I’m really enjoying MENQUILIBRIUM. Great to see such insight into the challenges and opportunities of modern manhood—and the vital need for positive masculine role models. In all the public toxic masculinity we see nowadays, it’s easy to lose sight of the traditional masculine virtues that should be celebrated and modeled for boys and young men—including duty, honor, loyalty, responsibility, protecting loved ones. Let’s hear more about those qualities and less of the public posturing of certain political figures who want to push us all back to pre-feminist patriarchy.
I feel the emphasis on "the unique needs and contributions of boys/men", and, just as much, "the unique needs and contributions of girls/women" serves to perpetuate the core problem, which is the artificial socially-constructed differences in expectations for the two genders. Although there certainly are genuine differences, even today the unrecognized commonalities seem much greater than the real differences. Not to pick on JMA's earlier comment, but just to use it as an example, why should we assume that women can't or don't have virtues such as duty, honor, loyalty, and responsibility? As for protecting loved ones, there may have been a time in the past when men's physical characteristics were relevant for this virtue, but in the modern world most such "protection" can, and should, be equally provided by either gender.
In summary, wouldn't we be better off spending our energy raising *all* children, regardless of gender, to be good *people*? Once we're doing that we can worry about refining things to make the people who happen to be men better men and the people who happen to be women better women.
Interesting piece. Definitely in the same ballpark as what I wrote in the following: https://www.psychologytoday.com/us/blog/rich-encounters/202408/the-trouble-with-men
I’m really enjoying MENQUILIBRIUM. Great to see such insight into the challenges and opportunities of modern manhood—and the vital need for positive masculine role models. In all the public toxic masculinity we see nowadays, it’s easy to lose sight of the traditional masculine virtues that should be celebrated and modeled for boys and young men—including duty, honor, loyalty, responsibility, protecting loved ones. Let’s hear more about those qualities and less of the public posturing of certain political figures who want to push us all back to pre-feminist patriarchy.
I feel the emphasis on "the unique needs and contributions of boys/men", and, just as much, "the unique needs and contributions of girls/women" serves to perpetuate the core problem, which is the artificial socially-constructed differences in expectations for the two genders. Although there certainly are genuine differences, even today the unrecognized commonalities seem much greater than the real differences. Not to pick on JMA's earlier comment, but just to use it as an example, why should we assume that women can't or don't have virtues such as duty, honor, loyalty, and responsibility? As for protecting loved ones, there may have been a time in the past when men's physical characteristics were relevant for this virtue, but in the modern world most such "protection" can, and should, be equally provided by either gender.
In summary, wouldn't we be better off spending our energy raising *all* children, regardless of gender, to be good *people*? Once we're doing that we can worry about refining things to make the people who happen to be men better men and the people who happen to be women better women.