What it takes to be a man

A few days ago, I found myself listening to a sports talk radio station. Setting aside the fact that I may very well be slowly mutating into 'one of those' types of men, there was an intriguing advertisement. A company (whose name I cannot recall) is offering catering services for those wishing to host a party to watch this year's NHL playoffs. The two most intriguing parts of the advertisement, though, are these:

1. All of the bartenders and caterers which work for your party are gorgeous women dressed in incredibly revealing clothing.
2. The tagline at the close of the advertisement is that they offer "a place for men to be men."

Now, this blog's focus on language thus far has discussed the implications of words such as 'yob,' 'hooligan,' or other decidedly negative nouns. The radio advertisement here, however, poses an intriguing problem. Here, we see an assertion that being masculine involves the following:

• watching sports
• drinking copious amounts of terrible beer
• spending time with women dressed in very little amounts of clothing
• not spending time with women which they are 'attached' to, such as a girlfriend or a spouse

What is noticeably absent from this model? Performance. It now, apparently, does not require any sort of performing aspect which asserts one's masculinity, individual cunning, or any other such aspect of the Stalky model. Rather, any man can still remain masculine by reclining in an armchair and, perhaps, gesturing lewdly at a woman in a short skirt. Equally, the advertisement infers that men are only 'masculine' while doing things such as these, and not while attending the opera with their wives, or walking the poodle around the block.

Clearly, this blogger ought to stop listening to the radio.

"Get me to the church on time"

And now another cinematic masterpiece, "My Fair Lady" with Rex and Audrey speaks to me through Engl 342.

In one of my favourite books and plays and movies, "Get me to the church on time" is well known song of the end of bachelorhood. Just before this number, Alfred Doolittle claims that Henry Higgens has "delivered him into middle class morality" - "happy I was, and free" he says. Money left to him by plot twist changes his life and makes an honest man of him. Which he deeply resents. He remains distinctly lower class, but now he has the means to marry and lead a "normal" middle class life.

This number does little to forward the plot (in the movie anyway) but contains the last vestige of the reformed Eliza's connection to her street waif ways - even her father has "moved up". It's prominent place in the film harkens to the comments the play makes on class values and the sensibilities of class transition (as much as it is possible).

After all, Higgens "passes Eliza off" as upper class with a new accent and dress. At the beginning of the movie he claims that it is not our values or salary that make the English hate each other but rather they make those judgments at the moment of speech, which places the speaker in their distinct social stratosphere.

So, this film shows one version of "the yobs winning" in that they can disguise themselves or buy their way into institutions and values of upperclasses. In the end though, Alfred Doolittle's accent and view of the middle class remains, as does Eliza's discomfort in her new upperclass position (her accent, now changed keeps her from going back) until she finally clinches it with Higgens (which happens in the stage version) - after all marriage can move people between the classes.
(In a hilarious line, she says that she'll marry her upper class beau - as soon as she can support him. "I don't want him to work - he wasn't brought up for it as I was.")

Language also comes into play here (connecting it more directly to our discussion of the actual term yob or hooligan). The idea that words and speech places an individual distinctly and irrefutably in their place, "creates" them. "The difference between a lady and a flower girl is not how she acts, but how she is treated" - the difference between a lowerclass man and a yob (in the derogatory sense) is the value placed on their specific role in society. Or, rather, that they have a role at all. As Stephen mentioned, it is the middle class that wants all to be middle class, to have classlessness. This is not necessarily a bad thing (though it could be argued either way), but a thing to be conscious of.

(Another point: when Eliza says that she can do without him, he claims to have created this in her - but when she leaves it is he who is lost. One could go on for hours - a genius genius film, play and text [Pygmalion])

Can't Escape the Yobiosity

So, this class has coloured my reading of most texts lately, but I don't think this one is just me.

I recently saw "Run, Fatboy, Run" which is essentially a British-styled poignant comedy written and directed by Americans. It stars that guy from Sean of the Dead and Hot Fuzz and was pretty great actually. I laughed and did actually warm what little heart I have to heat.
(Spoiler Alert - this will spoil bits of the plot but since it's a romantic comedy in some respects, you all know what's going to happen. Actually, they avoided many of the cliches or played with them so you'll still really enjoy it.)

However, there is a speech in it by the main character Dennis (That Guy) where he explains that he wants to be able to finish something, to feel like a man and to prove that he is good for something. The movie was essentially a funny version of performative masculinity - I mean he has to finish a marathon to prove to the love he left pregnant at the alter that he is worth something. And he's competing against a well off and eloquent Hank Azaria. Who (it is implied in a hilarious scene) has an impressive penis. And he's able to get into the marathon by running for a charity - the National Erectile Dysfunction foundation (yeah, the shirt has a limp banana on it). And when the news is reporting on the race as he limps along gamely at the end they start the broadcast by exclaiming "The lonleiness of the long distance runner." And I think that makes it pretty clear.

Seriously though, we have a man performing in order to gain the respect of a woman and son. This performance is disconnected from sexual performance in both a literal and literary sense, and eventually proves that he can satisfy a male role as father and stable provider if not companion (though hope is implied!).

Does this relate to yobs? Well, we see a distinct separation between Dennis and Whit's (Hank Azaria) positions financially and in terms of social graces. Dennis likes a pint, a smoke, a round of poker and takes his son out to make fun of joggers. Hank is not aristocratic (he's American, one of the few times Azaria doesn't have a hilarious accent) but he's well dressed, fit, dominant and takes "spinning" classes a la The New Man. However, Whit fails what Stephen has mentioned in blogs and blurbs as the one clear indicator of masculinity in this crazy world - fatherhood.
His obsession with order and high priced posturing disconnects him from the messy and impulsive world of boyhood - and what is a yob but a boy? Dennis, on the other hand, gets along with his son (at the start) because he is so immature - they play stupid games in the park and pick boogers. Classy (pun intended).

So, could it be argued that the yob/boy dichotomy is at once as much an inducement as an indictment to low-class ideals of masculinity? If we wish to avoid snobbery we have to look at all the implications of yobbism as a concept of masculinity - could what we see as infantalization also be our negative framing of the tendency to feel closer to the "simple" things in life? A pint, a bit of mess, a larf - though boys are not men, they become them. How we look to and shape boyhood will truly affect the man.

At the end of the film, Dennis grows to a man - cinematically this is shown with renewed posture, confident speaking, "grown up" clothes and vocabulary. But, he also plays silly buggers with his son as before, and does not immediately enter into a deep relationship with the mother - he asks her out. Thus, though he has achieved a rite of passage, he stays distinctly connected to the boyishness that made him charming in his crassness. Just as we cannot dismiss the boy inside the man, we cannot dismiss the yob inside him either.

Transcendental Yobbism

In my midterm essay on Martin Amis' novel Success I had one particular paragraph that I thought would serve as an interesting addition to our discussion on what it is to be a "Yob". I find it particularly interesting for a few reasons. One, Amis is a Brit writing about Britain. Two, it highlights the omnipresence of Yobbery throughout British society (at least from the book's point of view) and it was written in 1978(!) which I think adds another interesting point to our ngoing discussion on the origins and growth of "the yob problem". Anyway here it is:

The collapse into the unity of the middle class void and into unimpeded animal brutality is made evident in the transcendence of yobbism. The term Yob's meaning, as described by Gregory in reference to Terrence, is a person “both gutless and aggressive, as craven and sentimental as he is sour and crude, lacking any genetic tradition, any pact with good behaviour, Terrence is simply the representative of the values that got to him first” (184). Yobbism, which at first (in the novel and often in societal schemas) seemed to be confined to a description of lower class individuals like Terrence, over the course of the novel ends up breaking through all previous boundaries. Not only are lower class people like Terrence yobs but Gregory’s friends Skimmer and Kane are described as “upper-class yobs” (169). Gregory describes his other perennial associates as Torka “and his yobs” (215). Not only are yobs beginning to appear in the upper class but the already acknowledged yobs of the lower class are also extending their field of operation, insinuating themselves into new areas such as in the “traditional, familial, up-market Italian place… full of men with puffed, unintelligent faces and muscular pot-bellies” (184) who are accompanied by their equally yobbish wives. Everyone is middle class and everyone is a yob and in this yob- ruled world there are no goals or mobility, nowhere to go to escape yobbism. “The yobs are winning” (184) and in their world the only stability is the instability of perpetual flux and transit. There is no good or evil, no moral judgements on the various reprehensible acts people commit, there is only success and failure and the battle of each against all.

Deviance!

To put a slightly different spin on the topic of where thugs come from, I venture to pose the question of the actual presence of thug-ism today as a rising force within our Westernized society. Or, more precisely, is our Westernized society an environment where thug-ism can thrive?

According to the posting "Droog-ism: 'Happy Slapping'", on the course blog ("Among the Thugs"), "violence is on a totally different level than it used to be..." and "[t]he danger is that in the next 30-40 years there will be a huge crowd of uneducated young men with nothing to do except become more and more violent and anti-social". I seriously question if violent acts committed by young men have increased these last few decades here within our society, or if violent acts are more visible due to the increase in communications and media.

According to the text, Society: the Basics (Macionis et al), thug-ism arises from the following conditions:
[C]riminality is most common among lower-class youths because they have the least opportunity to achieve conventional success. Neglected by society, they seek self-respect by creating a delinquent subculture that ‘defines as meritorious the characteristics [these youths] do possess, the kinds of conduct of which they are capable’. Being feared on the street may win few points with society as a whole, but it may satisfy a youth’s desire to ‘be somebody’ in a local neighbourhood.
Walter Miller (1970) adds that deviant subcultures are characterized by (1) trouble, arising from the frequent conflict with teachers and police; (2) toughness, the value placed on physical size, strength, and agility, especially among males; (3) smartness, the ability to succeed on the streets, to outsmart or ‘con’ others; (4) a need for excitement, the search for thrills, risk, or danger; (5) a belief in fate, a sense that people lack control over their own lives; and (6) a desire fro freedom, often expressed as hostility towards all authority figures. (133-134)

At least in Canada and Great Britain, according to statistics (2002), yob-ism is nowhere near that of Russia or even the United States (Macionis et al. 144, 145). In fact, crime rates in both Great Britain and Canada are much lower. It would be interesting to see studies done within Russia and the US regarding the motives and types of crimes compared to those committed within Great Britain and Canada. I’m not arguing that thug-ism does not exist here, but is it really on a rise as the article “Droog-ism…” says? I doubt it.

Careful Where You Point that Thing - Thoughts on the Thug Dialectic

The term “droog” was discussed in class as a synonym for, or at least a term related to, gangster or ‘gangsta’. The functions of both a gang and its members were discussed, and the fictional and real life versions were compared. The violence and rebellion aside, what struck me most was how gangs replace family and authoritative structures which are not available or which are not fit to serve. In essence, new relationships are invented to fill these voids.
Terms like droog, yob, hooligan – they denote not just characteristics, but are relationship designations. This dialectic of terms is absent here because what most media outlets and the institutions in reciprocal relationship with them – governments, corporations and the like – would use these words as designations of type. They preach reform and failure of the school system, they blame television etc. and ad nauseum, but in the end these designations of type and dialects of essential character enforce class and type boundaries – the us and them boundaries.
To see these terms as designations of relationships intimately implicates those institutions in that definition. “They” (a useful term in this case, arousing all our demons) would acknowledge this relationship only in terms of the “bad apple” scenario: for example, once the “bad apples” in the education system or the police system are plucked, then the system can flourish. By wholeheartedly accepting these terms as designations of reciprocal relationships, we are indicting the whole damnable tree: we are claiming systemic breakdown.
Now, this is not to usurp the place of personal responsibility. Nor is it to say that in perfect, or even good, systems there would be no dissent or even intense masculine performance – no force could stop these, nor should they. But, it is to say that when we discuss these terms we cannot simply discuss what they define in and of the individual, but what they signify in terms of their relationships with power structures within which they are active. These entities - thug, hooligan, droog etc. - these relationships with the state and its institutions, are not just defined by these authorities, but may indeed demand them.

Indie Pop Hooligans

As Ben so poignantly stated, thug-ism perhaps finds its roots in rebellion and socio-political discontent. While the semantics differ (after all, what is the real difference between a thug, yob, and a hooligan? Dare I say that an International Committee of Angry Young Men needs to be established? I digress.), hooligan-ism is, generally, a form of destructive behaviour in the spectator sport arena (or, perhaps, the pub down the street). In this post, I will take a quick look at the Canadian indie pop band, Stars, and how a track from their most recent album, “Barricade,” relates to the Stalky model.

While using a Montréal-based quintet as a source of knowledge on hooligan-ism is certainly questionable, the band presents an interesting view of ‘love’ in the hearts of hooligans. In the song, the narrator expresses his love for a person, and how this attraction grows whenever the person engages in acts of hooligan-ism (“in Harmony Street, we’d beat a man just for standing there”). It is interesting to note, though, that the gender of the object of the narrator’s affection is never explicitly stated. The ambiguity of gender presents it as merely platonic affection for someone due to their masculine efforts while being “trapped on the terraces.”

Stars are careful to dress up the song’s lyrics with careful imagery and sound clips. Both characters appear to be Millwall F.C. fans who dress in a yobbish style (“in Bermondsey in Burberry”; Bermondsey being the home of Millwall F.C., and Burberry being a clothing brand largely associated with English hooligans). The emphasis of barricades, also, is notable for accentuating the fact that these are not mere football fans, but they are part of the destructive hooligan sub-culture which prompted club owners to put fences around their most dangerous supporters.

So what? If, as Ben stated, thug-ism was incited by rebelliousness, is it really such a stretch to believe that acts of hooligan-ism are ‘attractive’ to other hooligans? Why?

The point here, I believe, is that the song fits in with the Stalky model. The love never appears to be depicted as romantic affection, but, rather, is wholly platonic. This acts as a method of validation for the ‘performance’ (beating the man in Harmony Street, fending off the police and their tear gas, shattering shop windows, &c.). Stoicism is also quite prevalent, especially for the narrator. The object of the narrator’s affection, however, clearly rejects his/her stoic roots (“you look like you’d been softened / like you never really loved the pain”), proving incapable of the self-discipline required by the stoic-Christian ethic.

To wrap things up, I pose a handful of completely rhetorical questions to promote some discussion.

Do Stars offer a plausible representation of contemporary hooligan-ism? Is it Stalky­-esque? If we compare this representation of hooligan-ism (i.e. One in which the acts of a hooligan are inspired merely by the desire for validation) with Nas’ representation of thug-ism (i.e. Motivation comes from socio-political discontent, and the desire to discuss it with figures of power), which one is more inherently ‘masculine’?

Mommy, Where Do Yobs Come From?

Another basic question important in establishing a definition of Yobism and it's related terms is: Where do the yobs, thugs, and hooligans come from? How long has this cultural phenomenon existed and has it always been a problem? It seems that one might be tempted to say that Yobbism has grown steadily worse over time as we have seen outlined in various statements from English Newspapers posted on the main blog. However, this commonly held belief that seems at least somewhat to correlate with the larger "Good Old Days" mentality espoused by many people I believe to be largely false. Time and again I have experienced through my education in arts and literature, my knowledge of "history", and the stories of the multiplicity of people around me examples of what were certainly "the bad old days" or at least "the days that were in a lot of ways exactly the same then as they are now days".
Some things that, in the early explorations of Yobbism in the literature of modern Britain and discussions in class, I have come to associate with Yobbism and that I think most of our classmates would agree with are the following

• Class dynamics as well as prevalent attitudes and stereotypes of one class towards another.
• Money, and the lack thereof, which in turn can easily be related to class.
• Young men and aggression.

Are these issues ones that did not exist in the past? Have they just emerged as plagues on a modern sinful era, steadily growing worse since the collapse of the glorious British Empire? Do these things only exist in England, Britain, and the 20th and 21st centuries? I think we could all agree upon looking at any number of counter example that this is clearly not the case. Here are a few personal counter examples off the top of my head:

• The Crusades: At least partially an excuse to give a whole bunch of trouble making young European men, the second sons of noble families entitled to little more than their names, an opportunity to take out their idle aggression on something other than their countries, towns, and one other.
• Duelling and its subsequent banishment across Europe: Which arose, at least partly, out of yet another surplus of young men with nothing better to do than pick fights with one another.

Anyway I'm sure we can all think of better an more illustrative examples, however, this serves to illustrate the point that restless idle young men have been damaging things, hurting one another, and making general nuisances of themselves for a LONG time and Yobbism, which is certainly related to these issues has been around for far longer than just that span of one century, and the fall of one empire. So to establish what a "Yob" is and how to deal with them one must take into account these various historical and cultural factors rather than just relying on reactionary appeals to such dead-end cliches of the people crying for a return to "The good old days".

Origins and Objectives

Before we can fully evaluate thugs or yobs, it is important we understand their aims and objectives. To do this, we need look no farther than the words of thugs themselves. One of our generations most prolific “thug poets,” Nas, has told us exactly what we need to know in “I want to talk to you.”

The song explicitly tells us of the motives driving Nas, and those like him. The very name of the song foreshadows the nature of its artists discontent, as can be observed during the first lines of the song; Nas raps, “I wanna talk to the mayor, the governor, and the motherfuckin' president, / I wanna talk to the FBI, the CIA, and the motherfuckin’ congressmen.” Here we can begin to understand the nature of Nas’ discontent. The one thing he states he wants over and over is to talk to a figure of authority, and the overly repetitive nature of his demands make it clear that this desire is not being fulfilled. Herein lies the nature of Nas’ grievance; he is dissatisfied with the conditions he and those around him are subjected to, and he has no way to approach anyone in a position of real authority to draw attention to his plight.

Thus, he finds his own way to gain the attention of the powers that be; he resorts to violence. We can plainly see the link between violence and Nas’ frustration with his inability to talk to “the establishment” when Nas writes “I wanna talk to the man, understand? / Understand this motherfuckin’ G packed in my hand.” When his attempts to draw attention to how the “streets is upside down” fail, he uses his gun to force the attention of the authorities on to his problem. We can observe one of the major aims of yobs in Nas' words. Yobs and hooligans want to "make a change," and alter the way they are governed.

While we may find Nas’ solution overly aggressive, his issue with the state of representation in modern society bears much closer consideration. After all, if a citizen is truly dissatisfied with the way they find themselves being governed, what outlet do they have in today’s world? What if we do want to talk to the FBI? What if we do want to talk to the president? We simply cant, and that seems like a problem.

Statement of Purpose

Rotten in Brighton will aim to analyse the validity of hooliganism within contemporary English society as a response to the breakdown of the traditional ‘provider’ model of masculinity in a fragmented post-Empire Britain.

First, each member of the blog will address their impressions of a specific term relating to masculinity and its Darwinian model (such as yob, thug, hooligan, lad, et cetera), defining it in terms of the course texts. This will operate as an attempt to de-mystify the wide range of terms used regarding masculinity, and as a way to achieve a consensus (or, at the very least, promote a lively and rewarding discussion on the matter).

Building on this foundation in the following weeks, each contributing member will connect these concepts and definitions to examples in various arenas of society in the British isles, including politics, music, film, and news clippings, relating it to the continuing relevance (or growing irrelevance) of the framing of masculinity through common uses of these terms within each realm.

Thus, the theme of this blog will be the dialectic surrounding valid masculine performances and their representations in the uses of terms like ‘yob’ and ‘hooligan.’