Tag Archives: male

“Bro Code” in the Gym

Nationality: Armenian
Age: 22
Occupation: Student, Part time facilities attendant at on campus gym
Residence: Los Angeles
Performance Date: 4/26/13
Primary Language: English
Language: Armenian

I asked my informant for a proverb or colloquial axiom and he thus provided:

Alright, there are things in the Gym called “bro code,” and some of the bro code and bro sign stuff are, basically, “curls for the girls,” um, [laughter] “pecs for sex,” um, just meat-head stuff like that and um, they’re just insiders for the Ducheiest of Douchers, [laughter].

Although my informant defined such aspects of the “bro code” as, “for the Duchiest of Douchers,” such sayings seem to be largely prevalent in both the gym and other highly masculine gathering. Their prevalence suggests that they do not represent actual Misogynous values as often as they simply indicate masculine heterosexual bonding in male dominated environments.

Ice Cream and Hairdryer

Nationality: American
Age: 24
Occupation: Game Developer
Residence: Los Angeles
Performance Date: May 1, 2013
Primary Language: English

“Basically, it’s not really a joke… but in high school, I remember people kept saying how, it was like a legend how, if you put ice cream on your balls and then you put, you bring a hairdryer to them, somehow that’s supposed to feel, like, great. I don’t know… that sounds horrible to me. That’s, like supposed to be like a great feeling, like first you put ice cream on your balls, and then you warm them up with a hairdryer. It’s one and then the other. “

 

The informant said he’d learned it from friends in high school, and added that he’d never tried it personally, and had no way of knowing if others had tried it (besides their testimonies). He said, “I just have never had ice cream and a hairdryer in the same place. And balls.”

My suspicion is that this was a sort of initiation ploy for high school boys, the goal may have been to shame those who tried it (because it doesn’t seem like it could possibly be pleasant) and cause them pain. It creates distance between the genders because this is folklore that doesn’t work across all sides, so it may also be a means of fostering identity and tightening groups.