I keep re-reading the Understanding Patriarchy chapter of bell hooks’ The Will to Change – Men, Masculinity, and Love. It really helps me to grasp through which intense patriarchal male training i went. It’s like recoloring many years of my life, in particular my teenage years.
I was struck when reading that boys are trained to enjoy violence. I believe that around the age of 12 or 13 I’ve first been introduced to various violent computer games, some of which I then played intensely (tens of hours per week!) for years, with periods of where this had been the first priority in my life (with almost daily team practice and tournaments on weekend nights). The most intense period was over at the age of 16, and it continued to decline towards the end of my teenage years. I reengaged with it in burst throughout my twenties, sometimes not engaging with it for months or even years.
I’m still playing them today, rarely, and still every few months or so I do. My experience of them has changed since my involvement in NGL[1]: they lost most of their power to fully capture my attention, and at times I found them appalling. And still, these violent games are there, sitting, waiting for me. They are like a refuge to me, something that I can go back to when everything else fails. I’m particularly drawn to them during times of overwhelm and some kind of subtle dread.
Today we’ve been to an old fortification here in France, and I’ve noticed how all this that had been built to support warfare elicited more excitement than horror in me. So much effort put into ending life often in very brutal ways, people living in fear and immense separation — and my emotional response is excitement, phew!
While driving afterwards some tears came in response to my excitement associated with violence, and a few more tears throughout the day. It’s the first time I’ve ever found access to this mourning, so even though the mourning is still shallow, it feels significant.