The Modern Man

Last week as I sat in a restaurant, something caught my eye, as I was gazing across the Mediterranean themed interior a group of gentlemen were standing at the entrance, waiting for a table to become available.

The gentlemen were, I presumed, by the constant ogling of the reasonably attractive waitress, heterosexual and they were physically impressive specimens; with muscles appearing from places where I once believed muscles didn’t exist. They were dressed in an array of garments that were either too small or barely covered their torsos; from tiny little T Shirts with the words hype or swag, or cocaine and caviar, to other items of clothing such as string vests’, one man was wearing a cap that was balanced on top of his head, another was wearing shorts and a vest, yet he wore a woolly bobble hat, it didn’t make any sense.

They all seemed airbrushed, they were all a dark shade of orange, like an ear waxy colour and were covered in abhorrent tattoos all over their arms and legs, one man had a tattoo of a women’s face on his neck.

Now I’m not some sort of recluse or an old bloke stuck in a young mans body, I’m a 21 year old lad, I’d like to think my self as modern, I go out to clubs and bars and I even sometimes watch Made in Chelsea. So these types of men weren’t alien to me, but what I saw next was just down right ridiculous and made me question the current state of the male species.

After I had analysed their choice of clothing, I glanced up at their head region, their hair was, of course, pruned and styled with products and sprays, a couple had different variations of the classic 2 back and sides, whereas others went for the completely absurd shaved perm cut, or as its more commonly known, the fuzey. But what struck me the most, and left me slightly aghast, was their eyebrows, their eyebrows were just; well, like something I had never seen before. They were so thin, almost non-existence, and the protruding brow ridges looked almost swollen, it just didn’t look right, for these huge blokes to have the tiniest little, girly, eyebrows.

This made me question the modern man, and whether this neologism of metrosexuality, that half of heterosexual men claim to be, has gone too far.

Ever since journalist Mark Simpson coined the term metrosexual 20 years ago, the male grooming craze has boomed, with the male skin care market being reportedly worth an estimated £600m.

Within the gay community, grooming has always been prominent, and of course female’s have used natural and unnatural products to enhance their appearance for centuries, but traditionally straight men would find caring about what they looked like narcissistic and effeminate, nowadays if you don’t look like a ken doll on steroids you’re somewhat in the minority.

Also there is a strong correlation between the men who look like this and the men who stand at bars drinking iced shorts with straws, taking selfies, prancing about and groping attractive women because they are on a mission to ‘pull’ for ‘man points’ or ‘gains’ or whatever.

The whole package of this current breed of male is disturbing me as a young man in the 21st century. Everywhere I look there is more and more of them, doing their hair in car windows and drinking defecate coloured drinks, it’s starting to become an epidemic and worst of all the women seem to love their vacuous smiles and their basketball jerseys.

So as I sat looking at these men, it made me wonder what the next step the male species will take to go further, to look better, and to become doppelgangers of their ‘Geordie Shore’ idols.

It’s a very worrying thought.

Dominic Hewitson