Introduction

OPRAH

I always knew one day I'd be a guest on The Oprah Winfrey Show.

By most accounts, I've lived a charmed life. I was an all-American athlete in high school and college, played seven years of professional football, and was inducted into the College Football Hall of Fame. I come from a solid, closely knit family, the youngest of five children; my two brothers were also professional athletes.

Being on Oprah was consistent with my life's trajectory. But, just as my life as an athlete was beyond my dreams, I also never imagined the subject matter that would bring me to her stage.

I had been invited onto the show to discuss my work of engaging men to prevent men's violence against women. It was a moment of great irony because it was a rebuke of that which made my life as an athlete special. I was an anomaly among men, confronting and dismantling myths about masculinity and sports—the very things that had lavished me with privilege—and I was there to tell Oprah why this was an essential process for ending all forms of men's violence against women.

My appearance on the show was, in many ways, the vision of my mentor and friend Jackson Katz, who joined me on the show. When I retired from professional football I worked with Jackson, a pioneering voice on masculinity and the issue of men's violence against women. One of the fundamental goals of his work was to challenge existing ideas of masculinity while encouraging men with social status (like athletes) to normalize the conversation and help prevent violence against women.

I wish taking such a stance had been enough to effect real change, but it wasn't. The Oprah Winfrey Show was not the optimal venue to concretely deliver the message fundamental to ending men's violence against women. Nor was simply dismantling my privilege the answer.

I arrived at Harpo Studios a few hours before taping the show and spent most of the time anxiously pacing the green room that was at the end of a long hallway. The early morning silence was broken when a familiar voice, from the other end of the hallway, called out, "It's the O Magazine man!" It was an enthusiastic and iconic tone heard frequently gifting extravagant surprises to exuberant audiences and calling the names of Hollywood's most famous stars. It was surreal to see Oprah Winfrey walking toward me with a welcoming smile. She had just finished her morning workout and walked into the green room with a towel over her shoulder, wearing sweatpants and sneakers and, most notably, no airs or pretense. Her presence was overwhelming and yet she was warm and engaging, just what you would expect from someone who has had such a profound and indelible impact on American culture.

When I walked onstage at The Oprah Winfrey Show on September 23, 2002, I did so confident in my privileged masculinity and fully aware of how I had attained it. I was seven years removed from my professional football career, and over that time I had been immersed in engaging men on the complexities of masculinity and raising societal awareness of men's violence against women. But I was not a confident activist nor a spokesman for masculinity. I was a scared boy hiding behind the facade of cool toughness I had cultivated my entire life as a football player, and now I was trying to use that facade to face questions most men ignored.

I have a clear memory of how that facade was formed. At eight years old, I first attempted to play football. I was the third son and my two older brothers were stars of their age group in our town. I walked onto the field assuming that I would extend the family legacy; I felt as if all eyes were on my every move and that I had to live up to expectations. Anxiously, I stood in line with other boys, determined to catch the ball being thrown at me once it was my turn. But the anxiety was too much to bear and instead of running out to catch a pass, I ran to the parking lot.

The following year, at age nine, I tried again. This time the scrutiny of being a "McPherson boy" was heightened by the fact that my performance, or lack thereof the previous year, was still fresh in everyone's mind—especially my own. This time the drill was a simple handoff and weave through a few cones in the grass. The second attempt ended like the first, with me crying and running off the field to my father's car, in clear sight of our town's entire football community. Compared to the success of my brothers, it was clear that I was quickly becoming a colossal embarrassment. My father gave up trying and I found myself on my own; I had to muster the courage to overcome the cowardice I had readily displayed.

At age ten, I unleashed a talent that usurped my fears. But football did not erase my fears; it was merely the platform that enabled me to demonstrate the kind of masculinity that could disguise my most paralyzing fear—vulnerability. I was not fearful of the game of football; I loved to play it. But the performance of masculinity and the inherent expectations that I should ignore and disguise my fears, vulnerabilities, and insecurities—that part I had to learn.

For nineteen years, football would provide the stage upon which I mastered the performance of masculinity. In public I thrived, portraying an aloof indifference and proclivity for subtle yet discernible heterosexist attitudes and behaviors. However, internally I struggled with the truth of my dichotomous existence. As I progressed as a football player, the performance grew more grotesque and morphed into absurdity. I achieved social status without being a very social person, with privileges and perks that I neither wanted nor deserved; the respect I received bordered on "fear" that my (violent) physicality was a foreboding force simmering in my persona; I received attention (especially from women and "important" men) that afforded me consideration and inclusion in places from which I would have otherwise been excluded. I became a caricature of privileged masculinity, a "real man"—successful, but living by a set of false ideals that belied my authentic identity. Intuitively I understood this, but the privilege it afforded, and the same fears that haunted the ten-year-old me, kept me from thoroughly exploring or dismantling my public persona. I had become comfortable in the myth.

While the Oprah experience was incomparable, it did little to achieve and sustain the ultimate goal of my work: to proactively engage and enlist men in preventing men's violence against women. The approach is rooted in promoting positive conversations with men to expand the fundamental understanding of masculinity, defining it in ways that are affirming but do not perpetuate patriarchy, misogyny, sexism, and violence against women.

At that time, I was trying to find a publisher for what would eventually become this book. During a commercial break, I told Oprah about my book and she immediately responded with the name of a publisher. Within hours of my flight landing at home in New York, I reached out to that publisher and name-dropped one of the most famous and influential human beings on the planet. The manuscript was in the mail the next morning. I was certain that with Oprah's recommendation, the book would be on its way to publication.

The book was quickly rejected. I was told that Oprah's audience didn't need it to understand the issue, and men, for whom this book was ultimately written, would not purchase it. It was a profound rebuff I was not ready to accept at the time. And I found the response to be sexist and condescending—not to women, but to men. I believed then, as I do now, that men do care about being better sons, husbands, and fathers. I believe men do want to confront the issue of violence against women.

Still, nearly two decades since that appearance on Oprah, I have come to terms with the fact that in a certain respect the publisher was right. Men generally don't care to have this discussion. What has been haunting me is, why? What is keeping men from participating in this conversation of addressing one of the most intimate and widespread problems in our society? If masculinity is about being courageous and tough, why are men afraid to engage this conversation? Most importantly, what is keeping men from talking about how to be better fathers to their sons?

 

THE SOCIALIZATION OF BOYS

When I first began this work, shortly after retiring from football at age twenty-nine, I probed my life for lessons that instilled in me what it means to be a man. None of what I found was positive or affirming. What I unearthed was shaming language, bravado, and stoic posturing. That's when I arrived at the quintessential insult to boys: "You throw like a girl." It succinctly illustrates the foundation of men's violence against women: the belief that girls and women are "less than" and the unspoken suppression of boys' emotional wholeness.

The more I asked the question, "What does it mean to be a man?" the more salient and important that insult became in confronting misogyny and sexism's direct link to violence against women. In fact, it led to a deeper, inescapable truth that we do not raise boys to be men, we raise them not to be women—or gay men.

In examining this profound truth over recent decades, I am troubled to have found that we raise boys expecting them to devalue girls; it's an absolute requirement of being male. Eventually, "You throw like a girl" became more than a framework for my lectures and led to critical follow-up questions: How do we raise boys to be whole men without degrading our daughters in the process? How do we change the narrative about what it means to be a man? How do we get men to understand that being a "real man" and a "whole man" are not mutually exclusive identities?

It is important to note that I write as a cisgender heterosexual man aimed at reaching other cis heterosexual men. This focus is not meant to exclude nonconforming individuals but to identify and examine the trenchant dogma of masculinity that leads to men's violence against women, and the impact this narrow understanding of masculinity has on the healthy development of boys.

Throughout this book I use the word "masculinity," even though it is too often used as a monolithic term for the characteristics of men. More broadly, the term "masculinities" accurately accounts for the differences between and among men, yet we must acknowledge that we do not deliberately nurture boys as whole beings who are impacted by and possess a wide array of gendered qualities. Instead, we give them rigid commands and demand they conform to a strict set of behaviors and beliefs, which comprise what I call the mandate, performance, promise, and lie of masculinity. Together, these four tenets, which I will explore in the following chapters, constitute the dogma of masculinity—the expectations of male behavior and how it can earn for men the privileges of a patriarchal culture. Men are expected to categorically accept this privilege without understanding how or why it's achieved. How do men understand privilege they have not earned? If male privilege comes at the expense of women, is it truly privilege (and does it belong to men?) or is it more accurately defined as oppression?

 

#METOO

To engage with these questions about privilege means to get directly involved in the gender issues of the day. And if men needed a reason to get involved, we certainly got one in 2017. Arguably one of the most significant cultural awakenings of our time, #MeToo, started by Tarana Burke in 2006, became a global movement in 2017, when more than a dozen women in Hollywood came forward with allegations of sexual abuse against film mogul Harvey Weinstein. Subsequently, millions of women used their voices to reveal how they too had been sexually assaulted and abused yet had chosen silence over retribution, public shame, or loss of professional opportunity. This was reminiscent of a public conversation a few years earlier emerging from Janay Palmer's decision to marry NFL player Ray Rice, despite his highly publicized physical assault of her just a few weeks prior. A globally trending hashtag, #WhyIStayed, gave voice to women around the world, inviting them to lament why they stayed in abusive relationships with men who routinely hurt them. However, in this case, as with #MeToo, one voice in the discussion was glaringly absent—that of men, all men.

These conversations and movements are opportunities for our participation, but our proper role is not clear. What should men be doing? As a man, in the aftermath of violence, I feel I can only offer support, condolences, and sympathy. Truthfully, even empathy is so grossly insufficient that it feels disingenuous and unproductive. The only way this becomes a productive conversation is if we also ask, very pointedly, why? And truly seek to understand and make real change to the culture that creates perpetrators. If we are going to ask why she stays, should we not also explore why he stays as well? Why does he commit the violence and abuse his position of power? Is not the abuse of power an acknowledgment of assumed innate power over women? Can addressing the issue of violence address this question, or is deeper examination required?

It's important to note the ways in which we systematically avoid the common denominator in nearly all societal violence—men. The violence committed by athletes like Ray Rice fits a familiar narrative of violent black men or entitled athletes. Similarly, the sexual abuse and misconduct by powerful and wealthy men like Weinstein, TV journalist Charlie Rose, Matt Lauer, Russell Simmons, Garrison Keillor, numerous members of the US Congress, and a whole slew of others is so commonplace that their cover-ups and "hush money" are held in greater disdain than their original crimes against women. In each case, we fail to examine masculinity. We simply look away.

When Jackson Katz began talking to me about the issue of men's violence against women, he was adamant about including the word "men's." The point was to emphasize men's role in committing the violence as well as the essential role men can play in preventing it. We should no longer consider this a "woman's issue" but a "men's issue." But how is it a men's issue? And how do we engage men in a sustained dialogue about "men's violence"?

 

MEN AS ALLIES

I've realized the key to drawing men into a sustained dialogue lies in adopting a more aspirational approach to discussing masculinity. We need to be for positive outcomes, not simply against bad things that have occurred. This is why I've long doubted the efficacy of prevention programs, dating back to when I first began working on social issues in college for a New York State program called Athletes Against Drunk Driving. Such programs are typically aimed at preventing the last horrific incident from reoccurring, but progress and growth come by proactively teaching and instilling processes that promote positive outcomes.

There are many negative terms to describe masculinity ("privileged," "hegemonic," "toxic," "violent") as well as ways to address it. (We must "redefine manhood," "confront toxic masculinity," "challenge patriarchy and male privilege.") None of these constructions are positive and they only condemn the fundamental way in which men's identity is formed and lived. Furthermore, this language might only exacerbate men's defensiveness on gender issues.

I believe we need to engage men in a new set of terms that are aspirational and more accurately representative of the wholeness of men. Our approach needs to be deliberate and intentional. We can no longer allow good guys to be defined by the nobility of emotional abstinence or those who do not consciously harm others. We must be aspirational and courageous as we raise future generations of boys to be emotionally whole and fully actualized men. If we do this honestly and courageously, we will find the depths of our humanity: vulnerability, fear, insecurity, and love. We will discover that we care deeply, fear viscerally, and love irrationally. But we will also see very clearly how we deliberately and systematically stifle this truth simply to uphold something we have never truly acknowledged or questioned: how masculinity is governed by the dogma of patriarchy.

Although understanding masculinity has increasingly become a part of the work to end men's violence against women, it continues to lack the priority I believe is necessary for sustainable cultural change. That work is informed and directed by the experiences of women who have survived men's violence and those who advocate for all women and their rights to safety and equity. Men are enlisted by women with a set of priorities strictly aimed at eradicating the culture and behaviors of men that harm women's lives. Underlying this strategy is an appeal to men's sense of duty and protection of women. I refer to this as "protective patriarchy": a noble sense of male identity that comes from our prescribed roles as protectors and providers.

As men working in the "prevention" field, we often refer to our role as "allies" to women who need to remain accountable to women. We are allies because our charge is defined by the experience of women and it is at the behest and beseeching of women. Therefore, our role is in support of their work and their perspective. While we ultimately endeavor to engage men, this dynamic, in many ways, distances us from men. Since men don't voluntarily come to this discussion, there is an inherent loss of accountability to and solidarity with them. Male "allies" are challenged to remain steadfast and unwavering in the protection and advancement of women's lives and rights while finding solidarity in a cultural environment in which those rights are regularly violated. This is where accountability to women can cloud men's authenticity: sensing the urgent imperative to confront violence, we seize upon the rare moments to engage men but ignore their complexity. We want men to use their protective "instincts" while ignoring the fact that protective patriarchy is not instinctual but rather a product of a set of learned behaviors that narrowly define masculinity.

To sincerely and authentically engage men, we must have an honest conversation about masculinity. Failing to talk about it makes us less capable of thoroughly understanding or actualizing our roles as allies to women. This is especially true when deconstructing the issue of violence. Violence is used to control that which we refuse to understand or are incapable of fully understanding. If men don't understand the complexities and wholeness of masculinity, we will never comprehend our full humanity and therefore will use violence to control the environment and people around us who do not conform to our narrow view of ourselves and the world. If we do not work to understand the intricacies that influence male behavior (including violence), then we will be reduced to confronting men's violence no differently than women have attempted to dismantle male privilege. Or, worse, we will perpetuate the use of violence and force as the solution.

 

ACCOUNTABILITY VS. CHIVALRY

Most men will quickly and readily agree that violence against women is wrong and that something should be done to stop it. Some men will only assume such a stance to appear politically correct or to offer up a predictable vigilante-style bravado. Other men are truly sincere and act out of a sense of deep caring or hurt from having witnessed firsthand some form of violence against a loved one. However, what men do not always want to deal with is a solution that demands scrutiny of their own behavior and privilege, even in the context of doing what they know is right. So when the topic turns from the problem they can "see" in others to the problem they ignore in themselves, they become rigid and reticent. In other words, when they have to be accountable to themselves as opposed to chivalrous to women, men feel incriminated. The pushback is immediate. This is the blind spot of masculinity: the defense of narrowly defined masculinity that keeps us from exploring and living a more whole, complete version of ourselves. How do we move beyond the protective patriarchy that brings them to the discussion to a more fulfilling conversation about the wholeness of masculinity?

To authentically and truthfully process this question, we must first consider the way in which men are taught to care for girls and women. In other words, to truly be accountable to women and confront the core elements of misogyny and sexism, we must relinquish the mythical intent of chivalry—the protection of women. This would strip away the notion that women need the violent, obstinate, and overbearing qualities of male power and privilege for their protection and purpose. We must do this not because women implore us to do so, but because we truly care about the healthy wholeness of boys and men.

 

THE PIVOT

The approach must focus on helping men become better men. In most life endeavors, we work and train to attain excellence, not just success in the moment; in sports and academics, we work toward excellence, not the prevention of failure. Moreover, we do not train for victory by a discernible margin but mastery of a discipline or performance. We must apply the same vigor for excellence when considering the ideology of masculinity.

That is why I believe there must be a "pivot," a shift in the conversation from what women have asked men to do and toward a more trenchant, robust, and sustained conversation among men about the aspirational and essential values of masculinity. This must occur devoid of assertions of culpability for violence against women and focus intensely and intently on nurturing purposeful, healthy, and whole masculinity. We should be asking more what boys and men can become and asking less about what they should or shouldn't do.

This pivot should in no way perpetuate or defend the privilege of masculinity or advance the arcane creed of patriarchy. Nor should it attempt to diminish the work to end men's violence against women or come at the expense of the struggle for gender equality. In fact, gender equality can only be achieved if men acknowledge we have a gendered identity and fully understand why and how gender matters in our lives. This requires a thorough and honest interrogation of masculinity, which, when fully understood, will reveal the complexity of our gendered identity and the core elements of the misogyny and sexism that lead to men's violence against women. While we remain accountable to women, we are also responsible for the next generation of boys for whom we are obligated to lead in a better way than our fathers led us.

The nuances of masculinity are not something that men regularly, if ever, seek to understand. In fact, most men don't feel they own masculinity. We want to own "being a man" or "manhood," but not the broad complexities and dilemmas of masculinity. We have been sold on the belief that our behavior (good or bad) is "just the way men are." Even when a man does bad things, we defend him saying, "He's a good man and just made a mistake." This is the adult version of "boys will be boys": the excuse we make for the abhorrent behavior we are privileged to choose to ignore. This is the epitome of the blind spot. By default, we accept the "inevitability of male violence." We often have difficulty considering or articulating how we as men see ourselves in a broad spectrum or context. This is partly what leads to a lack of self-analysis, exploration, and growth: the unexamined belief that masculinity is a "fixed" thing. What is the process by which men learn such hardened and diminished understandings of themselves? And how do we engage men in a way that enables a broader, more fluid understanding of masculinity?

 

MY FATHER

Just after midnight on August 9, 2013, I received a call from my sister in San Diego. My father had suffered a stroke and was in a coma. By dawn I was on a flight from New York. When my brother-in-law Mike met me at the airport, he prepared me for the scene awaiting me at the hospital. When he cautioned that my father was in a coma and unable to speak, I thought, Huh, I just spent the past five hours in deep conversation with him. His voice in my head was more powerful than his DNA in my blood; it was like a second consciousness. Intellectually and emotionally, I had carried on a dialogue with him that was warm and intimate. When Mike said that he could not speak, I knew I was there to say goodbye to his body and that the man he had been was still alive in me.

My father was a great man. He also personified the word "stoic." As I spent time with him in his final days, I marveled at how he instilled in me so much of who he was, though he said very little and emoted even less. On the plane ride, I thought of him from my perspective as an adult, recalling our most recent conversations. But once in his presence, despite his inanimate state, I became a boy, his child, and I was brought back to the moment I first understood our bond. It was a beautiful Saturday in the late summer of 1977, when unexpected visitors arrived at our house. I was not in the mood for company and retreated to my room. The door was locked. Frantically, I pounded the door, and slowly it crept open. My father retreated with a look of surrender on his face. He had gotten the word about our visitors much earlier and was prepared to sit them out with a few newspapers and a nap. What he hadn't anticipated was my company. For that matter, I didn't expect his.

That day in my room was one of the greatest memories of my childhood with my father. There I was, in this silent and profound moment, with the person who would ultimately have the greatest impact on the man I would someday become. We sat, read, and slept in relative silence, yet shared so much of what we had in common, the stoic expression of father-and-son love.

When he passed away, I thought a lot more about that silence, that discerning and prideful quality that was passed from his dad to my brothers and me. What messages and lessons did I have to "infer" or seek elsewhere for a more complete and thorough understanding, because he simply did not talk? And what power did his silence give to other influences in my life—coaches, other men, the media—that shaped the way I conveyed the mandate of masculinity?

My father's stoicism made him an enigma to me, which by extension made me an enigma. Though our relationship was loving, it lacked intentional direction regarding my growth toward a whole, loving masculinity. Invariably and perhaps unwittingly, in his reticence he acquiesced to a prevailing understanding of masculinity shaped by a culture of men with little interest in my wholeness as a person. I always took my father's stoicism as the epitome of tough masculinity and, since it was respected by other men, as something regal and noble. Not until later in my life did I realize it was also incomplete.

I aspire to live my life in the new toughness of masculinity—deliberate, intentional, loving, caring, egalitarian, and nonviolent. All the things my father was but was incapable of articulating. I believe it's time for us as men to expand the definition of what it means to be men, understand the complexities of our gender, and learn to be loving, caring, and whole as we raise the next generation of boys to be loving, caring, and whole.