Professor Pluck's How to Stand and Pee and not be a Dick about it: Rites of Passage: The Navigation of Masculinity between the Scylla of Radical Feminism and the Charybdis of Toxic Manhood

By Joseph P. Willis and Phileas P. Pluck

This book is a coming-of-age answer to the masculinity crises in America as well as globally.

Young men today are lost and cannot find a valid path to maturity as men.

While Radical Feminism from the far-left emasculates young men and discourages any form of traditional masculinity as toxic, young men default

• Language: English
• Publisher: Joseph P. Willis
• Release date: Apr 8, 2024
• ISBN: 9798869299253

Book preview

Professor Pluck’s

How to Stand and Pee and not be a Dick about it.

Rites of Passage: The Navigation of Masculinity between the Scylla of Radical Feminism and

the Charybdis of Toxic Manhood

Joseph P. Willis, PhD

Phileas P. Pluck, PhD

Woodbridge Publishers

1280 Lexington Ave STE 2

New York, NY 10028

Copyright © 2023 Joseph P. Willis, PhD & Phileas P. Pluck, PhD

All rights reserved

First Edition

ISBN (Paperback): 978-1-916849-25-9

ISBN (Hardcover): 978-1-916849-58-7

No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in retrieval system, copied in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording or otherwise transmitted without written permission from the publisher. You must not circulate this book in any format.

Under no circumstances will any blame or legal responsibility be held against the publisher, or author, for any damages, reparation, or monetary loss due to the information contained within this book, either directly or indirectly.

Acknowledgments

I would like to thank Professor Anna Norberg for her continued encouragement to write this book as well as the late Dr. Joseph Kestner for directing me toward masculinity studies.

Dedication

To my models of masculinity who have passed:

I strive every day to be worthy.

Table of Contents

Acknowledgments

Dedication

Table of Contents

Chapter I—An Overview

To all Male Nerds, Geeks, and Good Guys—A Call to Action

Who will benefit from this book?

The Status of Masculinity in Society Today

The Paradox of Alpha Males and Rites of Passage

The Cyber-World and Young Males Today

The Gender Enigma

Crises of Masculinity

Rites of Passage to Mitigate Masculine Crises

Societal Influences, Literature and Rites of Passage

An Anthropological Definition of Rite of Passage

A Psychological Definition of Rite of Passage

Rite of Passage and Marriage

Chapter II—Physical Challenges and Rites of Passage

Nature as a Rite of Passage—Professor Pluck says, Know your Limits

Hard Work and Pain

Physical Rites of Passage, Determination, and Grit

Leaving the Comfort Zone

Nonconformism and Leaving the Comfort Zone

The Comfort Zone and the Myth of the Transgressive Male Barefoot Philosophy

Assumptions and Underestimating Low-Brow Linguistics

Petro Males

The Moral-Oriented Male and Toxic Power Males

Exercise, Health, and Dealing with Stress

Geese wing toward warmer latitudes: Movement, Structure, and the Cycle of Life

Chapter III—The Spiritual Rite of Passage

Rite of Passage as a Spiritual Challenge

Introspection and Self-Awareness—Metacognition

Teddy’s Rite of Passage

What does it mean to be a good man?

What is Spiritual Growth?

The Medicine Man—Expanding your Spiritual Horizons

Character—Doing the Right Thing When No one Else Will

Character Traits of the Spirit-Centered Man

Chapter IV—Intellectual Growth and the Rite of Passage

Professor Pluck says, Seek Rites of Passage to Challenge your Intellect!

Failure to Launch the Educational Rite of Passage—What Then?

Balancing Entertainment and Enlightenment

You’ve Got to Have Skills—Seek Self-Improvement and Never Stop Learning

Chapter V—The Cultural and Social Rite of Passage

Rite of Passage as Cultural and Societal Challenge

Societal Skillsets Acquired through Cultural Rites of Passage

About the Author

Bibliography

Endnotes

Chapter I—An Overview

Professor Pluck

My name is Professor Phileas Pluck, and I am the inner voice that will guide you on a masculine rite of passage. I am your harshest critic. I implore you to seek the highest internal standards without regard for the nonsensical interference of the outside world. I am your conscience, but also your consciousness—your continual self-assessment. I am your alter ego, your muse, your inspiration, your instinct, your gut feeling, the extra motivation you hold in covert reserve to propel you upwards, forwards, and to make yourself and the world a better place. I am your self-confidence, your vision, your assertiveness, your ultra-level of self-awareness and consciousness that gives you an edge over the binary evils of self-doubt and self-destruction. I am your fortitude, your self-faith and persistence, your grit and backbone. I am the eternal power of your unimagined imagination. I am the enduring belief in the blessing of luck, the hidden potential of possibilities, the courage to take risks in life, to accept failures alongside success and to learn from both.

How do you find me? You must become the virtual non-conformist. You must separate yourself from the herd. I am here. You must listen carefully. Persist. I am here to help you navigate today’s precarious strait of modern masculinity, but most importantly, to guide you on your rites of passage to manhood—to hear the worldwide call to men and respond—to grasp the vorpal blade and slay the Jabberwock—to pay your dues to manhood through physical, intellectual, spiritual, and cultural challenges—to return from your Bildungsreise with Jabberwock head in hand.

Your Author

With the help of Professor Pluck, I will guide you in your masculine journey to the rites of passage. While an academic, my rites of passage encompass many facets of manhood: construction, military, agriculture, sports, and education. My point is, I am not your typical academic. The subject of masculinity and rites of passage should be approached from a broad spectrum of masculinity. While I do not wish to offend my honorable colleagues in academia, due in part to immense volumes of academic theory, the academic world is often too isolated from the reality of everyday life to approach masculinity with an objective investigative lens.

That being said, the literary-academic approach can and should be used as a starting point in the honest investigation of masculine rites of passage. My academic area of expertise is Victorian masculinity. I have been guided by the works of Joseph Conrad, Oscar Wilde, Arthur Conan Doyle, Robert Louis Stevenson, as well as several other male authors from the Victorian period and the early twentieth century. With the guidance of Professor Pluck, I have sought out a comprehensive primer for modern manhood that could successfully guide the young men of today between the dual threats of toxic radical feminism and toxic masculinity, wherein the former despises men and the latter disrespects women.

As men in contemporary global society, we are confronted by extreme political influences from the left and the right. On the left, the overreach of radical feminists seek to control and diminish men because our behavior has apparently gone unchecked for too many years, while conservatives struggle to distinguish between traditional masculinity and toxic masculinity.

Du musst sitzen und pinkeln! (You must sit and pee.)

It was the summer of 1996 when Professor Pluck convinced me to attend an academic workshop in Munich, sponsored by the German government. At that time, housing was provided by private citizens, so my destination on the day before the workshop began was the flat of an unknown person in Munich. I had been visiting friends in Poland, so the day before the workshop began, I had taken a bus early that morning that was supposed to be an express bus but stopped in every town between Wroclaw and Munich. I passed the time by conversing in Schlesisch German with a Polish Oma who was visiting relatives in Bavaria. She wanted to know everything about America and my itinerary and why I was carrying six cartons of Sobieski cigarettes with me to Munich. She explained to me that this was five cartons too many, and she helped me conceal them from the German customs officers at the border crossing in Görlitz.

When I finally arrived in Munich several hours later, I was dropped off at a remote location that was not readily accessible to Munich’s mass transport—the Container Bahnhof. I was tired and was carrying my big Army duffel and a backpack. While I normally rode the bus, subway, or tram when I arrived at a train station or an airport in a large city, this drop-off location was seemingly void of any metro stops, and since this was long before Google Maps and smartphones, I couldn’t quickly research mass transportation options.

While I was wandering around aimlessly in an area of Munich that seemed totally deserted, a taxi appeared out of nowhere, so I gave him the address of the flat where I was assigned to stay. I had not yet changed money from the Polish Zloty to the Deutschemark. I informed the cab driver that I had only dollars. He replied, Was für ein Dollar? What kind of dollar? I knew the day was about to get even longer. I made an arrangement, gave him what I had in U.S. dollars (not Canadian or Australian), and told him to drop me off as close to the address as possible. Yes, thanks to gracious German hospitality, I had to walk ninety minutes with several pounds of luggage on a hot Sunday afternoon in Munich. (Driven by that experience, since then I carry very little luggage on domestic or international trips. Professor Pluck tried to warn me, but I did not listen!)

When I finally arrived at the flat in Munich, within five minutes of a very brief and stress-filled welcome by the host, she informed me that I must sitzen und pinkeln—sit and pee because men possessed poor pecker targeting skills resulting in a moist and nasty mess on and around the toilet. (Again, in the process of building cities and traveling to the moon, men have just been getting away with too much bullshit.) Understanding the German insistence that alles muß immer in Ordnung sein, I informed her that I had good aim, and if I missed, I would clean up after myself. She still insisted, "Nein, du musst sitzen und pinkeln." I refused, partly because I was absolutely sapped mentally and physically, but also because my patience had begun to wear thin with the limited parameters of German hospitality. Professor Pluck implored me to hold my ground for the sake of the universal brotherhood of males. (I would have insisted on standing while shitting at that point.) As a result, I was subjected to a severely negative tone by my host for the next two weeks of my stay.

I had successfully survived the Scylla of the radical feminist. There would be more of these occurrences since that experience in '96 and even my choice of scholarly pursuit would be challenged by the radical feminist agenda. In terms of gender studies in literature, masculinity studies does not meet the imprimatur of many radical feminists. Radical feminists assume that masculinity has already undergone thorough coverage throughout history due to the overt concentration on men exclusively until culture was rescued by an enlightened hatred of men in the 1970s.

I get it. I really do, but historical homocentric paradigms beyond our control do not alter the fact that contemporary young men are more confused than ever, and for that reason alone, I decided that the study of masculinity was a valid and noble pursuit in the search for answers to masculine problems and issues. Professor Pluck and my dissertation advisor implored me to drive onward and upward with the study of masculinity.

On the other side of this modern male navigational passage is the Charybdis—toxic masculinity, or as I prefer to term it, the art of being a true dick in the most negative sense of the word. Most contemporary young men have long ago lost their patience with the immaturity of bullies, male hyper-arrogance, male fear of intelligent females, the insane over-emphasis on sports and athletics, the overt aggression and violence towards anyone who disagrees with their messed-up view of life, the use of physical and mental intimidation, the lack of respect for intellectual pursuits and academics... the list goes on and on.

Male nerds, geeks, and good guys have had enough of this toxic bullshit, yet they are in desperate need of a valid rebuttal to not only avoid toxic maleness but also to find a suitable alternative. And no, we refuse to sacrifice aspects of valid manliness to sit and pee at the altar of radical feminism. We refuse. We will take a third path. Professor Pluck and I are standing up to the bullies on the left and the right.

To all Male Nerds, Geeks, and Good Guys—A Call to Action

This book is a call to action for Nerds, Geeks, and Good Guys—morally-minded men of the world guided by a more mindful masculinity.¹ There are practical solutions to the varied crises of masculinity. Men must not continue on the path of dysfunctional self-destruction, where we are blindly hypnotized by a false narrative of toxic manhood. Men must seek personal growth that will enable them to face present and future global challenges in an increasingly unstable world.

While this book will promote many positive aspects of traditional masculinity, traditional masculinity must be purged of alpha male² worship.  Functioning as the dominant males in social contexts, alpha males are responsible for many of