In recognition of Pride month, the Revealing Men podcast revisited this segment featuring writer and publisher Tommy Allen. Although the official celebration ends with the month, the celebration of men and masculinity continues.
“When I grew up, there were two things that a man should not be: a gay male or a woman. Stop acting like a gay man. Stop acting like a lady. Get back in the box and be a real man.” – Revealing Men host, Randy Flood, psychotherapist and Director of the Men’s Resource Center of West Michigan
In his practice, Randy Flood counsels many men who have experienced trauma and emotional damage caused by not being able to express the full range of who they are as a person. Maybe they’ve questioned their masculinity or their masculinity has been questioned, challenged, or denied because they don’t fit the cultural stereotype of a real man. This podcast (available on Apple Podcast and Spotify) will especially hit home if you’ve ever found yourself asking: “What does masculinity look like?” “Does it have the capacity to be many things across a wide spectrum?” “Who gets to decide?”
When Flood sits down to speak with his former college roommate, publisher and Lifestyle Editor for Rapid Growth Media, Tommy Allen, the two have an unbridled conversation about first kisses, proms, college mascots, outrageous clothing, and – most poignantly – about what it was like for Allen to be “outside the box” as a young man, navigating a world in which he wasn’t able to fully reveal his true self. Allen is an artist and comedian whose journey as a queer man coming out in the 1980s could also be the story of many men— queer or not— who grapple with their own sense of identity due to societal expectations about masculinity.
Recognizing the Multi-layered Individual
Allen predicts, “I really believe that we are probably within 30 years, if even that, where this idea of male and female gender is gonna become much more complex…. I kept hearing the concept that there are 500 points of a person that they [Facebook] track, and I’m sure it’s even more now, but in that moment, I’m more than just a binary. I do see hope in the future. That the binary will be broken and that people will reject those kinds of labels.”
The Men’s Resource Center provides a wide range of counseling and consultative services for men. Our men’s support groups offer safe spaces, online and in-person, where men find support and guidance on their journey to become more of who they really are. For more information about the Men’s Resource Center, contact us online or call us at (616) 456-1178.
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