Guns and Butter Blog

Cesar Millan, of the Dog Whisperer fame, often says "dogs follow dominant leaders, not lovable leaders or spiritual leaders" (Millan is careful in separating "dominant" from "aggressive" or "violent" -- real dominance can be transmitted with a posture, a grunt or a quiet, but firm tone, not hysterical shrieking or unrestrained violence).

We, Americans, revered such leaders too... once. WaPo has a clever article about the death of the classic American action hero that "dominated":

Fifty years ago, the reigning American action hero was a onetime college football player with hands the size of ham hocks and the sweetness of a drill sergeant with a hernia. In his greatest role, he shot the eyes out of a dead Indian, scalped another, called his young mentee "Blankethead" and not only didn't get the gal, he didn't get a damned thing. He ended up exiled, alone, to wander between the winds. Our last shot of him shows the door of civilization slamming shut, and he's still on the outside.

That was, of course, John Wayne in John Ford's great "The Searchers" of 1956...

I must admit, I grew up (in Asia) watching a lot of John Wayne (and Kung Fu movies), and the two combined formed a lot about what I think of "manhood."

And, of course, that kind of "dominance" came with a price:

He had something else as well, and it's the missing ingredient from today's movies: He knew it was all right to be hated. Hollywood historian David Thomson once called Wayne "the crown prince of difficult men." The stars of his generation knew that the price of heroism, of domination, of certitude, of command, was loneliness -- or possibly, since they were so disconnected from their emotions they'd never acknowledge such a thing -- aloneness. [Snip]

they were men who made decisions that cost other men their lives; they were hated, even loathed; they lived and drank alone. Their courage wasn't physical, it was almost metaphysical. They had the strength within themselves to ignore (though not really; underneath it cut bad) the will of the consensus and pleadings for such shady attributes as "compassion" and "humanity." They knew the job came first.

Yes, these men were difficult to live with, and even downright loathsome at times, but they were necessary to the society's survival when that very survival was at stake:

In one sense, he was abusive. Look at "The Searchers" through a lens of modern revisionism and you see quite a bit of ugliness in Wayne's great Ethan Edwards. He was racist, he was a bully, a tyrant, the father a son could never impress. Quick to anger, slow to forgive, given to spasms of violence. Perhaps Ford's last best message to us was the ferocity by which, through Ethan Edwards, he de-idealized the hero. It was as if, like Wayne, he sailed into a mellower old age parodying and sweetening the rage that had made him so great, yet so distant, but not before he told us: These guys were great. And they were necessary. And they were heroic. But they were also mean sons o'guns, cruel and masterful and dominating, and if you got on their wrong side, they made you pay.

And what kind of male action hero do we have now? Apparently, the lovable kind:

Today's stars need love. They don't want to be feared, they want to be hugged. They want to be told, "It's okay, big fella." They don't want to shoot anyone, if possible; they certainly won't beat a confession out of a suspect or verbally rip the head off a kid who's new to the unit and trying hard. Their anger is well managed. They never get even, they don't punish, they see the folly of vengeance, they inflict pain only on special occasions.

This isn't just an American phenomenon, of course. Look at James Bond. I grew up with Sean Connery, a real man's James Bond. Today it's Pierce Brosnan (yes, he looks very elegant in all the clothes, but he is a bit, er, "slender," even wimpish). The new actor (whatshisname) who plays the next Bond purportedly even hates guns! What kind of a man is that?

Occasionally, when I get into that kind of a move (helped by a generous portion of beer), I talk about the feminization of politics, and indeed of America, where the biggest sin is no longer, say, cowardice for men and immorality for women, but rather giving offense (usually by saying something politically incorrect).

One caveat; just as male actors are becoming, er, more feminine, there is a corresponding rise of the female action hero, who slashes, kicks and shoots, and often displays the same 50's male action hero persona (hard-swilling and difficult to live with), only with very slender waists and large (artifically enlarged) breasts.

Does this mean feminism has run amok and seriously flipped sexual roles?

Maybe. But I, for one, rather like the unrealistically gorgeous, but butt-kicking tough women who pay their own way, so I can't complain too much if that's what the society breeds in greater quantity (I certainly enjoy the fact that my own wife watches mixed-martial arts events like the Ultimate Fighting Championship with me).