Lynn M. Ta's, Hurt So Good: Fight Club

Everyone knows that the “First rule of fight club: You do not talk about fight club. Second rule of Fight Club: you do not talk about Fight Club.” In the movie, Fight Club, an unnamed character plays the part of a depressed insomniac battling to find peace within himself. This unnamed character joins forces with a man, Tyler Durden, to create an underground “paramilitary” rebellion club to have something to get their minds off of the reality of their miserable lives. This “Fight Club,” later called “Project Mayhem,” causes terror to the world around them. Not until one of the members is shot in the head by a police officer, after one of their missions went wrong, does the unnamed character, who acts as the narrator throughout the movie, realize

Ta’s, Hurt So Good: Fight Club, Masculine Violence, and the Crisis of Capitalism, she discusses how the narrator and Tyler, who we learn at the end of the movie are the same person, create this Fight Club because they are feeling like their masculinity is at stake. She backs this up by bringing up the fact that the narrator, who she calls “Jack,” goes to different support groups where he is surrounded by people that allow him to act less masculine. The first group we see him attend is called, “Remaining Men Together,” where men who have or have had testicular cancer go to express their feelings, she recounts this as an example of her claim because “Jack” becomes a regular attendee even though he does not have nor has he ever had testicular cancer. He just goes to have somewhere he can let his emotions out. When Marla, a woman who is faking illness to attend support groups too, shows up to the same ones that the narrator attends, he can no longer cry or enjoy attending the meetings. She also touches on the fact that Tyler would sleep with Marla, but “Jack” would not. In the movie “Jack” was characterized as the more feminine of the two men, he had nice furniture in his home, he did what is boss said to do without question, he was softer and more approachable than Tyler. And when people in the club talked about the creator of “Fight Club,” they would always call him Tyler, this angered the narrator because he was a part of the creation, and he deserved

The members of “Fight Club,” were men in power, they were working class men, they were every day, ordinary men, looking for an escape from reality. In chapters nineteen through twenty-one of the movie, which begins one hour and two minutes into the movie and runs for twenty-five minutes, until one hour and twenty-seven minutes into the movie, the complete control Tyler has over these grown men is shown by their excessive want to be a part of something, especially this “Fight Club.” In chapter nineteen, the chapter is called “Chemical Burn,” in this scene Tyler pours a chemical onto the narrator’s hand, and he lets him, he just struggles through the pain, when any rational thinking person would get Tyler into trouble for torture, but the narrator allows it to happen and once the pain is gone he does nothing to get back at Tyler. In chapter 20, “The Middle Children of History,” Tyler gives this speech to convey to the members that they need to do something to change their lives because they are just allowing it to pass them by. But those are chapters leading up to the chapter I felt most showcased Tyler’s almost totalitarian control, chapter twenty-one.