Guest lecture - Ryan Manhire “I’m Just Ken”: Masculinity, Cruel Optimism, and Deep Moral Disagreement over Barbie (2023)

Abstract:

I use Greta Gerwig’s film Barbie (2023) as an entry point into the interpersonal dynamics of contemporary conflicts surrounding masculinity (Kimmel 2017, 2018; Copland 2025). I examine how Ken’s narrative trajectory, from requiring Barbie’s validation to have a “great day” to embracing the self-acceptance of being “Kenough”, resonates with emerging interdisciplinary work on masculine vulnerability in the context of the rising manosphere (Botto & Gottzén 2023; Gerrand et al. 2025).

I suggest that the film’s mixed reception reveals a deep moral disagreement over masculinity, recognition, and the good life, which forecloses rather than enables dialogue. Drawing on Linda Zerilli’s (2025) account of judgement and persuasion, I suggest that even in cases of deep moral disagreement, the possibility of persuasion depends on the intelligibility of opposing judgements as ways in which the world appears to others.

Against this background, I consider how Ken’s narrative arc, together with the film’s satirical critique of hegemonic masculinity, can be read as inviting two distinct judgements. First, it invites those drawn to the manosphere to reflect on whether the “good life” it promises exemplifies what Lauren Berlant (2011) describes as “cruel optimism”, understood as an attachment that sustains forms of life while simultaneously undermining their flourishing. Second, it invites critics of the manosphere to engage more seriously with the experiences of alienation and vulnerability from which such attachments emerge. Rendering such judgements intelligible, I argue, does not entail normative legitimacy but brings them into view as something open to reorientation.

Everyone is welcome! 

This guest lecture is part of the seminar Feminist Philosophy of Language (IPP, Jasmin Trächtler) and funded by Alumni der Fakultät Humanwissenschaften und Theologie (e.V.)