“That’s My Dad!”
Boy Mocked for Emotions
The excerpt below is the last part of Ben R. Williams’ article (used with his permission), which appeared on August 29, 2024 in the Henry County Enterprise, a newspaper dedicated to telling the stories of Henry County, Martinsville, and the surrounding area in the state of Virginia, USA.
In his article, Ben responds to negative comments made by some people in the days after Gus Walz, the 17-year old son of the democratic VP candidate Tim Walz, teared up and cheered to those around him as his father spoke at the Democratic National Convention on August 21, 2024. With tears streaming down his face, young Gus, with visibly deep emotions of joy, applauded and shouted, “That’s my dad!”
On Gus Walz and Toxic Masculinity
by Ben R. Williams
…I am a 39-year old man. If one of my parents was on the world stage, having recently accepted the Vice-Presidential nomination, and told a roaring crowd of 20,000-some people that I was their entire world, it’s safe to say I’d find myself overcome with emotion. That strikes me as a natural human reaction.
It’s tempting to say that the reason so many of these hateful commenters mocked Gus Walz is because they have never done anything to inspire pride in their children, nor did their parents ever do anything to inspire pride in them. That assessment, however, is as irrelevant to the greater point as it is searingly accurate.
To me, the telling detail is that Tim Walz’ daughter Hope was also overcome with emotion during her father’s speech. However, no one criticized her for weeping. We expect women to weep. When men weep, it’s an aberration, a sign of weakness.
There is a toxic mindset that’s been seeping into the groundwater of this nation for generations. It’s supported by a certain subsection of both men and women. The mindset can be boiled down to two main points.
If a man experiences any positive emotion and reveals it to the world, he’s basically a woman.
Being a woman is the worst thing in the world you can be.
Obviously, both points are untrue. The worst thing in the world you can be is Jay Weber.[*] Nonetheless, this mindset is profoundly damaging. How many men do you know who lock up their feelings so tight that they don’t even understand themselves? How many men do you know who would rather cut off their own finger than do something that might be perceived as even slightly feminine? How many men do you know who would rather have someone call them a human monster than call them gay?
Toxic masculinity isn’t borne out of thin air. It’s drilled into people by their families, by their friends, by media, and by public discourse. And over time, the men who fall victim can no longer process or understand their own emotions, causing their emotions to become deformed and aberrant. They can’t reveal their depression, so they try to drink and drug it away. They can’t deal with stress at work, so they beat their wife and/or children. They can’t express their loneliness, so they commit acts of violence against strangers. They can’t accept that they’re gay, so they devote themselves to making life harder for gay people.
If more men had the emotional maturity of Gus Walz, the world would be a better, safer place for everyone. The hateful can laugh at the young man all they want; the joke’s on them, and the punchline isn’t funny.
Ben R. Williams is a writer and editor, and formerly a reporter at the Martinsville Bulletin. He has won several Virginia Press Association awards for news coverage, column writing, and photography. He lives in Bassett, Virginia.
https://www.patreon.com/benrwilliams?utm_campaign=creatorshare_creator
*Jay Weber is a conservative radio host who mocked Gus Walz, the neurodivergent son of Vice Presidential nominee Tim Walz.
