Something In The Water.

You’ll Look Better Without It: Authoritarian males admire men of power, enthusiastically replicating their controlling behaviours in their own lives. Big bosses beget little bosses, and bossiness becomes society’s standard operating principle. To be a right-winger is to both embrace and enforce the politics of control.

IS THERE SOMETHING in the water? Some dangerous mix of chemicals that’s turning so many Kiwi males toxically right-wing?

I remember my mother telling me that it was the iodine deficiency in New Zealand’s soil that made goitres such a problem a century ago. That problem was fixed by adding iodine to our table salt and daily bread. Tooth decay in our kids was similarly addressed by adding fluoride to the water supply.

Surely the manifold deficiencies of right-wing Kiwi blokes could be remedied by quietly introducing an equally efficacious additive? The rest of us would be so grateful if someone did.

What prompted me to climb aboard this contentious train of thought? Reading the public endorsement, by former All-Black, Zinzan Brooke, of fellow Kiwi, Dan Wootton’s attack on the Covid-19 policies of prime minister, Jacinda Ardern. “Cruel, Deluded, Doomed” was the headline grab from Britain’s Daily Mail, and it was all downhill from there.

Now, some might excuse Zinzan on the grounds that he’s been living in the UK for the past quarter-century and, as confirmed by Brexit and Boris, there’s definitely something dangerous lurking in the English water supply.

Others might simply point to the fact that Brooke’s a Rugby player and, therefore, highly likely to have knocked his brain about in what must surely be one of the most brutal games on the planet. (The Americans still shake their heads in disbelief at the absence of helmets and shoulder-pads.)

Unfortunately, the predictable misogyny and ill-informed opinionizing of Wootton’s contribution to The Daily Mail is not confined to the British Isles, or the game of Rugby. Exactly the same sentiments are expressed with monotonous regularity by right-wing blokes across New Zealand. What makes them do it?

A large part of the answer undoubtedly revolves around the issue of “control”. Right-wingers – especially right-wing males – seem utterly obsessed with the idea. It begins with the masculinist notion that maintaining control, both of oneself, and others, amidst the all the frightening chaos of human existence, is absolutely vital.

To lose control, or, even worse, to surrender to that chaos, is to embrace failure. “Real men” do not fail – they succeed. In the calculus of this particular expression of masculinity, failing is the equivalent of losing, and the one label no “real man” will ever accept is “loser”. Real men are not losers – real men are winners.

This obsession with winning: with not being a loser; is what distinguishes these men as right-wingers – authoritarians.

To control human societies requires strength, and the willingness to use force to preserve the hierarchies of wealth and power that keep all but the simplest human communities functional. Historically, complex civilisations have been dominated by men with the material and psychological resources needed to control other men, women, children, and nature itself.

Authoritarian males admire these men of power, enthusiastically replicating their controlling behaviours within their own lives. Big bosses beget little bosses, and bossiness becomes society’s standard operating principle. To be a right-winger is to both embrace and enforce the politics of control.

But, what happens when the hierarchies of wealth and power are disrupted? When the “natural order” is overturned? When forces beyond the control of those normally in control compel them to abandon business as usual? When the need to keep other human-beings safe and society functioning over-rules the interests and inclinations of bosses large and small?

What happens when the needs of those deemed inferior to the bosses: women, children, people of colour, the poor, the marginalised and the vulnerable are accorded equal status, or even elevated above, the needs of the people who usually call the shots?

Well, when that happens – as it has as a consequence of the global Covid-19 pandemic – right-wing males start behaving irrationally. Their loss of control frightens them, and they fixate on individuals and groups – like Jacinda Ardern and her Labour Party – who seem to embody the forces which have dislodged them from their privileged perches (both real and symbolic) in the pecking order. Nothing makes human-beings more hateful than the conviction that they are being robbed of their status – their control.

Hardly surprising, then, that so much of the vitriol directed at Jacinda Ardern is being spat out by high-status, authoritarian males.

What’s poisoning the water? Toxic levels of testosterone. Time, perhaps, for an efficacious injection of estrogen?

This essay was originally published in The Otago Daily Times and The Greymouth Star of Friday, 28 January 2022.

We’re Too Scared To Stop Them.

Dangerous Apes: That there is something profoundly anthropoidal about male-on-male aggression is a very difficult idea to shake-off. Thoughts of dominant male chimpanzees overawing their less aggressive male competitors for access to fertile females only serve to reinforce the overwhelming feelings of inadequacy which the experience of “backing down” and “caving in” evokes in human males. The admiration/fear of male physical prowess is hard-wired into the mutant Y chromosome of the human male.

LIZ GORDON deserves our thanks. Not only for her most recent posting on the shocking findings of the Christchurch Girls High School sexual harassment survey, but also for her contribution to the collation of its results. By her own frank admission, this was not a painless process. Clearly, what these young women reported does not make for easy reading.

Whenever the results of surveys like this one from CGHS are made public, shocked parents and teachers demand action. Entirely appropriately, the finger of responsibility is pointed at “toxic masculinity” and “rape culture”. Males are the problem – which can only mean that males must also be the solution. Men must be persuaded to change their behaviour. Parents must raise better sons. The male friends, acquaintances and workmates of toxic males and rapists must intervene whenever the ugly face of misogyny surfaces. The offenders must be told: “It’s not okay”.

But many men, when they hear this call for intervention, quietly shake their heads in despair. Why? Because unless they have the fighting skills of a Jack Reacher, most of them wouldn’t dream of criticising and/or reproving the sort of man who mistreats women. In the presence of violent and predatory misogynists, the ordinary man’s instinct for self-preservation will keep his head down and his mouth shut. “Maledom’s” dirty little secret is that most men are extremely wary of other men – especially those who hate women.

Misogyny is a marker no less pungent than the result of a dog’s cocked leg. It signals a male’s readiness to use verbal and/or physical violence to secure compliance with his wishes. More than that, it tells those males around him – most of whom are neither comfortable with, nor proficient in, the use of violence – that they are in the presence of someone highly experienced in the infliction of pain and suffering. In short, these sort of men frighten other men. No, that’s not true. They terrify them.

What’s more, their terror is entirely justified. On God’s green earth there is nothing – absolutely nothing – more dangerous than a group of human males possessed of a common purpose to do harm. Packs of young males are particularly dangerous. Their aggressive urges are not as well-controlled as those of older males, making them much more prone to recklessness. Young men forget that actions have consequences. Ask any non-violent man to tell you the five words he fears the most, and if his reply is anything other than: “What are you looking at?” – he’s lying.

When I was a student in Dunedin – many years ago now – I dabbled in amateur dramatics. I still remember fondly one of the stalwarts of the local theatre scene: a gentle bon-vivant of a man, getting on in years, but with an encyclopaedic knowledge of plays and playwrights, who gave generously of his time and knowledge to a younger generation of aspiring actors. One night, on his way home from the theatre, he was set upon by a group of young males who beat him senseless and left him bleeding in the street. He made a physical recovery, of sorts, but psychologically he was broken. Terrified to venture out, he immured himself behind drawn curtains and locked doors. Within a few months he was dead. His suspected assailants were never brought to trial.

Men’s entirely reasonable fear of violent men is compounded by the deeply entrenched cultural belief that any man who cannot, or will not, defend himself is weak and worthless. When challenged, a man is expected to confront his challenger. Usually, such confrontations involve not much more than a lot of shouting and a little bit of pushing and shoving. Nine times out of ten, the combatants are separated before any real damage is done. “Honour” is satisfied.

In the case of violent men, however, the dynamics are radically different. Violent men recognise instantly those who, being intelligent cowards, will not risk a physical confrontation. They know they can bully and humiliate such men with impunity – wreaking havoc upon their confidence and self-esteem. Significantly, these tormentors often call their victims “bitches”: confirming both their habitual conflation of weakness with womanhood, and how very deeply they despise both.

That there is something profoundly anthropoidal about all this is a very difficult idea to shake-off. Thoughts of dominant male chimpanzees overawing their less aggressive male competitors for access to fertile females only serve to reinforce the overwhelming feelings of inadequacy which the experience of “backing down” and “caving in” evokes in human males. No matter how many times women tell their male friends that “clever”, “kind” and “funny” rank well ahead of “violent” and “intimidating”, the weak and inoffensive male never quite believes them. The admiration/fear of male physical prowess is hard-wired into the mutant Y chromosome of the human male.

There is a reason why the six-foot-plus street-fighter, Jack Reacher, is one of the most popular heroes in contemporary popular fiction. The same reason, one suspects, that the unvanquishable knight, Sir Lancelot, was admired by the young men of centuries past.

In the male imagination, standing up to the bullies, the foul-mouthed abusers of young women on their way home from school, the vicious gang-rapists of their female friends and sisters, is what they should do. And would do, if, in the all-too-real and bloody world of fist and boot, telling misogynists that “It’s not okay” to abuse women would get them anything other than a damn good kicking – or worse.

Women are not the only victims of male violence. Men hurt and terrorise other men with equal relish.

This essay was originally posted on The Daily Blog of Thursday, 1 July 2021.