0123: Okay, fine, Heated Rivalry then

In other news, I'm making a feeble attempt to keep up with the cultural zeitgeist by watching Heated Rivalry this week.

It's not Breaking Bad or Six Feet Under or The Wire. If you're watching it in that context, you're guaranteed to be disappointed. It's not "art." It's not "serious." It's entertainment. And as entertainment, it succeeds spectacularly.

I feel like there are way more lesbian love stories in popular culture than gay male ones, and I suspect there are lots of reasons for that: women are allowed to be sexy and vulnerable with each other in ways that men just can't, there are far more out gay women in sports (and elsewhere) than out gay men, hence more role models both positive and negative, it's just a different field that women are playing on. So to speak.

But a show like HR was inevitable, and it's hitting so well right now for a bunch of reasons, many of which have nothing to do with the show itself, or the actors, or the storyline.

Two years ago, multiple members of a Canada's national Junior hockey team were tried for a group sexual assault against a young woman. Many of those players are now in the NHL (some after a short time away), and their careers, pointedly, did not end over this. And this is hardly the first time that there's been a sexual assault scandal at the highest levels of hockey specifically. This feels like a bit of a market correction to that.

There's a reckoning with the toxic masculinity of the last, god, fifty years? A hundred? What "being a man" means has been distorted to the point where a lot of guys are unable to express themselves in any meaningful way, have no way to make friends with other guys, and sometimes go years between tendernesses.

This isn't a "woe is me" thing -- it really isn't -- but a lot of men have nowhere to go for emotional honesty. Something has to change. If this is the thin end of that wedge, then hell yes.

(I won't go into the greater political climate, but that's absolutely part of this too. None of this is happening in a vacuum.)

But this show is hitting right now for a lot of fun reasons, too. If all you do is march in protest and watch stormtroopers take over neighborhoods and kidnap children, it's going to deform you.

The stress of the world, especially in North America, has got to be let off in lots of different ways. You need to get some humanity, some vulnerability, something a little impulsive and joyful to put in your mind from time to time, or else you go nuts.

Watching Hollander and Rosanov work so hard to stay connected to each other in the face of fame and pressure is a good message, y'know, for the kids. All the nekkid hockey butts are just a bonus.

Look, it's not that deep; when in doubt, find the things that make you happy, and then be as happy as you can. Play the game you love. Love the people you love, as best you can, and as best as they can accept that love from you. Feed yourself; not just food, but basic humanity.