Video Transcription

Mancave: Artclass AKA Opening Up

What are we doing here, sir? Sir, what are we doing here?

In today’s art class, we’ll be doing blind drawings of each other.

Should the hood be on or off?

Off. Otherwise, I’ll look like Darth Vader or something.

I’m actually pumped for this! I am terrible at art—like, awful at it. So I just want you to know whatever I draw of you is not an actual representation of you.

Thank you, I appreciate that. You’ll look far better than this.

Okay, well, we’ll see. Hang on. So, it looks like you…

I love Sharpies. We weren’t allowed Sharpies in my school.

Why not?

Because people would steal them and tag.

Oh, really? Can you hear that? High school?

Yeah, what about you?

What was high school like?

I ended up having an okay time. I wasn’t really myself though. I was a really sensitive, quite shy kid when I was younger, and I hid that a lot by becoming the jokester—just learning how to do banter and stuff like that.

Terrible at sport.

Hated the Beep Test.

Yeah, drama kid—not a kid that liked drama. You liked being a part of the drama class?

Drama class. Important stuff to know.

Yeah, what about you?

I hated school. I’d muck around, wag.

Wagged?

Oh yeah. I just didn’t belong, and I think a lot of it came from the fact that when I went to high school, I didn’t go to the same schools as my primary school friends.

At the end of the year, my family moved house, and I went 40 minutes away to a new school.

That’s a hard time to come in, when everyone’s friendships are already established.

Yeah, and maybe they’ve known each other since primary school. So you go like, “Good luck cracking into that.” And then, obviously, being different—visibly different—just made it harder.

As I said, I think in reflection, I get to learn that there were people—even in those times—like teachers who were like, “Hey, I’m here to help you and support you to get to where you want to go.” I didn’t know what I wanted, but I get to reflect on that and be really thankful for those trying, because sometimes we get a bit lost thinking, “Oh, no one’s here,” but actually, they were.

I think what was interesting for me was realizing that whole thing of, “Hurt people hurt people.” I got bullied or ostracized or made to feel different because I was a bit more sensitive.

But from that happening, I was like, “Great, the way I can feel better about myself is to tease other people.” I had this perception that I was this hard-done-by, sensitive, nice person. But on reflection, I went, “Actually, some people wouldn’t have that perception of me.”

That was a big thing for me around high school—just that cycle of, “Okay, I’m going to tease him, and then he’s going to tease another person.”

Did you think the teasing was like a level of banter that went too far?

100%. I can remember a specific time—my friend Andy and I would have been in year 8—where the only way we really communicated was with banter.

But one day, he just kept going, and I had this moment where I cried. I remember being in the hallway and asking, “Do you even want to be my friend?”

He was like, “Yeah, of course. What do you mean?” He was surprised that I was having an emotional reaction. Neither of us knew how to tell each other we were good mates.

It exhausted me, but I didn’t know there was another way to do it. It wasn’t until the end of high school that I was like, “Oh wow, I can actually build friendships through honest conversations without having to make a joke every two seconds.”

When I started at the new school in year 10, I was the easy target.

Partway through that year, a new student came along. This young man was just new and just took everything from everyone. I remember piling in because I was like, “If they’re doing it, I’m going to pile in on this.”

So much so that he opened his family’s house to invite people over. He wanted to be accepted.

Unfortunately, the banter went so far that he didn’t see any other way out. He took his own life.

In that period of time, I didn’t accept it for what it was. But as I’ve gotten older, I think, “Man, maybe I contributed to that.”

It was that whole cycle of, “Hurt people hurt people.” I was hurt and damaged by what people said about me. I just wanted to deflect it in any way I could.

Yeah, hurt people hurt people.

Sheesh. Wow. Thanks for sharing that. I think what a lot of the boys are dealing with in class and at school is the same as when I was in high school.

I feel for them.

I didn’t know what being a man was supposed to look like. I was never going to reach that. This idea of masculinity was just killing me.

I see the boys struggling with that. I think social media is putting more extreme pressure on this, especially around body stuff.

Seeing what they’re being exposed to now—like going to the gym and getting big—that wasn’t a thing for us.

It was sporty, but not like that specific.

And it’s just amplified now. It’s unrealistic. Everything we see is manipulated—lighting, filters—and those unrealistic expectations just create more pressure.

Man, everyone looks different.

Art class is coming to an end. Please present your drawings.

So, I started with the head, which again was very circular.

That’s not how you look.

Nope. Perfect teeth, by the way.

Can I get a score from our teacher, please?

James, you get a C-.

Doy gets an F because they shaded.

I’m out of here.

To be fair though, it’s really good. I’m done.

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