Michael Ian Black Is A Man Who Eats Salads (Reheat)

Why does eating alligator seem more manly than eating chicken? Is coffee more “masculine” than tea? This week, comedian Michael Ian Black talks with Dan about manliness, and how it relates to food — a conversation they have as Michael decides to order salad at a pizzeria.

Speaker names marked ? are inferred from speaking time and the show’s known hosts — they are not voice-verified.

• 0:00Dan Pashman?

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• 0:42Dan Pashman?

  There are so many easy weeknight recipes using Lando Lakes cheese and butter that bring delicious restaurant taste right to your table. From chicken parm to weeknight shrimp pad Thai, Lando Lakes has plenty of quick dishes that'll have the whole dinner table talking. Visit landolakes.com/reцепes/collection for easy weeknight dinners.

• 1:03Dan Pashman?

  Hey, everyone. Dan here with another Sporkful Reheat, and this one was requested by listener Dan in Chilmark, Massachusetts. This is a great request. I always love this episode, but here's why Dan wanted us to play it.

• 1:14Speaker 01

  I thought of requesting this episode during a visit to Ithaca, New York. I took my son and his friend there to visit Cornell University. They're both 18 years old and gearing up for college next year. During our visit, I took them on what I called a pilgrimage to Moosewood Restaurant. Even though I'm not a vegetarian, Moosewood has been a huge influence on my style of cooking. During our meal, I noticed that we were the only men in the restaurant. So I asked my son and his friend, are men allowed to be vegetarians? That got us talking about masculinity, and it immediately brought me back to your episode with Michael Ian Black.

• 1:52Dan Pashman?

  This is an episode that I think has stuck with me and affected the way that I think about gender and masculinity and femininity and different foods and the things we map onto those things. It's the kind of episode you're not going to forget. So I'm really excited to pull it out of the deep freezer and share it with all of you. Remember that there's an episode you want us to share from the deep freezer. Drop me a note at [email protected].

• 2:14Dan Pashman?

  And before we get into it, some quick notes on Michael Ian Black. He has continued with lots of different projects since I spoke with him. His podcast Obscure is still going strong. He's got a Substack finally called Michael Ian Black. And he's got a regular gig on Roy Wood Jr.'s CNN comedy news show, Have I Got News For You? When we taped this episode, Michael still lived in Connecticut, but he's since moved to Georgia. Now, quick heads up that this episode does contain explicit language and discussions of body image, and it begins with strong opinions about pretzels. Here we go.

• 2:42Speaker 02

  I like a thin, crispy, or thin-ish crispy pretzel. I don't like the very flat pretzel chips. And I eat it in the manner of a lumber mill processing lumber.

• 2:53Dan Pashman?

  Yes, that's how I do, right. Do you do like a bundle or you do one at a time?

• 2:57Speaker 02

  Oh, God, one at a time, always one at a time.

• 2:59Dan Pashman?

  No, you gotta get a few to maximize crunch.

• 3:01Speaker 02

  That's never gonna happen. That's never going to happen.

• 3:14Dan Pashman?

  This is the Sporkful. It's not for foodies, it's for eaters. I'm Dan Pashman. Each week on our show, we obsess about food to learn more about people.

• 3:26Dan Pashman?

  Michael Ian Black first got famous in the 90s as a cast member on the MTV sketch comedy show, The State. Since then, he's starred in a bunch of TV shows, including Another Period on Comedy Central and movies like Wet Hot American Summer. He's also written more than 10 books for both adults and kids, including Naval Gazing, True Tales of Bodies, mostly mine, but also my mom's, which I know sounds weird. Yes, that's the whole title. He talks a lot in that book about body image and aging. He's also hosted a long-running podcast called Mike and Tom Eat Snacks with his friend, Tom Kavanagh. Michael is a deep thinker, including about snacks. He has even more to say about pretzels.

• 4:02Speaker 02

  I eat pretzel sticks in a very specific way. I do not deviate from that. So I go in, go in, go in, then I kind of hold them in my mouth, go in, go in, go in, with another one. So I'm bundling now, but just one at a time. And then there's something texturally very satisfying to me about swallowing the sort of mostly chewed pretzel, but not entirely chewed pretzel. So I'm sort of feeling it descend into my larynx and down into my stomach.

• 4:28Dan Pashman?

  Do you ever get like poked on the inside?

• 4:30Speaker 02

  Yes.

• 4:30Dan Pashman?

  And you enjoy that?

• 4:31Speaker 02

  I don't enjoy the poke. Like you have to be, like you really have to be masterful about this.

• 4:36Dan Pashman?

  I actually eat my pretzel sticks the same way, like the wood chipper approach, although I put multiple sticks in my mouth at once and chomp, chomp, chomp them down. But my, my, what I don't love about the pretzel sticks, they feel they have a bad ratio of exterior to interior because so you get a lot of salt on the exterior without much unseasoned inside to counteract that. So they're very salty.

• 4:56Speaker 02

  I like a very salty chip.

• 4:57Dan Pashman?

  Okay.

• 4:57Speaker 02

  That, that is a real problem with me. That is, that is enhancing my bloated appearance.

• 5:02Dan Pashman?

  Yeah, retaining a lot of water.

• 5:03Speaker 02

  A lot of water. It's a real problem.

• 5:08Dan Pashman?

  To meet up with Michael, I took the car ferry from where I live on Long Island, across Long Island Sound to Connecticut where he lives. Michael and I are both suburban dads, a little older and chubbier than we used to be. We're domesticated and I wanted to connect with him on that suburban dad level. So I wanted to eat with him at a place he likes to go with his family. He picked a pizzeria called Tuzi Piazza. So, um, so where are we here, Michael? Set the scene for us.

• 5:36Speaker 02

  We're in one of the country's only Jazzeries. I think that's what they're still calling it.

• 5:42Dan Pashman?

  They, I did notice that sign.

• 5:44Speaker 02

  Yeah, it's a jazz themed pizzeria here in the wilds of Connecticut where I live.

• 5:50Dan Pashman?

  Michael and I started off comparing the dinner routines in our respective households. He says most of his fights with his wife happen around that time of day.

• 5:58Speaker 02

  Sometimes it's the cleaning up. Sometimes it's the, uh, going over the events of the day, which can lead to bickering. It really could be anything.

• 6:09Dan Pashman?

  Sometimes I run into an issue because I, I, I like to cook. My wife's a good cook also, but I'm more the one who enjoys it.

• 6:16Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 6:17Dan Pashman?

  Which is a double edged sword because it means that.

• 6:19Speaker 02

  You then become responsible for it.

• 6:21Dan Pashman?

  Responsible, which that I can live with. It's more that like, there's a double edged sword to caring about the food.

• 6:28Speaker 02

  Right.

• 6:29Dan Pashman?

  Because on one hand, I get pleasure from putting effort into a meal and having it come out well and having my, make my family happy. On the other hand, like sometimes like they're just coming, they're rolling in the door at 5:30 and they need dinner at 5:31. The kids walk in the door cranky. My wife's been dealing with them, so she's cranky understandably. And I've spent the past hour like trying to craft this meal that I think is going to please all the differing constituencies that I need to please and, and it will be delicious for us. And then when they come in and no one's in a good mood and half the, and the kids don't want to eat the thing I made, then I fall to pieces.

• 7:01Speaker 02

  That's right. You're devastated at that point. Because you've given everything.

• 7:04Dan Pashman?

  Right.

• 7:05Speaker 02

  And all you want is their approval.

• 7:06Dan Pashman?

  Right.

• 7:07Speaker 02

  All you want is their love, ultimately. And the way that they can show you their love is by enjoying your creation.

• 7:12Dan Pashman?

  Right.

• 7:13Speaker 02

  And when they don't do that, it's like they're rejecting you.

• 7:15Dan Pashman?

  Right. So how do I deal with that?

• 7:18Speaker 02

  You leave them.

• 7:23Speaker 02

  You say, I'm going out for a bag of cigarettes and you don't come back.

• 7:26Dan Pashman?

  You say, I'm, instead of interviewing Michael Ian Black in New York City, where I am frequently, I'm going to choose to take a boat to Connecticut.

• 7:32Speaker 02

  That's right.

• 7:33Dan Pashman?

  I won't be back for weeks.

• 7:36Speaker 02

  It's a rowboat to Connecticut.

• 7:41Dan Pashman?

  Your kids are teenagers now, right?

• 7:42Speaker 02

  Seventeen and fifteen.

• 7:44Dan Pashman?

  Who does more cooking in your house?

• 7:48Speaker 02

  Quantitatively, my wife. Qualitatively, me.

• 7:53Dan Pashman?

  Would she agree with that statement?

• 7:54Speaker 02

  Probably. Like last night I made dinner and she, we, we, we were just on vacation in a foreign land. And when we returned, really all I wanted was something simple because we'd been eating at sort of fancy-ish restaurants for the last 10 days. So I just basically threw some chicken in the oven and some salad and some rice. And she was upset with me because I hadn't planned a, a sort of a more ambitious dinner. But I didn't want a more ambitious dinner. And as it happened, it was exactly, it was perfect for me.

• 8:26Dan Pashman?

  What about for her?

• 8:28Speaker 02

  Not my problem.

• 8:30Speaker 02

  And this is, this is a perfect example of the kind of quarreling. It wasn't a quarrel. She, she gently admonished me. And then I got defensive.

• 8:42Dan Pashman?

  That's why sometimes it's better not to care.

• 8:45Speaker 02

  Right.

• 8:45Dan Pashman?

  Because if you, like, I would not have gotten, so this, I, the story I told you is one that this is what happened to me last night. I cooked dinner, the kids came back, they were coming back late from camp and they were, they're always exhausted after a day at camp. And so never in a great mood, which puts, whoever parents are with them not in a great mood, understandably. And I was emotionally invested in the meal I had prepared and I can't.

• 9:08Speaker 02

  What did you make?

• 9:10Dan Pashman?

  Nothing super special, but my younger daughter has really like has gotten pickier and pickier.

• 9:16Speaker 02

  How old is she?

• 9:17Dan Pashman?

  Five. And I, so I really, she'll basically eat pasta and I really took it upon myself like I'm gonna try to do something creative. It's gonna get her to eat a little something with some nutritional value. And we had leftovers from a barbecue from the weekend. Leftover corn and leftover grilled zucchini. So I said to myself, here's what I'm gonna do. I'm gonna make a big batch of pasta. I'm gonna split it.

• 9:44Dan Pashman?

  I'll take half of it and add grilled zucchini and corn and some Parmesan cheese and olive oil and salt and that'll be for my wife and me. I know she'll like that. I know I'll like that. My daughters won't want grilled zucchini in their pasta. But I didn't want to just give them pasta with cheese and sauce. So I took the corn, which my younger one has been eating a little bit of. I took it off the, the.

• 10:06Speaker 02

  Cobb.

• 10:07Dan Pashman?

  Cobb, thank you for the, and I was like, I'm gonna, I'm gonna have an elaborate game to get them really into this meal. I melted butter and I said, you're gonna get to paint your food. And I gave them a food brush and I said, here's the butter. You can paint it on the, the corn in the bowl yourself. It's, you'll have, it'll be interactive and it will taste good also. And they'll eat some corn. But I was very worked up that this strategy was gonna work. I put a lot of pressure on myself. And when they came in already cranky and the younger one said, I don't want this, I got upset. And then my wife, Janie was just like, I'm just gonna go sit in the living room because no one in this table is in a good mood right now.

• 10:49Dan Pashman?

  I did get the younger one to eat some corn. She did paint the corn and she did eat some of it. And so that felt like a small victory, but not without effort.

• 10:56Speaker 02

  It's all you can get. It's a look with a five-year-old, that's what you're gonna get. You're gonna get small victories. Congratulate yourself on being a great father.

• 11:03Dan Pashman?

  Really?

• 11:03Speaker 02

  Sure. You got her to eat a little corn. You did better than your wife did.

• 11:09Speaker 02

  She removed herself entirely from the situation.

• 11:15Dan Pashman?

  Should we go up there and order some pizza?

• 11:17Speaker 02

  Yeah, I can't. I don't think I can eat pizza.

• 11:19Dan Pashman?

  Okay.

• 11:19Speaker 02

  But I'm gonna get something.

• 11:20Dan Pashman?

  So you picked a pizza place and now we're not gonna eat pizza?

• 11:22Speaker 02

  I picked the pizza place before I had been to France. And before I realized that I was gonna come back from France feeling morbidly obese. So I feel like I need to, to do a little better.

• 11:36Dan Pashman?

  I know that at one point in your life, your waist size and length on your pants was 30, 32.

• 11:41Speaker 02

  That's right.

• 11:42Dan Pashman?

  And then it went up to 32, 32.

• 11:44Speaker 02

  Yes.

• 11:44Dan Pashman?

  Where is it now?

• 11:48Speaker 02

  I don't know.

• 11:52Speaker 02

  I don't know. I think it's probably still around 32, 32. I'd like it to get, I'd like it to get down to about 15, 32.

• 12:01Dan Pashman?

  That sounds very healthy.

• 12:03Speaker 02

  Oh, no, I have a very healthy body image, clearly. I'm doing great.

• 12:09Dan Pashman?

  Do you remember when you first started to be aware of that?

• 12:11Speaker 02

  Well, for a long time, I thought I was too skinny. And then one day, I was too fat.

• 12:18Speaker 02

  Probably around 40, 41, 42, somewhere in there. And part of me is like, Michael, you're, you're rapidly closing in on 50. Like, chill out, calm down. Like, it's not gonna get better for you. So maybe just be all right with it. I can't.

• 12:36Dan Pashman?

  So we live in similar sort of areas, these sort of distant suburbs, and I feel like, but we, you and I both also kind of like go into the city for work somewhat regularly and, and the body images and body types that you see when you're in the city versus when you're in the suburbs.

• 12:51Speaker 02

  Right.

• 12:52Dan Pashman?

  Radically different.

• 12:53Speaker 02

  Right.

• 12:54Dan Pashman?

  So I, I try to like hang out with the suburban dads.

• 12:57Speaker 02

  Much better.

• 12:57Dan Pashman?

  Yeah.

• 12:58Speaker 02

  Much better strategy. Those guys gave up a long time ago.

• 13:03Dan Pashman?

  By, by that metric, I feel like I'm doing great.

• 13:05Speaker 02

  Oh, you are.

• 13:06Dan Pashman?

  You know?

• 13:07Speaker 02

  By that metric?

• 13:08Dan Pashman?

  Right.

• 13:09Speaker 02

  You're very handsome.

• 13:13Dan Pashman?

  It's funny because coming to see you, so I have two pairs of sneakers.

• 13:16Speaker 02

  Okay.

• 13:17Dan Pashman?

  I have my like cool city sneakers and my suburban dad sneakers.

• 13:20Speaker 02

  Uh huh.

• 13:21Dan Pashman?

  Um, they're both New Balance sneakers, but one are kind of like funky and they're like the old, the retro New Balance ones. And the other ones are just kind of like jogging shoes for someone who doesn't jog.

• 13:30Speaker 02

  Right.

• 13:32Dan Pashman?

  And I was really torn which to wear to come see you.

• 13:34Speaker 02

  Wait, let me see if I can identify just by looking at them because I'm not sure I can tell a funky pair of New Balance from a not funky pair.

• 13:39Dan Pashman?

  I think you'll be able to tell.

• 13:40Speaker 02

  Oh, those are funky.

• 13:41Dan Pashman?

  Yeah.

• 13:42Speaker 02

  I like those blue suede sneakers with yellow netting atop it. And then where the laces are, it's a, it's a, it's a, it's a kind of a sky blue, orange tongue, red laces. Now that sounds like a riot of colors, I know, but when viewed all together, somehow inexplicably it works.

• 14:02Dan Pashman?

  Thank you. But then I, you know, I was on the boat to come here and I thought to myself, why am I putting on Airage for Michael?

• 14:09Speaker 02

  Well, the, the rest of you doesn't look that great. I mean, the F U V T-shirt. I'm not, I'm not blown away by, I mean, it's all right.

• 14:19Speaker 02

  Some shitty shorts you're wearing.

• 14:23Speaker 02

  It was really all about the sneakers for you.

• 14:25Dan Pashman?

  Yeah, yeah, but, but I was like, part of the reason I wanted to interview you here, sort of in your natural habitat, is because like, I feel like we have this kind of like suburban dad.

• 14:34Speaker 02

  Uh huh.

• 14:35Dan Pashman?

  Commonality. And so I was like, I should have just shown up in full on suburban dad mode.

• 14:39Speaker 02

  Is this not full on, the, the only difference would be the sneakers I'm guessing.

• 14:42Dan Pashman?

  No, this is one of my cooler T-shirts.

• 14:44Speaker 02

  Ooh.

• 14:47Speaker 02

  But we have to order because now I'm really hungry.

• 14:49Dan Pashman?

  Yes, yes, yes. Okay, let's order.

• 14:50Speaker 02

  Now, I like the pizzas here. I do, I do really like the pizzas and you'll see that they're jazz themed, a lot of them. So you've got like the David S. Ware, that was a jazz musician. The only reason I know that is because it's on the menu and so I'm just assuming.

• 15:04Speaker 02

  And I've gotten that one before. It's escarole, white beans, garlic, sausage, Parmesan, and chili oil over a light tomato sauce.

• 15:11Dan Pashman?

  That sounds really good.

• 15:12Speaker 02

  It is really good.

• 15:13Dan Pashman?

  I'm actually not a big meat on pizza guy.

• 15:16Speaker 02

  Okay. What about the contadino, which is a vegetable medley of mushrooms, peppers, onion, broccoli, and tomatoes? Too many vegetables?

• 15:21Dan Pashman?

  Too many. Because you put the vegetables on the pizza, they release water when they cook, and now the crust gets soggy.

• 15:26Speaker 02

  The thin crust feta cheese, plum tomato, hot oil, shredded mozzarella. I mean, I feel like that's a happy compromise, but maybe I'm wrong.

• 15:33Dan Pashman?

  I like that.

• 15:34Speaker 02

  I'm probably gonna get a salad of some sort. I think it's gonna be the Greek. I like a Greek salad.

• 15:39Dan Pashman?

  Let's do it. Thin crust pizzas with the feta cheese, plum tomato. Michael's decision to get salad and his concern for his waistline got me thinking about masculinity. It's something Michael has also thought about a lot over the last few years. Back in 2018, after a string of school shootings committed by boys or men, he wrote an op-ed in the New York Times called "The Boys Are Not Alright." Michael wrote that "it's not socially acceptable for men and boys to talk about emotion and vulnerability." And as a result, he says, quote, "Too many boys are trapped in the same suffocating, outdated model of masculinity, where manhood is measured in strength, where there's no way to be vulnerable without being emasculated, where a manliness is about having power over

• 16:21Dan Pashman?

  others." In 2020, he wrote a book on similar themes called "A Better Man: A Mostly Serious Letter to My Son." Michael writes about everything from his complicated relationship with his own father to the nuances of ordering coffee versus tea as it relates to manliness. He also talks about the rituals and posturing of traditional masculinity and writes, quote, "Manhood, or at least my manhood, is quiet and simple and straightforward." I was curious to hear how his approach to manhood relates to food. So I ordered pizza, but I don't like meat on my pizza. You ordered a salad.

• 16:54Speaker 02

  Right.

• 16:56Dan Pashman?

  And it's interesting to me that there's this idea that like meat is masculine. Eating a lot of meat makes you more manly.

• 17:04Speaker 02

  Yup.

• 17:05Dan Pashman?

  So when you go into a restaurant and order a salad for your meal, like, is that something that's going through your mind? Like, how do you, how do you feel about that?

• 17:12Speaker 02

  So one of the things that I have discovered is that masculinity is more or less, and I would say more, a language more than anything else. And the language is designed to sort out men by social status. And so every single thing that you do as a guy can be put on this scale of masculinity. So you can rank any food, as absurd as this is, by how masculine it is. So you could say, so you're talking about meat. Yes, meat, for whatever reason, and we could talk about the reasons, is more masculine than vegetables.

• 17:55Dan Pashman?

  Do you remember the first time you ordered a salad for your meal and felt okay about it?

• 18:00Speaker 02

  No. In my early twenties, when I was living in New York by myself, there was a Greek diner across the street from my apartment building. Every now and again, when I felt like I just needed to replenish my body in some capacity, I would get the Greek salad, whi- which is what I got today. And the Greek salad with chicken can be a very masculine salad. It's a kind of rustic salad. It's got a lot of ingredients.

• 18:24Dan Pashman?

  Especially there's grill marks on the chicken.

• 18:26Speaker 02

  Exactly. And so I never felt partic- actually, I shouldn't say that. Now that, I mean, I hadn't thought about this before, but I guess maybe I did at times feel like, oh geez, I'm ordering a salad here at this diner. Yeah, I think I did have a kind of consciousness about it.

• 18:41Dan Pashman?

  So, so would you, would you, especially when you were a little younger, would you have been less likely to order a salad if you were out with other guys?

• 18:49Speaker 02

  Probably. I probably would have been, yeah. I have a friend who had this exact thing. He's just a guy, just good guy, regular guy. And he was with a dude, a friend of his, they went out to lunch or something, and he ordered a salad, and the friend said something like, you want to purse with that? And my friend is like, are you serious? Like, are we really still going through this kind of like dumb ritualistic?

• 19:13Speaker 02

  Flexing of our masculinity over the fact that I just want some greens? On one hand, it's sort of like, oh, he's just making a dumb joke. On the other hand, yes, but it's so representative of something so destructive.

• 19:38Dan Pashman?

  Coming up, Michael and I get much more into this conversation. Why does eating alligators seem more manly than eating chicken? Why is coffee more manly than tea? And how do we move beyond this narrow definition of what it means to be a man? Stick around.

• 20:06Speaker 03

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• 20:11Dan Pashman?

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• 21:24Dan Pashman?

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• 21:40Dan Pashman?

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• 22:49Dan Pashman?

  Welcome back to another Sporkful Reheat. I'm Dan Pashman, and just a couple of weeks ago, I got back from my tour of Italy with Culinary Backstreets, and man, it was even more incredible than I expected. We ate spaghetti alla sasina, actually, two different restaurants back to back, so we could really taste-test the difference. We went to Leche, all the way down in the tip east, tip southern, eastern, farthest, most point of Italy. Not a lot of tours take you there, but we did, and we had so much fun. In fact, it was such a huge success that we're doing it again in 2025. The folks at Culinary Backstreets and I are teaming up to do another tour, retracing the steps that I went to for my research trip for Anything's Possible. You'll eat spaghetti alla sasina, you'll hang out with Silvestro Silvestri and cook together in Leche, you'll eat in Rome with Katie Parla. Space is limited.

• 23:32Dan Pashman?

  If you want to come on the tour in November 2025, head over to sporkful.com/events. Again, that's sporkful.com/events. Hope to see you there. Now, back to this week's reheat. Okay, back to my conversation with Michael Ian Black. Let's just pick it up where we left off. We had ordered, and we were talking about food and masculinity.

• 23:53Speaker 02

  You could probably very easily rank meats according to masculinity. So we would go, let's say buffalo is probably more masculine than cow. Alligator is probably more masculine than buffalo. Why?

• 24:09Speaker 02

  And you're not disagreeing with me, right? Like you're going, yeah, that seems right.

• 24:12Dan Pashman?

  Right. Well, it feels like it comes down to sort of like the aggressiveness of the animal.

• 24:16Speaker 02

  I mean, to my mind, that's exactly right. The reason you would say the alligators want more masculine meat to eat than buffalo is because the alligator itself is a kind of more ferocious or aggressive creature. I don't even know if that's true. It may not be than the buffalo. We receive it. Yeah. So we would have to, we would have to exert more energy or take more risk to kill the alligator.

• 24:39Dan Pashman?

  It's really like a dominance ritual.

• 24:41Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 24:42Dan Pashman?

  Because, because eating an animal is in some ways, it's like an expression of your dominance over it.

• 24:47Speaker 02

  Sure. So when you order a salad, you're just saying, I'm dominant over these plants.

• 24:51Dan Pashman?

  Right.

• 24:51Speaker 02

  And everybody's like, so what?

• 24:52Dan Pashman?

  That wasn't hard. Like, so you pulled lettuce out of the ground, that it put up a fight?

• 24:55Speaker 02

  That's right.

• 24:56Dan Pashman?

  So like the most manly thing you could eat would be like a T-Rex?

• 24:58Speaker 02

  Uh, no, the most manly thing you could eat would be a human that you stalked and killed. A human of greater strength than you.

• 25:06Dan Pashman?

  Hmm.

• 25:06Speaker 02

  A human man of greater strength than you.

• 25:09Dan Pashman?

  Right, right.

• 25:09Speaker 02

  So you get into this problem of defining your maleness as that of dominance. And so you can quickly see how that becomes problematic when you're dealing with other aspects of your life.

• 25:23Dan Pashman?

  How could this go wrong, Michael?

• 25:26Speaker 02

  Right. I, I don't think there's anything inherently wrong with being willful, being aggressive in certain situations, being competitive in certain situations. I, I don't think there's anything wrong with these ways of navigating our lives. I think there are big problems with if these are the only ways we navigate our lives and we don't allow ourselves as men to, to allow the possibilities of other avenues of expression and other ways of being.

• 25:56Dan Pashman?

  So what is it about the topic of masculinity that interests you so much?

• 26:03Speaker 02

  What I realized when I started thinking about it in a more serious way is that it had been a topic that had actually consumed me and my comedy for a long time. When I look back at stuff that I've done, a lot of it has been about subverting sort of traditional masculine ideas. And I think a lot of that has to do with growing up feeling kind of out of place with the way I was supposed to represent myself as a guy. I feel like a lot of guys feel like this. And a lot of times that gets mistaken, I think, for there's a kind of conflation between gender identity and sexual identity that may or may not be appropriate as the individual goes. In my case, it was never appropriate, although it was certainly conflated all the time.

• 26:48Dan Pashman?

  Well, even by your mom.

• 26:50Speaker 02

  Yeah, by my mom, who is gay or was gay, she's dead now, who thought I was gay and didn't want me to be gay because she was worried about how gay people are treated in the culture. I certainly understand that, having grown up in a lesbian household. But it was never a question for me, my own sexuality. My masculinity, or the way it expressed itself, was a constant question. This kind of masculine puffery that I just, I never felt comfortable with. I never felt like it was me. And so I spent much of my childhood adolescence into early adulthood trying to figure out, like, how do I navigate being a guy when I'm not this guy? And it took me a long time to just feel comfortable in my own skin.

• 27:33Dan Pashman?

  I agree with what you're saying.

• 27:35Speaker 02

  This tea is very good. Now, this is a very unmasculine tea. It's an organic green with coconut made from fresh brewed tea. And I drink a lot of tea. And if you want to rank these things, coffee more masculine than tea, black tea more masculine than green tea, green tea sweetened, probably the least masculine of all. That, of course, is what I'm drinking.

• 27:57Dan Pashman?

  But that is, is, there is, there is this, an idea that, that sweet things are,

• 28:02Speaker 02

  Yes.

• 28:03Dan Pashman?

  It's not surprising to me that I, that I think it's, I mean, you know, restaurant kitchens are notoriously sort of aggressive male spaces. But if there has traditionally been a place for women in male dominated kitchens, it is more often

• 28:17Speaker 02

  The dessert.

• 28:18Dan Pashman?

  The dessert. The pastry chefs are more often women, that, you know, the, the, the people cooking the steaks, not so much.

• 28:24Speaker 02

  Mm hmm.

• 28:25Dan Pashman?

  And so you can see how that bias can play out and, and can affect people's careers.

• 28:29Speaker 02

  Right, and you can also see how, just on this, sort of, the, the loose terms that we're defining it to this point, how people would get channeled into those careers. And less men are more likely to go into that because of the bias against sweetness. It's crazy, but that's the, that is the world we live in.

• 28:47Dan Pashman?

  But, you know, look, I, I, I agree, and I can, I, I agree that like, yes, there's a place for these impulses, that are, these natural impulses to a point, you know? Yes, it's demoralizing that we don't have more control over them than we do, and that it's, it's demoralizing that they remain such powerful forces in our society. But it's so deeply ingrained.

• 29:11Speaker 02

  Yes.

• 29:12Dan Pashman?

  And it's not just about like society's expectations. I mean, it goes back to before society. Like, this is some deep evolutionary shit. Like, we are hardwired. And it makes perfect sense, from an evolutionary perspective, that the men who are the most aggressive, the most eager to assert dominance over others, would be the ones who would, and this is not a good thing, but like, it's

• 29:35Speaker 02

  Most likely to repopulate, or continue to populate the earth.

• 29:38Dan Pashman?

  Right, exactly. So, so, so it would make sense that over millennia, that men would become more and more aggressive.

• 29:44Speaker 02

  Right, we have these impulses that we were talking about, these impulses of aggression and competitiveness and whatever. That we give sort of free rein to, or free your rein to. But we also, as men, have impulses of empathy, vulnerability, love, that we suppress and

• 30:05Dan Pashman?

  Cause they're not considered manly.

• 30:06Speaker 02

  Exactly. And so when everything that you're doing in the language of masculinity ranks you on a scale of least masculine to more masculine, and where you fall on that scale determines a lot about your social standing in the world. And you see that the sort of more aggressive, hyper competitive, whatever people are rewarded in terms of being viewed as more masculine, it only follows that you would then suppress those things because you're worried about your own social standing. And that's, it becomes self reinforcing. Oh, wow. Thank you very much.

• 30:38Dan Pashman?

  That's a beautiful looking Greek salad right there, Michael.

• 30:40Speaker 02

  Yes, I was just presented with my salad and my gosh, tremendous. Thank you.

• 30:47Speaker 02

  Now traditionally, like a diner Greek salad would be mixed together. This is sort of segregated, so I've got all my feta on one side, followed by my red onion, carrot.

• 30:56Dan Pashman?

  It's almost like there's a pile of lettuce and then there's stripes of ingredients. There's a stripe of cheese, a stripe of carrot.

• 31:02Speaker 02

  Gorgeous. And this is gorgeous looking pizza.

• 31:03Dan Pashman?

  This pizza has got big cubes of feta and also the shredded moths. This is basically just like a giant, it's like a dough disc covered with a lot of cheese and a lot of spicy oil.

• 31:14Speaker 02

  That's right.

• 31:15Dan Pashman?

  And a little bit of tomato sauce.

• 31:16Speaker 02

  It smells very good.

• 31:21Dan Pashman?

  The crust is very nice. It's got a nice, light crisp to it. It's not doughy.

• 31:26Speaker 02

  They do a nice job at Tuzi Piazza.

• 31:27Dan Pashman?

  Yeah. The, the, the first half of each slice is a little, the crust really got soggy.

• 31:32Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 31:32Dan Pashman?

  But I think that's more.

• 31:33Speaker 02

  That's the thin crust. That's the problem with the thin crust. You're taking that risk.

• 31:36Dan Pashman?

  Well, I, I would suggest that maybe it's, it's a fault with the recipe.

• 31:39Speaker 02

  Hmm.

• 31:40Dan Pashman?

  Not the, I think, I think it's a great crust, but it just can't stand up to this much liquid. I think they should cut out the fresh mozzarella and just do like feta, tomatoes, chili oil. A lot of oil has been released and so it's very flimsy. I think I'm going to go fork and knife here. I think there's actually a, I think that there's a masculinity bias even with pizza.

• 31:58Speaker 02

  Absolutely.

• 31:58Dan Pashman?

  I think that there's something with like, that it's somehow considered. More effeminate to use a fork and knife.

• 32:02Speaker 02

  Of course.

• 32:03Dan Pashman?

  That's like a sign of weakness.

• 32:04Speaker 02

  You can rank every aspect of every single fucking thing by what's more masculine or less masculine. I'm looking at the pizza. I would say feta cheese, for whatever reason, is slightly less masculine than mozzarella cheese. Why? I don't fucking know, but I feel like that's right.

• 32:21Dan Pashman?

  Right, yeah. Well, i- i- partly because I think there's just an idea that it's like fancier.

• 32:26Speaker 02

  Yes.

• 32:27Dan Pashman?

  You know, like, like, but, but eating with your hands is perceived as more masculine.

• 32:31Speaker 02

  Far more, because it's more primal.

• 32:32Dan Pashman?

  Right. Basically, like, anything that's more caveman-like is considered more masculine.

• 32:36Speaker 02

  Right. Anything that's a little more continental or European.

• 32:39Dan Pashman?

  Right. Or like evolved.

• 32:42Dan Pashman?

  Is considered weak and effeminate. I feel like the title of this episode is gonna be, Michael Ian Black is a man who eats salads.

• 32:50Speaker 02

  Yeah. I eat a lot of salad now.

• 32:52Dan Pashman?

  Yeah.

• 32:53Speaker 02

  Because of my deep, uh, body issues, which are entirely related to issues around masculinity.

• 33:00Dan Pashman?

  How so?

• 33:01Speaker 02

  When I was young, younger, young, I'm no longer.

• 33:06Speaker 02

  I thought I was too skinny, which has its own problems in terms of masculinity, because you don't have kind of the muscle definition that it's become associated with masculinity, which is a fairly recent development, by the way. Like, if you look at, like, Superman from the George Reeves, who played Superman in the 1950s and 60s, he just looked like, he's just a dad bod. Just looked like a dude, you know, maybe a little bit bigger, but he didn't have like that kind of like Dwayne The Rock Johnson muscularity.

• 33:33Dan Pashman?

  Right.

• 33:34Speaker 02

  That is kind of demanded of men now, if you really want to be kind of masculine, masculine. Uh, a lot of guys, skinny guys, feel very emasculated by their physiques, and I was one of those guys. Like, I just didn't, I never filled out in, in my mind, in the right way. And then one day I woke up and, you know, I had a little gut and I was in my 40s and I was like, oh, now I'm morbidly obese and I need to do something about this. And, you know, it kind of presents its own problems.

• 34:01Dan Pashman?

  But it's interesting that, that you did not say to yourself. I have arrived.

• 34:06Speaker 02

  No.

• 34:06Dan Pashman?

  I have a fat gut. I'm a man now.

• 34:09Speaker 02

  No, no, no, because my vanity, my own male vanity doesn't allow it. Um, which is another thing that we don't talk about as guys, which is our vanity. And men are vain, but vanity is associated with women, but we're not given permission to express those same anxieties. Like if as a guy, I walk in and I say, I feel really fat today. Like, that's a very kind of mock worthy thing to say to a group of guys. And they're, they're certainly not gonna be like, oh no, you look great. Harold, you look great.

• 34:41Speaker 02

  Like, that's just not gonna happen.

• 34:42Dan Pashman?

  Right. There's almost an idea that, that the most macho thing you can do is to be like fat and ugly.

• 34:48Speaker 02

  Right.

• 34:49Dan Pashman?

  Like, like to not care how you look.

• 34:51Speaker 02

  Exactly.

• 34:51Dan Pashman?

  To, to be overweight, to be dressed like a slob, to eat with your hands. And then that's the, the, that's how you are the most manly.

• 34:58Speaker 02

  Right. The kind of Harvey Weinstein model of masculinity, which is I'm just a fat slob and I don't give a shit. I take what I want and I eat what I want and I fuck what I want. And it's all the same thing. It's all the same. Sort of giving into kind of these primal urges that you were talking about and not giving a shit what anybody thinks or says or does about it.

• 35:17Dan Pashman?

  Right. Which, which brings us back to, uh, the dinner issues we had in my house last night, you know? The idea that like, sometimes it's better not to care about your food. Which in, which in a way is its own type of masculinity. Being like, fuck it. I don't care. Whatever. Just throw some food on a plate. I'll eat it. As opposed to like, I'm gonna make it look pretty.

• 35:38Speaker 02

  I'm gonna plate it well.

• 35:39Dan Pashman?

  It's gonna be plated. I want to get nice grill marks on my zucchini, you know?

• 35:44Speaker 02

  Not caring is more masculine than caring, which is terrible, but, but true.

• 35:51Dan Pashman?

  Right.

• 35:51Speaker 02

  But absolutely true. Well, I shouldn't say that. Certain things that you care about are very masculine. If you care about a sports team, very fucking masculine. If you care about your business and that's all you care about and you're driven by it, very masculine. But, and we all know this is true. The thing that matters the most, for example, are your kids, your spouse.

• 36:15Speaker 02

  But caring about those things with the same intensity is somehow not viewed as masculine. I mean, men are viewed as masculine if they're seen as being protectors of their family.

• 36:26Dan Pashman?

  Right.

• 36:26Speaker 02

  Guardians.

• 36:27Dan Pashman?

  Providers.

• 36:28Speaker 02

  Providers, but not nurturers.

• 36:30Dan Pashman?

  Right.

• 36:31Speaker 02

  And as fathers, we need to nurture. We need to be present in our lives, in our kids' lives, excuse me, in a way that they know that we're there, we're present, we're listening, we're available emotionally, and that we're modeling the kind of behavior that will hopefully make them turn out to be decent human beings.

• 36:52Dan Pashman?

  Well, Michael, thank you so much.

• 36:53Speaker 02

  Thanks for lunch.

• 36:54Dan Pashman?

  I'm an admirer of your work.

• 36:55Speaker 02

  I mean, you haven't offered to pay for it, but I'm just assuming you will. Thanks for lunch.

• 36:59Dan Pashman?

  I will pay for it.

• 37:05Dan Pashman?

  That's comedian and actor Michael Ian Black. If you want to listen to more podcast episodes with Michael, check out his show Obscure. In it, he reads a novel in its entirety. And the great thing about it is Michael's never read the book before, so he's reacting in real time. And it feels like you're right there, too, just hanging out with him. It's really fun. Subscribe to that show and The Sporkful in your podcasting app. This episode was originally produced by me, along with Anne Sanni and Aviva DeKornfeld. We had editing help from Rob McGinley Myers and Dan DeZula mixed the episode. This update was produced by Johanna Mayer and mixed by Jared O'Connell. Our team also includes Emma Morgenstern, Andres O'Hara, and Tracy Samuelson. Music help from Black Label Music. The Sporkful is a production of Stitcher. Our executive producers are Peter Clowney and Daisy Rosario. Until next time, I'm Dan Pashman. And we're the fries from?

• 37:50Speaker 04

  Abilene, Kansas.

• 37:52Dan Pashman?

  Reminding you to eat more.

• 37:54Speaker 04

  Eat better.

• 37:55Dan Pashman?

  And?

• 37:56Speaker 04

  Eat more better.

• 38:09Dan Pashman?

  The team that produces The Sporkful today includes me, along with managing producer, Emma Morgenstern. And senior producer.

• 38:14Speaker 05

  Andres O'Hara.

• 38:15Dan Pashman?

  Our engineer is. Jared O'Connell. The Sporkful is a production of Stitcher Studios. Our executive producers are Nora Ritchie and Colin Anderson. And hey, did you know you can listen to The Sporkful on the Sirius XM app? Yes, the Sirius XM app, it has all your favorite podcasts, plus over 200 ad-free music channels curated by genre and era, plus live sports coverage. Does your podcasting app have that? And there's interviews with A-list stars and so much more. It's everything you want in a podcast app and music app all rolled into one. And right now, Sporkful listeners can get three months free of the Sirius XM app by going to siriusxm.com/sporkful. Until next time, I'm Dan Pashman.

• 38:56Speaker 03

  This podcast is supported by Nurtec ODT, Remedy Pant. We know you didn't ask for an interruption, but migraine doesn't wait for the right moment to interrupt either. It just barges in, takes your time, and throws everything off. So when migraine takes your time, take Nurtec. It's for the acute treatment of migraine with or without aura in adults. Nurtec can provide pain relief in two hours, which can last up to two days. Ask your healthcare provider if Nurtec is right for you, because your time is for you, not migraine. Don't take if allergic to Nurtec ODT. Allergic reactions can occur even days after use. Get help right away for trouble breathing, rash, swelling of face, mouth, tongue, or throat. High blood pressure and Raynaud's syndrome can occur. Get help for high blood pressure, numbness, coolness, pain, or color changes in fingers and toes.

• 39:42Speaker 03

  Common side effect is nausea. For full prescribing information, call 1-833-4-NURTEC or visit Nurtec.com. All right, back to your podcast, playlist, or whatever's keeping you going today. What do I gift my mom and nieces?

• 40:03Speaker 03

  Oh, Dad loves music.

• 40:11Speaker 03

  And my coffee-obsessed bestie?

• 40:16Speaker 03

  All those great brands at Walmart? Who knew?

• 40:21Speaker 03

  Shop gifts, no love at Walmart.