Let's Talk About Manpain and Masculinity

[eilowyn]

I had a new idea for my grad school writing sample.

MANPAIN.

It's a fan-coined term for "when a main character in a story (always male, generally white) is written with a particular kind of psychologically painful history that causes him to behave in specific ways

Comments

[pocochina]

I can't think of anything specifically about masculinity in SF/F, except this rather famous Supernatural essay. I know I've mentioned Difficult Men as being about masculinity on television and I think you'd find it useful. Manhood in America by Michael Kimmel is a great book about masculinity in US culture.

[eilowyn]

Thank you! See why I was making sure you weren't dead?!

[enigmaticblues]

I swear, I just read something on masculinity lately that went into this in a way, but I am blanking. If I think about it, I'll let you know. (Something about Orphan Black, I think, talking about all the ways the clones embody femininity, and all the ways the men embody different ways of being masculine.)

I do think you're onto something, though. I wonder if you could use something like Orphan Black as an example of how women are more and more allowed to be feminine in different ways, but men are limited, and it takes something like a dead girlfriend to allow them to show non-stereotypical qualities while remaining "alpha males," but that limits the ways that men can perform masculinity, particularly in SFF?

[makd]

If you're following person of interest, the character of John Reese suffers from manpain in season 1, then again this past season

[sunclouds33]

I need to ground this thing in some sort of theory, so I'm positing that manpain is a trope that allows "real" men to show vulnerability. If they're crying over a dead woman, it's totally legit. And I want to talk about masculinity from a gender studies point of view,but I'm having trouble trying to figure out what sources I need/can useMaybe it could help if you contrasted with male characters showing vulnerability in other ways outside of the cliched manpain definition. Are these male characters less popular? Are they typically in different genres aside from the sci fi/fantasy? On different networks

[eilowyn]

With pocochina's recommendation of Difficult Men (above), I might argue that manpain is a mode of behavior seen in SF/F, while other masculinities are seen in prestige shows like Breaking Bad and Mad Men (I just started that book and I think you'd enjoy it, btw). The interesting thing is these SF/F characters are usually slashed by women, while you don't see that much Walter White/Jesse Pinkman or Don Draper/Roger Sterling slash out there (I'm not saying it doesn't exist though . . .), so there's something to be said for that.

[sunclouds33]

Put simply, the SF/F protagonists seem to get man pain because they "require" that kind of excessive OTT tragedy in order to be excitably and adrenaline filed violent but remain heroic. Definitely the case in Angel/The X-Files/True Blood/Law and Order: SVU and NYPD Blue (if that counts which is should because BOOO!!! Elliot Stabler) which I watch. It seems to be a similar case from accounts I read/hear from Supernatural/Battlestar Galactica/Dr. Who which I don't watch

[lokifan]

Hmm. I'm sure I've read about this - about manpain as the only way 'real' men are allowed to show vulnerability, and the excess required for them to cry etc - but I can't remember where.

It might be useful to compare "alpha" and "beta" males within specfic narratives, the treatment of their pain and whether it's manpain. Xander's pain is often done in comedy-style ("country music, the music of pain") whereas Angel's is melodrama, for instance. Harry versus Ron or Neville in HP - Neville gets the comedy broken nose, Ron turns green versus Harry all pale and grim. I'm sure there are loads of other examples. Oh! Mitchell vs George in Being Human UK, although S3 of BH is all about tearing down Mitchell's manpain woobie bollocks.