Concordia TheoBLOGical Seminary

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1. Single Young Male | January 30, 2008 at 12:23 pm | Permalink

   As one of these single young men of whom both Ms. Hymowitz of the Post and “Dorr” here at this blog, who I assume is a woman, I feel as though I must respond to these harsh, yet mostly correct charges. So, I’ll move point by point, and see if I get anywhere. If I don’t, then I must be the man described both in the article and in the post.

   Firstly, the charge of men my age sticking with playing video games (although not PS3s, we are cost conscious) and going clubbing rather than following closely the next presidential election and discussing social policy at the local coffee shop is a true one. We simply don’t want to believe that decisions now will affect us later, but they do and will, and we’d rather deal with the consequences later than fix the issue. Of course, we’ll leave this responsibility for our descendants, which is irresponsible, but due to the human condition, inevitable.

   Secondly, sports are not responsible for the collapse of maturity among men, or its delay. The four major sports of baseball, basketball, football and hockey were all around in this golden age of maturity in the 1950s. While the technology did not exist to follow them 24 hours a day, seven days a week, they were still on the radio, and on television on weekends. Sports are an opportunity for father and son, mother and son, families in general to spend time with one another and enjoy being around each other. Sports are not the problem. They are merely a way in which the problem is manifested. Oh, by the way, it’s “the” NFL, not just NFL. If you’re going to reach us, which I encourage, at least be conversant. It will aid your task. Also, if you’re able to tell us what the difference is between the American and National Leagues, we’re going to be more receptive to what you have to say. I guarantee it.

   Now, to the problem. What the source of the problem is, I’m not really sure (original sin seems to be a good place to start), but the problem is we’ve been coddled. We’re depriving ourselves of advancement because we know no other way; some families want to provide for their children’s every need, stunting their growth and making them dependents for life, even if they can’t claim it on their 1040. This could be a simple lowering of expectations by our society, or a circle, that low expectations, caused by low performance in some, guarantees low performance in all. I can speak personally when I say I was coddled, I was not asked to do much growing up, and now I’m frantically learning how to operate as a productive, independent man, with mixed results. In our history, the post-war children, the Baby Boomers, began to eschew responsibility for an Epicurean way of life, and America, and Western Civilization, has never recovered. We now have a culture of entitlement, that expects the government, or whoever is in authority, to take care of us, to provide for us, as opposed to us providing for ourselves. This is not to take away responsibility from myself and the rest of the single young men out there, but to explain how it happened. We were not asked to take care of ourselves, we were not asked to go get what we needed. We were told, by word or deed, that it would be given to us, and it is impolite and inconvenient to bite the hand that feeds us. So, we accept the welfare, because it allows us to survive and amuse ourselves without having to deal with reality. In this way, it makes it even harder to deal with reality once it is placed upon us. Some of us are not OK with how this is. Some of us are trying and struggling, just like those mentioned in the article, albeit with a late start, trying to catch up. The best thing you can do for us is expect to make it, encourage us to do so, but firmly, and don’t help us, unless we’re close to drowning. Don’t coddle us, enforce good habits by making us pay for our cars and insurance, and our big trips, and our education. Force us to make it, and for the most part, we will, sooner or later. Make us earn it, and we will appreciate it. Otherwise, we won’t even truly appreciate what we have, because it won’t be ours.

   I apologize we’re not ready at your convenience, ladies. Again, some of us are trying: we’re part of the way there, we may be able to think seriously, but not have the day-to-day operations of grocery shopping, cooking and keeping things clean down yet. Maybe we have the day-to-day stuff down, but there’s no depth there. Have high, yet grounded expectations; we are still sinners, after all. Just maybe, some day, we’ll get there.

2. DeGroot | January 30, 2008 at 12:38 pm | Permalink

   Great article. I do think that men have learned this behavior as a reaction to feminist extremes. It’s as if man’s current ethos screams, “You want to take over? Go ahead…I’m going to sit back, relax and do whatever I want for as long as I want to.” Unfortunately (or fortunately) this wanes for the secret male intellect, who knows that he is going nowhere fast, and his perpetual indulgence strips him of his masculinity.

   It is a learning process, I think, for both sexes. For the female, she needs to learn how to step down from the aggresstive ranks and let men make decisions (good or bad) and learn from them. Some resources for further investigation are “The Proper Care and Feeding of Husbands” by Dr. Laura Schlessinger, and “The Way of the Superior Man,” by David Deida…both are theologically off base, but in principle there is value in seeing how these authors are trying to address society as a whole, in recognizing the problems within our culture between the sexes and trying to address it in practical ways.

   We know, as Christians, that the only perfect relationship is Christ’s relationship to us in his atonement through His innocent bitter suffering and death, and then glorious resurrection. All who believe in Him, have hope of life eternal and the perfect communion with God and one another in heaven now.

   Men are built with the capacity to love sacrificially, like Christ, and to provide for their families in that headship role. Women, therefore are built to recieve those provisions and care for the needs of the family as the image of the Church, in reception of God and His good gifts. Let this Image be constantly known to us, and remind us of our earthly and adult responsibilities to serve God and neighbor (spouse, family, friends etc).

3. SingleYoungMale2 | January 31, 2008 at 8:24 pm | Permalink

   Very interesting article. I recall the idea that maybe families have coddled men AND women or the birth order has proceeded to make it difficult for men AND women alike to not be themselves and let them stand or fall on their own. For every instance is different, therefore singling out all men is just pathetic. After all, a few of those things can be hobbies and are more tame than that of some women in our society anymore who go out, party, have no self-esteem, get drunk, sleep with guys and continue in this spiral until they become pregnant and have to learn both responsibilty and hardship of providing a family. Thus, they feel they have to provide everything for this child, want to do it on their own, without anybody’s help and not let the child do anything on their own because they are afraid they will lose them or will get hurt Now, am I saying that men don’t do this, by no means! However, I do think if you lean heavily on one side of things, you can swing way too far and make brash statements about men which have the reverse effect of this article and blogs purpose. Now also, past relationships can creep into one’s view of a gender, therefore I would closely watch your bias about “immature, PS3, NFL watching” boy” and “politically-charged, sophisicated, brandy-drinking” men. When we all boil it down, maturity is not a requirement for Heaven, learn to love us for who we are, not who you want to change us to be. You can’t change anyone, if you do….you lose the person you know for a instantly transformed “robot” in your benefit. We all need Christ, just some like to think others need Him more…..Sin=Sin=Sin, as Christ loves us, Deal with Us…Or Not, Depriving Yourselves from us becoming what you want us to be.

4. Mike Larson | February 1, 2008 at 10:47 pm | Permalink

   I appreciate this post and Ms. Dorr’s Buck up challenge to the masculinity crisis which this article hits on. It is certainly a reality, to be talked about and meditated upon. I recently saw an interview on Fox News with Sylvester Stalone, who was promoting his new Rambo movie. He was asked about the state of masculinity in American culture and he recognized that there was in fact a “crisis of masculinity.” He said something I found strangely profound - that entering manhood was not an attitude or idea but rather involved a “physical encounter with the world.” Rambo did not elaborate but I found this simple statement captivating. We have seen in my generation, from a social and cultural standpoint, the retreat of the American male from the world. This physical encounter with the world can be seen in many ways - involvement with productive civic institutions, devotion to family, or loyalty to work or place of employment. A primary and central “encounter” which has suffered in the last 30 years has been man’s encounter in marriage as given in Genesis - that a man should leave his father and mother and be joined to his wife. This encounter is one of being joined to a woman’s flesh unto death. This is an encounter which confirms manhood, given that the Lord tells us it is not good for a man to be alone (Gen 2:18 [show]Genesis 2:18
   Then the LORD God said, "It is not good that the man should be alone; I will make him a helper fit for him." (ESV)
   ) - it is granted that some receive the gift of celibacy. Fifty years ago it was taboo for a man to reach the age of 30 and not be married. There were social pressures from friends, church, and grandma who asked, “when are you finally going to get married!” “when am I going to have grandchildren?” These coercive questions are seldom asked anymore. The single life, or life of a playboy is now culturally accepted by the social apparatus. It is a “lifestyle choice” to be solely devoted to oneself. Video games, the sports obsession, drug use are affects of man’s retreat from the world and most importantly wife and children.

   It is clearly a crisis on many levels: spritual, social, and cultural. We should also view the crisis as to its political consequences, involving his neighbor and institutions. In the civic realm, the male’s retreat will manfiest itself on the national level. In the recent presidential debates the male candidates all share common traits: soft voices, steril and subdued body language, not a hint of righteous anger. One would never imagine the country is engaged in a war across the broader middle east and is being ripped apart by open borders. The patriarchal order has been curiously replaced by a matriarchal one. The American male can not assert himself - being thoroughly feminized. This country, a nation, which finds its identity in the world based upon its borders can no longer confidently do so. The American male cannot defend himself as evidenced by his inability to win any engagement of war in the last 60 years. He cannot barely propagate his own species - hence the low birth rate. The political and social culture of “Mr. Can-do” of 1944 is now “Mr. Maybe” or “Mr. Maybe” from the Hymowitz article. It may come as a suprise to the American male in the near future that patriarchal orders are alive and well from China and across the middle east. They have ambitions and an appetites that do not satisfy themselves in sports, video games, or drinking. When they choose to impose themselves in the world they may not be as subdued and sterlized as their American male counterparts - they may be extremely hostile. Their American male might have beat Halo 3, multilple times but may very well not know how to respond to a real world threat.

   It has long been noted that there is a direct relationship between religiosity and fertility. With Islam being the fastest growing religion on earth, this faith is out birthing the western world exponentially thanks to the psychology of liberalism and its hatred of life. Somalia’s birthrate is 6.91, Niger 6.83, Afghanistan 6.78, and Yemen 6.75. What these countries share in common is Islam. The best standing argument for allowing the illegal Mexican hoards to crash through our gates every day is their cultural value for high birthrates (3.6 to be exact). This is due largely to their strict adherence to their Catholic faith, conservative principles, fear of God, and their renunciation of the infanticide which plagues our own citizens. If our nation fails to reacquire our reverence for bringing forth life and its divine value we will face further population poverty which will render us irrelevant as a benevolent superpower in the near future. God bless the married couples who bring forth many children and God bless those who choose to adopt. No achievement on earth is higher. And no office on earth is nobler than that of the mother and father.

   The declining birth rate of the west is also largely due to the pervading culture of homosexuality - from television, music, movies, and the fashion industry. This is why many in the third world (Islam primarily) hold a deep hostility to our country and the American male. It is not our foreign policy but our cultural exports (degenerate movies, fashion, pornography etc). It is not our This “culture” (too high a term – culture derived from the Latin word cultura – meaning “to till soil”) has set forth an agenda which seeks to “emancipate” sexuality from monogamy and marriage. The homosexual engagement in fact has no roots in any providential soil and bears no fruit whatsoever. The entire relationship is based upon sexuality, pleasure, and self indulgence. These post-modern conceptions on sexuality and marriage has castrated American masculinity and thoroughly demoralized him - though he is complicit in the reception of this cultural plague. There are no children to raise, no pains of child birth, no sacrifice to bring forth human life. When the Roman Empire was crumbling homosexuality was especially rampant. It is not by random or oppressive measures that the three major religions in the world condemn homosexuality. Religions developed over thousands of years conclude again and again that homosexuality is bad in both civic and spiritual realms. The only religion which supports and encourages homosexuality is Marxism (worst idea in human history killing over 100 million in the past century). Georg Lukacs, Marxist theorist and deputy of culture under Bela Kun’s regime instituted a radical sex education program in communist Hungarian schools. Children were instructed in free love, homosexuality, the irrelevance of religion and middle class values, and the pointlessness of marriage and monogamy (sounds like a familiar program relative to the United States school system in 2006). The goal of such an agenda is to destroy the traditional order through making obsolete the nuclear family, which in its essence, is the enemy of Marxism. Marxism, whether known by its human political vessels or not, is working most actively through the gay agenda to bring about its ends. Organized promiscuity, polygamy, and the pleasure principle are the common weapons of the movement- they are primarily excercized through entertainment moguls and politics.

   Sexuality therefore is not for enjoyment within the arrangement of marriage but more for enjoyment as a purely recreational activity (little different from going bowling on a Friday night). Homosexuals on average have multiple times the partners of heterosexuals and have far greater chances for contracting AIDS and other sexually transmitted diseases. The natural man intuitively knows with certainty that homosexuality is bad for his family, culture, village, and nation. When ever a young person first finds out about the existence of homosexual behavior they are immediately repulsed. This innate survivalist inclination is to be trusted above all things. Although Marxist reeducation camps, sensitivity training racquets and popular culture attempt to legitimize sodomy the natural man will never be swayed so long as he is born of flesh and meditates on his intuitive survival impulses. The stoned leftist who attends gay pride parades and the like only does so after a long systematic Marxist training program initiated in elementary school with its summation in the university system.

   This “avant garde” approach to sexuality transmitted to the heterosexual scene as well hence the low birth rates. Gay and straight alike, once “man and wife” or “lovers” are now “partners” (the John Wayneesque leftist code word for sexual deviants). “Man and wife” is hetero-centric you see and therefore terminology fit for bigots. “Partners” is “gender neural” and more casual in terms for sexual liaisons, thus far superior for the leftist mind. Although the homosexual lobby is most fervently pushing this “enlightened” revelation of sex through the media (which by and large is controlled by the purple hand) they are not solely to blame. We look to Freud and his sex obsession masked in psychology, Alfred Kinsey (sexual pervert poster boy for 60’s sex liberation), who studied and viewed child molestations for research and his cult following. We look to feminism, 60’s counterculture and the resulting sexual revolution (if it feels good do it mantra). These are all historical catalysts which have systematically divorced sex from marriage leading to our embarrassing fecundity to give birth to new life. It is true that MTV, the AIDS obsession, Madonna, Internet pornography, and Sex and the City have further caused this separation. It is true that these same forces have convinced my own generation that oral sex is defiantly not “sex.” The eight year terror of a southern playboy playing President also asserted the same thing. It is also now true that “hooking up” is more common the “dating.” A 2001 survey conducted by Bowling Green State University in Ohio found that of the 55% of local 11th graders who engaged in intercourse, over 60% said they had sex with a “partner” who was no more than a friend. Therefore seeking a sexual outlet in the companionship of peers or “partners” is more common than within the romantic attachment or marriage. From my own experience true dating or the nearly extinct “court ships” are all but extinct or scoffed at where present.

   The strength of this Nation is very much due to her spectacular founding by God fearing men and women on the shores of Plymouth Rock. The years which laid the framework for our constitution and form of self-governance were marked by a people with a special regard for rigid asceticism and puritanical living, especially in regards to sex. National strength and sexual restraint are directly related. Our present sex-obsessed popular culture is violently ripping open the cords which for centuries preserved the virtuous young man and young woman. It is true that if the sex obsessed young mind has its perversions coddled by popular culture instead of having it condemned(true for the Puritans up through 1950’s), he will be driven into the deepest caverns of human depravity where all is lost. National strength and sexual deviancy are related in that loosing the cords of the traditional marriage-bound sexual relationship hastens the fallen nature to recklessly pursue the basest of human desires. The pre-marital sexual experience hinders the youthful vigor in its pursuit of education, wealth, power, and spirit. The improper sexual arrangement gives one a false sense of security which drains not only ambition, but bodily fluids (best preserved), and emotional capital. It is these life forces which feed the more disciplined desires of a strengthened body and intellect, and countless other virtuous pursuits, which are more valuable for the national interest. The MTV junkie, the pervert, the porn addict, the gangster drug peddler, the stripper, and the slob obsessesed with his video games is more likely to read Plato, Aristotle, Cicero, Shakespeare, The Federalist Papers, and the United States Constitution if they are not preoccupied with such worthless activities. In the same way, the former addicts by draining their spiritual, emotional, and physical capital are less likely to become soldiers, poets, novelists, and overseers of a virtuous and productive citizenry.

   Young men and women must rediscover the historical traditions of dating and their value for relational maintenance and individual health. Sexual purity and revering the divine value of innocence is central to the embryonic family and national strength. Pride in family honor, community, and nation must supercede the selfish impulse to seek out his own whimsical desires. Young men and women must wed in proper order loving each other completely to death. It is of divine law that the man and wife revere the sanctity of life and bring it forth in greater numbers. The family is the most fundamental biological unit which births a mighty and virtuous nation. For these reasons men should make his “physical encounter with the world” - cleaving devoutly to his wife, children, and faith.

   Ok Miss Dorr - your post unfairly motivated me to stay in on a friday night. You ruined my plans. I was going to watch the basketball game then go out for a drink with friends. haha

5. Cat Lover | February 9, 2008 at 8:45 pm | Permalink

   Quote:
   “Naturally, women wonder: How did this perverse creature come to be? ”
   The answer is to be found here:
   http://www.nomarriage.com/faq.html

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