Making The Man: Militarized Masculinity & The Queer Glitches The Promise Military masculinities can produce complex trauma in male soldiers––even for those who are seemingly welladjusted. Men are expected to represent the utopian nation-state as they join and participate in their ranks… and they are expected to remain in the same idealist (abled, heterosexual) state once they are no longer military personnel.1 The military promises that men can become the “realest” and most authentic version of themselves through their resources.2 It claims to provide the unique resources to build an ultimate masculine identity defined by “emotional control, overt heterosexual desire, physical fitness, self-discipline, selfreliance, the willingness to use aggression and physical violence, and risk-taking.”3 This military promise, however, essentially collapses in on itself as war in fact cultivates disability and queerness (of a general sense) by opening up Herbert Andrew Paus. The United States Army builds men. Apply nearest bodies to debilitation recruiting office / Herbert Paus. United States, 1919. Library of Congress. and interdependence.4 With the inevitable failure in upholding the mandatory personal and social standards of ideal military masculinity (not “manning up”) often comes the experience the psychological distress and of being associated with the not-masculine which is often categorized as feminine, disabled, and queer. As dictated by military masculinities, men must continually reject from themselves and others all that is considered not-masculine––if not, they risk becoming what is viewed as abject in their community.
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