Critical Reaction to Paul Theroux’s essay “Being a Man”

Paul Theroux’s essay entitled “Being a Man” depicts a topic that anyone can relate. Topic that is still present
and evident in our present time, it’s as if it is passed from their generation to us. In his essay, he mentioned that
there are gaps between genders, what are these gaps? And what are the effects of having these gaps in their
lives and in the society? He said himself that being a man is difficult when people expect you to be something
you are supposed to be. That sometimes people can’t tell what’s the real idea of manhood and what makes a
man. We expect men to be the one who can protect, lead and make decision for everyone, but aren’t we
supposed to be doing our parts equally without relying too much on men? Women can also be as strong and
smart like men, sometimes even women surpass them in many ways but people disregard the fact that women
can do better than man and focuses instead on what should men be and what they are supposed to do.

During 1985 when the article was given about gender differences, there were a lot of arguments and
misconception of what truly defines masculinity and femininity. That man doubted their existed because
there’s a different idea of manhood in different places. That man should be the one as expected to make
changes in a country, to be the one who protects everyone by the law, the one who needs to be responsible and
be “the man” they are supposed to be. Gender stereotypes was present during that time.

I believe it is still evident and showed. Seeing that almost all officials are men makes me think that the
government only allows men inside these premises and ignored the role of every women who tries to make a
stand in the government. People are too dependent and they trust men to run our country and never gave
women the chance to lead, an example to that there have been 16 presidents in the Philippines including our
recent president, President Rodrigo Duterte and out of those presidents only 2 of them we’re women. Making
it look like people depend on men to make decisions for the country and to protect the people. And people tend
to expect that women should be doing all the light job and leave the heavy job or so called the
construction/physically involved jobs/professions to men only. What we have is gender equality and it is still
evident no matter where you look.