Rod Dreher has seen fit to add his own two cents to the talks about "child-men." He is a lot nicer in his approach to blaming men than Kay Hymowitz was, by turning it into a case of young men being deprived of much-needed tradition and guidance. There is truth to that, but it's an evasion of the larger issue of the fact that no one, in any serious position in the media, is calling on women to "woman up" and take responsibility for what women have done to create the current culture that a lot of women complain about.
Society does not call on women to save sex for relationships that end with marriage. It doesn't expect women to sacrifice their careers in order to fully take on the traditional duties of being a wife and a mother, but it does expect men to not only be serious providers, but assume many responsibilities around the house that were traditionally the wife's responsibility. Moreover, society doesn't even tell women to put on their big girl panties and deal with it when they are just dissatisfied by their marriage and want out. With women initiating about seventy percent of the divorces in the United States, the commitment problem is clearly one that women have a greater struggle dealing with than men, when it comes to serious commitment.
The phenomenon of "child-women" is what has caused "child-men." It has been traditionally accepted that women make men grow up when they get married and have kids. Both Hymowitz and Dreher get this, but can't seem to face up to the reality that women by and large today don't want to do the things that will cause that to happen. It's not hard to realize why no one in the media is pointing the finger at women. Anyone who has ever laid down the law to a woman who was the source of her own misery knows that such women are violently incapable of changing their behavior. They'd sooner chew your eyes out of their sockets, while screaming obscenities at you, accusing you of misogyny, being unable to get laid or unable to deal with a strong, independent woman, than do a little introspection.
This is my challenge to the Drehers and Hymowitzs out there. Name a single compelling reason for a non-religious man to get married that overrides the damage he knows he will face if he ends up in the statistical majority who get divorced, and that is not something he can easily get outside of marriage.
In modern America, you can't find it.
Society does not call on women to save sex for relationships that end with marriage. It doesn't expect women to sacrifice their careers in order to fully take on the traditional duties of being a wife and a mother, but it does expect men to not only be serious providers, but assume many responsibilities around the house that were traditionally the wife's responsibility. Moreover, society doesn't even tell women to put on their big girl panties and deal with it when they are just dissatisfied by their marriage and want out. With women initiating about seventy percent of the divorces in the United States, the commitment problem is clearly one that women have a greater struggle dealing with than men, when it comes to serious commitment.
The phenomenon of "child-women" is what has caused "child-men." It has been traditionally accepted that women make men grow up when they get married and have kids. Both Hymowitz and Dreher get this, but can't seem to face up to the reality that women by and large today don't want to do the things that will cause that to happen. It's not hard to realize why no one in the media is pointing the finger at women. Anyone who has ever laid down the law to a woman who was the source of her own misery knows that such women are violently incapable of changing their behavior. They'd sooner chew your eyes out of their sockets, while screaming obscenities at you, accusing you of misogyny, being unable to get laid or unable to deal with a strong, independent woman, than do a little introspection.
This is my challenge to the Drehers and Hymowitzs out there. Name a single compelling reason for a non-religious man to get married that overrides the damage he knows he will face if he ends up in the statistical majority who get divorced, and that is not something he can easily get outside of marriage.
In modern America, you can't find it.
"...a case of young men being deprived of much-needed tradition and guidance"
What both Dreher and Hymowitz neglect to do is mention who is depriving young men of tradition and guidance. It sure isn't other men, that's for certain.
"no one, in any serious position in the media, is calling on women to "woman up" and take responsibility..."
I agree. It's all very strange. Feminism has done a nearly complete job in obliterating the Victorian legal infrastructure that kept women as legally children. Before, they were wards of the men in their lives, either their husbands or their fathers. No authority, and therefore little to no responsibility for their actions. Feminism has given women agency in modern times where before they had none.
Problem is that social culture was not changed in parallel with the legal one. So while women are no longer legally children and possess the agency and authority of men, women, while no longer legally children, have a child's sense of responsibility. What's more, society doesn't expect anything more than a child's level of responsibility.
Thus this feminine agency and authority lacks the restraining properties of responsibility and accountability. As a result, you have child-women running amok, doing horrific damage, while petulantly blaming it all on their brothers, and if women are held to some account for their actions, the consequences are less for them than for their bretheren for the same acts.
It is not the slacker man-child we should be concerned with. He's harming no one. It's the self-righteous entitled little girl shouting "gimme!" right next to him that bears our considerable attention.