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"An Emasculating Truth" complete and ready for viewing
Submitted by Matt on Tue, 2010-04-20 18:16
Via email:
Hello -
A few months ago, Matt posted the trailer for “An Emasculating Truth” – a new film directed by the Neistat Brothers.
I wanted to let you know that the film is now complete and can be viewed at anemasculatingtruth.com.
Over the course of the past few months, new studies and articles have been published about the decline of manhood. It’s only proof that this topic is gathering attention amongst academics and the news media, from nutrition and health blogs to almost every major outlet from the New York Times to NPR.
And even with the latest swath of commercials “emasculating” the American Man, we believe our film, “An Emasculating Truth”, couldn’t have come at a better time.
Thank you for taking interest in our film and letting your readers know about it.
Hope you and your readers enjoy it.
Best,
Chris
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Comments
Been there done that...
I have seen this "let's go on a journey" approach done before- and much better at that. Nothing new was brought to the table here.
Oh please...
As soon as i got to the Latino guy's definition of man i thought "I am out of here". This looks like a call for men to go back to being oppressed in the old fashioned way rather than in the new fangled way. I dont need John Wayne (who incidentally was one of the few major male stars to stay out of WWII) any more than i need Germaine bloody Greer.
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Rise, Rebel, Resist.
Lots of stuff in there
It's good the producers are trying to address some of their own concerns around masculinity. Personally I am not that concerned about masculinity as a defined thing simply because of the kind of MRA I am: I feel that culturally and personally, men should have the same degree of freedom in their self-expression and self-image as women have, both personally and in their society at large. In other words, to ask about one's own "manliness" to an MRA like myself is a fairly ambiguous question. I view men as men in the same way that women are women by virtue of the fact that they are. One does not need to do or be anything if she is a woman to be a woman; likewise I do not see that a man has to do or be anything to be a man.
The age of the producers of this film may be somewhat telling. I first became conscious of men's issues back in the early 1990s and at that time, the mythopoetic category of men's issues books dominated literature on the matter. These books (eg: "Iron John") asked not "what is a man?", but "what are you, as a man?" It didn't ask you to prove your manhood; it asked you to look into yourself and see what kind of man you are. These approaches did not discuss women that much. When they did, they rarely if ever referred to feminism but did refer to "the feminine", usually in a positive way.
But at the same time, these books also took up the matter of male initiation and said that this lack of such experiences were hindering the happiness and personal development of men. Thus it suggested that men did in fact need to do something-- just not anything to become a man, but to become a happier, more grounded, more self-directed man. And in some cases, authors of these books along with others actually tried to make that happen and are still doing so. (I am thinking of The Mankind Project and similar groups). Whether one agrees with this or not, that's for him to decide.
So these producers are showing us some of what their personal struggles as young men are these days. And I am seeing that indeed, they are struggling. They have every reason to be concerned about the well-being of their own sex and every right to start asking questions, coming to their own conclusions, and acting on them.
emasculating??? why man should keep it?
Yes!! I accept the truth of declining levels of testosterone, but never understand whether there should be a standard level.
I understood there have been changes due to the culture, gender equality and technology, that reduces the traditional masculinity in several ways. But I don't know why we should have the traditional masculinity.
I don't know why still lot of people/men talking about strength , leadership and power. It seems meaningless for identifying natural manhood, because manhood spreads along a wide range including the good things defined by the culture as womanly things. The traditional masculinity was forcefully installed by cultures, not by nature. That was installed in different way in different period by different cultures. A good recent example for an attempt of non-natural masculinity re-installation is http://anemasculatingtruth.com/
you dont have to go back
I think we can all agree on the declining role and recognition of the worth of men. We can also agree that on some level men as a whole have taken towards shame and guilt when they should not have. And most importantly that men need to start talking about their own concerns.
I'm fine with however an individual defines his masculinity but I will do what I can to stop any movement to have/keep men living in the 50's. At that time men and women were under a contract so to speak. Preaching responsibilities to men and self fulfillment to women is out of the question.
I never even want to see that contract back in place. God knows risking your life is not worth an apple pie and barely seeing your kids. If it is more often in the nature of men to risk their lives I would say it is only for someone who would return the favor. I would argue it is not fair or natural for men to be the only ones consistently risking their lives for such an unnaturally large society and an unnatural nuclear family. Women used to die frequentaly of childbirth and other natural causes so i dont think there is anything innate to me that says "must protect the woman". I never want to see something like the Titanic again. Chivalry is not a reason to die. I resent the traditional idea that women are kind and gentle in nature. I know from history and literature that women were not always put on the pedestal of purity so I find no reason for it has to stay that way.
manonthestreet I don't know
manonthestreet
I don't know if I will view this film or not. I wish the film makers well. Personally I am a bit uneasy with films about manhood ( if that is indeed what it is about). I do have a strong inner experience of my own 'being' and 'manhood'. I also find that my own internal experience of my manhood is ill fitting within the society I live in. Sometimes, in fact often, I come up against a divergence in what I feel is manhood and what others feel. So things like leadership, power and even fatherhood are not first in my mind. Rather my feeling revolve round things like contemplation, solitude, creativity and personal striving.
I don't think manhood should be defined by sex. In fact I think sex is an affliction which dominates and destroys manhood. Well it destroyed me anyway.
Completely Misses The Most Important Factor
This film completely misses the most important influencing factor, the cause of the 1% decrease in testosterone per year, repeated every year for the last 20 years. This has nothing to do with feminism, society's concepts of masculinity, or any of the other things mentioned in the film.
This is all about chemicals in the environment, particularly hormone disrupting chemicals technically called "endocrine disruptors." Men and boys are being systematically chemically castrated. And nobody gives a damn about it ... now that's a men's rights issue. If this was happening to women, I wonder, would we not have put a stop to it long ago?
For all MRAs who are not on top of this issue, research chemicals such as Bisphenol A, PCBs, DDT, dioxin, and many others. Here is a quick overview:
http://www.nrdc.org/health/effects/qendoc.asp
For the MRA wanting more detailed info, I suggest the book called Hormone Deception by Lindsey Berkson. Here's the link:
http://www.amazon.com/Hormone-Deception-Everyday-Disrupting-Hormones/dp/0658021303/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1271867582&sr=1-1
Great stuff
Wow, this is the kind of discussion I love to see here on the site!
manonthestreet I think you
manonthestreet
I think you are correct redwoodwriter. I really don't think you need to be an endocrinologist to see that that the idea that falling testosterone levels have a social course is ridiculous. It makes as much sense as saying that baldness is caused by feminism. Certainly the environment is full of new chemicals that where absent during times past. Also we all get a dose of these no matter where we live as they can spread through the air and water.
I would add a separate thought. I don't think a man is measure by the amount of testosterone he produces.It production falls by 50% I don't think that makes him half a man.