Strong Enough to Be Goofy: What Real Masculinity Actually Looks Like as a Dad

There are two guys Robbie wants to talk about. One brushes his teeth with brake fluid, hasn't communicated a feeling since 1987, and thinks vulnerability is something that happens to other people. The other one is so emotionally available he makes Miss Rachel look like Brock Lesnar. Both of them are a problem. And somewhere between these two caricatures, real men — real dads — are supposed to figure out who they're actually supposed to be.

This is the masculinity episode TUF has been building toward. Not a lecture on what you should be. An honest look at where we're at, what we're being sold, and what it actually looks like to show your kids the full picture of what a man is — strong when they need a wall, goofy when they need a goofball, and emotionally present when they need someone to sit on the floor with them.

Robbie is an Enneagram 8. Vulnerability doesn't come naturally. This episode is him working through it out loud — and making the case that the strongest version of a dad is the one who can do all three.

Topics covered: the manosphere and why the brake fluid masculinity model has real costs for your kids and your marriage, what's actually missing on the other extreme, why your family needs different things from you at different times and why knowing which one to give them is the whole job, the specific moments where Robbie has shown his boys each side of him, and why controlled chaos — emotion plus reason — is the most powerful thing a man can develop.

Transcript

Exploring Masculinity: The Two Extremes

SPEAKER_00 0:00

There are two guys I want to talk about today. One brushes his teeth with brake fluid, hasn't communicated a feeling since 1987, and thinks that vulnerability is something that happens to other people. The other one is so in touch with his emotions that he makes Miss Rachel look like Brock Lesnar. Both of them can be a problem. And somehow, between these two caricatures, real men, real dads are supposed to figure out who they're actually supposed to be. That's what today's all about. And we're going to take a look at, again, two extremes in society. You've got this modern view of masculinity, you've got the extreme side, the manosphere, super masculine. Women are subservient. Children should just do what they say. They go to work, they make the money, they do what they want, they drink whiskey. And then you've got the other side where they just are completely prostrated to everyone else in their lives. They are not strong. They're just there to be either like the goofy dad who doesn't do anything or isn't of importance, or they're just there to support the wife, or the wife is the boss. They are essentially a gagline, or they're just so emotionally in touch that they cry at everything. A butterfly crosses the street and they cry. If you've ever seen the movie uh Elemental or Elements, whatever it is, the Disney one, the water character who's just constantly crying the entire time. These are the two extremes that we're presented with nowadays, especially through social media. I see both sides. I don't see a ton of in the middle, unfortunately. And as many of you know, that's that's where I live a lot of times. I live right in the middle. That's where I think that we need to be focusing more of our efforts and more of our attention is how do we blend these extremes and where do we pick and choose where we want to be? For me, I've never been either one of these characters fully, right? I joke around, I make jokes about certain things, and uh I've always kind of described myself as the person that could go and watch how to lose a guy in ten days with his girlfriend or wife at you know, whatever point in my life I was at, and can go have a good cry with that, or go laugh at that movie, go watch chick flick, a romantic comedy, or I could go out on a football field or a rugby field or a wrestling mat and kick the shit out of you. Those are the two things. Both of those things are part of me, part of who I am. I'm a big, strong, masculine man who likes to do a lot of things that would you would consider stereotypical masculine, but I'm also someone who enjoys cooking, baking, watching movies. I'm not afraid to cry in front of my wife or my kids if I'm watching something that makes me emotional or sentimental. Um, and I don't like people putting labels on me one way or the other. I don't like the label of like that's masculine or that's not masculine. I'm gonna do what I feel like is best for me and what's best for my family. And that's that's how I live my life. And not to say that I'm the best or that I know what I'm doing, but I do think that finding a good middle ground is where most of us should be aiming for. So this episode's not to tell you where you should be landing or how you can be masculine or what masculinity even is. This episode is more so just taking an honest look, an honest view at where we're at at this point in time, what we're being told about being masculine, about being dads, and where I'm at, where I feel like I'm doing well in these areas where I might struggle a little bit. And then also just letting you know that it's okay to pick, choose where you want to be. Not everyone's gonna be the exact same way. Not everyone does masculinity the same way, not everyone is a dad the same way. But it's our job to figure out what the best path forward is for ourselves and for our

The Stoic Provider: A Closer Look

SPEAKER_00 3:52

families. And that's what we're gonna explore a little bit today. So let's start the conversation out by taking a little bit of a deeper dive into the two extremes, into the break fluid guy and into the constantly crying wimp, for lack of a better term. I don't have, I don't have a term for it yet. We'll take a look at the break fluid guy first, right? Because this is something that's been prevalent in society and culture. The manosphere, as they call it, has definitely taken up. You've got the likes of Andrew Tate or Nick Fuentes or whoever you want to talk about. There's a long list of people that go through and they portray this stoic, masculine, strong, rough, abrasive, kind of a dick in all reality, just like kind of this dick persona of this is what it means to be a man. This is what it means to be masculine. And if you don't do this, then you're beta or Sigma or whatever the fuck kids say nowadays, something like that. You're the stoic provider for your family. Your job is just to be there to be a provider, to provide discipline. You don't show emotions, you don't open up, no saying sorry to your kids or to your family. You don't want them to see that side of you. And so to me, there's a lot of problems that come along with this. This is kind of the stereotypical of what it was thought to be a man, what it was thought to be a dad in the past, the 1950s, the 1940s, maybe even way before then. You've got kids that are afraid to come to their dad with things because they're afraid of being either berated verbally or even physically. You've got spouses who are carrying all of the emotional load for the entire family, and they end up getting burnt out. They look for different outlets, they don't feel seen. Uh, it just causes a lot of issues for everyone. And at the same time, I maybe this is just me, but I wouldn't want my family to be afraid of me. I don't want my kids to be so afraid of me that they can't come and bring something to my attention or they don't feel like they can talk to me about something. I don't want my wife to have to hold all of the emotional baggage that comes along with raising a family. I don't want my kids to only go to her, to only have that relationship with her. This is a partnership. We're partners together in this. And part of that partnership is that me as a dad, me as a man, I have my part to play as well. And it's not just the stoic disciplinarian that a lot of times is is portrayed of what you should be as a man. And in all reality, this has got to have an impact on a lot of men too, right? Unless you're just a complete sociopath, which maybe some people are. Um, maybe some people really do want that model. But I've got to imagine that there is this immense burden that comes along with thinking that you have to be this stoic provider, never showing emotion, never showing any gaps. You're holding a lot. This is not to say that like dads don't hold a lot or that men don't hold a lot or that they don't do enough already. They're doing a lot. It's just they have this idea in their head of trying to be so quote unquote masculine or so tough, so stoic that they don't let any emotions come out. They don't want their kids to have that emotional connection with them. They just want them to fall in line in what their perfect, their view of what a perfect family looks like. That picture perfect, white picket fence, two kids, dog. They've got this idea of what it needs to look like. And they let that cloud how they act as a man, as a dad. And it's gonna eventually come out, right? The weight is going to press down on you, and no matter how strong you are, I know because I've been there. I've been someone who's tried to hold up the weight of the world on my shoulders. And unfortunately, I'm not strong enough. No one is strong enough to hold up the weight of the world or the weight that their family puts down on them. It's gonna come out in one way, shape, or form, whether that's anger or frustration or snarkiness or yelling at your wife, yelling at your kids, these things have to vent out. You can't always be the stoic, no emotion person. Everyone has some sort of emotion, needs some sort of outlet. And if you don't let these things come out, if you don't have this open flow, this open communication, it's gonna come out in some other way. And a lot of times it comes out in a way that you don't want it to. That's happened to me before. I get more, more snarky, I get pissed off, I raise my voice quicker, I get upset about things that I shouldn't be getting upset about. And that's not where

The Emotional Goofball: A Different Perspective

SPEAKER_00 8:25

we should be as men. That's not where we should be as fathers. And then you have the other side of things. You've got the men who are so emotional and so goofy and just they don't want structure or they don't want to be stoic. They don't want to be necessarily strong. They lay everything down at the feet of their wives, their partners, their kids. They let it all go out there and they don't offer any protection whatsoever to their family. They don't hold anything back. And they're not doing any of the regulation. That's part of the problem, is that they don't have any regulators. They don't know how to regulate their own emotions, their own feelings, anything like that. They just let it all flow out for everyone else to try and help them regulate. And that's not necessarily where you'd want to be either. You don't want to be the person who's constantly crying, who freaks out if something happens, who doesn't take any responsibility, doesn't help create structure, doesn't do the job of being in this area, the context of being a dad. Do the job of being a dad in terms of just like straight masculinity. They're the people that fall in line with everything. They just do what other people want. They don't have a backbone, they don't take responsibility for their actions. They are essentially, I don't know, sheep, I guess is what you would call them. They don't, they don't offer much, unfortunately. An example of this would be you see online the man who just sits there is maybe he's in an unhealthy relationship with a spouse or with a wife, and he just sits there and watches his partner do whatever they want. If they're verbally abusive to kids or they're hitting them or uh hitting, hitting you, right? Or they're being verbally abusive to you. They just sit down, they take it, they don't do anything, they don't stand up for what's right. They're too afraid to have a voice of their own. They just get emotional. This is also not a healthy version of masculinity in my mind. It's not a healthy version of being a dad. And so you've got these, it's not political. I don't want it to become something political, right, left. I don't really give a shit about that. But a lot of times you will see them fall more in line. A lot of times the people who are the super stoic, firm, you know, asshole type people, you see them being more prevalent on the right side of politics. And then on the other side, you see it more so with like the woke bluff, I guess you would say, is where you're kind of seeing a lot of this stuff. And for me, I don't want to fall in line with either one of these caricatures. You both of them have things that can be taken out of some of the core character aspects of them that can be utilized in your life to make you a good dad, to make you a good man, but you have to be the one who goes in and discerns that. You can't just take what other people say or what society's telling you or what social media is telling you. You need to be the one who goes in there and makes these decisions for yourself. And that's part of the reason why a lot of people don't want to go to the middle or they don't like having to do this because you have to think for yourself. You have to know yourself well enough to figure out what's the right path. No one can tell you which way to go. I'm not sitting here and telling you what you need to do or who you need to be. What I'm telling you is that we as men, we as dad, dads, need to actually take the time to sit down and think through this. Think through who we are, how we're presenting ourselves to our kids, to our friends, to our spouse, to everyone, to society. Who are we? And what type of men do we want to be? What type of fathers do we want to be? And these are the questions we have to ask. And guess what? It's difficult. It's hard to do. Sometimes it's really hard to sit down and look at yourself in the mirror and try to figure these things out. And sometimes we don't even think about it. I I know that I didn't think about a lot of these things for the longest time. It's a difficult thing to do, but it's it's of the utmost importance that we do it, especially for our family, especially if you're a dad and you're raising kids. You want to make sure that you understand who you are, what type of person you are, and that you can be a different type of person in different situations without calling it a compromise. It's not a compromise. It's called navigating life. That's the thing that a lot of people will push back on. It's not like you're compromising or you're settling or you're flip-flopping or whatever it is. I hear that a lot, is that, you know, if you're not, this is more so in politics again, which we're not going to get into, but like if you believe one thing and then you believe something that's on the other side of the line as well, and you hold those two as like as truths, so be like, oh, you're a flip-flop and you're just going back and forth through the line. But for me, it's more so like I'm a critical thinker and I'm taking the time to actually think about the things that I want to be prevalent in my life or who I want to be, as opposed

Finding Balance: The Middle Ground of Masculinity

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to just towing the party line, as opposed to letting someone else tell me what I need to think. Your family is gonna need different things from you at different times, and you have to be smart enough to figure out what it is. Sometimes they're gonna need a wall. Sometimes they're gonna need that strong, stoic person to be there, to be that foundation for them. Sometimes they're gonna need a goofball, someone who's just playing and being silly with them. Sometimes they're gonna need just someone to sit on the floor with them and listen and maybe cry with them and and share those emotions with them, right? And that's not a weakness, it's not a compromise. What it's called is being a dad, being a partner, being a spouse, being available for your kids and being strong enough to know that that doesn't make you weak. So let's dive in a little bit into each one of those that I just talked about, right? The stoic, strong portion, the silly goofball, crazy one, and the emotionally available one. I know that for me, there are definitely times in our lives where your family looks to you to be the strong one. And it doesn't mean that you don't feel things or that you're not letting them see that you have emotions or that you're not emotionally available, right? The strong stoic one, the strong stoic portion of you as a dad, as a man, comes out when it needs to. And a lot of times when it's needed is when things are so crazy and hectic that your family, that your spouse, that your kids are looking towards you to be this solid, stable rock that they can have a base on. And that doesn't mean that you're not feeling all of these things inside, that you're not emotionally distraught, or that you're not scared, or that you're not angry, or whatever it may be. But the the kids especially they look to you to

The Role of a Stoic Father

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be that person that can provide the stability that they need. Right? You're at a funeral, grandma died, and the kids are emotional, their world is turned upside down. This is probably the first time that they are ever experiencing death on this type of level. And it may be hard for you as a dad, and I'm not saying that you can't have some tears, you can't have anything like that, but to be completely hysterical or to be completely emotional is not what your kids need. And unfortunately, sometimes your needs and your wants and your desires need to be put on the back end. Not that you don't deal with them, not that you just hide them or cover them all up. You should let your kids know if you're sad or if you're angry and all of that stuff, but it's the ability to filter some of this stuff out. Your kids, your family, they need you to be able to protect them from some of the things when it's appropriate, when they're not emotionally able to handle what's going on right now, or they're not at the age where they're able to process that. Having a strong person that they can rely on is important to them. Or if there's some sort of emergency going on, they don't want to look up and see dad freaking the fuck out. I've talked about it before. They want to make sure that dad is calm, cool, and collected because if dad's freaking out, then that means we need to freak out. And they just they go nuts. It doesn't make the whole situation better. So there are these times where you should be the strong stoic father, that you should be the person who is taking the brunt of whatever's going on and protecting your family, your kids, your spouse from some of the things that are out there. That's part of your job, that's part of being a man. And you don't do it all the time, and this is where your choice comes in is like, hey, you pick and choose where those are most appropriate. It's also important to be strong because unfortunately, this world is full of real shitheads and some real bad things. But your job as a dad is to be there, to be strong, to protect your kids. That's part of our jobs as dads, as men. So I know that that's important to me. And I maybe put more emphasis on that because I have very strong protective instincts. You don't have to do that all the time. It doesn't have to be for everything. But for me, being strong, being physically capable, being able to handle a lot of these things, those are important to me. Those are important to me for me to be able to utilize those when it's necessary with my kids, with my family. Which

Embracing Goofiness in Parenting

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takes me into the next portion. This is a part where a lot of people who are strong, who've got strong discipline, who like to be the stoic leader, this is where they struggle a lot of times. And it's the the goofball portion of you. It's the part that can be goofy, that can be silly with your kids, that can go and wrestle with them, or make funny noises, or make funny jokes, or, you know, lay on the ground and let them jump on you. Whatever it is. It's different for every family. And we all have, I mean, unless you were just born uh the most serious person in the world, a lot of times when we're younger, we're able to tap into this silly aspect of us ourselves. We're able to tap into this goofball aspect of us that really starts to dwindle as you get older and you get more responsibility. It's like that childhood part of yourself that essentially dies as you get older. Being able to tap back into it, it's important for your kids to see that. It's important for them to be able to connect to that. They're going to be silly, right? Uh, I've got a six-year-old and a three-year-old. They think fart jokes are funny. They like to just make silly noises, they make jokes that don't make any sense whatsoever. And when they feel the most seen is when I'm laughing with them, when I'm being goofy, when I'm being silly, when they feel like they can be themselves in front of me. Kids like that. Kids like to be goofy, kids like to have fun, they like to laugh, they like to do all of that stuff. And if you're always so serious, you're gonna miss out on a whole aspect of your kids' life that, in all honesty, provides some of the best memories and also provides some of the best connection that you're gonna get with your kids that they'll probably pull back on when they're older. You want your kids to hang out with you when they're older. We'll make them like you when they're younger. That's, I mean, part of our job is to take care of our kids, but we also want our kids to like us, right? I know I do. I want to make sure that when I'm older and I've got grandkids, that I'm not having to sit there and beg my kids to come and hang out with me, that I want they want to come and hang out with me, that they have fond memories playing with their dad, and they want their kids to have fond memories playing with their grandpa, who can be silly, who can be fun, can be strong when they need you to be, but at the same time, can be this silly, goofy, fun person to be around. And that's a portion that a lot of these stoic dads or stoic men they miss out on. They're not able to tap into this very easily. And then the last part is actually the one that I struggle the most with. It's the being emotional, being emotionally available to your kids, letting them see you cry, letting them see you be sad, explaining to them that you got angry, and letting them know what's

Emotional Availability and Vulnerability

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going on, sitting with them in their emotion, letting them have that emotion and you just being there and helping them get through it. To me, I'm a I'm an Enneagram eight, I don't like vulnerability, and this is the portion that I've struggled with the most, and probably the one that I will struggle with the most for the remainder of my life is how can I ensure that I'm providing this emotional availability to my kids? Make sure that they get what they're needing. I'm still working on it now, but being able to show them, like, hey, I'm sorry, I got upset. Sometimes dad gets upset, I made a mistake. Or when I'm sitting down and watching a movie with them, if I start crying, you know, I do. Sometimes I get emotional with movies, I get sentimental. And I've tried to hide it a lot in the past, and I still do to an extent. I'm not sitting there crying hysterically, but letting them see that this is uh tears of joy, or it makes me sad because it reminds me of something. Letting them know that dad's not just a goofball or a stoic, strong person, but also a person who has real emotions and that it's okay, especially for me. I've got boys. I've got three boys, and I want them to know that it's okay to have emotions. I'll teach them about regulation. That's part of our jobs too, but letting them know that it's it's okay and it's not weak to have emotions. It's actually a weakness to not. Be able to tap into your emotions. It's a weakness to not show some of this vulnerability because you don't feel comfortable enough with the people around you. And that probably means that your relationships are at a surface level, which is a weakness, in my opinion. And I mean, part of this is I've felt like this for a while that I'm a very critically like critical thinker and reason and all that stuff. But I've always believed that emotions are some of the most strong. Emotions are some of the strongest things that we can experience as human beings and can actually push people to do things that are well beyond our capacities. But emotions can also drive you down roads that don't lead you into good places. If you let your emotions lead the way solely, it's not a good thing. If you're only driven by reason, it's not necessarily a good thing. You're going to miss out on big aspects of your life. And to me, controlled chaos is the most powerful thing you can have. Being able to tap into your emotions and utilize those emotions and feel them while also thinking logically and reasonably, that's a great way to move forward, in my opinion. I've always thought so in

The Balance of Strength and Emotion

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sports. Utilizing your emotions to make a big tackle, but not so emotional to where you go out of control and cause a bunch of penalties and cost your team the game. Now you need to learn how to do this. Is it easy? Absolutely not. It's not easy. But being a man, being a dad, these aren't easy things to do. They're hard. That's why a lot of times people just pick one lane and go down that, because that's the easy route. The hard route is to actually sit down and figure these things out, have these conversations, and then to make those the example that you portray to your kids. Because our kids are always watching. They're always watching what we're doing, even if they don't want to listen to you or what you're saying, they're always watching. They're paying attention. They see how you are, they treat people the way that you treat people. And it's our job to show them this aspect of being a man, of being a dad, of what it's like to be a human being. We have a lot of different areas in our lives that we're working on. We've got emotions, we've got silliness, we've got strength, fear, anxiety. All of these things are present. And we're the adults, and it's our job to help filter it, but to also show our kids that these are the things that are going to happen in life, to prepare them for the fact that this is going to happen to them as well. And not to tell them exactly how they should be, but to give them the framework that they need to become the person that they want to be. And hopefully you've given them enough context and you've given them enough example to where they try to be the best person they can be, that you're setting them up for success in the future, not so that way you can tell them exactly who they should be, but that they know the type of person that they would like to be and they can work towards that, just like all of us should. And so I'm not sitting here telling you to change who you are or to fundamentally be completely different or to drop all of your beliefs and values. All I'm really asking is for you to take a look internally of what type of masculinity you're portraying, or what type of dad you're portraying, or if you're not a man, if you're, you know, a woman, like this can apply to you as well. It doesn't have to just be singular to masculinity. I'm sure there's a whole episode that we could do on femininity too, and like the different extremes that they've got. Take a look at yourself. Take a look at what your strengths are, how you portray yourself. And if you are just kind of towing one line, or if you're only showing one aspect of yourself, look deeply, think about who you want to be, who you want your kids to be,

Creating a Well-Rounded Legacy

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and make the changes that you need to to ensure that that's happening, that you're showing this full picture of what it's like to be a dad, what it's like to be a man. And hopefully you're gonna be setting yourself and your family up for a great life. Because that's really what it is. I was gonna say success, but who knows what success is. Success is different for each person. And to me, it's more so like what is the way that we can have the best life that we're able to have on the short amount of time that we have left on this planet? That's what I want. And I want to be able to leave a good legacy with well-rounded kids who treat people respectfully, can be strong for their family, and can be goofballs and can be emotionally supportive to their spouses and to their kids when they're older. There's not just one way to be strong, in all honesty, and not all types of strength are created equally. Just having pure physical strength, to me, that's not enough. To be the strongest dad, to be the strongest man that I can be, I need to be strong in the different areas of my life. Know when to show emotion, know when to hold things back, and know when to be a silly goofball. And that's what I'm working on, to show my kids a complete picture of what strength really is. So that will do it for this week of the Unhinged Father podcast. I appreciate all of you being here and listening. Um, I am trying to get a little bit more consistent with the episodes. It's been very difficult with a newborn and with kids, we've been very busy, but I am going to try and get at least one out every two weeks. Maybe eventually I'll get back to once a week. But I hope that this is helpful. As always, if you know someone that you think would benefit from this episode, from this message, what I talked about here, I urge you to share it with them. Text it to them, whatever it may be. Send it to someone in your life that you think would be uh benefited from this. If you have any questions or concerns or thoughts about the episode, I'd really love to hear from you. There is a little link in the episode description that's send a message about the episode. It'll send a text message directly to me. Apparently, you can leave voice messages now too. Thank you, Buzz Sprout. But I would love to hear from you what your thoughts are, where you think uh I should do my next episode on. If there's anything that you want to hear me talk about, please share that with me. And then lastly, I don't typically ask for this, but I I have seen growth with the podcast. And I really would appreciate if you do like the show, if you're a listener, please go and subscribe on Apple Podcasts or on Spotify or wherever you listen and leave a five star review. It really does help get the show get out to more people that maybe wouldn't see it any other way. Uh, but other than that, I really appreciate all of you again being here. Have a fantastic rest of the week, and I will see you all next time.