Shepherds of Men

On justice and rage.

This week’s Sunday read is a bit of a change of pace. Next week, we enter the home stretch of regular Sam Bankman-Fried related content, with an overview of the book and some insight into the publishing process. As a small reminder, don’t miss recent Dark Markets Podcast episodes on Eigenlayer and the TikTok ban.

“You’re the angriest man I’ve ever met.”

This weekend I’m at home in Texas, laying my uncle* Tommy to rest. He was one of the most beloved members of my huge extended family, and he performed both me and my two brothers’ wedding ceremonies. He was a huge man, literally and in personality, by many accounts a generous friend and community member. He always carried $200 in cash, just in case somebody needed it – and he often decided somebody needed it.

His ceremony was attended by close to 300 people – a ton of family, but just as many friends and colleagues from over the years. We’re good at handling death in Texas, whether because it’s so often close at hand, or because so many of us actually, literally believe in Heaven. Tommy recorded a goodbye video before his illness took him, and there was a lot of laughter as we said goodbye. But he also died far too young, at 72, and while he lived a fantastic and rich life, his funeral hovered on the edge between celebration and tragedy. Many, many people’s lives will be worse in his absence.

That outpouring of love seems particularly notable because of what Tommy spent his life doing: chasing bad guys and enforcing rules.

He did it in a much more ground-level, hands-on way than I have. He was a law enforcement officer for the first half of his career, and was elected Sheriff of a small Texas county in the mid-90s. After that he became an insurance fraud investigator. And in his free time, he officiated high school football, which in central Texas, probably takes nearly as much physical bravery as enforcing the actual law.

I’m obviously no fan of cops, and God knows what it was like doing that job in rural Texas in the ’90s. But Tommy was always, at least in his demeanor, everything you’d want an ideal cop to be: a friendly, open, even goofy guy, who had something else inside of him ready to come out when it was absolutely necessary. One of the speakers at the funeral praised Tommy for maintaining a helping attitude to the people he encountered on the worst days of their lives, rather than becoming bitter and angry. I’d certainly like to think he was one of the good ones.

He was also a lifelong, devoted Christian, in a way that I can’t take literally, but that I increasingly take very, very seriously. Scattered around the crowd at his funeral you could find a half-dozen older men bearing shoulder-height shepherd’s crooks. You could have mistaken them for extra-long wooden walking canes. These were church elders, and Tommy had given the staves out as gifts to those he respected.

That’s how he saw himself, and how he saw other upstanding men (yes, all men – this is a quite traditionalist cultural context). Vigilant, strong shepherds, protecting a flock of those who needed that strength. I increasingly see myself in much the same way as I age into a position of authority and respect (like it or not).

But adopting the role of shepherd is a double-edged sword, whether it’s done by necessity, or (as in both mine and Tommy’s cases, I think) as an inescapable consequence of one’s deep disposition. As I’ve written about my own work, the shepherd gets little respite from anger, confrontation, and, ultimately, violence.

Because the best shepherd must be willing to protect against the fiercest wolves.

The Angriest Men

There’s no denying Tommy influenced me. Superficially, I adopted my handlebar mustache from him (unconsciously, at the time). I think I also absorbed a lot from him about how to be a big man, literally and metaphorically, while carrying yourself in a way that’s approachable and kind and loving. (I come from a breed of giants. At six feet and 210 pounds, I’m on the small end of the men in my tribe.)

But there is a duality inherent in all of this. However well he mastered it, even those who loved him would admit Tommy was not perfect in his use of the power his demeanor, skills, and identity granted him. He could be stubborn, and within his own family, it usually went without saying that his word was the real law. At his worst, though not often, he could be downright mean - even cruel.

This duality is also inscribed in our family tree: Tommy the Sheriff had a brother who was a bank robber, drug addict, and thief. This person is currently incarcerated, in the twilight of his life.

It’s a duality that has often been romanticized, and it’s specifically a long-running trope of white masculinity in America. The white man, in this self-imagining, is full of an almost caveman-like violence and rage, but his standing in society is based on his ability to master and channel that animal within. You see it in fiction even today in figures like Raylan Givens – maybe the best line in all of Justified is when Raylan is described as “the angriest man I’ve ever met,” and he can’t comprehend it at all.

Raylan is part of a much longer tradition of figures able and willing – though never acknowledged as eager – to enact the violence deemed necessary to protect the community. Of course, in 21^st century America, what constitutes that “community” is always the real issue.

But for the moment, my interest is more in a particular variety of masculinity, because even if it’s specifically connected to whiteness in the American West, I don’t think it’s a stretch to say that there’s some version of this in every society – there is always a place for defenders who channel a deep disposition to violence into protection rather than destruction. Even if they themselves aren’t often the best judges of the difference between the two.

I can certainly attest to it myself – I am, just beneath the surface, a very, very angry person. I experience that anger as self-righteousness, directed both at individual bad actors, and at the broader system that so often victimizes the defenseless.

Maybe that second part helps distinguish the true shepherd from the power-hungry enforcer. Or maybe they are two sides of the same coin. The latter may see the evil in those outside the circle, while the former sees the good in all, and wants to bring everyone inside the flock. There is the punitive shepherd: the violent lawman, the avenging angel. And then there is the reconstructive shepherd: the giver, the open-armed man of God.

In some of us, both sides have a voice, and struggle for supremacy. For now, I’m holding uncle Tommy in my heart as inspiration to invite the sinners in when I can, to repel them when I must, and to cultivate the wisdom to know the difference.

***

*Technically my cousin once removed, but he was my mother’s age, and basically a brother to her. It’s that kind of family.