Man Hugs

Urban Dictionary is generally regarded to be a source of amusement. Such concepts such as a Cleveland Steamer, Tennessee Log Jammer and Dirty Sanchez were brought into the public eye by the website. However, conceptually speaking, Urban Dictionary is an immense assessment of the English language. I have encountered individuals in my life who are offended by the word "gay". Understandably so, as this word is usually said with very negative connotations by people in the heterosexual community. However, the classical definition of the word is "happy". Why then, does nobody in our modern society use the word that way? Simply put, if 99% of the population which uses a language uses a word in a different way than it traditionally is used, isn't that linguistically accurate? Language is a living thing that grows and changes over time.

Urban Dictionary provides the following definition for the word "Bro":

Obnoxious partying males who are often seen at college parties. When they aren’t making an ass of themselves they usually just stand around holding a red plastic cup waiting for something exciting to happen so they can scream something that demonstrates how much they enjoy partying. ... They often wear a rugby shirt and a baseball cap. It is not uncommon for them to have spiked hair with frosted tips.

This is the common definition of the word bro. I live on a college campus, and therefore have a chance to observe the behavior of bros quite frequently. The other day I was forced to halt my walking down a particular hallway while two bros hugged very animatedly and obviously in front of me before laughing and walking in opposite directions. I laughed at them before I realized that was exactly their intent. The sole purpose of the encounter was to get attention and hopefully amuse those who observed it.

A hug, for me, is a very non sexual expression of affection. It also occurred to me that although women can hug other women and men without anybody thinking twice about it, men are unable to engage in such preposterous activities. It seems to me that there are only two types of men who hug other men. Those who do it for amusement and those who do it to legitimately express appreciation and affection. This is an extremely simple classification, but it is important to look at why each class chooses to act the way they do.

We have established that the bros do it for amusement, but they also do it because of society places a taboo on heterosexual men showing emotion at all. In fact, they cannot express their love for another man without being outcast by the other men who are afraid of the same fate. And thus the problem persists. Most men, and even most people in today's society lack the emotional maturity to observe such things in themselves.

The other group of people simply do not care about what society says about the action. This is composed primarily of the very young, and the elderly. They do not care about what society says.

In conclusion I hope that we can all take note of our basic feelings and express our thoughts and emotions as mature people. We all must coexist in the same world, why would we spend all our time worrying about what others think about us, when we could be working together to achieve happiness.