It has come to my attention that I owe Ryan Michler a sincere apology. When I reviewed his book, The Masculinity Manifesto, I truly had no idea what I had. While the review was far from scathing, after reading Senator Josh Hawley’s Manhood, I now realize even my light criticisms were far, far too harsh.
Where do I even begin?
Josh Hawley has written a self-help book. Not only does his job alone make Josh Hawley writing any self-help book just totally bonkers bullshit, but Josh Hawley is also extremely, uniquely unqualified to write any self-help book, particularly one aimed at the average American man. But he’s not done! He’s also especially unqualified to write one based on his interpretation of the Bible.
In general, I have two main beefs with self-help:
1. You’ll probably solve hunger faster by streamlining the fishing licensure process than by teaching a man to fish.
2. Anyone smart enough to write decent self-help is probably also smart enough to come up with ideas for improving public policy.
The thing is, Josh Hawley is a sitting Senator. Fixing systemic problems through public policy is his literal, full-time job. So why would he, of all fucking people, write a self-help book utterly devoid of even one specific legislative or policy idea?
His book barely even mentions policy. And there’s zero analysis of systems, except for a ton of broad, sweeping generalizations about academics (he graduated from Stanford University in 2002 and Yale Law School in 2006 and taught at St. Paul’s a London elite private school) and “the left” and “the Epicurean left.”
It’s deeply weird for anyone whose job it is to improve government to write a self-help book rather than a policy book. But it’s even weirder for a 43-year-old first-term Congresscitter who went straight from a private high school funded by his rich parents to elite college and law school to a great clerkship through personal connections to finding wealthy people to bankroll his Senate bid. What, exactly, has life taught Mr. Hawley that is in any way, shape, or form applicable to the average American man? Michler, by contrast, is a middle-class dude who went to war, started multiple businesses, and both failed and succeeded professionally.
Perhaps not shockingly, Manhood doesn’t include many stories from Hawley’s life. In fact, if I remember correctly, he tells more stories about his grandfather, who, unlike his father, actually grew up poor, than about himself or his dad.
What the book has a lot of is Bible stories. It’s Hawley’s attempt to use the Bible to blame “the left” for all of modern men’s problems while at the same time telling men to take personal responsibility for their lives. And, again, without offering anything remotely specific in terms of public policy solutions to the widespread and pernicious anti-male bullshit “the left” has supposed perpetrated. Even though, again, that’s his literal full-time job.
What isn’t his job, and what he, despite his extremely extensive and impressive education, isn’t qualified in any way, shape, or form to do, is interpret the Bible. So it’s very weird that he’s not only written a self-help book despite having accomplished absolutely nothing that he would recommend anyone should emulate, but that he’s also written it based on the Bible despite the fact that he is, to my knowledge, absolutely unqualified to speak on Theology.
The last reason it’s deeply weird that sitting Senator Josh Hawley wrote a self-help book based on the Bible is that despite being very busy, hasn’t really accomplished anything positive and has done a ton of dirty, fucked-up shit. Again, how does this qualify him to tell other people how to live? And what is the point of using the Bible as a guide to life if you still decide to lie and subvert Democracy and kidnap and cage children and defend racists? If this is how this motherfucker acts with Jesus, what the fuck would he be doing without him?
There are far, far worse things to say about Josh Hawley. And never fear, my babies. As long as there’s breath in my body I will continue to work on getting my thoughts about this particular shitbag beyond his weird book and what he means for US fascism into readable form.
What I’ll leave you with is that men in the US are having a really hard time, as I’ve written about extensively. I wish that instead of writing a self-help book based on Hawley’s interpretation of various Bible stories interspersed with regular bitch sessions about “the left” he had instead pointed his considerable intellect, privilege, and position of power into actually helping men. I wish he’d spent the time and energy eliminating occupational licensure laws, ensuring government jobs don’t require a college degree, and creating a functional social safety net. I wish he’d revised the regulations that have made housing, education, and healthcare soar in cost while keeping wages for the average man in the bottom half stagnant since 1970.
In his book, he advises men to make sure their life matters. I wish, in sum, that Josh Hawley would take his own advice.
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Cathy reads books: Manhood by Sen Josh Hawley