WHEN I WAS a high school soccer and basketball player, locker rooms were a sanctuary for me. I remember elaborate pregame handshakes and earnest debates over whether it was okay to pray for a win. I chatted with teammates about defensive strategy, physics homework, and crushes. But I do not remember anyone ever bragging about sexual assault.
Donald Trump excused as “locker room talk” his vulgar boasting about kissing, groping, and trying to have sex with women during the infamous 2005 conversation caught live by Access Hollywood and released during the 2016 campaign. Trump’s lewd remarks still loom large for me, because I refuse to normalize having an admitted sexual assaulter in the Oval Office and also because UltraViolet, a creative women’s advocacy organization, periodically plays that videotape on a continuous loop in front of the U.S. Capitol. Tourists, members of Congress, and everyone else get a regular reminder of who is in the White House.
However, as UltraViolet’s action and the flood of #MeToo testimonials demonstrate, it is not enough to shine a light on the prevalence of sexual violence. Revelation alone does not beget liberation. We can’t simply hold up a mirror to our cultural misogyny and expect the image to change. For real transformation, we must project a true image—an imago dei —rather than our current distortion.
In November, a project emerged in the sports world to promote positive, healthy masculinity. In four short webisodes, NBA all-star Kevin Love sits down with athletes Michael Phelps, Paul Pierce, and Channing Frye for vulnerable discussions on mental health and what it means to be a man. “We’re reclaiming locker room talk,” says Love in the trailer.
Love broke the guy code of silence in March in an essay for The Players’ Tribune about his mid-game panic attack and subsequent hospitalization. “Growing up, you figure out really quickly how a boy is supposed to act. You learn what it takes to ‘be a man.’ It’s like a playbook: Be strong. Don’t talk about your feelings. ... These values about men and toughness are so ordinary that they’re everywhere ... and invisible at the same time, surrounding us like air or water. They’re a lot like depression or anxiety in that way.”
The web series, called Locker Room Talk, is produced in partnership with Schick Hydro and the Movember Foundation as part of Schick Hydro’s “The Man I Am” campaign, which pushes men to celebrate their individuality.
In one of Love’s interviews, decorated Olympic swimmer Phelps discusses his life-threatening depression. “I don’t ever want my medals to define who I am,” says Phelps, “because that’s not who I am. ... You could be the strongest man in the world, but you’re still going to go through problems.”
Each guest shares mental health struggles and the need for vulnerability before finishing the episode with a public face-shaving session. Cleverly, Schick brands itself as the clean-shaven face of a rebranded manhood.
Sustained change comes from a clear vision of what we can be at our best, not just from incessant critiques of who we are at our worst. As an athlete, cheers for my team always motivate me more than boos toward the opposition.
February means Super Bowl season. I struggle with the sport that seems to epitomize (or at least symbolize) the worst parts of a dying masculinity—hiding under masks, proving self-worth by tearing another to the ground. But more and more male athletes are redefining what it means to be a man, Kevin Love included.
What would it look like for high school and community-league sports teams to have similarly intentional conversations about a new vision for masculinity? This Super Bowl season, I want something to cheer for—even after both teams head to the locker room.
Jenna Barnett is the culture editor at Sojourners and the producer of the award-winning podcast Lead Us Not.
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