Us Against You

These chapters explore two central themes: what it means to be a man in a toxic environment, and what it means to need people even when we don’t want them.

The fight in the forest defies rationality and feeds into what Backman wants to explore: the true inner self of a person attracted to violence. Even Benji’s sister knows that he will go to the fight, and Leo chases after the thrill of violence, too. They cannot help themselves—their instinct is to follow where danger calls. If violent fighting reveals inner truths about a fighter, then Benji turns out to be much more apathetic than he or anyone else believes. Benji is no longer thrilled from punching someone out, and if he is injured to the point where he can’t play hockey, he doesn’t care. So much of Benji’s identity has been created by the projections of other men: the men of the Pack, David, and William. The men of the town see Benji in a certain light and don’t allow for more nuance. However, Backman’s layered narration strives to prove the exact opposite point: Every person, man or woman, has vulnerabilities, subtleties, and paradoxes in their character, no matter how tough their exterior.

This issue of identity, particularly of toxic masculine identity, is heightened when the police come looking for Leo. Leo is young enough to be impressed by the organized violence and loyalty of the Pack—all he knows is that he is angry, but he is not a fighter by nature like Benji. Instead, Leo believes that someone in his family must do something about anything, and he strives to be the kind of person who could bring down a threat like like William (or, his sister’s rapist—the person he truly wants to defeat). Leo tries on the identity of a Pack member, posturing with his cigarette and repeating their homophobic slurs. For Leo, the type of man that his father represents is not enough, so Leo seeks from others how to fill the role of a man.

What Leo doesn’t see, because he is young and sad, is that he is flirting with an identity that defies logic and prevents a happy future. However, no one in his family has seen Leo’s secret inner struggle, so Leo’s anxieties are turning away from self-harm and toward a manifestation of anger onto other men’s bodies. Each member of the Pack has their own stories of trauma and usually can trace that trauma to an age similar to Leo’s.

The irrationality of the anger that informs the violence of characters like William, Teemu, and even Maya when she pointed Ana’s gun at Kevin’s head, is in part the tragic understanding of how humans need community and value themselves as players in a society. Two of Backman’s themes repeated throughout the book are that we tend to resent people because we know we need them, and that responsibility means that we have no true freedom. On the one hand, all of the characters pretend that all they need is themselves: their own attitudes hardened against the others who don’t understand them. On the other hand, every character also seeks out love and craves attention and acceptance by the people they love, respect, or admire. That need terrifies the characters, but as the title suggests, the characters must accept their desire to get along and meet one another where they become an “us.”

Backman leaves his reader wondering what the limits are in being an individual versus being an individual who relies on others. For example, Maya is going through a terror that only she can truly understand, because although the rape itself is long over, the ramifications have created an endless ripple effect in her family and in her community, so Maya must relive it constantly. Maya is alone in her torment, but she relies on Ana to be her confidant, her release from that trauma. When Ana must deal with her own traumas and leaves Maya on her own, Maya is lost and feels betrayed. Through their complicated friendship, Backman suggests that individuals must find their own peace and cannot rely on others to provide that relief. That is not to say that we don’t need others, rather that everyone needs to be seen and everyone wants love—however, we’re on our own until we decide to actively become an honest and open community.