Straight White Men, Is There Still A Place For Us?

Everything I’ve written below is based on my own experiences and observations. Critique it, debate it, insult it, and take it for whatever it’s worth.

I grew up learning, believing, knowing I was destined to be the hero, not only of my story, but of the story—the overarching giant story of all of us.

In the movies, cartoons, and tv shows I grew up with, it was very easy to see myself as the hero. I could be like Clint Eastwood. I could be like Harrison Ford or Tom Cruise. I could be Dusty from G. I. Joe or any one of three members of the A-Team or, even better, the one and only McGyver. Luke Skywalker, Daniel-san, Neo, Aragorn, Maximus, Captain America — there is literally no end to the types of heroes I could identify with in popular culture.

I have never known what it’s like not to see myself in the hero role. It is so ingrained in my imagination as to be part of who I am. It’s a given. I am the hero.

The last decade of my life has seriously chipped away at that reality. It seems like all of a sudden tv shows and movies and the broader culture are questioning my role as the hero. And not only might I not be the hero — I hate to even mention this — there is a creeping possibility I may even be the villain in this larger story.

How can this be? How did this happen? And how was I so naive I did not see it coming?

No one ever suggested when I was growing up that I was part of an oppressive system holding people down so I could stay on top. No one ever said I was taking the place of women and people of color because people like me would rather have around them other people like me. No one ever introduced me to the full weight of the horrors of slavery and Jim Crow and indigenous exploitation. They did not tell me I was accountable for what happened long before I was born.

No one ever told me I was born into privilege.

We live in a very strange time when people and communities and whole cultures are willing and sometimes even eager to indulge in self-critique.

We have become more and more comfortable as a culture holding ourselves up to a microscope, not just them, but us. With that attitude of honest reflection, there is a growing awareness of white Americans, and straight Americans, and American men — and especially straight white American men — as a problem instead of a solution. Add into that mix that I was raised in the almost ever-present American Evangelical culture, and forget about it. The devil himself has more cultural appeal in this moment.

This new awareness has had some strange effects on white people in general, and white American men in particular. I am one, so I feel I can talk about the weirdness. And what I see, or think I see, is that the response from white American men to the current cultural pressures bearing down on us diverge into three very different paths of reaction.

On the first path — let’s call it the Angry Cowboy path — I see an instinct to defend and protect self and tribe from the aforementioned surprising yet inevitable recent turnaround in public opinion.

Angry Cowboys say, ‘I was not born when your great grandparents were mistreated, when your ancestors were abducted, split up from families, killed, sold, worked to the bone in a land not their own for people they had never even seen, let alone wronged.

‘I was not born when your people were pushed off their lands, when your people were labeled as savages, pagans, brutes not counted as equal to the obviously superior and therefore much worthier race of the white European-American.

‘I was not there when they were forced into prison homes, taken away to be put into schools to make them more white, killed by neglect and cruelty, robbed of all that mattered to them — their lands, their homes, their sources of food, dignity, pride, wildness, space, independence.

‘I do not pay men more than women. I do not treat women as less knowledgable, as less tough, as less skilled, as incapable of doing what I or other men do.

‘I do not yell racial slurs at Black Americans or Africans or Hispanics or Asians or Middle Easterners. I don’t mind hiring them if they’re the best option, or going to them for medical care so long as they seem as professional as their white counterparts.

‘Why should I be held responsible for crimes I did not commit? It is not fair.

‘And not only that, I think those people are just mad that I work harder, am smarter, and have made more of myself than they have. It’s not my fault I’ve turned out better than them. It’s theirs. They need to suck it up and stop whining.’

At its best, this road leads to a frustrated but mostly passive desire for the way things have always been. ‘Let’s get everything back to how it used to be because that was working out just fine for everyone.’

At its worse, it gets angry, aggressive, violent, sometimes deadly.

Angry Cowboys know they are the heroes of the story, and feel like everyone who questions that fact is, by default, a villain. But they are not sure whether this story ends with the heroes triumphant and victorious, or if they will be martyred to the unbeatable villainous culture that surrounds them.

Another path we straight, white, American men can find ourselves on carries all the same anger, frustration, and cynicism of the Angry Cowboy crowd, but it goes in the complete opposite direction. Let’s call this the Smug Protester reaction.

The Smug Protester says, ‘I will assuage all race and gender guilt by yelling even louder about it than the people who have been wronged.

‘I will not admit to ever having been wrong, or confess to my own failings, shortcomings, and misunderstandings because that does nothing for the cause. Instead I will attack anyone who is not as woke as I am.

‘I will pat people of color on the back and say, ‘I think we’re getting there.’ I will bemoan the state of the poor wretched indigenous person who has lost everything because my people stole it. I will explain to women how well I understand their struggle, how much I am not a part of the crowd that holds them back. I will wear rainbow wristbands for LGBTQ people, and I will correct anyone who gets the acronym wrong. In all cases, free of charge, I will type cunning insults at the haters and backwards thinkers.’

At its best, the Smug Protester is only mildly patronizing, condescending, and irritating to people on all sides.

At its worse, the Smug Protester is angry, obstinate, overreactive, and self-righteous. He has flipped from seeing the world in black and white to seeing it in white and black, a different version of the same problem.

The Smug Protester still sees themself as the hero of the story. In this version they are the benevolent white savior instead of the infringed-upon white victim.

A third path accepts that straight white men are not the hero of this story, nor have they ever been the sole unblemished hero of any story.

This path understands, and tries to be okay with, the next chapter of American and world history needing straight white American men to be something we have never imagined ourselves to be —

Sidekicks.

Wise Allies.

The Wise Ally says, ‘I will try to imagine walking a mile in someone else’s shoes, no matter how different they are from me. I will seek awareness, empathy, humility, and compassion. I will listen more than speak, and when I do speak, it will be in encouragement and support, not insults and slander.’

The Wise Ally lets go of being Batman, or Maverick, or Michael Knight. They know it’s time to embrace their role as Robin, Goose, and K.I.T. (I know Robin became Batman and Goose died and K.I.T. was a machine — let’s just try to focus on the central theme here and not be pedantic, okay?)

If we demand the hero role, we become irrelevant at best, and the villain of the story at worst — the very thing we are trying so hard to prove we are not. If we are willing to let it go, who knows? A whole new world of awe and opportunity may open up around us, inviting us to ride the fast-flowing river of change for the better, which is way more enjoyable than trying to make some kind of misguided stand against the river’s whitewater torrents.

Those are the choices I see my fellow straight white American men taking.

I would like to be a Wise Ally. I would like to ask others what I can do to help and support them as they march forward. I’m trying to be content with that level of heroism, nothing more, nothing less. It’s certainly what I want to be in my wife’s and children’s lives — I want to support them in their thriving, not demand they support me in mine.

I cannot think about what I am losing by America becoming a more equal place. I must focus instead on what we gain: a diversity of voices, the strength of a wider variety of experiences, the wisdom of quiet resilience developed through generations of suffering, the optimism and energy of a type of multi-generational hope we as straight white men can never fully appreciate, but which we can welcome, stand in awe of, and draw inspiration from.

We are part of a great moment in history, maybe one of the great moments. Do we want to spend it complaining how unfair our very advantaged lot in life is? Do we really want to be the whiny brat gently nudged out of the way by a humanity in forward motion?

I sure don’t.

I want to be part of it all, second fiddle or 67th fiddle or no instrument at all, I want to see this with clear eyes and unbridled enthusiasm.

As a Christian, there is a prayer in our tradition which supersedes all others because it was the one Jesus gave to his followers to pray. I am paraphrasing here, but I think this captures the essence. It begins,

Our Father,
May your creation be in awe of you.
May your kingdom invade our world.
May your desires happen here.

I believe God’s kingdom has been, is, and will continue to fill and shape this world we live in. A kingdom of love, of conscience, of justice, of joy, of bravery, of wildness, of liveliness, of imagination, of beauty, and of equality. A kingdom to which any person of any kind can belong. No barriers to entry. Absolutely and unequivocally no hierarchy.

That is what I see happening in our world these last 2,000 years.

The kingdom of the Creator is invisible, but it is here, and all are welcome to join in. Justice is more prevalent. Greed, corruption, and selfishness are laid bare. In this kingdom, no one is higher. No one is lower. No one gets extra credit for being in longer. No one gets points for who they know. We are all equal. We are all loved.

In that kingdom, it does not matter that I am white, or male, or straight. It most certainly does not matter that I am American.

But out here, in the world not yet made right, it still matters. And the very best thing I can do to help it not matter in the future is to take a step back so others can take a step forward.

How many white boys are growing up learning that the world in which they live is basically fair and that anybody who says differently is part of the problem?

How many white boys are growing up learning that anything that is uncomfortable, any request that rattles them even slightly, is an attack?

… How many white boys, regardless of politics, are learning that they’re the hero of the story?

— Garrett Bucks, The White Pages

Photo by Hello I’m Nik on Unsplash