https://www.cnn.com/videos/us/2022/11/26/richard-reeves-us-men-trends-smerc-vpx-contd.cnn
Smerconish on CNN interviews the author, of the book "Of Boys and Men: Why the Modern Male Is Struggling, Why It Matters, and What to Do about It,"
Here is a brief review of the book on Amazon:
C. Thompson
5.0 out of 5 stars Urgent message with one blind spot
Reviewed in the United States on October 11, 2022
Verified Purchase
Reeves’s book offers a much-needed overview of the difficulties facing men and boys in the US today. These include a serious reduction in academic achievement, declining wages and employment, poor health, and increasing “deaths of despair,” which are nearly three times higher for men as for women. His book also demonstrates that this “crisis of masculinity” is linked to structural changes, such as automation and globalization, which have reduced the number of jobs traditionally performed by males. Probably, the book’s most valuable contribution is to show that remedying men’s difficulties can also benefit women.
Unfortunately, though, as Reeves explains, efforts to improve the situation confront opposition from both sides of the political spectrum. Conservatives want to turn the clock back to the day of stay-at-home moms dependent on traditionally employed males. Progressives, locked into the conviction that “gender inequality can only run one way,” decline to acknowledge the structural factors behind the issues facing males and to see them as individual failings of “toxic masculinity.”
Reeves’s proposed solutions to the problems he identifies include an array of steps that, for the most part, I find convincing. One is to encourage male employment in HEAL (health, education, administration, literacy), just as we have promoted female employment in STEM (science, technology, education, math). In education, he notes that having male teachers makes a positive impact on boys’ academic performance. I do have reservations, however, regarding his proposal that boys be held back for an extra year of pre-school. Elsewhere, he emphasizes that genetically-based male and female differences are overlapping, rather than binary. In this context, I am puzzled that he believes “all” (a word he uses repeatedly) boys should be held back for a year.
That said, this is an excellent book. As a progressive, I am concerned that we ignore its message at our peril, and I fear that, as Reeves explains, if responsible parties do not deal with this issue, irresponsible parties will exploit it to everyone’s detriment.
The issue and the hidden dimension I think I see, of course, is that men since President Carter have lost status. The American idea of a tough emotionally unavailable man is dead. The sun has set on the Marlboro Man. The link above details some of the tragedy. The best way I can think of to identify the source as a problem of self hate is as follows:
The fact is that men are irrelevant today. Women are rejecting them in droves as well as schools and corporations. Why deal with children when you can hire responsible and cooperative and educated women. Likely in the future, when the testosterone lunacy of the gorilla male is eliminated genetically as has largely happened among Asians, the population of men will be kept maybe at ten percent of the most feminized to serve as breeding stock.
Meanwhile the Republicans will seek to pull us back into the cave as Democrats become Feminazies.
Smerconish on CNN interviews the author, of the book "Of Boys and Men: Why the Modern Male Is Struggling, Why It Matters, and What to Do about It,"
Here is a brief review of the book on Amazon:
C. Thompson
5.0 out of 5 stars Urgent message with one blind spot
Reviewed in the United States on October 11, 2022
Verified Purchase
Reeves’s book offers a much-needed overview of the difficulties facing men and boys in the US today. These include a serious reduction in academic achievement, declining wages and employment, poor health, and increasing “deaths of despair,” which are nearly three times higher for men as for women. His book also demonstrates that this “crisis of masculinity” is linked to structural changes, such as automation and globalization, which have reduced the number of jobs traditionally performed by males. Probably, the book’s most valuable contribution is to show that remedying men’s difficulties can also benefit women.
Unfortunately, though, as Reeves explains, efforts to improve the situation confront opposition from both sides of the political spectrum. Conservatives want to turn the clock back to the day of stay-at-home moms dependent on traditionally employed males. Progressives, locked into the conviction that “gender inequality can only run one way,” decline to acknowledge the structural factors behind the issues facing males and to see them as individual failings of “toxic masculinity.”
Reeves’s proposed solutions to the problems he identifies include an array of steps that, for the most part, I find convincing. One is to encourage male employment in HEAL (health, education, administration, literacy), just as we have promoted female employment in STEM (science, technology, education, math). In education, he notes that having male teachers makes a positive impact on boys’ academic performance. I do have reservations, however, regarding his proposal that boys be held back for an extra year of pre-school. Elsewhere, he emphasizes that genetically-based male and female differences are overlapping, rather than binary. In this context, I am puzzled that he believes “all” (a word he uses repeatedly) boys should be held back for a year.
That said, this is an excellent book. As a progressive, I am concerned that we ignore its message at our peril, and I fear that, as Reeves explains, if responsible parties do not deal with this issue, irresponsible parties will exploit it to everyone’s detriment.
The issue and the hidden dimension I think I see, of course, is that men since President Carter have lost status. The American idea of a tough emotionally unavailable man is dead. The sun has set on the Marlboro Man. The link above details some of the tragedy. The best way I can think of to identify the source as a problem of self hate is as follows:
The fact is that men are irrelevant today. Women are rejecting them in droves as well as schools and corporations. Why deal with children when you can hire responsible and cooperative and educated women. Likely in the future, when the testosterone lunacy of the gorilla male is eliminated genetically as has largely happened among Asians, the population of men will be kept maybe at ten percent of the most feminized to serve as breeding stock.
Meanwhile the Republicans will seek to pull us back into the cave as Democrats become Feminazies.
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