I am a huge fan of Parks and Recreation. It is a show I’ve watched in its entirety three times through. I have a lot to say on the value of the show, and how it stands out compared to other TV comedies, and even how it relates to my beliefs about God. But that isn’t for this post. This post is yet another profile in positive masculinity, focusing on perhaps the most masculine person I can think of: Nick Offerman.
As with my previous profiles, I’m not going to go through all of Nick Offerman’s life and work, but rather I’m going to highlight a couple of elements of his life and work that I think exemplify positive masculinity. But first, as always, a manly picture – which for Offerman is not hard to find:
Not only is Nick Offerman the ridiculously appropriate narrator for The Adventures of Tom Sawyer the audiobook, but he has written a number of books himself – Good Clean Fun: Misadventures in Sawdust at Offerman Woodshop, Gumption: Relighting the Torch of Freedom with America’s Gutsiest Troublemakers, and Paddle Your Own Canoe: One Man’s Fundamentals for Delicious Living. He is, often intentionally I think, almost a living parody of manliness. Smelling of whisky, flecked with sawdust, robust mustache or full beard, and just wafting androgen wherever he goes. Offerman’s success seems to come from embracing himself. I didn’t realize how similar he and his Parks and Rec character were until after the first time I watched through the series, and wanting to learn more I looked up the various actors and people connected to the show. He reminds me of Teddy Roosevelt, and is one of the only people alive today who could say “Bully!” to describe something positive unironically.
I think of Ron Swanson as one of the best type-castings in TV history, and it’s fun to learn about how much Ron Swanson became like Nick Offerman. The Libertarianism was already present in the character, but he was expanded to include Offerman’s love of woodworking, red meat and Lagavulin whiskey. Scenes in Ron Swanson’s workshop on the show were shot in Nick Offerman’s actual workshop. (This didn’t make it into the show, but he and I share a love of the Chronicles of Narnia and the Lord of the Rings. As if I could love the guy more!)
In an interview with A.V. Club, he even reflects on his relative masculinity, something he also discusses in his books:
I think it’s fascinating that I receive attention for what people perceive to be a level of manliness or machismo, when amongst my family of farmers and paramedics and regular Americans, I’m kind of the sissy in my family. But when I arrive in Los Angeles in the entertainment community, and I use implements like a shovel and a hammer, our society has distanced itself so far from working with its hands that those incredibly pedestrian skills are perceived as somehow being extraordinary. I think the whole thing is kind of sad, honestly, in the same way that our civilization—particularly the consumers of pop culture—has grown so used to an emasculated, bare-chested leading man that something like simply growing a mustache can impress people. [Laughs.]
For such a manly man, Nick Offerman also has a lot of Feminist friends, including of course Amy Poehler. In interviews, he is open in his insistence on the necessity of Feminism. He also insists on the necessity of self-reliance. He’s kind of a Libertarian Feminist, which is not a creature one meets everyday.
He wants to inspire people to treat each other better, and he knows that to do that, you need to lift up the experiences of the oppressed and disadvantaged. Here, in his own words:
Honestly, in the case of Nick Offerman, I think his masculinity is unassailable (even without a mustache), and his positivity is immediately apparently in his acting, writing, interviews, etc. I probably should have started with him, but, you know, hindsight and all.
When I thought through these profiles, and talked about the phronemos, the Aristotelian exemplar of wisdom, I hadn’t realized how much I considered Offerman to be a phronemos, not just of positive masculinity, but of wisdom in general. I look forward to reading more of his writings, and learning more from Nick Offerman, today’s profile in positive masculinity.
>unfinished 