A few years ago I suggested our community consider the joys and benefits of walking in my review of Jeff Speck’s
The Walkable City. But beyond just a review, I posed the question: “
What would happen if an entire city was engaged in a book club around a topic like creating a walkable city?”
While nothing came of it, I was glad to be able to put it out there for discussion.
Now, I am not going to attempt to take credit here, but I am going to celebrate that someone has stepped up to create a moment much like what I suggested. But this time instead of a book, it is a film experience.
The documentary
The Mask You Live In, currently appearing at Celebration Cinemas and GVSU all this week, is a look at the masculinity we have been pedaling to our boys as children and how this is causing great harm as these boys mature into men.
The film was created by Jennifer Siebel Newsom (
Miss Representation, 2011) and presents a soul-searching moment for us in society to engage on this and other topics we would often rather not discuss.
“In America, boys are taught, at a young age, that to be ‘a man,’ they must suppress their emotions, become dominant and be superior to women. This toxic messaging in our culture has devastating effects, not just on the emotional lives of men, many of whom we meet in the film, but Newsom argues, it is also a huge contributor to violence in our culture, as well as our rape culture,” writes Alexandra Heeney of the
Stanford Daily (Newson was a graduate of the university in 1996).
To get a seat at any of the remaining screenings near you, visit this community-wide event page for all the details. https://www.eventbrite.com/e/the-mask-you-live-in-community-screenings-tickets-18638771066
Admission: Free