five women being raped, a one in four
dieing of homicide in their own home. I know two
women whose husbands took their lives.
Speaker 2 (08:20):
So again, most men are not violent. But was silent
to the violence?
Speaker 1 (08:26):
Isn't that a violence, Tony?
Speaker 2 (08:29):
Isn't it is the form of violence? Yes? And I'm
glad you said that, sister, because we have to expand
our definition of violence. We have to expand it. It
has been too narrow focused. Yeah, And you know, domestic
violence continues to be the number one call for police
(08:49):
departments across the nation. Right, no particular community or cultural
group you know, has a lock on this thing across
the nation. Its remains the highest and number one call
for the average police department in our country. We know
that the scariest moment for our daughters, which should be celebrated,
(09:10):
is when they go off to college. So our work
with men, when you speak about that call, we are
and the fact that, as you mentioned that most men don't
know those statistics, and that's very true because we're the
first generation of men really having a responsibility to take
(09:34):
a very active and intentional role in addressing these issues. Right,
so we don't even have a voice for it many
of us. A lot of our work is engaging men,
mobilizing them, but educating them and helping men to develop
a voice to speak to these issues because it's new
(09:55):
to many of us, really helping men to understand their
influence and how they then use their influence to create
platform platforms, meaning what we choose to elevate to really
use their voice in this space. See, we believe firmly
(10:17):
that if women could end the violence on their own,
they would have already. We also that that only makes
sense to me. And while as a minority of men
in comparison to the rest of us here it's still
a lot of men, but it's a minority in comparison
to the rest of us. Somewhere twenty twenty five percent
(10:37):
of menace, so as a minority in comparison to the
rest of us, are perpetrating the violence. Now, sell those
men we love and care about, and we also have
to look into the history as to what led toward
them becoming who they are. That's also important in our work.
(10:58):
We know hurt people, heard of the people. We know
trauma breeds trauma from generation to generation. We actually know
that eighty percent of men who perpetrate violence against women
and girls who were victimized themselves as boys. Right, we
know that to be true. So while we can't count
(11:20):
on these men right now, when I go back and say,
if women could end the violence on their own, they
would have already, And then we have this smaller percentage
of men we really can't count on right now, but
we're not throwing them away right particularly in the black community.
(11:40):
I can't speak wholeheartedly for other community, but I could
speak about our we're not throwing men away. We have
to address this, but we're not throwing our men away.
But while we can't count on them at the moment,
you have this group of men that may be many
of your listener, the large majority of men or the
(12:03):
women listeners, the men they partner with, the large majority
of them don't perpetrate the violence. But we have to
really dig into the collective socialization of manhood. That's why
we got that little catchy term the man box. We're
talking about the collective socialization of manhood. What's in our
collective socialization that we don't know? Those stats that we have,
(12:28):
that we have this lack of interest in these type
of experiences women have because we were interested in the
women in our family. We love them, we care about them,
we do all we're supposed to do in those spaces.
But this general understanding of the experiences of women, we're
very lacking as men in that respect. And men who
(12:50):
are abusive at the end of the day, they really
rely on that because that contributes to our silence. So
our job is collectively as men no longer be silent,
to become educated, to teach other boys, other ways to
be men, to redefine some of these aspects of manhood.
(13:10):
And you know, from a sports and knowledge, get off
the sidelines right, get in it, right, get in the mix,
and really find our place and our role and responsibility.
And that's a great part of the work of a
Called Men.
Speaker 1 (13:25):
All Right, I want to talk about the man box,
but I want to back up for just a moment
because I hear the women out there screaming. Okay, So
you know, for many, many years I've worked with women, men,
mostly women, and my assignment this year, twenty twenty four,
(13:45):
what's the work with men? And okay, I'm going to
be obedient. So I've offered a variety of things for
them showing up, Tony. But my question is for me,
for everybody, what do we say, how do we let
(14:08):
men know those who are use as those who not
who are not, that there's work to be done, that
they have to do and they got to show up
to do the work.
Speaker 2 (14:18):
How do we do that? That's a great question. And
over these years of doing this work, these twenty plus years,
we're constantly reevaluating that when we first started doing the
work of a Call to Men, we were just talking
about men's violence against women, and we got to figure
(14:39):
out how to disruptive stop it, et cetera. And that's
like you know, you know, that's like preaching to the choir. Right,
you have those five six men that always show up,
and that's it. See what we learn, what we learn
in this this thing we call the collective socialists of manhood,
(15:01):
also known as a man box. Men are taught to
define what it means to be a man by distancing
ourselves from the experience of women and girls. Doesn't mean
we don't care about the women and girls in our
circles and our family, et cetera. Of course we do.
But we define what it means to be a man
by distancing ourselves from what we perceive to be the
(15:23):
experience of women and girls. Right. Also, we're not taught
to be our authentic selves as men. This man box
really forces us to be a role self rol e
instead of our whole self whl Right. And so when
you take this lack of interest we then define then
(15:47):
as a result, you have distancing and you take this
inability to be your authentic selves. Right, It could be
challenging to get us to join certain spaces, right, even
when you talk about like a healing space. For most
of us, we've been taught ain't nothing wrong with me,
(16:09):
that's right, I can't talk about I can't talk about see.
A big part of this man box is men are
taught that men are strong, dominating, women are soft, gentle,
and weak. Yes, that's in the teaching. We're then taught
(16:30):
to define what it means to be a man by
distancing ourselves from the experience of women and girls. So
by virtue of distancing ourselves, we as men don't admit
it to weakness much at all. The word weak is
not even in our vocabulary. Even when feeling weak, we
come up with other ways of saying that, I'm a
little tired, and I'm a little stressed. I'm not feeling
(16:52):
too good today, I'm a little wore out on burnt.
We never use the word weak in association with ourselves.
Now you couple that with being taught that asking for
help is a sign of weakness. Now, just mathematically speaking,
(17:12):
we find ourselves as men. We don't ask for help,
we don't offer help far to offer, and we don't
accept help. Right, and then it's amenability to ask for, offer,
or accept help is healing us as men. So when
you talk about healing circles and those kinds of spaces,
(17:34):
they are not attractive to us because they lean into
that space of help, and we resist anything in many
cases that look like help because then it starts to
look having us look or believing that we're weak. And
(17:54):
if we're weak and that distancing, we're closing up that gap.
You feel the way I'm coming from. All of that
we run from as men.
Speaker 1 (18:05):
Absolutely. One of the brothers that I worked with, he said, Iyamla,
vulnerability and inadequacy are chrystonite to a man.
Speaker 2 (18:15):
Well, yeah, we don't do vulnerability right, and vulnerability is
risk taking in many respects, and it's risk taking that
really leads toward accomplishment, even when you're talking about healings.
But we're taught to be in control as men, not
to be vulnerable, right. And you know, as I shared
(18:37):
with you, the impact is having on women in this
epidemic of violence is hurting us as men too. Yes,
absolutely we You know statistics tell us that six million
men go undiagnosed annually for depression and anxiety because we
(18:58):
don't ask for help or we try to cover it up.
We don't go to the doctor on a regular basis.
We don't practice preventative medicine. Again, this issue around asking
for the help. Men who are partnered, by the way,
are much more healthier than men who are not. And
it has very little to do with the man. It's
(19:18):
that partner that's constantly ensuring that he takes care of himself.
Right now, I go for a physical exam twice a year.
I see my doctor on a regular basis. But I
wasn't always that person. And as I get older, I'm
more invested. But my wife has been behind me all
(19:40):
these years. You know. Look, I got a vitamin box.
That's one of those big old boxes. I don't even
know half of what I'm taking. I just do what
she tell me to do, and in some cases because
she's a student of it, you know. And so I
noticed the true that personally and otherwise, that men who
(20:04):
are partner have a tendency to be healthier, and a
lot of that has to do with the person in
their lives. They even tell us that, you know, not
only does that person in our lives insist upon us
going to the doctor and all of that, but even
when at the doctor's office, they asked the questions they
(20:27):
have to because we will not tell We'll be right
in the doctor's office because we came for one issue,
but we're not going to tell them about that pain
that's been nagging us and decide that we will literally
this this really you know, we can laugh at it.
I've seen things every now and then on social media
(20:47):
making fun of men, but seriously thinking when we think
about it, very seriously and critically, you're in the doctor's
office to address one issue, and you've been having this
nagging pain in your side for weeks, and you leave
that doctor's office and don't mention that you know, there's
(21:08):
something about that that really has to be addressed amongst
us as men. And that's this issue of health, the
inability to ask for help. So when you talk about
a mental health crisis amongst men, right, this inability to
ask to help. Men complete suicide three and a half
(21:29):
to four times that the rate of women. Women live five, six, seven,
eight years longer than men on average. So this whole
issue of really addressing Now we've been socialized to define
what it means to be a man. We have a
(21:50):
tendency to call the men to say by addressing this
disease issues, we will increase healthy, respectful manhoods. And in
that increasing of healthy respectful man we will also decrease
this epidemic of violence against women in the girl. It's
a win all all the way.
Speaker 1 (22:11):
Around, and we'll talk about that when we come back.
Welcome back to the R spot.
Speaker 2 (22:26):
Let me ask you a question.
Speaker 1 (22:27):
You talk about the socialization of men. How do mothers
play a role in that deficit, dysfunctional socialization of men?
How do mothers play a role and how do fathers.
Speaker 2 (22:42):
Play a role. Well, there are three aspects of manhood
that we intentionally address at a call. The men that
we feel contribute greatly to the socialization that we want
to challenge and change. As men, we're taught to have
less value in women, right, And it's all collectively speaking,
And this is not about individual men. There are individual
(23:05):
men that will act and operate differently, but what we
do know this is the collective experience of men. And
even those individual men that act and do differently, they
understand this collective socialization as well. In this collective socialization,
we're taught to have less value in women, right, Which
is why the easiest way to tell the boy he's
(23:27):
not playing up the standards in sports? Is it telling
me he's playing like a girl? Oh my god? And
he will immediately try hard. Why because when you tell
him he's playing like a girl, you are telling him
he's in this place of less value and he needs
to get out of there. And that's why it works, right,
because we're taught that women and girls are less value
(23:49):
than men. We work with coaches all the time to
help them to learn other ways to motivate boys. Right
Because coach, every time you tell the boy he's playing
like a girl, what are you in essensaning about girls? Right?
So you got to think about the language you're using.
But the reason why coaches use that language is because
(24:12):
collectively speaking, we're taught to have less value in women
and girls. So less value is one aspect of socialization
we put a lot of tension on. Another aspect is
the issue of women as the property of men. While
we know that there was a time that was true,
it's no longer true today, but it's tolerated throughout our community.
(24:34):
It is also why domestic violence flourishes. The issue of
women as the property of men. Third area that we
put a lot of attention on is the socialization of
women as objects, particularly sexual objects, which is why we
unfortunately still live in a rape culture. Those three aspects
of the collective socialization of manner and if you put
(24:57):
them in an equation less value us property, thus objectification,
it equals violence against women, right, this whole thing. If
you couple that with as I talked about men not
having permission to be their authentic self finding manhood by
distancing ourselves from the experience of women and girls, we
live are still in the state of a binary heteroonormative
(25:21):
as far as our society is concerned, not a lot
of room for self expression as it relates to gender
or sexuality. All of this is part of this collective
socialization in a male dominating society which we still live in.
Many men are challenged by the notion that is a
(25:41):
male dominating society, Well, it is you will find women
as men. We all have women who are authorities in
our lives. Right, we have a woman right now running
for president in the United States. We do know women
are in leadership. But when we say a male dominating society,
if you put all the men in our country on
(26:03):
one side of the room and all the women in
our country on the other side of the room. It
then becomes very clear that men run control and dominate
this nation. Now, women who are raising sons or boys,
they're raising sons and boys based on what they've been taught.
(26:24):
That is important in respect to men. So what we
as men respect is what women will raise their sons
to be right, So whatever we respect as men collectively speaking,
And you're raising a son and you want him to
(26:45):
live in concert with men, to be respected and appreciated
by men, you're going to teach him what men say
he needs to know. Now as men, and I've been
around many men will say, you know, well, this ain't
about us. You know, women do the same thing, or
women teach the same thing. Yeah, they do. They do
(27:07):
teach the same thing. You know why. It's how we
as men collectively define what it means to be a man.
To a women's gonna teach that to her son so
he can be on part with us, and we collectively
as men begin to redefine manhood. Women themselves would teach
that to their sons, and boy, it still comes down
(27:30):
to us as men, in my estimation, we can blame. Now,
there are many women who are going against the grain
of that and saying, I'm not teaching that to my sons.
I know it doesn't work, I know it's not cool,
but they'll find themselves at times that are disadvantage because
(27:51):
they'll be teaching their sons one thing in a home,
and then when he hits the community, it's the door.
We got a whole him, and we're putting a lot
of pressure on him not to really conform to what
he may be learning from his mother. Right, and then
there are the women who are teaching him exactly what
we are saying it means to be a man. So,
(28:14):
because it's not my most important point here would be
it's not so much about blaming women. And that's where
we will get off on as men. You know she's
teaching it to her son, Yeah she is, But let's
let us as men redefine or reimagine at least what
(28:36):
healthy man who looks like, and that she may have
the opportunity to comfortably teach that to him because in
her mind also it's safety, right, What are we going
to respect? How is her son going to be saved?
She might already feel like she's a disadvantage, particularly if
she's a single bomb raising a boy. She may already
feel like she's at a disadvantage by not being a man.
(29:00):
Safety is always paramount for her. That he got to
go out this door, go to school, go here, go
here on his own. He got to be able to
handle it right, handle what handle what we collectively has
to find what it means to be a man. So
it's really really not about her. It's about us that
we begin to reimagine what healthy man who looks like
(29:22):
she would gladly teach that to us.
Speaker 1 (29:24):
Son, Now you have raised so many things. We're gonna
be here for the rest of the week. But the
couple of things I have to say, because I really
want the mothers to get this, the women to get this,
because we are raising sons, many of us are raising
them alone. And I always say to women, you are
raising somebody's husband and somebody's father. So when you're talking
(29:45):
to that child, that boy, that young man, you have
to remember that this is what he's going to hear,
this is what he's going to expect, this is what
he's going to respond to from his wife and his daughter. Okay,
so let's go on and talk about the man box
what's in the box.
Speaker 2 (30:04):
Yeah, so we use the box again. The man box
is actually the collective socialization of manhood. But to teach
it to men, particularly the teacher to boys. When you
say the man box, you know that that sounds kind
of cool. Actually, you know you can get men. You know,
we was talking earlier about getting men to pay attention,
(30:25):
to have some interest in what we're talking about. When
you say the man box, a lot of men will
sit up and say, well, that's interesting, what's that? And
it will ask men, you know, what are all the
ingredients that define what it means to be a man?
All right? And every time they define one, we can
just drop that in the box. And so actually, when
(30:46):
you're engaging with men, they themselves will fill up that
man box. And you get men into a space to
have the conversation, we will gladly have the conversation. The
challenge is, and you alluded to this earlier, is getting
us into the space. But when you talk to men
(31:06):
about the man box, in the box a men a tough, strong, aggressive,
dominating in control. We don't do vulnerability. As I mentioned
in earlier, we're taught to have less value in women.
Women is a property, amendment of women as object, particularly
selfual objects. We're taught to be protectives. We don't share
our feelings any emotions, with the exception of anger is
(31:28):
the only emotion we give each other permission to express.
We're not our authentic selves with more of a role
self than our whole self. These are all the things
that make up this box. We also say that homophobia
is the glue. Homophobia, meaning the fear of being perceived
as gay, is the glue that keeps this man box together.
(31:52):
Many of us are being held hostage to this box.
We've had enough of it, but we may fear more
being outside of it than in side of it. You know,
many of us are picking, choosing our moments to be
outside the box and be comfortable and free. And then
there are other times where we find security in the
box based on what's going on in our environment, and
we might it might be safer for us to be
(32:15):
in a box, and that's where we become more performative,
because in our art, this is not who I am,
but based on my situation, this is how I have
to be right. So this is how this box pretty
much operates. The box teaches men don't be too nice,
don't be too caring, don't be too loving, don't be
too concerned, don't be too any of that, right, All
(32:38):
of that can be viewed as weakness. Right, And for us,
you know, it's very, very important to never appear weak,
even though there are many, many times when we are weak. Right,
And this piece around limited emotional intelligence. The only emotion
(32:59):
we give each other permission to express his anger. Most
of us don't even know what anger actually is. You
know that anger is a secondary emotion, is a response
to the emotion. Every time you get angry, you were
either scared or your feelings hurt. But as men, we
don't do fear. No fear, right, And we don't talk
about feelings in a way to say my feelings are hurt.
(33:21):
We never say that to each other. But when I
get upset with you, I'm upset with you because you
hurt my feelings. Right, But we can't talk in that
kind of language. As men. We've been taught to define
what it means to be a man. Okay, by distancing
ourselves from what we perceive to be the experience of
women and girls. Women and girls do all of what
(33:45):
we're talking about ten times better. Than men. Women and girls,
selectively speaking, are much better representative of how we would
define emnity. By distancing ourselves from the experience of women
and girls to the fine what it means to be
a man as men, we are, in essence, distancing ourselves
(34:10):
from our own humanity. We are when you say why
we are simply on remote control doing tradition, We're just
passing tradition down from one generation to the next. And
we're not doing enough questioning of what we're passing down
to our sons and other boys. We're not doing enough
(34:31):
critical thinking of what we're passing down to our sons
and boys. We're just doing tradition on remote control. And
our job is to get men off the remote control.
And let's be more critical in our thinking. What we
were doing as men one hundred years ago is not
necessarily what we should be doing today. And that's why
(34:53):
we talk about reimagining manhood. Let's reimagining men and at
a call to men, our bagline is the next generation
of manhood. And so while there's an urgency of now,
we have a huge focus on the next generation of
manhood and getting off of remote control. And that's our
(35:14):
work right now. Of their men listening. My hopes is
to get them off of remote control and start thinking
more critically about what we're doing, what we're teaching. Every
time you tell a three to four year old boy
to stop crying, you are, in essence telling him to
stop feeling. We can have we can have a discussion
(35:36):
around why you're crying, right, but to not even have
an investment in what's going on when you just stop crying.
By five years old, the average boy has already been
taught that crying is off the table, and sharing what's
going on with you is off the table. What is
he doing with all that and.
Speaker 1 (35:58):
With that peace? It's not the crying, it's that what
is going on with you, what you're feeling, what you're experiencing,
doesn't matter, it's not important or you know, cannot be shared.
And then when he gets a wife and kids, he
doesn't know how to share what he's feeling. We'll talk
about that right after this break. Welcome back to the
(36:28):
R spot. Let's get back to the conversation. I want
to go back for a minute. Women ask property of men.
Here's a question, no heat, no judgment, I promise you,
and women particularly as sexual objects, is that what is
leading to the just the astronomical rate of men creating
(36:51):
children and then walking away from them because the woman
was just the sex object. You don't have any connection
to her and therefore no responsibility for the gestation of
his seed. What is that, Tony helped me. What part
of manhood is that?
Speaker 2 (37:07):
Well, you nailed it, right. If we look, if you
look at less value, property and objectification, it's in its
a tirety is a dehumanization process or a dehumanization issue
or experience as it relates to men and women. Right,
If she's of less value, we can see what that means.
(37:28):
She's a property, So she's not really even a person,
even though we know, but she's not in our socialization,
and she's an object, particularly a sexual object. Right. Well,
that's why when men break up with a woman, we'll
tell them in a minute, you know, just let's go
to the club. Right. I mean, when I was a
young man, I remember that term they should have, you know,
(37:50):
it's more efficient to see or something like that. Get
over it, right, get over it and move on. We don't
even allow men to grieve. Right, Women will say to
other women and nothing's one hundred percent here right. This
is not an exact science. I don't want anybody to
think that. But women will say the other women, a girl,
take a time out, get yourself together, take a break,
(38:12):
and I'm gonna be right here with you. We don't
talk like that as men. It's like, let's replace her
right now. Put some clothes on, We're going to the club.
That's what we get your behind uh out of this house.
Stop laying around here crying and carrying on like or whatever,
whatever whatever. Get yourself together. You know, I introducing you to
(38:36):
my girlfriend's cousin. We want to do something right, and
we and then that's just what we're gonna do this.
We're simply gonna replace her, right, That's what we're gonna do.
So we don't even have a recognition collectively as men
that you actually need degree this is a loss in
your life. We don't. It doesn't. We don't see it
(38:57):
that way. So yeah, yes, And I'm not saying that
we're not in pain and hurt as men when we
make those decisions just to walk away, whether it's from
children or partners or whatever. But based on what we're
todd's easier to do it right. And I'm not here
(39:18):
demonizing man. There's a lot of men who are sticking
and staying and doing the right thing. And brothers, we
are not talking about you in this moment. We're just
talking about the impact of this collective socialization that will
make it easier for us to walk away. And I'm
a big fan. You can be a great non custodial parent.
(39:40):
You just got to put time in, right, You got
to put time in. It requires time. It also requires
you to have an appropriate relationship with the mother of
that child. Right. You can't demonize her. You can't. You
cannot demonize the person that you're yow loves more than
(40:01):
anyone in the whole wide world and have a good
relationship with that child. You've got to figure out a
way to be in conctant with her, to be kind
and in some cases to be loving and caring. Is
a level of maturity that's involved in doing that, and
then you can be a great non custodial parent.
Speaker 1 (40:22):
Let me say this because I want to go back
to this object again. You know, there's a man box,
there's a woman box too. And one of the things
that concerns me right now that I see growing and
I don't know if this is the collective socialization of
women or I really don't know what to call this,
but how women are objectifying men meaning what can he
(40:48):
give me? What can he do for me? What can
he buy me? And he's got to come to the
table with, you know, X amount of dollars or X
kind of job because that's what I want.
Speaker 2 (41:00):
How is that.
Speaker 1 (41:03):
Either keeping men in the box or creating a new box.
I don't even that's a collective socialization of women. My
question to you is how is that impacting men?
Speaker 2 (41:17):
Well? I think what comes up for me is when
we say women see them ass, there may very well
be a selective group of women that see them ass. Yes, absolutely,
I would say more in general, it's a lot of
things that in front of us when we think about that,
(41:40):
when we think about capitalism, right, I got mind, you
get yours. When we think about living in a capitalist society,
when you think about the impact of gender on women.
You know, right now today women makes eighty cents to
the dollar for men doing the same job, and a
black or brown woman makes a sixty five cents to
(42:01):
a dollar doing the same job. When you think about
issues of equality, issues of equity, when you think about
trauma that women have experienced at the handsome men, and
now you got women trying to figure out and so
might be doing a little sideway, but I'm still not
gonna be but so mad at them trying to figure
out how to have some power, yeah, right, and some
(42:27):
respectability in this world that if you're a woman, you're
going to have less. If you're black or brown women,
you're gonna have less if your dark skin could we
live in a society rooting an anti blackness, if your
dark skinned black women, you're gonna have less. Right, if
you don't fit into the box of how we have
(42:48):
society to find what's physically attractive, you're going to have less.
And within all of that people are trying to find
way to make it right. So, yeah, you're going to
I have those experiences. Maybe, and maybe it is more
of a a younger woman's game than an older woman's game.
Maybe younger women's saying I ain't doing what putting up
(43:11):
put up with right, you know, So I get it,
and I can see the challenges it creates. But I
can also see how they got there. And most of
the time, when you look at how they got there
is less their responsibility in all ours more hours collectively,
(43:33):
unless say people don't have any responsibility for their decision
to live. Course they do. But there's something going on
within our society that's also fostering orstering that as well.
Speaker 1 (43:47):
Tony, we are about to run out of time, but
I don't want to end this conversation, so I'm going
to ask you to stick around and we're going to
do a part two. So to all of thesteners, if
you heard something today that's helpful, if you've got more questions,
I want you to be sure to tune in next
(44:07):
week for Part two.
Speaker 2 (44:09):
I'll see you then.
Speaker 1 (44:10):
In the meantime, stay in peace and not piece fine.
The R Spot is a production of Shondaland Audio in
partnership with iHeartRadio. For more podcasts from Shondaland Audio, visit
(44:31):
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Host
Iyanla Vanzant
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