I learned a lot from watching this documentary. I found it very interesting when they said that men are far more reserved about their emotions than women. They explained how society forces an image that all men need to be strong and show no sympathy, and that anger was the only “acceptable” emotion men could express.

Something else that really surprised me was when they asked the young football player how he would feel if his coach said he played like a girl. To many men that sentence is taken as a big insult since coaches are usually implying that when their player is being soft. This is primarily due to men in society believing that women are the ones who should be sensitive, not men. The coach uses “playing like a girl” as a way of motivating his playing to be more aggressive since the player does not want to seem weak in front of his teammates or anyone watching.

When Carlos visits Zambia, he is very uncomfortable with how different their society is. They are far more accepting to physical contact between the same sex. The reason Carlos has that level of discomfort is because most societies would consider that to be gay. It is seen completely different in America which is why he feels so uneasy. He is scared of being judged or bullied, similar to what we see in the documentary. A lot of men fear opening up about things because it does not meet society’s norms.

The documentary was great and allowed me to learn a lot of things, it discuss multiples topics about about men in a very interesting way. For example, it really surprised me to see how men who have never been given the chance to express themselves on their masculinity could have a deep analysis and understanding of the wrongs that have hurt them; even if they have commited serious crimes, the prisoners understand that part of the problem comes from the fact that man grows to fit into a very specific mold created by society and if you don’t fit into this mold, you’ll be rejected. I also have been hit by how boys in high school really feels a constant pressure to look strong, confident, stoic and how they can’t show any signs of weakness; but as soon as you allow them to ” open up”, they immediatly allow themselves to show weaknesses and their true-self, which means that everyone undergo the damages of masculinity.

About Gomez’s book, I found the part where he goes to the Palladium during the gay night and where he was intrigued by what he saw pretty close to what the documentary was talking about. Since homosexuality is taboo and no one is allowed to ask about it, when he entered the club,he was introduced to a place where homosexuality was not something to hide and he got really shocked and thought about it multiple days. It is about the same in the documentary where as soon as you start questionning sexuality or not acting strong, rough or something considered as ” manly”, you are considered gay or not man enough.

Although men around the world get a bad reputation, they have been repressed as well. Especially men of colour. There were a couple of things that really surprised me from the documentary, however the main surprising aspect was the statistics shown. I pride myself on being very knowledgeable of discrimination, whether that be racial, gender, religion, or disability discrimination. The third lead cause of death in men is suicide. This statistic made me very upset, society does not allow men to be vulnerable with other people. Thus, if a person is not allowed to be vulnerable with anybody other than themselves, their mental health could be severely impacted. Mental health is not longer a taboo topic, yet it is when a man is involved.

Another thing that surprised me was that not many people in the documentary knew the difference between sex and gender. Sex is what biological genitalia you have and gender is what you feel inside. If you feel like your gender is male then you are male and that is the end of if. Not many people really can understand this. Even to this day not many people grasp the concept of gender.

One thing from Carlos Andres Gomez’s story that really caught my attention was the different type of culture north america has compared to Zambia. In Zambia friends (no matter what gender) could walk around holding hands or with their pinkies intertwined. I think this is very sweet and wholesome. But here in america, especially in the late 1980’s, this would be very taboo. People would not hold hands if they were the same gender, and if they did people would stare and judge. The documentary made me understand why Carlos felt a little uncomfortable at the start. Our society also makes men afraid to show affection because men are supposed to be “strong and stoic”, but in Zambia’s society friendship is cherished. And I think that is beautiful and this is why Andreas was so comfortable while Carlos was a little weary.

A man is known as strong, a fighter and as someone who solves problem. In this documentary, they asked the little boy in the football team what would he feel if his coach told him he was playing like a girl. In my opinion that boy would get destroyed by what his coach said since in our society boys think that girls are weak, soft and sensitive. That young man doesn’t want to be seen as weak next to the other players since that would often contribute for him to get bullied and get called a “pussy” or a “faggot”.

What also caught my attention was the guy that was explaining why he shoot someone six times in a row. As a kid he would get bullied by his father. He started smoking weed then he joined the weed business and had a conflict with someone in there. He killed him because in his head he thought that if he didn’t do it, all his friends would’ve taken away everything he has. He also said that it was the only time he felt like he had power. In my opinion, he only want it to take revenge since as a kid he would always get beat up by his father. Often guys wants to hurt someone else the same way they have been hurt.

In the Carlos Andres Gomez text, Carlos say that in the U.S two guys holding hands or even a little touch would be considered as been gay but when Carlos went to Zambia touching hands between guys was absolutely normal. In my opinion, in the U.S guys are really scared to get called “gay” since in the documentary we see that people often bully gay people since they are afraid of becoming like them.

Watching the film, I was surprised by the huge amount of misogyny that is used by many men which objectifies women and often uses violent wording, to represent sexual attraction. For instance “I would hit that” or “I would tear that up”. Furthermore, I was interested in the idea of the documentarians that merely suspending or expelling children for acting out worsens their issues. It leads to the children feeling as though they have no hope,, and thus continuing their negative streak. This is the same issue as is ongoing in US prisons: they operate from a punitive mindset which leads to a high recidivism rate among criminals as the criminals are only made to feel worse and their core issues are never resolved. Furthermore, with a felony, these people cannot get jobs so it is all the more likely that they will turn to crime for their livelihood. Norway has implemented a rehabilitative prison system, and as such, they have a much lower recidivism rate than that of the US, indicating that this method works (Norway’s recidivism rate is 20% whereas that of the US is 75%). Lastly, I was quite surprised by the statistic that 1 i 4 boys experience bullying but that only 30% tell people about it. 1 in 4 is 25%, this is a lot more than I assumed, and I am unpleasantly surprised that so few of these children had the courage or confidence to tell somebody.

Of Carlos Andres Gomez’s book, I found the aspects of him yearning physical contact with other men interesting, and it relates to the film in that the film documents how men are often discouraged from expressing emotion, and to be stoic. Therefore, showing physical affection would certainly be considered a faux-pas by this old-fashioned standard.

Sports are not for weak

In the documentary “The Mask That You Live In”, the first thing that stroke me was the violence use in sports.

It really caught my intention because, as an athlete, I can’t accept such behavior.

I do karate, a sport where the goal is to hit each other. And even then, we learn to respect each other.

Of course we are here to win, and it is frustrating to loose. But getting mad and yelling at the players won’t fix anything.

When you loose there is only one thing to do, fix what didn’t work and improve what did work. Only training and hard work can do that.

Like my coach always says: “The work is never done.”

Video Game and violence

The second that jumped at me was when they talk about video game.

I firmly think that video game doesn’t encourage violent behavior. It could even reduces them.

In most case, people play video games to be someone that they cannot be in real live. Like a secret agent, a professional hitman or even a super hero.

We know this isn’t reality and that’s why it feel so good. There is no consequence, so why not enjoy it.

Most main character are stoic and without emotion. But it is over shadow by how cool they are.

If you want to feel emotion they are a lot of different media. Video game is suppose to make your heart bounce, make your adrenaline go wild, and make you like a boss.

Since it is so violent, is is a good chance to take all your rage on the game and not on a real person.

The link with Carlos story.

The part of Carlos story that caught my attention was when he spend time in a eastern country.

I founded funny how he was embarrassed with everyone being so open to physical contact.

The documentary explain it by saying that it all come to education.

The main school of thought is that we need to taught our children to be thought and strong.

But we don’t have to stop there. We can also teach them to be kind and how to deal with their emotion in a healthy way.

Happiness bring happiness. Only by surrounding yourself with people who are truly happy that you can see the light in this dark world.

I believe this is something we can learn from eastern country. It is correct to have emotion and to shared them with other.