A Journey to the Moral Center of "Bro"
My friend-let’s call him Brad-once announced at a party, “Take my picture next to the bonfire!” He held up an oversized styrofoam cup containing half Burnett’s blueberry vodka and half Sonic limeade, smiled, and then tripped into the fire.
Brad is a bro.
I've been thinking about Brad a lot lately, ever since I watched the Netflix hit rom-com, To All The Boys I've Loved Before, based on the book of the same name by Jenny Han. In the film, there's a boy named Peter Kavinsky. Peter is a dream boat, which is problematic for a couple reasons: A) we’re adults and this is a fictionalized teen. B) Peter is a bro-a high school bro-but a bro nonetheless, and I've been, or so I thought, conditioned to hate bros, or at least quietly resent them. So why did I find myself so drawn to Peter?
I felt I needed to know: Why do I care so much? Why now? Why this bro?
I looked into previous bro-centric research. I wanted to know about all of the bros-real and fictional. So much of their findings tell me what I've always known: bros are basic and white and love Coachella. You can see it here and here and here. Again and again, these studies and analyses seemed focused on all the boys I hated, not all the boys I loved. I kept digging.
In 2014, Erin Gloria Ryan of Jezebel attempted to define the bro by geographic location. But this wasn't what I was looking for either-I don't love Peter Kavinsky because of what state he's from-so I finally just asked myself out loud: what do you want, Justin? I want to find the moral center of being a bro. I want to know what makes Peter Kavinsky, a good and decent bro, good and decent (other than screenwriting). With the question in front of me, I did what any man who has been forced to watch The Sound of Music every year at Christmas would do. I started at the very beginning.
The way we have defined the bro has been both fluid and restrictive since the word developed from “brother” in the 1970s. As Alex Abad-Santos noted in The Atlantic, in the '80s the term, rooted in the black community, was commandeered by popular culture. Surprise! In the '90s, it was notably used in the movie Encino Man, which, honestly, says a lot about the bro's trajectory. Then it showed up in How I Met Your Mother. Then in various Dane Cook films. Soon it became synonymous with fraternities, Xbox, and cheap domestic beer. "Bro" triggers a sensation that "dude," "bud," and "man" just can’t seem to evoke. Since its inception, bro has evolved, devolved, and grown into something grander than its original iteration.
In the 21st century, bro began to splinter and became bastardized. It took on forms like "bruh" and "brah." While bro culture became a watershed movement for being a real douche, the definition of what a bro was continued to expand.
The bro that most people think of is like, well, Brad. But the truth is, all the variations of bro are like gentle feathers torn from a down pillow. Once that pillow was opened in the '70s, it was only a matter of time before the term spread in every direction. I stole this metaphor from the movie Doubt, and I will not change it-it feels layered and poignant.
Today, I will collect those feathers in pursuit of finding one thing: can a bro truly be good?
Loosely Defining The Bro
To start, I had to make clear boundaries. Bros are not bad, nor is this an attempt to justify bad behavior. A bro isn’t defined as someone who creeps on women or is inherently misogynist. That’s an asshole. Unfortunately, many times those two circles make a very tight Venn Diagram, but that’s a chart for a different time. It seemed outdated to let gender restrict who is and isn't a bro. A woman is just as capable of being a bro as a man. When defining a “bro,” we identified three major indicators:
Does he or she have bro friends?
Would you consider getting a beer with this person?
Does someone think he or she is cool?
The Process
I sat in the largest conference room I could find with a large iced coffee and a mission: I would chart my way to the intersection of bro and goodness. I started my personal Good Will Hunting by drawing a line on a whiteboard, with Frat Bro on one side and Soft Bro on the other. I quickly realized that a line was no place for a bro. A bro is an amalgamation of things. That signaled a missing piece-a third option, the Stoner Bro. What graph or flow chart or word cloud could encapsulate all of it? That’s when our line became The Broton.
The Broton
The Broton is a circle that represents the journey of the bro, but most importantly, The Broton gave us a directive. A circle gave every bro a place to land-and a place to aspire toward. The three poles represented on the Broton are the Soft Bro, the Frat Bro, and the Stoner Bro. As bros are plotted on the Broton, their proximity to the middle of the circle is an indication of their goodness.
For instance, Dwayne “The Rock” Johnson is clearly a bro. But he encapsulates the best qualities of the stoner, frat, and soft bro variations. Meanwhile, someone like Jon Snow, who shares little in common with the Frat or Stoner varieties, is placed on the farthest edge of the Soft Bro category for his incessant whininess and inability to see that the women of Game of Thrones are actually in charge.
A Classification of Bros
If you fit into all three of these categories-Soft Bro, Frat Bro, and Stoner Bro-then you are, for all intents and purposes, a bro. But then I wondered, why are some bros good and others are, well, not? My hypothesis is that it all has to do with extremes-the more extreme you are in your given category, the less likely you are to be a good bro.
The Rock encapsulates a bit of each category so seamlessly that he eclipses the bro stereotype entirely. However, without light there can be no darkness. To find the goodness, we must identify what stereotypes define "bro" as we know it. I closed my eyes and finished every last drop of my iced coffee because to do this-to find these traits-I had to be willing to see them in myself as well.
The categories are best described as follows.
The Frat Bro is someone who has considered farting on your pillow with the intention of giving you pink eye. When you’re at the bar, he suggests you start the night with a shot of Fireball. He talks about the gym and takes pictures in a mirror with his legs spread apart. Speaking of, he manspreads on the subway, but typically with no intended malice. He tends to reschedule dates a couple times before forgetting about it entirely. He’s funnier than the other two categories and loves to cook out. Much like a labrador retriever or Jacob Tremblay, you know what you’re going to get with him because he’s just there to do the best he can.
Leading this category is Rob Gronkowski and the entire cast of Entrourage-you know, the sort of guys who might break a chair over a table at a wine bar that's playing a light jazz version of Sam Smith's "Too Good at Goodbyes." Yikes. But we also have Texas senate nominee, Beto O'Rourke and Awkwafina. These frat bros are just here to have a good time, get a little rowdy, and pack it in.
The Soft Bro is a complex bro. He’s what we call “woke for gain.” He’s excited about the opportunity to talk about volunteering at an inner-city elementary school, but it’s with the hope of taking his date home with him. A soft bro offers to teach you about wine, even though he only drinks Yellowtail Chardonnay. As opposed to the gym, he talks about his diet. (He's gone vegan recently, but he doesn't even miss eggs. He swears!) On dates, he has a bad habit of being condescending on topics about which he has limited knowledge, like bitcoin or intersectionality. He is, however, willing to learn. He comes across very trustworthy to parents and is ready to talk about his feelings.
Matt McGorry is the perfect example of a Soft Bro. In full pursuit of goodness, he’s tried to educate himself on social justice. That’s good! But his execution can be corny at best and disingenuous at its worst. That’s bad. Classic Soft Bro. An ally doesn't need to stand at the pulpit, bro! But the Soft Bro also contains the likes of New Girl's Winston Schmidt. The Soft Bro wants to get it right, but sometimes, you have to stick it out for the best result.
The Stoner Bro tries so hard. He believes in democratic socialism but doesn't really understand what democratic socialism means. When asked about it, a stoner bro asserts, “We should just take care of people.” A stoner bro “wouldn’t drink again if weed were legal nationwide.” He doesn't talk about his diet or go to the gym because his metabolism is alarmingly efficient. If it isn’t, he doesn’t care. His ideal date is someone who is down to play Smash Brothers, but a stoner bro is Captain Falcon-always. The stoner bro is rarely combative, sometimes to a fault. A stoner bro is ultimately an easy-going pal.
That's why Seth Rogen and Friday Night Lights' Tim Riggins are in there. Just good guys who like to kick back and do their own thing. It's also why it includes Bernie Sanders, who suggests free college with no clear explanation of how to pay for it. Wall Street? Scratch off lottery tickets? The stray 10 dollars I found on the subway? Who knows. Free college!
A Conclusion
Sitting in the large conference room as the sun went down, I wiped a bit of dry erase residue across my forehead. Yes, we had defined these bros, but what did that mean? In the center of my circle, I saw these seemingly similar, yet different people. Why had some of them drifted inward? And like a fever, the clarity broke across my sweat-covered face. The Rock, Rihanna, Peter Kavinsky-they encapsulated everything I love about bros without any of the shame.
And that leads us to The Lovable Bro (TLB). What makes a bro lovable is the shedding of any particular moniker. Being a bro comes with an essence, an aura. A bro makes you feel at home, even when there are no other friends around. But TLBs are special because they manage to do it without alienating anyone around them. Where Drake (a Soft Bro, with a Frat Bro rising) falls toward the outer ring for his obtuse love of his bed and his mama, TLBs feel no need to disclose that at all.
Rihanna exhibits a laissez-faire approach to life, an understanding of what’s important in the world, and the ability to throw back a good, cold beer. But like a superhero or a farm-to-table restaurant, the ultimate quality of TLB is that he or she uses these powers for good. It's a shared quality of the inner-circle: Peter Kavinsky, Michael B. Jordan, The Rock. Their attitudes highlight the best parts of the bro without forcing the worst trappings upon those around them.
While kicked back with a nice Austin East cider listening to a stripped down version of Tina Turner's "The Best," I asked myself, Justin, where are you on the Broton? I call myself a Soft Bro, with a Stoner Bro rising, but I hope that ultimately, I wouldn't be too far off from the center. Maybe the Broton is here for us to judge ourselves-to look into our own souls and ask: How can I be less of an asshole today?
I like to believe the Broton is fluid-that maybe even if you realize, I am an asshole, that you can continue on in The Broton and find redemption. Maybe Brad, a true Frat Bro, has floated somewhere a bit closer to the middle as well. That’s the dream isn’t it?
Can I paraphrase the Book of Matthew from the Holy Bible? I'm going to paraphrase the Book of Matthew from the Holy Bible.
Judge not, lest ye bro-ness can be judged.
We're all bros, in our own way, looking for the path that will lead us a bit closer to center.
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