Continuing where the last video left off, this edition of Manthropology looks at the effects of Margaret Mead’s writing, in particular how it influenced various feminist tracts that were themselves influential.
And suddenly, things start making sense.
As a casual glance around would inform you, much of the discussion of masculinity that goes on in this day and age is roughly “why don’t we just…change it? After all, there’s nothing inherent about it, it’s all just social constructs, right?”
And as the last video discussed, Mead and Boas were two of the biggest propagators of this train of thought. But the question remains, what is the link? How did Margaret Mead’s theories go from a popular anthropological text to one of the foundational documents of the crappiness of modern life?
That’s a trick question, because no one in the “powers that be” will ever refer to Margaret Mead—and that’s because Coming of Age in Samoa is not DIRECTLY responsible for the zeitgeist. However, it influenced some other books, and those books were themselves highly influential. And thus, lost in the murky depths of history, we can see where Mead’s influence was found.
In this book [the Forty Nine Percent Majority], which by the way, I must thank Jack Donovan for even informing me of its existence, Bobbo set up an…actually pretty good framework of what masculinity is in America, purely so he could take it down.
He defines “American masculinity” as four pillars: “Give ’em Hell” (an aura of being a man of action and bravery), “no sissy stuff” (The stigmatization of stereotypically female qualities including vulnerability), being a big wheel (high status, success, etc.), and being a sturdy oak (related to “give ’em hell”, but it’s more along the lines of confidence and being reliable and strong).
If you liked the video, please subscribe.
Or visit my twitter (https://www.twitter.com/larsenhalleck)
Or my Gab (https://www.gab.ai/LarsenHalleck)
Or my Dailymotion (https://www.dailymotion.com/larsenhal…)
Or my Vid.Me (https://vid.me/LarsenHalleck)
And in the unlikely event you want to donate to my patreon…
(https://www.patreon.com/larsenhalleck)