What makes a man? (aka, who are you?)

[[Syl]]

Other than the strictly physical characteristics, of course. Are you your thoughts, your emotions, your khakis?

[Zarathustra]

You are your choices. Everything else is just stuff that happens to you.

[Cail]

I am the culmination of everything that's ever happened to me. Like the song says, all roads lead to where I stand.

[Nathan]

Everyone is a product of the chemical reactionss in their bodies and their experiences.

[Plissken]

This is worthy of alot more time than I'm going to give it here, but:

I think that people are defined, not just by their choices and experiences, but by the context in which they make their choices, and through which they interpret the meaning of their experiences.

Ultimately, there are two choices for context: Joy or Fear. How you choose to view your experiences, and how you choose to frame the questions you must answer on a daily basis between these two will determine what kind of man (or woman) you are.

(Actually, it's kind of nice to spout this off here in this forum. This idea was one I was spurred to consider by the end of LFB, about 20 years ago - Joy is in the ears that hear, Unbelievers!)

[Fist and Faith]

Well, Plissken, the opposite of fear is love. It is known. p210.ezboard.com/fahirashangarfrm18.showMessage?topicID=35.topic
heh

[Plissken]

I actually think that love is encompassed by joy. Love is just one of the many contributors to joy, although people who get the two reversed aren't all that far off.

(Fisty, this seems like a good time to complement you on your sig.)

[Fist and Faith]

Why, thank you!

[Avatar]

I think that people are defined, not just by their choices and experiences, but by the context in which they make their choices, and through which they interpret the meaning of their experiences.

Well said Plissken. I agree totally. It's not just what happens, it's how you interpret, experience and act on it.

Obviously the experience has a massive influence, but you get to decide how you're going to take it. The choice may not be an easy one, or even a natural one, but it's there if you'll make use of it.

Beyond experience, affecting and influencing it, is perception.

--A

[Prebe]

I agree with Plissken there, but I think the man/woman you are is as much a question about the choises you are going to make. We have to take the future into account.

Even if a person has commited foul deeds in a specific context, that does not necessarily make him a foul person. Some things may have happened since the deeds, that will make him react completely different when the exact same context presents itself again.

[Avatar]

Hmm, not sure I agree. While it's obvious that nothing can predict with certainty how you will act/react next time, by that time the intervening circumstances will have made you into somebody different. It's not a predictor that you can use in determining what sort of person you are right now.

When that even happens, and you've acted a certain way, it will be that past event that determines yourself.

While I certainly agree that we can't assume Y simply because of X, neither can we assume Z in the absence of Y. (If you know what I mean. )

--A

[Prebe]

I know exactly what you mean Avatar.


I might have been unclear. I was just trying to make the point, that who a person WAS does not determine who he IS.

While it can be interesting to discuss who a person was, it is infinetely more important to know who he is, when interacting with him. I grant that this will be influenced by who he was, but as you say, the relationship is not causal.

[Avatar]

I was just trying to make the point, that who a person WAS does not determine who he IS.

That I'll definitely agree with.

--A

[Fist and Faith]

My tae kwon do teacher from years back used to say, "I'll know a tree by the fruit it bears. If a tree says, 'I'm an apple tree,' then I find bananas growing on it, I'll know all that about apples was just talk. And if you say, 'Yes, I'm very dedicated. I practice two hours every day,' then come in for your tests and can't do anything, I'll know your dedication is just talk." As Katie Holmes said in the Batman movie, our actions define us.

In a way, however, that doesn't really answer the question. I guess it's important to know why we choose to act as we do. But the rest of the world isn't as concerned with why we did it as with what we did.

[Avatar]

Yyou're right Fist. Above all else, our actions define us in the end, because it is our actions which we can always control.

Of course, our actions are based on all those other things, but actions are the things that can be seen, experienced by others, etc.

Better to think terrible thoughts and act nobly than to think noble thoughts, and act terribly.

--A

[bossk]

I've been watching a lot of TV recently, and I've come to realize that being a man means:

1) Buying the right car, though the ads seem to disagree on which one I should buy.

2) Drinking the right booze. Again, many voices shouting "look at me" on this one. Really hard to choose which represents the most manly me available.

3) Buying Maxim, Stuff, and GQ, and doing exactly what the articles tell me. Thank God there are some faceless hacks out there who have the secrets to manhood, and are willing to pass them along to me while I sniff the perfume... I mean cologne ads.


See, there is always someone out there willing to tell you how to be a man. All you have to do is listen.

[bossk]

As Katie Holmes said in the Batman movie, our actions define us.

Boy... I wonder if she thinks about that when her boyfriend jumps on couches on national TV?

[Fist and Faith]

ROFL!!!!!

[matrixman]

Oh man, bossk has nailed this thing perfectly.

Yessir, to be a man for me means to have ribbed abs and buns of steel--and Speedos, just like those cover dudes on Men's Health magazine.

And, of course, gotta have cool shades. At least I got that covered...

[Plissken]

Just curious: Were we supposed to be answering the question about what defines a person, or a man?

Because, while I will still argue for for the contextual importance of action, as opposed to action itself, there may be issues specific to being a man that would make for good discussion.

Example: My father trained me to open doors for women, and as a child I did so out of fear of correction from my father.

As I got older, I stopped opening doors, out of fear that I would be percieved as old fashioned or sexist.

Now, I open doors for women because it gives some small joy to thought of as the kind of guy that opens doors for women, and to be able to show respect (and hopefully give a small joy) by making someone else feel slightly special.

(PS - Yes, consumerism is actually rampant enough to make guys think that the beer they drink is what defines them as a man - and they will drink whichever beer had the best commercial on the subject until they manfully piss themselves and pass out.)