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Since the equal rights movement and the current trend towards a more emotionally in tuned society, are American men becoming feminized?
When one looks around and the growing acceptance of homosexuality, the swapping of gender roles in heterosexual relationships, and this near obsession with personal vanity that many men seem to focus on today and a general tendency towards egalitarianism.
This piece I ran across brings up some very interesting trends and points out various aspects of what appears to be the feminization of American men.
The Feminization of American Culture - The World & I Online Magazine (http://www.worldandi.com/public/2001/October/sax.html - broken link)
As the influence of the new psychology permeates our culture, women have understandably begun to wonder whether men are really, well, human. "What if these women are right?" wonders one writer in an article for Marie Claire, a national woman's magazine. "What if it's true that some men don't possess, or at least can't express, nuanced emotions?"8 More than a few contemporary psychologists have come to regard the male of our species as a coarsened, more violent edition of the normal, female, human. Not surprisingly, they have begun to question whether having a man in the house is desirable or even safe.
From the time young boys enter school, they are told "Don't play rough" "Don't play with (toy) guns" "Hey now your not being a good citizen" all said in a sickeningly sweet voice. Boys are taught that competition is evil. (Don't pick teams cuz someone might get their feelers hurt) And any time a little boy shows a little rambuctiousness (sp) they get put on riddalin (which is essentially medical grade meth) or some other drug to kill their personality. There are fundamental differences between boys and girls, since the feminist movement however, acknowledging these differences is some how seen as sexist. So everyone must play nice.
Assuming I ever have a son, I will encourage him to pull girls' hair and eat bugs, and I won't put him on drugs for doing it. Why? It is just a part of growing up.
From the time young boys enter school, they are told "Don't play rough" "Don't play with (toy) guns" "Hey now your not being a good citizen" all said in a sickeningly sweet voice. Boys are taught that competition is evil. (Don't pick teams cuz someone might get their feelers hurt) And any time a little boy shows a little rambuctiousness (sp) they get put on riddalin (which is essentially medical grade meth) or some other drug to kill their personality. There are fundamental differences between boys and girls, since the feminist movement however, acknowledging these differences is some how seen as sexist. So everyone must play nice.
Assuming I ever have a son, I will encourage him to pull girls' hair and eat bugs, and I won't put him on drugs for doing it. Why? It is just a part of growing up.
Bingo! I completely agree with this. It all starts during the years that human mind learns the most.
I think so. I was noticing one day how our presidents seem weak compared to other world leaders such as Benjamin Netanyahou, Castro, Putin, Chavez... Our Presidents don't command respect. Bill Clinton was a weiney. George Bush is to some degree too. Bush Sr., Ford and Carter were wimpy too. Nixon and JFK were not. I think Hilary Clinton, whom I do not like, has more testosterone than all of her running mates. And that is the flip side of your argument. While American men have taken on feminine behaviors, American women have taken on masculine behaviors.
Part of being a boy is learning to be strong. Boys play rough sports and love the thrill of victory. Along the way we would hope that they learn to be a good sport and have some compassion for the ones that lost. These are lessons for adult life. Those who work hard and prepare the best stand the best chance for success.
Enter the new age thinking.
We won't keep score. Everyone is a winner. Everyone gets a trophy and they are all the same.
Lesson learned? We are all entitled.
The flaw? In reality as adults the best reap the rewards, the lessor get none.
Today we are teaching boys to be appologists. Even if it isn't their fault appologize anyway.
I wouldn't say we are femenizing them but we are making them weak and dependent upon society to make them feel okay.
I coached soccer for my sons team. He wasn't into baseball or football. Sigh we all have a cross to bare. Fortunately this dad also liked soccer. Our team worked hard we pushed the basics and we went undefeated. LOL everyone keeps score even if unofficially.
At the end of the season everyone got identical trophies. My son asked dad why do the loosers get the same trophy? I answered so that they will feel okay because they at least tried. My son said but dad they didnt try as hard as we did. I had no answer. But the other coaches on our team and I chipped in and bought 15 cool trophies before the event. We gave out the trophies on our own. Why? Because our kids earned them.
The touchy feel good crowd found out and cried foul.
They said its only about having fun not who is best. My reply is winning is about as fun as it gets and loosing sucks.
Kind of a trick question here as my sons are not feminized and they grew up doing all the things normal boys do, like pulling girls hair and eating bugs (as one previous poster said) and they played with toy guns and real guns, and they had hot rods and motorcycles and dated every Saturday night.
They are, all 3, happily married to women who have not yet been masculinized. Now, we come from a conservative but respectful of others background so if men are being feminized it hasn't hit this family yet!
Our four daughters are married to men who can hold their own but we taught the girls to stand up for their rights while not trying to compete with their husbands. Nature tells us when we should push and when we should retreat.
However, from what I see out there in this world men are being taught to be wimpy and this is portrayed on TV commercials and in the sitcoms. We were raised to be respectful of women, have good manners and respecting everyone regardless of their background.
I loved the comment about Hillary. Sheesh, if women were all like that men would want to stay single and the population rate would decline rapidly.
My two cents so, okay, let's everyone jump in and trash this message
This thread will be all over the place if we don't realize that there are as many definitions of "masculine" and "feminine" as there are people! There is no big black definite line that seperates these two words.
What really is "natural" , what is learned ?
However I would've thought we could agree that harming others is neither....it's just bad.
"""I will encourage him to pull girls' hair and eat bugs, and I won't put him on drugs for doing it. Why? It is just a part of growing up.""""
It should also be part of growing up to learn right from wrong...it's wrong to harm others.
The "boys -will-be-boys" bunk is what produces wife beaters.
But your son may get lucky and some girl who has her hair pulled will turn and punch his lghts out Now would that be "masculine" or "feminine"?
Pooping is part of growing up but if your kid did it in the neighbor's front yard you wouldn't curtail that ?
I was thinking about this recently. And it led me to some questions. Why is it that anyone who has a problem with homosexuality or homosexual behavior is jumped for being a bigot and told to quit being a homophobe because it is completely natural to be homosexual and no one should be viewed as different because of it. Then it is often the same people who despise masculinity, especially any white man with an alpha male personality. Alpha males are far more prevelant and obvious in the animal kingdom, yet this is not good enough for those who despise a man who behaves in that manner.
So which is it? Do we support people acting the way nature programmed them to? Or do we admonish them and force them change? If so, who gets to decide which natural behaviors are acceptable and which need to be changed?
In this crazy mixed up society its fantasy to think anything will change back to the early wild west days. Anyone that yearns for the past should get a life.
You guys have read too many gender specific novels and watched too many movies which re:inforce gender specific roles. We live in an extremely high pressure high tech overly competitive world. I never thought I would see people walking and driving with cell phones attached to their bodies like they were not even human. I think its pretty obvious here in America that women
secretly feel they are much more adaptable and intelligent than their male counterparts.
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Now would that be "masculine" or "feminine"?
Boys Will Be Girls & Girls Will Be Boys
