Be A Man -- A Lesson From Soda Popinski (next post 2/17)

I referenced Joe Ehrmann's Inside Out Coaching last month and I'm going to do it again here. It's a great book and Joe provides so many fantastic ideas that are both philosophical and practical in nature. Inside Out Coaching will help any coach, parent, teacher, or leader of any kind greatly enhance their capacity and ability to change the trajectory of people's lives for the good.

One of the many ideas in the book came home to roost for me a few days ago, when one of my sons was playing Punchout (the modern version of the old Mike Tyson game) on a computer. He was looking at Soda Popinski, a big mean Russian with a thirst for "soda". (How did they get away with creating all these racist, stereotyped characters?) Anyway, my 7 year old is looking at Soda Popinski and wonders out loud, "how does someone get abs like that?" Granted, there are people in the world who have the physique of Soda Popinski. And having muscles and abs like Soda Popinski wouldn't be a bad thing for many athletes. At the same time, he's a CARTOON VIDEO GAME CHARACTER, and yet there was something about him that made a little boy want to be something.

It was a good reminder of the power of the messages that young people receive about authentic manhood. It was also a great reminder of something I read in Inside Out Coaching about the role of a Coach in dispelling society's myths and helping young people develop accurate ideas of what makes a real man. And while there's nothing wrong with muscles, abs, etc., those things have absolutely nothing to do with masculinity or manhood. Being a man has to do with a capacity to care for people, putting others before oneself, and things like that. Men who coach boys ought to think through how to affirm those boys and help them to become real men.

80's Lyric

Buying bread from a man in Brussels
He was six foot four and full of muscles
I said, "Do you speak-a my language?"
He just smiled and gave me a vegemite sandwich

- Men at Work (1981)