Drugs, Sex and Protein Shakes by Joseph Shield

Author:Joseph Shield
Language: eng
Format: epub
Published: 2018-07-13T00:00:00+00:00

CHAPTER FIVE

From Obsession to Acceptance

Key Insights

These young men’s personal stories and insights provide us with an understanding of how young men perceive, construct and experience their bodies in contemporary society. They afford insights into the plethora of influences, events, motivations and emotions that affect young men’s perceptions, and the development and presentation of their bodies and identities. They point to the varied ways in which many young men take up and internalise (or not) ‘body’ knowledge that is circulating in their specific social contexts and the way in which they use various body techniques to attain a socially desirable body. They also air the rogue, resistant attempts of some young men in the face of the ubiquity of ideal body messages. For example, Joe’s struggle against social norms and expectations to create what he perceives to be an individualistic body that expresses non-conformity. However, their familiarity with dominant discourses concerning masculinity and what qualifies as an ‘ideal’ body inevitably influenced and constrained the way they portrayed themselves within various public spaces (e.g. work, school, home, nightclubs). Consequently, each of the young men, like millions of other young men around the world, engaged in some form of bodywork with a view to attaining a specific kind of body, and consequently attaining an identity that is considered attractive, healthy, manly and ideal within the social settings and spaces they live.

Yet, as their stories suggest, adolescent identities are complex and multi-dimensional, constantly undergoing a process of constant negotiation and renegotiation. Their perceptions of important matters, their understandings of whom and what they are and what they might become morph over time, and upon reflection. Jack and Rocco demonstrated that an awareness of “social body trends” - which were used to mask their biologically undesirable bodies - was beneficial to their lives, their careers and beneficial for building relationships with others. These young men negotiated their way through their social worlds by acquiring a desirable appearance and identity that enabled them to manipulate their social networks by acquiring power and status as a result of shaping up to social expectations of the ideal man. In return, these young men were often rewarded with social, cultural, economic and sexual capital, for example increased public attention, improved sales and sexual relationships. However, wearing a superficially imposed body and identity, and living up to social ideals often comes at a cost as it shields our natural idiosyncrasies and personalities from those whom we do not know or trust in order to protect ourselves from judgment and rejection. This limits our ability to connect meaningfully and to bond with others. These alternative identities not only mask our naturally “risky” selves, they sometimes totally consume the way that some young men perceive themselves, ultimately losing touch with the person they once were. Their alternative bodies and identities become habitual, second nature and permanently embodied. In other words young men, and women, learn to judge people by their covers and in the process often become and define themselves by their own external facades, which they have constructed.

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