Unexpected Masculinity In an Impossible Cave Rescue
How men you might not call masculine did something literally no one else alive could have, teaching me a lesson in masculinity
In June 2018 a soccer team of 13 boys went missing in a cave in northern Thailand. The world held its breath for 18 days until the boys were successfully rescued. The path to and the peril of that rescue are expertly described in the new National Geographic documentary, The Rescue, produced by the same team that gave us Free Solo, the Alex Honnold climbing documentary.
The story is beautifully told, but what I found in the inspiring documentary was another kind of inspiration: A triumph of masculinity in making the impossible happen, saving lives in the process. Watch my video as I bring out the untold and unexpected lesson of the cave rescue--how masculine men prepare to be useful to their community, to take personal risks, and to accept responsibility for those risks and their effects on others.
For me this is all just another lesson in the long line of thing I have yet to learn about masculinity. In the Year of Living Manly, I learn from the masculine men in America what it really means to be masculine. It's not what I thought, and I bet it's not what you think. And the story of the Thai cave rescue illustrates much of it very well.
Resources:
The Rescue main page: https://films.nationalgeographic.com/the-rescue
All Thirteen, highly recommended book describing the rescue including a Thai perspective: https://soontornvat.com/books/all-thirteen/
Figures from the video:
