We desperately need role models of healthy, secure masculinity. I can’t believe it’s controversial to say that, but apparently it is.
You know how sometimes it seems like the world doesn’t value the things you value… like, at all? That’s what happened to me when I opened Substack on my laptop this week. My eyes floated to the right side of the screen and lingered there for a minute before glazing over completely.
That’s the spot where the leaderboard showed that Andrew Tate—a proud, self-proclaimed misogynist, currently facing charges for human trafficking, rape, and organized crime—had become Substack’s latest number-one bestseller...
At first, I was furious. I was incredulous, angry, and riled-up. However, all of that was quickly replaced with a deep and profound sense of disgust.
Substack is supposedly the anti-slop, emotionally-literate platform for writers.
With over 50 million users on the platform, I was disappointed, bordering on betrayed, to see the likes of Tate get enough support to land atop the leaderboard.
I just… ok, um…
I’m sitting there gawking defeatedly at the screen, wanting to scream at the top of my fucking lungs. I couldn’t take it anymore. For the most part, I try to stay off of social media these days because of shit like this. I didn’t even log on to Substack to scroll, either. I went to write. And then, there I am faced with the dumbfuckery staring back at me.
I just kept sitting there. And then a mountain of thoughts came flooding in. I felt extraordinary disdain and total dejection at the same time until, suddenly, I was back in high school watching a fight break out.
One I could’ve stopped, but didn’t.
Fear of rejection keeps men quiet when bad things happen.
I was fifteen years old, and the person who threw the punch was on the football team with me. Everyone was gathered in a circle just outside of our school’s library in the space between the end of lunch and the start of the next period. I remember trying to understand why the crowd was forming, and then feeling like my feet were stuck to the pavement once I figured it out.
Across from the football player stood someone about three times smaller than him. This person had a reputation for pissing people off, but they also had a learning disability where they struggled to recognize social cues.
The more boisterous things became, the more stunned I felt.
This can’t be happening.
I desperately wanted someone to do something, I just really didn’t want it to be me. We went to an all-boys school and it was the kind of place where social status relied on put-downs disguised as witty banter, and where sameness meant acceptance. Anything that made you different was fair game to be used against you. And I’d been picked on as a kid. Mostly, for being artsy. While it’d taken a lot of work, I finally managed to shed that persona by the time this fight took place. It’d required years of careful engineering to earn a social status that was both flexible and neutral—one that let me fit in without standing out too much.
So I’d watched from the edge of the circle outside of the library, panicking, while that football player raised his arm to strike. Intervening felt like I’d be throwing away the social safety I worked so hard for. And, as ashamed as I felt, the fear of losing that safety kept me quiet while things continued to escalate. Yes, I’d managed to embed myself within the jocks’ social group by then, but I was very much still struggling with my queerness.
I hadn’t come out yet.
My closest friends didn’t know. At times, I tried very hard not to know either.
So, standing on the edge of that circle outside of the library at school, I remember thinking there was no way he was really going to do it. This teammate of mine was not going to punch this guy.
But then he did… he punched him directly in the center of his face.
Immediately, I thought he broke his nose.
At first, none of us did a thing.
Then, suddenly, I’m standing between them—nobody tried to stop me. Everything grew quiet directly after the hit, anyway. Next thing I know, I’m at the school nurse’s office telling the guy with the bloody face he’s going to be ok. Before I could leave, he reached out and hugged me; thanked me even. And I walked out of there completely full of shame for having saved my own ass at the expense of his. I didn’t go to the principal or tell anyone about it, either. I just went to class.
And I still regret it.
Healthy masculinity requires vulnerability, empathy, acceptance, failure, and accountability.
After a while, I’m scrolling the Notes feed on Substack and it’s clear I’m not the only one who’s aggravated by the leaderboard. All I could do was shake my head. I hate that healthy masculinity is such a faux pas thing to talk about.
Seriously, I’m sitting there wondering how insane I must be to hope more people agree that vulnerability, empathy, acceptance, failure, and accountability are behavior patterns worth endorsing. These are the basic elements of secure, human connection—regardless of gender. And I still can’t believe how controversial they are.
Shifting uneasily in my seat, I’d wondered if there are just too many people out there in the world who dream of punching a bully in the face, but who haven’t yet realized that they’ve become the bully. And I know I could be wrong, but I also know that kind of pain, without an outlet, ferments into really something sinister.
Shame is a breeding ground for insecurity.
Unfortunately, I also know a thing or two about that. I turned 32 this week and I never expected to make it this far.
Recently, a couple close friends and I talked through that very topic during a conversation about “life milestones.” We were sitting across from each other in a triangle in their living room. As soon as the topic popped up, I knew I had a decision to make: be honest, or deflect. For years I chose the latter, but this time I decided to go with the former.
The line of questioning bopped unceremoniously from “how’d you picture your career” to “what’d you want to be when you grew up,” and then over to “how did you choose which college you went to” and “wait, did we all feel super pressured to go to college in the first place??”
From my seat on the end of the couch, I’d kept my eyes on my friend while she explained her answers, fidgeting incessantly with my hands in my lap. When the invisible sharing stick finally made its way over to me, I inhaled slowly and prepared to let the honesty out.
More calmly than expected, I explained that my upbringing was spent predominantly in fight-or-flight mode. Moving past the details, I stated quite plainly that all of that had led to an arduous game of tug-of-war with both my mental health and masculinity as a teen. Before continuing, I’d braced myself in what I hoped was a subtle way. I’d uncrossed my leg from its perch on my knee and swapped it for the other one. Eyes flitting back-n-forth between my two friends, I then told them how that chapter of my journey ultimately led to a suicidal crisis and how a phone call to a friend saved my life.
And, with all of that in mind, I explained how I never pictured what my adult life would look like—no ideal career, house, hobbies, hopes, dreams, or schemes. No role models. I didn’t think I’d be here for any of it.
My friends didn’t recoil. Their eyes were a bit wider than usual, sure. But they already knew the raw truth of what I’d shared. Granted, this framing was a bit different than I’d ever really gone into with them. But I was glad I did. To me, it didn’t feel harsh, or triggering, or upsetting. It just felt... matter of fact. Sort of like a clean slate. I see a lot of hope in that from where I’m sitting.
So, what did I want to be when I grow up?
Happy.
Which is why, every year, I find myself more and more grateful for my clean slate.
Curiosity is the antidote, but connection is the cure.
I’d finally clicked away from the Substack homepage and into the draft I’d gone there to work on. Blinking cursor and blank background in front of me, I let out a big, long exhale. More calmly, I started thinking about all of this from a different angle.
It wasn’t until my twenties that I learned to talk to the men in my life about pain, so I can empathize with those hoping for a way to resolve their insecurity and loneliness.
And male loneliness has truly become an epidemic.
30 years ago, 55 % of men reported having at least six close friends.
Only 27 % of men have six or more close friends today.
15% of men have no close friendships at all.
When I called my friend in crisis all those years ago, my voice wobbled but his didn’t. He was calm and offered advice that saved my life. I later asked him how he stayed so level-headed during that phone call, since it was his clarity that made the difference. What he said in response is something I’ll never, ever forget.
He told me that when he answered the phone he was terrified, but he knew he needed to find a way to keep calm. So he asked himself: “What would Derek do if roles were reversed?”
And then, he tried to act like me.
That’s something I’ll carry with me for the rest of my life. My throat still catches thinking about it. It’s one of the most profound mindset shifts I’ve ever come across, too. I use it all the time now.
Asking for help is the second bravest thing you can do.
The first is asking someone else if they’re ok and meaning it.
When I finally reached a place in my life when I was ready to stop searching for masculinity to guide me and, instead, try steering myself by pointing toward the kind of person I wanted to be, it was clunky at first. But that’s the thing that actually helped me get rid of any fear of being quiet when bad things happen. Defining what I value, and making decisions based on those things, helped me build accountability. Vulnerability, failure, and acceptance led me to develop empathy and nurture a sense of security.
That’s what it took to get here.
It’s why I’m confident in who I am and what I believe in.
I want to be someone the people in my life can have honest conversations with—even, and especially, when they don’t have their shit together and/or they’re dealing with pain. To do that requires a level of empathy only found by helping people learn to make space for themselves and others.
For me, that’s about as masculine as it gets.
onward.
If you enjoy reading my writing, I publish short reflections like this each day as part of my daily column, Kickturn.
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I’m not shocked anymore, just disgusted and weirdly deflated by how many people still mistake cruelty for strength.