Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
Names: Melzer, Scott, author.
Title: Manhood impossible : mens struggles to control and transform their bodies and work / Scott Melzer.
Description: New Brunswick : Rutgers University Press, [2018] | Includes bibliographical references and index.
Identifiers: LCCN 2017056007 | ISBN 9780813584904 (cloth : alk. paper) | ISBN 9780813584898 (pbk. : alk. paper)
Subjects: LCSH: MenIdentity. | Masculinity. | Sex role. | Body image.
Classification: LCC HQ1090 .M4195 2018 | DDC 155.3/32dc23
LC record available at https://lccn.loc.gov/2017056007
A British Cataloging-in-Publication record for this book is available from the British Library.
Copyright 2018 by Scott Melzer
All rights reserved
No part of this book may be reproduced or utilized in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, or by any information storage and retrieval system, without written permission from the publisher. Please contact Rutgers University Press, 106 Somerset Street, New Brunswick, NJ 08901. The only exception to this prohibition is fair use as defined by U.S. copyright law.
www.rutgersuniversitypress.org
The Manhood Dilemma
Do not cripple your friends. Do not bring them to tears, says the organizer. If its your first time at fight club, he adds, turning to face me, you fight first. He hands me a rounded nine-inch training knife, padded gloves, and a fencing mask. My opponent, Mike, has a knife, too. Unfortunately for me, Mike actually knows how to use his. I have no fight training or experience, and its about to be painfully evident.
I try not to think about the language in the release form I just signed: I the participant, am knowingly risking injury, which typically includes bruises, bumps and scrapes but can include serious injury and death from either fighting or watching. Bruises. Bumps. Scrapes. Death? Its unlikely anybody will come close to dying todayat least not of anything more than humiliation.
Mike and I are fighting under the auspices of the Gentlemens Fighting Club, a San Francisco Bay Area group formed in the late 1990s. In GFCs history, there have been few serious injuries. This fact, along with the thickly padded gloves and sturdy mask, alleviates most of my concerns. Still, I am tempted to repeat the prefight instructions to Mike: Please do not cripple me or bring me to tears.
Fighters ready? the timekeeper asks. I tighten my fingers around the handle of the training knife and square off with my opponent. Fight!
It is Fight the Professor Day at GFC, a onetime gathering organized at my request. Its a comforting sign of the GFC bring you up, not beat you down philosophy that my original titlePunch the Professorwas rejected. Suddenly it doesnt sound as funny as it did when I first suggested it. While typical GFC novices fight in a suburban garage, today were on a concrete patio and grass in a fenced-in backyard. Despite my lack of fighting ability and the jarring reality of staring at a knife-wielding opponent of greater skill and experience, Im not gripped with fear. I have watched enough GFC fight footage to have some sense of what to expect. I know that fights usually end after 60 seconds, when fatigue overwhelms most amateurs. Im hoping a lifetime of competitive sports and good reflexes will offset some of my disadvantages.
Also, I did a lot of sandbagging to get my opponents to underestimate me. This was not difficult. I doubt they worried that the longhaired, 59 professor with no fight training or experience might discover and unleash his inner Bruce Lee. To ensure as much, I sent messages beforehand noting my chronic back injury, and on the day of the fights, I complain of jet lag and lack of sleep (all true). As we boil mouthpieces and wait for all the fighters to arrive, I add a healthy amount of self-deprecating humor. Ive done everything except have my mother place a pleading phone call to Mike right before our knife fight. My strategy works. I find out later that the consensus was I would last only one fight.
The last of the days participants arrive, and we head outside to the backyard. Everything is in place, including the generously supplied athletic cup. Its time to fight.
My brother, whom I persuade to drive with me to the event and be an observer, is assigned the role of timekeeper. This responsibility is accompanied by two others. First, depending on the extent of my dismemberment, he will either rush me to the hospital or just drop me off at the hotel. Second, he will have to make a convincing argument to our family that he was an unwilling participant forced to attend the eventa hostage, reallywho tried to talk me out of it, failed to do so, and despite his strong reservations about my choosing to fight, felt obligated to watch over his younger brother.
His story is mostly true. Youre an idiot! he admonished when I told him about my plans to fight. He added a well-placed expletive to avoid any subtlety. Proving him right, I aggravated my balky back several days before the event. A physical therapist friend realigned my rotated sacrum and manipulated my vertebrae back to their proper positions. She was surprisingly nonjudgmental about my upcoming foray into fighting. Other reactions ran the full gamut. One friend got teary eyed at the thought of me fighting. I suspected she lacked confidence in my abilities. Another friend questioned my sanity, but he sent a supportive text the day of the fights: Good luck today you crazy s.o.b.
At dinner one night, a couple friends were skeptical and gave me some gentle ribbing when they find out about my research topic. (I know you cant talk about it, but if youre in a fight club, put your thumb on the table.) Several others questioned me about the risk of injury and expressed curiosity, excitement, and enthusiasm. I considered inviting a linebacker-sized friend to help me with prefight body conditioninga fighting euphemism for getting punched and kicked during training to acclimate the body to getting hitbut later changed my mind. When I finally told him about my now-abandoned idea soon before my fights, he replied, Theres still four days left!
My then-partner may have been the most enthusiastic, which means our families later questioned her thought process as much as they did mine. Shortly after Fight the Professor was confirmed, it came up during a casual conversation at home. She asked me why I wanted to fight. Unjustifiably defensive, I questioned her motives for asking. Effortlessly, casually, she peeled back the layers of my psyche that I naively thought were hidden. I just want to know the truth, she said nonchalantly, as she turned the page in the magazine she was skimming. I stumbled through a response about my responsibilities as a researcher. She has a degree in anthropology and sociology, yet I heard myself delivering a SOC 101 lecture about best practices when studying human behavior, about the importance of participant observation, of not really being able to understand the fighters and their experiences unless Ive experienced it myself. All of it is true and half-true.
I have no delusions, I told her, finally directly addressing what was unspoken. I know that I have no training and no fighting experience, and Ill probably get my ass kicked. I sensed that she was waiting for a but, yet she said nothing, and the conversation ended. The qualifier I suspect she awaited lingers in my mind. Why
