Authentic Masculinity: Of Men and Jackasses

Last night, I was in a debate for quite a long time defending the dignity of marriage.  It was an online debate, so naturally, people started getting rude.  When two of them decided to start saying disgustingly offensive things and making ignorant insinuations about the Catholic Church and sexuality, I sent off one last message telling them why I would not continue to debate with them, and I left.

In reality, it was probably pride enough that led me to go that far.  I should've just left without explanation.

A little later, I discussed it with my wife, who is quite feisty, and she went and tore them a new one.  It makes me wonder about masculinity.  The men I was arguing with were very clearly trying to be macho debaters.  They probably thought they were being manly by throwing out grotesque sexual commentary to offend me, whom they perceived as some academic pansy.  That's just one of the differences between authentic masculinity and phony masculinity.  One of the keys of masculinity is confidence.  I was confident in the points I made.  I had no reason to descend into name-calling, intimidation, or rudeness.  A real man doesn't have to prove he is.  The men I debated were demonstrating false masculinity.  They felt the need to prove they were men, and they ended up only proving that they were jackasses.  So, I want to start a series on authentic Christian masculinity, and the first rule of authentic masculinity is:

1.  Real men don't have to prove they are or men who try to prove they are men inevitably prove themselves jackasses.

Pax,

Micah