Have You Seen My Mangina?

Man-hating gender-traitor Tom Matlack tries to

pinpoint the source of his betrayal.
“You first became a mangina when you began wearing narrow-fit, open-
collar paisley shirts, silver bracelets, and that dagger-and-snake necklace,”
my college roommate and best friend Brian Pass recently told me.

“You’re borderline mancunt,” Joel Stein, from Time magazine, added.

There’s been plenty of criticism of my recent piece “Cleavage or Soul?” for

presenting a supposedly negative deconstruction of masculinity—to wit: “As
far as I’m concerned, there should be a bow season for trash like you.”

Nothing a lethal projectile can’t solve, I always say.

The consensus among my critics can be summed up in this comment: “Tom.
Men like me have an enemy all right. And the enemy is man-hating, white-
knighting, mangina apologists like you.”

♦◊♦

What does that even mean? Did I get lost in some poor woman’s vagina?
Have I become some chromosome-scrambled human Labradoodle? Being
repeatedly called a word I didn’t even know existed, I set out to investigate.

As far as I can tell, the term mangina comes from an illusion wherein a man
“tucks his stuff” (i.e., hides his genitalia between his legs), thereby giving
his pubic region a feminine appearance. The Urban Dictionary traces the
popularity of the term to one oft- parodied scene from The Silence of the
Lambs.

But how does this relate to my manhood? Did I lose it somewhere between
my legs? If I had been called a queer, pussy, feminist, or even a metrosexual
I might have understood. But mangina? In desperation, I reached out to
some friends.

Tom Miller is the general manager of the women’s relationship website

YourTango. He must know about manginas, I figured. But he responded to
my inquiry with a clip from a Will Ferrell movie (and the suggestion that I
start using the “C word” more regularly, to get my street cred back):

Konstantin Selivanov is a champion boxer and ultimate fighter. Back in

Russia he’d open the door to his house with a hand grenade in one hand,
ready to pull the pin, because of repeated KGB death threats. He came to
this country with $300 and spent his first months here sleeping on a concrete
basement floor with his young wife. A decade later, we train twice a week in
his gym. “I don’t know, man,” he told me between sets. “You lift a lot of
weight and throw a heavy punch, but man, it’s all between you and your
’gina.”

I tracked down a urologist who spends the summers in my neighborhood,

figuring he must have some doctorly insight. “Maybe it has to do with how
early you showed up at my house to make sure you didn’t miss a minute of
Sex and the City?” he mused. Fair enough.
A rapper buddy of mine called me out for attacking one of his favorite artists
for stripping down in Esquire. “Why would I want to know the reality of
Katy Perry? She’s interesting because I can project on her what I want her to
be. I think you became a mangina when you decided to seek out and live in
reality. Many people use fantasy to get through their day. In most long term
relationships/marriages you must think and do things that you certainly don’t
want to do, or admit you do, if you ever have any designs on getting laid.”

“You being a mangina explains why your hair smells like breast milk,”
photographer Ron Cowie told me. Wow, really?

I had taken a few lumps, but I was no closer to a real answer.

♦◊♦

“Could it have been the scooter and the man purse? Or the designer jeans
with the embroidered logo you wore into Sing Sing?” James Houghton, my
venture capital partner of the last 11 years, asked me. Nah, I don’t think the
murse has much to do with it.

“I don’t think I know a straight guy who is more proud of his junk (which is
what I think straight guys call it these days) than you,” one business school
friend told me. “But you do own that God-awful full-length white leather
Gucci jacket with shoulder pads and ribbing that makes you look either
Martian or like the late Michael Jackson.”

“In my eyes you were forever a mangina when you didn’t take a job on Wall
Street and then didn’t come to my bachelor party at the strip club,” another
business school pal complained.

“When I saw you wearing a pink girls’ sports watch, I thought either this
guy is very secure or he’s a chick,” Todd Dagres (a founding investor in
Twitter) told me, sounding confident that he had figured out this mangina
thing. “But since then I’ve discovered that you just don’t give a shit what
people think.” My heart sank in disappointment.

“I think the proper usage is to say one has a mangina, not that one is a
mangina. As in, ‘Don’t get your mangina in a bunch,’” a hard-core gamer
offered in passing. Thanks for the grammar lesson, but that’s not helpful.
Don Foote is a rock musician, my general contractor, and my go-to manhood
guru. “Dude. You and your supposed critics are a lot closer than you let on.
Thicken up your skin,” he said, trying to slap some sense into my mangina.

“The blamers and haters (male and female) can’t figure out why they are not
happy, so they get stupid, and blame something outside themselves. Suck it
up and admit that you are your own problem, and work on being happy—
that’s what a man does. That’s what a woman does.”

Despite getting philosophical on me again, Don was onto something. But I

wasn’t satisfied yet.

Paul Kix, a senior editor at Boston Magazine, finally came up with

something concrete for me to consider. “You’re a business success in a
male-dominated field, which would normally exclude you from an
allegiance to manginas,” he said. “That said, your voice cracks when you’re
angry—like a high-pitched crack, as if femininity itself were boring through
to the surface.”

♦◊♦

Finally, I was getting warmer. I felt sure an answer was within reach, so I
emailed my buddy Grant Gund (his dad owned the Cavaliers when they
drafted LeBron James). He’s been in enough professional locker rooms to
sniff out a mangina a mile away. The email that came back had no text—just
a picture of me dressed up as Kiss lead singer Paul Stanley last Halloween.

I had no idea where Grant found the image, but I stared at my eye makeup
and exposed nipples for a while. It was the long look in the mirror I had been
waiting for, and it came with a revelation:

I am a mangina, I whispered to myself. I stood up from my desk and said it

louder: I AM A MANGINA!

My 5-year-old came running into my study, Wii remote in hand, with a

questioning look on his face. “Daddy?”

“Son, it’s all right. Daddy is very, very happy,” I reassured him, not wanting
my newfound identity to frighten him.
Just to be sure, I checked with my friend Bennett, who I met my first week
of college. He wore a sundress to orientation (or a kilt, I can’t remember)
and we have been friends ever since. The guy has more guts than I ever will.

“If those guys come for you with a bow, just put it on your hair! I hope it’s a
cute color!” he began from somewhere on the left coast, where he teaches
acting. “From where I stand, you smell like chest hair and Old Spice. You
are manlier than I can ever hope to achieve. I am a fag. I am a proud, wrists-
arcing-through-the-air, pinky-raising, loafer-wearing, scarf-tying sissy. You,
sir, are a father. You also scrog women. Right there you out-butch me.”

This self-proclaimed fag was trying to reassure me, but as I laughed, I

confirmed what I had suspected all along: Being a mangina is loving guys
like Bennett and all my other friends, because they show me that there is no
one-size-fits-all approach to manhood. It means not entering into a
misguided zero-sum battle of the sexes, or imagining that women are the
enemy. If that is what my critics are talking about, they are definitely right. I
am a mangina, and damn proud of it.

Just as I was embracing my inner mangina, I got an email from Peter

Hunsinger, the publisher of GQ, with a confessional: “I am a mangina
because I always clear my golf dates with my wife’s schedule before I book
them.”

Then I recalled what a fellow writer, Micah Toub, recently wrote in the
Globe and Mail:

“If that makes me a ‘mangina,’ then I’ll put that on a T-shirt and wear it,” he
concluded.

Better make that three, my friend.

♦◊♦

About Tom Matlack

Tom Matlack is just foolish enough to believe he is a decent man. He has a

16-year-old daughter and 14- and 5-year-old sons. His wife, Elena, is the
love of his life.
Comments

1. Jenn Weigel says:

January 26, 2011 at 6:59 am

I knew you had a mangina when you talked about loving your kids
and your smart, hot wife. What kind of pussy would openly discuss
their emotions? Grow a pair, will ya??

Reply

2. Pedro H. Alonzo says:

January 26, 2011 at 7:00 am

I liked your article about Esquire. It was not as much apologizing to

women but saying to men, “wake the fuck up, the women are taking
over”. The stats about college education are alarming. Not because
women are empowered through education but because men as a
gender have fallen behind as far as they have. Your work is a scary
mirror to uneducated biased fucks who want to think we are still
living in the 1950′s.

Reply

3. Jim Wilder says:

January 26, 2011 at 7:01 am

When I saw you on Tyra I wouldn’t say you’re a full Mangina, but ….

Reply
4. Chip says:

January 26, 2011 at 7:03 am

I know the type of guy that espouses crossbows and mangina

comments. They are the honorless bullies. The ones to whom glory,
war and greed are all that matters. And I’d argue that the honorless
attitude is what nearly destroyed America during the financial crisis of
2008.

I’d further argue that if we replace glory, war and greed with duty,
honor, and country, America would be a better place. (That’s a lot
coming from a gay guy quoting MacAuthur!). If anything, the pieces
I’ve read of the Good Men Project are about how those more noble
concepts fit into today’s word especially with respect to being a good
dad.

Reply

5. mordicai says:

January 26, 2011 at 7:05 am

People are confused about equality. They think that if an oppressed

group– be they women or ethnic minorities or unpopular religions–
gets the same treatment as white cisgendered heterosexual christian
males, then that must mean that white cisgendered heterosexual
christian males suddenly have less power! Our hegemony is cracking!
Oh no! When of course, it isn’t a zero sum game. When, in fact, when
other people have their rights infringed, when egalitarianism isn’t the
rule, then you don’t have rights, you have privileges.

Privileges are even easier to take away then rights– when you start
stepping on the toes of a woman’s right to chose, or a Muslim’s right
to build a YMCA, or whatever? That makes bodily autonomy &
 religious freedom weaker for everyone…even white cisgendered
heterosexual christian males. & it doesn’t stop. When you build a
pyramid, a hierarchy, it is hard to maintain it. You have to continually
narrow your focus, you have to keep excluding, more & more. It isn’t
enough to be a white cisgendered heterosexual christian males…now
you have to own property. & now “christian” doesn’t include
Catholics. & now you have to be the firstborn male. Etc.

The icing on the cake is that people want to believe that sexism &
racism– even when the are soaking in it. Like Andy Gray & Richard
Keys, the sportscasters who were in the middle of being sexist & then
IMMEDIATELY complained about a female official who had said
that racism existed in sports. If the world is equal than the advantages
in my invisible backpack aren’t privileges, they are talents!

Reply

6. David Wise says:

January 26, 2011 at 7:12 am

George Carlin called it the pussification of the American male.

Reply

o Sarah says:

January 26, 2011 at 10:34 am

Which I have a problem with, because “pussification” implies

women are inferior, no matter what. When you call a man a
mangina, you are not only insulting that man, but all women as
well, because for some reason, femininity is inferior, and
masculinity is superior. There are no degrading male insults
used on women, but even women insults are used on women,
 because women acting like women is just inferior. Yet, if a
woman acts like a man (whatever that is), she is seen as
empowered.

Reply

 Bennett says:

January 26, 2011 at 12:20 pm

HELL yes! We gay men get that immediately! To apply

the feminine to a man or just about ANYthing makes it
scorn worthy somehow. Equally, to apply gayness to
something does the same, often with a patina of
immorality or disgust. To whit, “That’s gay.”

Reply

7. DF says:

January 26, 2011 at 8:28 am

Bottom line, it’s hard to be happy, it’s hard to find lasting happiness
in a long term relationship, sometimes it’s hard to get laid alot in a
LTR. Woman and men are different, and the differences turn me on
no end, and drive me crazy, but that’s what makes it fun. Life is much
more nuanced than the “Maxim” model would suggest.

I like big tits as much as anybody, but at the end of the day, I know
big tits are really meaningless- is that so hard to understand? Why
blame the magazines and movies and porn for our “enslavement”- do
we have no free will?

And no, I wouldn’t know if Jessica Simpson is sexier than Gwyneth

Paltrow until I talked to both of them, because that is where sexiness
 really lives. DUH!!!

Just my opinion…..

Reply

8. Roger L Durham says:

January 26, 2011 at 8:32 am

I don’t know about the term, but the practice of “tucking genitalia”
goes much farther back than 1991. I remember high school spring
break — 1976 — some of my buddies (very masculine and not a hint
of feminism within their DNA) “tucking their stuff” and stretching out
on a bed before our girlfriends came into the room.

I guess I would have to say that my first indication of your “mangina-

hood” came with your description of standing in a church parking lot,
calling your mom, looking for a place to sleep after being tossed out
by your wife for being a horrible, despicable, husband and a typical
expression of a man. Certainly, you were not taking responsibility for
your actions. You were attacking the very core of masculinity and
“tucking your stuff” and running home to mommy.

As for the crow bars, I would offer a prophetic image — where the
prophets of the Old Testament called for turning spears into
plowshares (a call for peace), I would suggest that you turn to the
attackers (pussies in camoflage, trying to be what they believe to be
men) and suggest that they turn those crowbars into knitting needles.

Reply

9. Jesse Kornbluth says:

January 26, 2011 at 8:33 am

 Irony is wasted on fools.
In fact, they are projecting dark fears about themselves.
They secretly suspect that their macho is a poor cover.
They are pussies.
I say: show your big dick.

Reply

10. Ron Mattocks says:

January 26, 2011 at 8:34 am

I had been following Tom’s writing for a while, but even though we
were in agreement on many topics, over time, my suspicion that Tom
might be “tucking” started to grow the same way it would for a father
who notices that little Johnny exhibits a real flair for shoes and hangs
figure skating posters all over his room. But when Tom announced he
was sticking with “The Good Men Project” as the name of his
magazine, that’s when I knew without a doubt he kept “Jake the
Snake” under wraps. To me, his over-use of the very docile sounding
good hinted of “good boys” who always do what they’re told and
continue this submissive behavior into adulthood. I guarantee, every
unabashed “swinging Richard” out there doesn’t want to thought of in
such bland terms as “good.” What red-blooded, American male goes
to the vending machine and selects a Hershey’s Goodbar when he can
get a PayDay or some other candy bar with nuts and the ability to
really “satisfy” (if you know what I mean). I thought Tom could’ve at
least toned down his “Emasculation Proclamation” by calling it “The
Good Ol’ Men Project,” but going the route he did, made me realize
Tom had transformed into his own ironic version of “Tucker Max.” In
light of all the recent criticism directed at Tom, I guess it just goes to
show that the logic of Kirk Lazarus’s Tropic Thunder advice to Tugg
Speedman applies here too. Never go full Mangina.

Reply
11. Boysen Hodgson says:

January 26, 2011 at 8:39 am

This one is definitely going for republish. Nicely done. The Manginas
I hang out with (and man, there are a lot of them) have the biggest
cojones of any men I have ever met. You’re in good company Tom.

Reply

o tom matlack says:

January 26, 2011 at 8:42 am

Thanks Boysen you are a gentleman and a scholar.

Reply

12. John Taylor says:

January 26, 2011 at 9:11 am

Can we make shirts that say “My Mangina is Bigger Than Yours”? I
know Tom probably has the nicest one out there, but still. What’s so
wrong with having a mangina? I think the bigger question of it all is in
finding out when having a mangina became a problem in the first
place? Defining masculinity is a difficult task. Defining an individual
is a personal task. I like sweater vests and the fact that I can pick out
matching clothes and hair clips for my daughter. I delight in knowing
what kind of pads or tampons I need to stop by and get on my way
home from work. I am thrilled with the fact that I can look at any
other woman as just a person because sexy and beautiful to me is
defined in my wife.
 Tough and brawny don’t make a man. Huge muscles and the ability to
kick an ass or two can be achieved by anyone, male or female. I say
‘Viva La Mangina”. Cheers to all the bros who proudly where their
gina on their sleeve, a touch of fashion in their wardrobe, and a stick
of reality in their pack of gum located in the murse.

Reply

13. Matthew Piepenburg says:

January 26, 2011 at 9:11 am

Tom suffers from numerous symptoms of the Mangina ailment. It’s

hopeless, really. The first time I knew for sure—that is to say:
unequivocally and without a trace of doubt– that Thomas Matlack is a
Mangina was in October of 2009. He wanted to meet at a frou frou
little French bistro on Newbury Street. French bistros—in fact,
anything at all French– are for Manginas (Symptom 1). Once seated, I
noticed all kinds of other frou frou, blue-jeaned, flip-flopp-wearing,
murse-carrying Manginas gathering to sip tea and eat distinctively
effeminate salad nicoises, which Tom ordered (Mangina symptom 2).
Sitting across from Tom, I saw, for just an instant, that when he raised
his glass, he did so with his pinky extended. (Mangina symptom 3).
Also, he wouldn’t drink alcohol at lunch or dinner. (Mangina
symptoms 4 and 5). I’m told when he rowed in college, he held his oar
with the same pinky extended (Mangina symptom 6). It should be
noted as well that Tom drives a British car—very Mangina (and hence
Mangina symptom 7). If it’s not American-made, it’s Mangina. (I bet
he holds the steering wheel with his pinky extended.) Last year I sat
near him at the Boston Garden during a Celtics game, and when he
cheers/screams, his voice cracks like a chic (Mangina symptom 8).
Also, Tom reads a great deal; only chicks read (Mangina symptom 9).
Perhaps most obvious, Tom spends a lot of time “counseling” in high
security prisons and hanging out with bachelors at Sing Sing
(Mangina symptom 10).

Reply
14. David Atchison says:

January 26, 2011 at 9:12 am

I knew you were a mangina when you argued the validity of Esquire’s
list of hot chicks with a list of smart chicks. Here’s the Non-Mangina
Equation for that Hot Chicks > Smart Chicks. (Just kidding of course
)

Reply

15. alexander shapiro says:

January 26, 2011 at 9:13 am

Do you remember the Wesleyan Psych Professor who claimed to be a

lesbian trapped in a man’s body? could he have gotten to you?

Wearing stockings on a crazy cold row on the icy connecticut river

men in tights is a major cause of Mangina
has Pfizer created a treatment yet?

Reply

16. BS says:

January 26, 2011 at 9:14 am

You, Sir, are a father. Right there you classify as 1) unimpeachable…

if you are raising humans, you deserve praise no matter what your
characteristics and as 2) manly. Strength is shown more in the tasks
you perform, like fathering, disciplining both young creatures as well
as oneself, than in bravado or display of sacred talismans of masculine
 identity.

I can only recommend to your detractors that they focus their ire on
me, a genuine gender-traitor, not you, guilty merely of wearing
sweaters and standing up for 50% of the human race’s dignity while
allowing the other 50% a choice about who they want to be.

So unless those warriors of the gruff and barking, of the Viking model
of manhood are going to open up with the requisite salvos against us
queens, they should really shut up. You are not the gender betrayer, I
am. Lucky me!

Reply

17. Erik Schineller says:

January 26, 2011 at 9:15 am

My experience with you being a Mangina is that you have grown to a

point in your life that you have continued the ability to care for the
men in your life and ascended to care for the women that deserve
respect from even the worst misogynist. I believe you have taken the
anger and angst of your past and put them into the positives to help
others grow from your previous misfortunes and current success. If it
wasn’t for aman’s ability to perform the wonders of a Mangina, we
would have to turn to books to teach our boys what a pussy appears to
be before the legs of a woman get spread for the first time to revel the
ever destructive power they will have over those of us with a desire to
tap that thang for the rest of our lives.

Reply

18. Brandon says:

January 26, 2011 at 9:32 am

 Great job on the post, Tom!

If I wore graphic tees, I’d sport a MG for the cause.

The ‘open season’ guy (and all of his cronies) are probably scratching
their heads right now… (yes, we all know you are still reading GMP,
even after that fiasco. You weren’t fooling anyone.)

BTW – I hope you had the rest of the band with you on Halloween…
based on their solo careers, I’m curious how well this costume went
over, lol!

Reply

19. 987md says:

January 26, 2011 at 9:47 am

This article is so poorly written that I have no idea if it is satire, I have

no idea what the point is, and I am super disappointed in the Good
Men Project. Y’all usually have such a high standard of articles.

Reply

o Noah says:

January 26, 2011 at 10:01 am

Please leave, then. You won’t be missed.

Reply

20. Sarah says:

January 26, 2011 at 10:38 am

I’m glad some males are bracing their “mangina,” but as a woman I
still find the term offensive, because not only is it meant to insult the
individual man, but it’s also an insult against all women. Whenever
men insult each other, they use female terms to insult them. Even
when women or men insult other women, they use female terms. But
there are no male terms used to insult others. “Grow a pair,” “pussy,”
“mangina,” those are all direct stabs against women as well, as though
femininity is inferior and masculinity is superior.

Reply

o Rich N. Phaemus says:

January 26, 2011 at 11:05 am

It’s all about context and the gender of the declarer.

Reply

o Female Feedback says:

January 26, 2011 at 11:11 am

Yes, I agree with you.

I think it would help if more precise language was used, such as

“courage,” “empathy,” etc or whatever the trait is that the man
is showing or not showing rather than putting everything in
terms of vaginas and testicles.

If you draw a line between men and women and let each side
only have some traits, each side loses.

Reply
 o Bennett says:

January 26, 2011 at 12:29 pm

Yes yes yes, Frankly, what are they doing insulting in the 1st
place? That alone is cause for rethinking your approach to life.

Reply

21. Allan says:

January 26, 2011 at 11:58 am

If sexism is the common enemy, why do people spend so much

energy on trying to pin the blame for it on one sex or the other? All
the negative quality of humans on one sex or the other?

Even trying to get outside of the box, people can’t think outside the
box.

Reply

22. Josh Tyson says:

January 26, 2011 at 12:08 pm

A couple of things have been missed here:

1) Vaginas are infinitely tougher than penises and especially balls.

You can blow too hard on a set of balls and wound them. Vaginas are
powerful and elastic. They eat testes 3-square a day forever. Thus,
being called any variation of a pussy is a veiled compliment.

2) This is the real mangina: http://themangina.com/ A friend of author

 Jonathan Ames who invented a prosthetic vagina for men at least a
decade ago called, The Mangina. Wearing one allegedly brings power
and perspective.

Reply

23. Mangina School says:

January 26, 2011 at 1:31 pm

I, for one, have no doubt that Tom is a great guy to have a beer with
and shoot the breeze for a while. There is some good content here on
“Good Men” that I enjoy. And I doubt that Tom is a transsexual (not
that there’s anything wrong with that.)

With that said, the reason why people refer to Tom as a mangina is
because he fervently espouses the notion that Man’s only hope is to
uncritically do everything that women tell him to do. He constantly
promotes deeply misandrist screeds such as Hannah Rosin’s “The End
of Men” yet he refuses to even consider that women may not have our
best interests at heart.

Men are never served by doing what women want them to do. And
deep down, women despise men who do as they’re told. As men, we
need to unplug from the feminist kool-aid fantasyland and base our
journey on Logic, Reason, Courage, Strength, and Self-Reliance. I see
some articles on “Good Men” getting there, but this “Tell me what to
do Mommy” stuff is horribly destructive to men.

As shown in the article on Esquire, Tom has no problems taking a

bullwhip to “All Men” by calling them “The Enemy,” simply because
you’ve had some problems with sex addiction in the past.
Conveniently leaving the millions of women who enjoy, are employed
by, or are entrepreneurs in sex-related industries out of your
condemnation.

Tom has drunk HARD on the leftist feminist Kool-Aid, and he’s
 passing around the cup to the rest of us. THAT is why people call
Tom a mangina.

Reply

24. John says:

January 26, 2011 at 1:33 pm

Kind of funny, but it felt more like an exercise in name-dropping.

Great, you know people….so what?

Reply

25. Vincent aka @CuteMonsterDad says:

January 26, 2011 at 1:47 pm

As I was reading this I kept envisioning you holding a tea party for
each of your illustrious guests. As you’ve indicated, the definition of
manhood varies. Simply put Tom “Laertes” Matlack, “to thine own
self be true.”

Vincent | CuteMonster.com

Reply