The Terminal Perpetuation of Masculinity

                                                                 Doug Vogt / ABC

The press praised his struggle against terminal lung cancer–his “uphill struggle,” his “aggressive chemotherapy”–as the battle of a legendary hero (“Peter Jennings”). They stood, misty-eyed, in awe of his “realism, courage and firm hope” because he lived his last months with the same strength and independence that had made him famous. In the press’s eyes, ABC news anchor Peter Jennings was a man to salute. He was tough, a fighter to the bitter end. His knowledge was his arsenal, his assurance an indestructible shield. And in farewell tribute to a man of all men, the world knelt its respect to an exemplar, a fallen hero. Peter Jennings: a true man unto death.

The media glorified Jennings’ masculinity, chiseling his life’s legacy in stone. They defined his life heroic by his adherence to masculinity’s norms: winning, emotional control, dominance, self-reliance, the primacy of work (Kahn 143). However, his terminal prognosis seemed a direct refutation of this masculine tradition. Terminality implied that he could no longer dominate, that his strength was to no avail. It stripped him of his ability to work and his power to control, forcing him to depend on others for his care. Finally, it damned him with the knowledge that he would lose the fight for his life. And the world celebrated Peter Jennings. They celebrated him because he fought. They celebrated him because he stood strong. They celebrated him because he kept the dignity of an untouchably, unfailingly masculine man.

Peter Jennings’ media coverage illustrates that popular culture honors perpetual masculinity. Media and literature hail such a controlled, strong and dominant man as a paradigm of the real-man tradition. If he deviates from this masculinity at any time, the public identifies the deviation as a loss: he has moved away from the man he once was. Thus, masculinity is to keep its dominant status through a terminal prognosis.

Even as terminal illness strips men of their traditional dominance and control, media and literature pigeonholes their terminally ill subjects into the masculine norms of healthy men. Its viewers take the popular images as the norm to emulate, and when the terminal prognosis comes, these norms of emotional control, dominance and self-reliance can hinder a man’s end-of-life closure and care. The gay man’s emotional openness about terminal illness offers a counterpoint to terminal masculinity, a different point of view that may help ease the last journey.