Question 1: The documentary reveals the myriad roles fathers play in shaping their sons’ ideas of masculinity. Pick any 2-3 specific instances and analyze how these roles may be changing over time. Link to a global issue.

In the documentary, at 20:00, there is a man who was grown up without having his father during his childhood. He says struggled how to be a man, especially in middle school as he didn’t have a father figure in the process of growing up. He says because of that, he wasn’t the most masculine of men and got bullied at school. From here, we can see that father figures in the process of growing up at a young age is very significant to build the common masculinity in society and the lack of experience with the father figure can cause a lack of common masculinity which can cause social problems such as becoming a target of bullies. This also suggests that the common masculinity is taught by the father figure in childhood for children to protect them as Joe Ehrmann’s father taught Joe how to throw jabs and punches and how to be strong, powerful, tough, and the best when he was growing up. On the other hand, we can see that common masculinity is something that stresses many boys in their childhood as the documentary shows. This misdefined common masculinity is a global issue and something that should be vanished in order to protect people who don’t value that masculinity.

Question 2: Do you think that the documentary is accurate in its portrayal of this topic?  Why/why not?

In my opinion, this documentary is accurate in its portrayal of this topic because it has interviews of almost all types of men who have experienced challenges towards masculinity during their life. Often a documentary tends to focus on one specific person and usually, the person has a very special and limited case/situation which doesn’t apply to most of the viewers. However, The Mask You Live In has interviewed many different people from children to elderlies, different races, with different gender identities. And the part I most liked is the interview of an ordinary white man who has gone through ordinary childhood with masculinity (around 10:20). His family is normal with no financial problems. He just experienced the pressure of masculinity as he was grown up. This man’s case applies to most of us which is very important because viewers need to feel connection with the issue in order to understand the issue fully in my opinion and The Mask You Live In did that very well.