CraveOnline: I wrote about this too because as media savvy as I am, and knew I didn’t want the image I was being sold, I found myself confused. If I see an attractive woman who I don’t want to date, or I talk to someone and we don’t get along so I’m going to move on, I still felt confused. I realized it was because I’m being told to consume them and don’t ever stop trying to consume them. That was a big step for me to realize I can appreciate something without trying to consume it.
Jennifer Siebel Newsom: Exactly. I love in our film when Tony Porter talks about the language that boys and young men are taught about their relationship with women. “Oh, I want to hit that.”
Right, I don’t want to hit anyone.
Hit, a violent action. That, object. And unless we have more men of consciousness speaking up and out and challenging that behavior that has become somewhat normalized in our culture, we’re just going to have and perpetuate the status quo and it’s going to be a really ugly culture.
“At the end of the day, we want to reconnect men.”
I relate because I have very helpful friends who try to help me by teaching me to have game. I tell them that’s okay, I don’t want to have game, I just want to be sincere and connect with someone sincerely. But because I’m still single they say, “See, sincerity didn’t work. You need to have game.”
No, and that is sad. I feel sorry for them because what kind of a relationship is that? If my husband was having game when we were [meeting], that’s not a real authentic relationship. That’s a facade. They’re just wearing a mask. They’re pressuring you to conform to an unhealthy norm. They’re asking you to put on a mask and be someone that is not true to you and that you know is not healthy and who you want to be.
That’s what Gone Girl was about. If you have game, you will attract a sociopath who loves that game.
That is terrifying.
Is one of the messages of The Mask You Live In that love is more powerful than the bravado we’re taught? You see it in spiritual movements, or even political ones like Gandhi and Mandella used love to fight oppression. Can we apply it to our social revolution?
Totally. Totally, because really at the end of the day, we want to reconnect men. We want to connect their hearts and their heads, right? Which have been disconnected through the socialization of boys into men. That’s just what’s been happening and perpetuated. So if we can all reconnect with our hearts and come from a place of love, which ultimately means we’ll come from a place of respect, we not only won’t devalue others but we won’t devalue ourselves.
The more extreme the bravado, the more insecurity that clearly masks, right?
I think we’re coming to a place in time where there are more and more men like yourself, men of consciousness, who recognize there’s something unnatural about the messaging that they’re being fed and there’s something wrong with it. So I think the more men that stay true to themselves and resist and stay connected and lead with their hearts and are comfortable with their emotions and recognize the value of relationships, not only relationship with themselves but relationship with others, it’s going to be a snowball effect. It will invigorate and inspire other boys and men to do the same.
