Washington Post Profiles Former Football Star Working to Promote a Healthier Vision of Masculinity
“McPherson grew up thinking most of his inner struggles centered around race. He figured they were about being a Black quarterback and attempting to break barriers. Later, he realized the source was mostly masculinity.”
— Jerry Brewer, Washington Post
| For Don McPherson, a former college football star and NFL veteran, it all comes down to our failure as a culture to offer boys and young men a positive vision of manhood capable of standing on its own.“We don’t raise boys to be men,” McPherson said in a recent profile by sports columnist Jerry Brewer in the Washington Post. “We raise them not to be women.”¹
McPherson, who now works with sports teams, the military, and other traditionally male-centered institutions to prevent gender-based violence, is featured in our new film You Throw Like a Girl: The Blind Spot of Masculinity, based on his book of the same title. In the film, McPherson draws on his football career to show how outmoded cultural definitions of manhood can reinforce sexism, misogyny, and a culture of silence around men’s violence against women. He also details the devastating damage these cultural norms can do to boys and men themselves. “We have to realize that, while maintaining the status quo might not hurt us now, we are hurting our sons by clinging to it,” McPherson says in the Post piece. “They will not have the example and the methods to adapt to change.” You Throw Like a Girl, directed by Peter Hutchison and Lucas Sabean, the team behind our acclaimed new release Healing from Hate: Battle for the Soul of a Nation, is now available via streaming, on DVD, and can be watched through your university or public library on the Kanopy streaming platform. To see if your university subscribes to Kanopy, click here. |
“Don McPherson directly engages with young men and with a culture of violence, empathizing with and meeting young people where they are. A wonderful addition to courses on sex and gender, violence, culture and sports.”
— Dr. Heather Hlavka | Associate Professor of Social and Cultural Sciences, Marquette University
“Poignantly reveals the mental and physical harms of traditional American masculinity, [and] illustrates what becomes possible when boys and men are able to fully realize their humanity beyond rigid masculinity norms.”
— Joseph Derrick Nelson | Author, Unjust Resilience: Black Boyhood, Academic Success, and the Middle School Years and Assistant Professor of Educational Studies at Swarthmore College
“Compelling … powerful … thoughtful and inspiring.”
— Marianne Schnall | Author, What Will It Take to Make a Woman President?
“Groundbreaking. A powerful resource for engaging young people—especially young men—in potentially life-changing dialogue about the complex interplay between ideas about ‘manhood,’ sexual assault, and men’s emotional, physical, and mental health.”
— Jackson Katz | Creator of the Tough Guise video series
“Today more than ever, young men hunger for new models of masculinity. Don McPherson, long a national leader in expanding public discussions of gender, violence, relationships and intimacy, illuminates a pathway for boys and men toward a healthy, life-enhancing and egalitarian future. You Throw Like a Girl will quickly become a foundational educational resource for high school and colleges courses, sports teams, and other organizations.”
— Michael Messner | Professor of Sociology and Gender Studies, University of Southern California
“Perfect for classroom use to inspire critical thinking and spirited discussion about gender relations generally and masculinity in particular. I highly recommend it!”
— James W. Messerschmidt | Distinguished University Professor of Sociology, University of Southern Maine
