What A Real Man Looks Like

Big brass ones on that guy. I salute him.

Posted by Robohobo at July 2, 2009 11:49 AM

Excellent picture. Just about says it all, doesn't it?

Posted by cilla mitchell at July 2, 2009 12:04 PM

Masculinity. It seems to the weak mind like a toxin, until a crisis arises that can be solved by no other means.

When you're on that amphibious assault craft at the beginning of Saving Private Ryan, very few people put much faith in the next fellow's "charisma" or whatever. And after that big door comes down, NOBODY cares about it at all. Conversely, once you've acquired all the levels of Maslow's pyramid, had your basic needs addressed, had your thirst for all the latest fashion trends satiated, then, and only then, can you turn your attention to the next dog-in-a-purse. It's part of the human condition. Our priorities shift. And many among us want to pretend it isn't so.

Posted by Morgan K Freeberg at July 2, 2009 3:06 PM

It is long past the time that the national pissy-pants character took a hard lesson in what makes the world go around. Like the fellow in the photograph who did what he had to do and went back to work, the nation needs to do the same thing. Self-indulgent and childish gratification do not create men, but women-ized boys.

The world is a hard and violent place; the veneer that separates the civil from the chaotic is thin and brittle. To ignore that is to invite disaster, just as is being unprepared for any emergency.

None of the men I know would put "The day my son was born" on their list of most amazing events, for example and none of them give a damn if the arugula is organic. The birth of a son is important, but not amazing, but the rearing of that child to be a man is.

Dan Patterson

Posted by Dan Patterson at July 2, 2009 4:23 PM

Arthurstone, Perhaps because it is the end of a long day and I am tired, but I am having a difficult time deciding it you are being sarcastic or what. Is it that you are upset with the implication that "real men" only ply the trades and the misguided perception that they cannot be found among us white collar workers?

Posted by MarkH at July 2, 2009 4:51 PM

It's up to men to save this country. It was ever thus and it will be ever thus. (I can hear the shriek of the feminists already although a good case can be made that we're in this predicament because men haven't been encouraged to be men in the last 50 years and that blame's laid at the doorstep of the feminists.)

You can attempt to negate it. You can raise your child gender non-specific like those 2 Swedish lunatics but the differences are good, right and proper. Historically, men have always saved humankind; it's about time they remembered that and the rest of us encouraged them.

Men can be smelly, messy and leave their socks around. Who else will run into the WTC when they're collapsing to save lives?


Posted by Lucy at July 2, 2009 4:54 PM

Greetings:

Back in the early '80s, I was living north of Chicago. One night, there was a story on the TV news about a house fire during the middle of the previous night. A young boy, I think his name was Sean Ryan, discovered the fire and got his family out of the house safely. The news reporter tried to maximize her exposure time with the lad, who seemed to need none of it. I still remember how he told her, "I saw what needed to be done and did it." Case closed. There's still a lot of America left in the Midwest.

Posted by 11B40 at July 2, 2009 5:08 PM

In contrast to that construction worker hanging from a chain, we are lead to believe that this guy really knows how to get things done. Would this guy ever find himself at the end of a chain to help a woman in need?

Posted by azlibertarian at July 2, 2009 8:54 PM

They are a much rarer breed than I recall from years past. I imagine this woman is thanking her God this man was there. It's a shame he did not save the man who drowned. JOB WELL DONE!

Posted by Roger Drew Williams at July 2, 2009 9:13 PM

Re: Azlibertarian at 8:54pm
When that photo of The Won on His Bicycle came out last summer, at first I thought it would be ridiculed far and wide (look at the dork on his bike!). Until all the overprotective nanny-state parents decided he looked just like them, modeling good behavior by wearing his helmet...sigh.

Whilst hobnobbing with a group of these folks a week ago at a picnic, discussion turned to The Won. They are in an unacknowledged panic over the economy, their job losses, their investment losses, but they were defending The Won and his mighty intellect and doing it by screaming his praises, quite literally screaming loudly with eyes bulging and spittle flying. Screaming about how smart Obama is, he's a constitutional lawyer you know, how stupid Bush always was, how that Palin woman is even dumber than Bush, etc. Mind you, I know better than to take on a whole backyard full of The Won's tipsy supporters all by myself so there was nobody taking the other side of this debate, it was a one-sided screaming match and kinda creepy. Deep down the truth has started to sink in and I think it frightens them.

Posted by Boots at July 2, 2009 10:39 PM

Here's Oglesbee's quote on the matter:

"They just harnessed me up and dipped me down in the water and I grabbed her and the crane drug her to the boat and that's it," Oglesbee said. "What are you going to do if she's like that? It's no big deal. The whole crew did it."

Posted by Harvey at July 3, 2009 12:21 AM

Patterson,

The birth of a son is amazing, well worthy of celebration. Because now, in about 10 years or so, you've got someone to mow the lawn for you.

Posted by Alan Kellogg at July 3, 2009 12:10 PM

I was watching a rerun of The Virginian with a particularly poor story last week but still counted it as riveting compared to the latest over-color-saturated crime drama of current TV. Seeing this photograph crystallizes the reason: masculinity celebrated. Even a bad episode of a forty-year-old TV western is good simply because the characters are real men. "Manly firmness" is how this virtue was referred to in the document we celebrate this weekend.

Posted by Matthew M at July 3, 2009 4:22 PM

Katherine Hepburn and her brothers
saved a drowning man; They hit the
water on the way to him at the same
time, in the same state of undress.
none of them thought there was any-
thing unusual in what they did.

To paraphrase Heinlein:
Most women are damn fools and children,
because that is what our society allows
them to remain.

Unfortunately, now, men too.

Remember Sarah Connor in T2 ?
Linda Hamilton trained hard for that role,
and could have done the rescue above, easy.
She wisely went cold turkey after the film
wrapped, and before the Special Ops mindset
became permanent.

Oh, MarkH: Who, on her way to join the
Iranian street protests, told her
boyfriend not to worry about her:
"Its just one bullet, and its over".

Ave atque vale, Neda Agha Soltan

Posted by M. Report at July 3, 2009 9:48 PM

Excellent Pic, truly worth a thousand...

Arthurstone, lighten up; it looks like you're pickin' nose hairs over this, and repeating yourself to make sure we understood was over the top...

MarkH, pay A-stone nevermind, he's just pickin' nose hairs...

Azlib, prudent move, that, to not engage without proper support on your flanks nor reinforcements over the horizon. Just remember, these are lemmings, what you're seeing now is the mass of mindless dhimmicrats starting to grumble in alarm as they begin to see the precipice ahead...

And for all, this is The Iron Marshal wishing you a wonderful, safe, and victorious birthday celebration of the greatest country - warts & all! - in the World (for now, at least...)!!!

T I M

Posted by The Iron Marshal at July 4, 2009 3:19 AM

While we're on the subject, let's remember that the man hanging from the crane had some help - there was somebody operating the crane, and he (or she) seems to have done a hell of a good job of it.

Posted by Rich at July 4, 2009 7:37 AM

God Bless Jason Oglesbee, and all those who put themselves in harm's way, whether deliberately or from the opportunity provided by the circumstance.

Posted by Deborah at July 5, 2009 9:44 PM