Working Toward Sovereign Masculinity: Reactionary Care of the Self in the <i>Order of Man</i> Podcast

This paper discusses Order of Man ( OoM ), a thrice-weekly podcast and “digital brotherhood” of men aspiring to “become better in every area of their lives,” as a case study for theorizing masculine practices of “care of the self” in the realm of digital audio content. Conducting a discourse analysis that examines several episodes that were released during the first nine months of the COVID-19 pandemic, I consider how the OoM project leverages a predominantly White culture of dispossession and entitlement to articulate a specifically reactionary form of self-care in which self-improvement figures as a means of combatting perceived gender oppression. In particular, I interrogate OoM founder and host Ryan Michler’s concept of sovereign masculinity as a framework for resisting the cultural influence of feminism and of government overreach, and for reinstating patriarchy as a fundamental social good.