The Phallusy, A Penis in Five Parts: Part Three: Getting Screwed!

Scientist: Dick bug.
Other scientist: No.
Scientist: Penis beetle.
Other scientist: No.
Scientist: Cock roach.
Other scientist: OK, sure.

It’s taken me a very long time to accept and believe that I’m enough. But even more, oh, so much more, I’d like to believe none of it matters. That I’m enough no matter what. But, in this series of essays, I’m talking specifically about a man’s body. My body. My penis.

There is nothing more embarrassing for me to talk about. Or more difficult. Truly. But I need to. And if I need to, maybe others do as well. And the work is hard (no pun intended). The messages out there are not going to change anytime soon. And they are everywhere.

In many ways, We’re Screwed!

But fuck it. Fuck all of it. Fuck what the media tells us, advertising, marketing, merchandising, music, movies, don’t even get me started on porn. It’s all just a huge crock of shit. Maybe it’s mostly the Western world, maybe mostly the U.S., I kind of suspect that it is, that the rest of the world isn’t still in middle school and has more relevant ways of measuring worth. But I grew up in the good old U. S. of A. and in my sad mind…

Size matters (I hate that phrase. I hate that I even had to write it.) I even used to lie about my shoe size, because you know what they say about men with big feet.

Why would I hate my body, or any part of it? Because I bought the bullshit. BODY SHAMING. Shape and size glorifying and shaming. I know I’m not alone by any means. Loads of men and many or most women live with their own body-shaming. Without question, women get slammed so much harder than we men do. They can hardly escape it. Until recently, you never saw anything but thin, trim women in advertising, sometimes frighteningly so. And if it was geared toward a male audience, they were also big breasted. Advertising is becoming a bit more inclusive of different body types and colors and sexual orientations, but, oh, we have such a long way to go. And so much to repair.

It’s all bullshit! We’re told that there is a “perfect” way for us to be. That there IS an ideal. The Big Picture says that the best “ideal” to be is young, white, moneyed, educated, straight, and fit. And male. And for the sake of these essays, speaking just physically, we’re told a person’s pate should be full of hair, their penis large, their vagina small and shaved, their breasts perky, their ass firm, their belly flat, and on and on.

There was a rhyme I learned in 9th grade that was for the girls to chant for the boys’ benefit.

We must, we must, we must increase our bust.
The bigger the better, the tighter the sweater,
The boys depend on us.

I was fifteen and I thought boobs were as great as the next guy. But I also heard in that bosomy mantra the message of what I would need to be for the girls to depend on me. As for women, so they say for men, “the bigger the better.”

Everything around me seemed to endorse for boys and men that…

We must, we must, we must all have large dicks.
The bigger the better, will make her much wetter,
The girls all love big pricks.

Are you there God? It’s me, Cooper.

We’re taught that we are not enough. That we need to be other than ourselves to be happy. It’s all around us. Huge industries reliant on making us feel less than, and that we’d be better as someone else. An ever newer and improved version of ourselves. There’s always a brighter and better way to make ourselves more beautiful and more desirable. More perfect. More ideal. The ideal.

When I first moved to LA, twenty plus years ago, I picked up the main local independent rag, the LA Weekly. A terrific publication for local happenings and stories on the Greater Los Angeles’ people and events. It was also free, paid for by advertising. Law firms, real estate, strip joints, plastic surgeons. Those four pretty evenly foot the bill. Covering the entire back page in full four-color was an ad for a plastic surgery center. In big bold letters the caption above the barbie doll of a model read, “You’re in LA! Why Not Be Beautiful?”

The message was clear.
1) As your self, you are not beautiful.
2) With our help, you could be.

I can’t speak with any real authority to the woman’s experience of body shaming, and I know my struggle pales by comparison.

BUT, my struggle is also real. And I don’t think I’m alone.

“You’re in LA! Why not be beautiful?”

Oh really? Go fuck yourself!

But I bought that crap, hook, line, and sinker. Yeah. Bullshit.

One thing that really sucks about this struggle of mine, is that I, of course, carry it with me into relationships. And not just into relationships with women. It only makes sense that my insecurity has to have also affected my relationships with men. Making comparisons to build myself up or tear myself down or tear others down. How stupid and sad is that?!

Beginning with my earliest memories, long before I was tuned into media, I looked to my dad and other men to learn what mattered, what to value about people and relationships. And too many of the men I watched and listened to came from the same school of keen observation as my father. They ogled. They leered. They rubbernecked. Hell, I did too. But, it’s about what it taught me. They joked about big penises and small penises. They objectified women and men alike.

I was a thirty year old virgin when I married, and as such had had no experience to tell me otherwise, that my body, my self, as it was, was perfect. Was good. Was enough. Nothing to tell me that maybe it was less about my body and more about my mind and my heart. About what happened before I even got to sex that would make it good. I had a lot of work to do.

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Part Three: Getting Screwed! is the third in a five essay series, The Phallusy: A Penis in Five Parts, actor Cooper Thornton’s lifelong journey to accept, love, and celebrate every bit of himself. The WHOLE package, especially including the “package” part of the package.

Thanks for reading. In many of my essays I mention or go into depth about my journey with depression. It’s helped me to know that I’m not alone. If you or someone you know struggles with depression, talk about it. Help remove the stigma. You can call any one of the hotlines out there or visit a very helpful site like youfeellikeshit.com. Please know you deserve care and love and that even though it seems there is no light at the end of the tunnel, the darkness will pass.