This Side of Seven: Boys to Men

This Side of Seven: Boys to Men

Guys, repeat after me: “Honey, I know I watch way too much sports this time of year. So, I am willing to watch whatever YOU want to watch tonight and forget about Tuesday Night Football.”

You love sports, you love your woman, and you love harmony. With just a little subterfuge on your part and naivete on her part, a real man can have it all!

But here’s a question to consider: what is a real man? I mean, other than loving sports, what qualities do real men possess? There are plenty of males in grown-man bodies who act like boys. Adulthood and manhood are not the same thing. When does a boy become a man in America?

In some cultures, every answer would be the same. These cultures, usually small and indigenous, recognize the need to mark the transition from boyhood to manhood through a ritual.

For example, all boys born into the Satere-Mawe people of Brazil have to do to become a man is repeat the same ritual 20 times over a period of several months. Each puts on gloves full of hundreds of bullet ants and wears those gloves for 10 minutes. The sting of a bullet ant’s bite is considered the most painful in the world.

To become a man on Vanuatu, a small island in the South Pacific, boys must partake in a ritual called land diving. It’s like bungee jumping, only without the bounce. The boys launch themselves off towers up to 100 feet high. The vines secured to the jumper’s ankles must be measured exactly right in order to ensure contact — but minimal contact — with the earth below.

Fulani tribes in West Africa pit boy against boy in a whipping match. Each boy whips the other three times. The boy who inflicts the most pain and flinches the least is declared a man.

And boys belonging to Ethiopia’s Hamar tribe must strip naked and climb atop one of the tribe’s largest bulls. Alongside that bull are three other large bulls, and to become a man, the boy must leap from bull to bull until he has been atop each three different times.

Unlike fraternity hazing or gang initiation, which allow participants to enter into a brotherhood, these rituals are designed to bring participants into manhood. Most involve three phases. First, the boy is separated from his mother and community and taken out into the wild. Second, the boy is guided by men through a ceremonial process that involves storytelling, physical challenges and most likely pain. And finally, the boy returns to his community recognized, respected and treated like a man.

So, back to the original question: When does a boy become a man in America? Is manhood based on a legal recognition like becoming old enough to drive, vote, join the military or drink alcohol? Is manhood based on a change in status like becoming a graduate, a husband or a father? Maybe it’s a physical change like having his voice drop or growing a decent beard? Or is it achievement-related like getting his first “real” job or killing his first deer?

That’s the problem: there is no one answer, which leaves a lot of males confused and guessing, or worse, taking risks and engaging in behavior that they believe to be man-like in order to prove to themselves and others that they are now indeed men.

In order to figure out when a boy becomes a man, it would help to have a definition of manhood. It would also be nice to have some shining examples of manhood that boys can admire and aspire to become.

Back in 1977, author Tim LaHaye (who would later go on to co-author the highly successful “Left Behind” series of books) wrote a book titled “Understanding the Male Temperament.” On page 12, the first example of a “modern-day manhood hero” he identifies is … Bruce Jenner. The second? O.J. Simpson.

Another book, “The American Male,” written by Myron Brenton, laments the portrayal of men in comic strips and on TV, especially sitcoms. “In most of these shows, Father can be classified as the village imbecile. When he tries to fix a faucet, he winds up with a flooded basement (either his bride or a husky repairman comes to the rescue). When he attempts to fend for himself, he nearly sets the whole house afire, trying to cook a meal. Bring a beautiful sexpot into his orbit — usually a teacher he is all set to give hell to because she has been picking on Junior — and he degenerates into a drooling adolescent.”

“The American Male” was written in 1966, way before Homer Simpson, Joey Tribbiani, Al Bundy or even Archie Bunker. In other words … things didn’t get better. Looking to the worlds of entertainment, sports, and politics for pillars of manhood is a risky endeavor.

The 5-pound, deluxe edition Webster’s Dictionary that my father presented to me in 1992 when I graduated from college defines manhood as “1. Manly qualities collectively; manliness; courage. 2. The state of being of age; man’s estate. 3. The state of being a man, or a human being as distinguished from other animals or beings.”

In trying to figure out how to act like a man, these definitions aren’t very helpful. And besides, dictionary definitions often change over time. Reputations and opinions are also subject to change (see: Bruce Jenner and O.J. Simpson). So, I choose to base my definition of manhood on something that doesn’t change: the word of God.

There are many biblical verses that relate to manhood. One man who knows them all is Dr. Robert Lewis. Back in 1990, Lewis was serving as a teaching pastor at Little Rock’s Fellowship Bible Church when he developed a curriculum called “The Quest for Authentic Manhood.” He did so at the request of a group of men in their 30s who wanted to bring their purpose and responsibilities as men into clearer focus. In 1996, at the age of 27, I joined over 1,000 other men every Wednesday morning for Lewis’ “Men’s Fraternity” sessions. They were truly transformative.

Part of that curriculum included the following definition of manhood: “A real man rejects passivity, accepts responsibility, leads courageously and invests eternally.”

The conventional definition of manhood focuses on taking care of one’s self, competition with other men, success, justifiable aggression and personal rewards. In other words, the things a man DOES. A biblical definition of manhood focuses on service to others, community with other men, significance, self-control and eternal rewards. In other words, the things a man IS.

LaHaye writes on page 141 of his book: “The man who responsibly toils day after day at a job he detests, in order to support his family, may not feature a robust constitution or physical ‘animalism,’ but he is more of a man than the hulking lumberjack who abandons this family to satisfy his own selfish desires.”

Lewis suggests fathers make it easier for their sons to recognize their manhood by creating a ritual or ceremony (preferably one that does not involve physical pain or trauma). He suggests it should be expensive, involve other important men and include a symbol or gift a boy can take into manhood. My father instinctively presented me with a family heirloom – a ring that had been worn by my grandfather for 25 years and then by my father for 25 years. As a man, it was now mine to wear. Dad and Mom also treated me differently from that point forward, no longer offering unsolicited advice or much assistance. The world was mine to explore, and any poor choices would be mine to learn and grow from.

When you think about others more than yourself, when you exercise self-control in thought and action and when you provide for your loved ones financially, emotionally, and spiritually … well, then you can rest assured you are a real man.

It turns out it has less to do with sports than we thought.

Jason Pederson

For two decades, Jason Pederson served as KATV-Channel 7’s Seven On Your Side reporter. Now on the other “side” of his award-winning time on the news, he now serves as Deputy Chief of Community Engagement for the Arkansas Department of Human Services. His perspective-filled and thought-provoking column, “This Side of Seven,” publishes exclusively in AY About You magazine monthly.