For American youth, which industry controls the spigots of information flow? Within this certain industry, which company holds most sway over cultural and social perceptions of same said youth? Unless you’ve been cryogenically frozen for the last 30 years and aren’t a Dire Straits fan, you’ll know that the answers – in order – are “the entertainment industry” and “MTV”.
This post isn’t a profound insight into MTV’s scrap-metal mangling of youth culture. Rather, I want to point out the attitude of one particular cultural gate-keeper and expound briefly on how that affects boys and young men growing up today.
After a reading of Eve Ensler’s new monologue “I Am an Emotional Creature“, Jason Rzepka – who works in “social issues and entertainment” – had this to say:
“She’s an extremely remarkable person. The world needs more Eve Enslers…I found my inner vagina.”
Perhaps Rzepka should speak to Caster Semenya about that affliction.
I googled Rzepka to learn more about the type of sack-loathing Herb who would be caught dead uttering such a phrase on the record. Turns out, Rzepka is VP of Public Affairs at MTV – which sounds like the type of job that could control propaganda and programming. I’m particularly troubled that a young man who holds an important position at MTV – and therefore in our culture – says things like this. In an overfeminized time when boys should be developing themselves as men, comments like Rzepka’s tacitly encourage them to move more towards androgyny and outright femininity. If youthful minds are Playdough, MTV’s cultural dictates are hands. Molding young peoples’ minds as they do – and using the pink dough to boot – is especially detrimental to boys whose core identities aren’t as malleable as girls’. The ideas that come out at the tail end of the boob tube have been hand-picked, distorted, filtered, and steam-pressed by minds like Rzepka’s. Young men today are being shaped by an elitist group of other slightly less young men who continually worship at the alter of V.
Young men have no need to find an inner vagina; in fact, Ensler’s current monologue or her famous one have no place for a man to find anything. Her writings are gynocentric – just read the fucking titles. If Rzepka found a vagina somewhere while at the reading, he should put it back because its not his.
But Rzepka’s trite comment is troubling on a more fundamental level. Why is it that young men are made right, whole, or correct by developing their feminine side? They are fledgling men; the only tools they have are those of men. Their brains, their bodies, their attitudes, their hormones, desires, and motivations operate in a completely masculine realm. Anything they “find” has to occur based on a bedrock foundation of their being male. So searching for their inner vagina is a snipe hunt; understanding the full scope of what it means to be a man – finding their descended nutsack – is a better endeavor.
Chuck Ross had his inner vagina surgically removed by an ex-girlfriend and Dr. Roissy. As of this writing, the IV is still in remission. He blogs daily at Gucci Little Piggy.
