I’m not a regular listener/watcher of The Pivot Podcast, but the men behind it get some good exclusives and their interviews often make headlines. Simone Biles’ husband Jonathan Owens made his terrible comments about men and marriage on the Pivot Podcast in late 2023, and I think the Pivot hosts have a real knack for getting famous men to admit some weirdly toxic thoughts and beliefs. Speaking of, Anthony Mackie was a recent guest on the pod, and his comments about men and masculinity are getting a lot of attention. Just FYI: Mackie has four sons with his ex-wife Sheletta Chapital. His sons’ ages are between 15 and 8.
On raising four sons: “I keep my boys humble. Like my boys have never had a pair of Jordans. My boys don’t do all that internet fly sh-t. I could be the biggest star in the world. Do not let me catch you being stupid…. My oldest gets it, my 15-year-old. He tell the other ones, he’s like, ‘Yo, don’t make dad mad.’ Once you get one that’s right, he’s going to straighten the other ones out.”
The death of the American male: “So, it is just that thing of… in the past 20 years, we’ve been living through the death of the American male. They have literally killed masculinity in our homes, in our communities for one reason or another. But I raise my boys to be young men. And however you feel about that, you feel about that. But my boys will always be respectful, they will always say “yes sir” and “yes ma’am”… they will always say “thank you.” They will always open the door for a lady. They will always make sure that their mother is provided for. They will always be men.”
The oldest is the man of the house: “Every time I left for a job, I tell my 15-year-old, ‘You’re the man of the house. You make sure these doors are locked. Every night this alarm is on. You text me or you call me every night before you go to bed and you wake up.’ I love that because we’re men.” Mackie believes all the “money” and “celebrity” in the world “means nothing” if he’s “not there to protect” his family.
On European men: “So, for me, it’s always that idea of American masculinity is very different. You feel it when you go to Europe, you see these [motherf–kers] and you’re like ‘I could bust your ass, boy.’ You go to Europe and [they’re wearing] those tight-ass pants. Boy, you better lotion your ankles.”
I’m including the video below and I have it cued up to this section on American masculinity. Let me say that I think it’s a much more loaded conversation when a Black man is talking about masculinity, and there’s obviously a much deeper history which intersects with racism in America, the legacy of physical and financial oppression and the waxing and waning of respectability politics in modern America. I think if Mackie was speaking solely about how he enforces his own ideals of respectability and masculinity on his sons, it would be less of a conversation. But Mackie is, like, consciously tying that conversation to “the death of American masculinity.” Which is something of a talking point in right-wing circles, that no one will “let” men be men, that masculinity is in crisis because women have rights or something. The sh-t about European men is so weird too. There are some moments here where Mackie comes across as somewhat toxic.
Photos courtesy of Avalon Red, Cover Images.
