Five Things We Learnt About Being A Man From Grayson Perry
Turner prize winning artist and occasional man in dress – Grayson Perry – is on a mission to talk about masculinity. So, in the spirit of equality, Woman’s Hour dedicated a whole special to the topic, and we learnt a LOT. Here are our favourite pearls of wisdom.
1. Masculinity isn’t fixed, it can change
Grayson told Jenni Murray that we can and should question the concept of masculinity, and that things needn’t be this way forever: “The kind of behaviours we think of as being manly, like being tough, being a bit violent, and being domineering, maybe we don’t need that so much anymore. They are a bit old fashioned and they could change in the future…"
But he warns it is going to be a long slog: “I see my daughter, her generation, they are much more at ease with gender fluidity and sexuality…but I think that gender is such a deep rooted set of conditioning within us that it takes a long time to change it. It is going to be a fluctuating wave over decades, if not longer before we find a 21st Century version of masculinity that works in the modern employment landscape, and with what the expectations of women are of men.”
2. There are BIG upsides to being less ‘manly’
Grayson assured us it was worth the work: “It can feel like when you are challenging traditions of masculinity that it is all about losing something. ‘Oh I can’t do that, women don’t want me to do that.’ Actually there is an upside to giving up a lot of privileges and the responsibilities and expectations of being a man, and the upside is mental health…. If you drop the armour of masculinity, you might find you are a lot lighter.”
And if that weren’t enough, he can guarantee “girls might like it.”
Grayson Perry - Feminism
Grayson Perry on the upsides of feminism
3. Men have more emotions than they think
Grayson said understanding men have emotions, lots of different types of emotions, is the key:
“there is a very narrow range of emotions that is encouraged in boys, mainly anger and stoicism. Boys and girls have the same deck of emotions. But emotions, kind of ambush men, they catch them out. 'Oh my God I am having a feeling’. We are all emotional all the time. We just have to be aware of the landscape. Men are often only aware of the peaks…It is a gradual slide, you have to learn to spot it when you feel less angry, or less fearful, or less anxious."
4. Relationships can only happen once you let your guard down
As Grayson said, “being emotionally brave is hard”, but it can have real upsides. As part of the Woman’s Hour special, he went to speak to three young boys/future men. We love this clip from the programme. The boys got to what Grayson called an “absolute fundamental truth” via a discussion about teddy bears: “If we are going to have good relationships, you have to be a bit vulnerable”. Plus Grayson got totally rinsed for his 'bizarre' relationship advice.
'If you show that you're sad, you might not have to get angry'
Teenage boys discuss what masculinity means with artist Grayson Perry.
5. You have the power to control your embarrassment
And if opening up goes disastrously wrong, Grayson Perry also taught us some great coping mechanisms: "A big thing I have learnt is that you can have some control over people's attitudes towards you. It all depends on how you feel about yourself. If you project confidence, people pick up on that." And how can we trust him?
He told teenagers, gathered to ask him questions at the Southbank: “I spent most of yesterday dressed up as a housewife wandering around the centre of town, when I used to do that when I was your age, I would be terrified, you know, ‘Oh my God! They are looking at me!’ Now I don’t give a *!$% and no-body looks at me. All of that stuff is co-created, so if we are self-conscious about something, whatever it might be, if you don’t worry about them, magically we find out that other people don’t worry about them either”. Easy.
Grayson Perry – Embarrassment
Grayson Perry talks about embarrassment
