VICTOR JOECKS: Why the left won’t offer a positive vision of masculinity

Society would have more success turning boys into men if it provided a coherent definition of the term.

Men and boys are in crisis. Pick your statistic — high school graduation rates, incarceration rates, deaths of despair, college degrees. Females do better than males and often by a wide margin. But there’s scant recognition of this though it has been happening for decades.

Instead, boys hear that masculinity is toxic. In 2018, the American Psychological Association linked “traditional masculinity” with mental disorders.

Liberal Washington Post columnist Christine Emba recently wrote on how “men are lost.” Aside from high-profile CEOs and politicians, “men find themselves lonely, depressed, anxious and directionless,” she wrote. Some have all but disappeared into an online world of video games and porn.

To counter this, Emba believes men need a “positive vision” of masculinity that is “neither neutral nor interchangeable with femininity.” She’s right but admits, “I find myself reluctant to fully articulate one.”

She’s not alone. Brookings Institution scholar Richard Reeves recently wrote a book on “why the modern male is struggling.” In an interview with Emba, he acknowledged also dodging the issue of how men should act.

The reason this is so hard for the left is that it requires acknowledging that men and women are inherently different. The vital push for equal opportunitiy morphed into a demand for equal outcomes. But if men and women have fundamental differences, they will have different priorities, interests and skills. That means equal opportunity won’t produce equal outcomes.

There are a number of people looking to fill this definitional vacuum. One is Andrew Tate, who has become a social media sensation with his cartoon version of masculinity. He’s strong and brash. He flaunts his expensive cars and surrounds himself with attractive women. Some of Tate’s messages — “one of the only things in this world you can control is your state of mind” — could come from a motivational speaker. But others are disturbing, such as “women are the true currency of ballers. (Expletive) money. It’s women.”

The irony is that Tate’s misogyny depends on the left’s decadeslong effort to tear down traditional norms such as monogamy and marriage. While the left wants to erase the differences between men and women, Tate wants to make them a source of conflict. Both paths are wrong.

The alternative is to view the differences between the sexes as complementary. This can be seen in marriage. The strengths of a man and woman complement the weaknesses of the other to produce a stronger family unit than either could produce alone.

In her piece, Emba hints at a longing for complementary relationships. She interviewed New York University business professor Scott Galloway. He notes that some women who say they want men to ignore their masculine traits “don’t want to have sex with those guys.” Emba writes, “I, a heterosexual woman, cringed in recognition.”

There’s still the need to define what it means to be a man. The best description I’ve found comes from Robert Lewis’ book “Raising a Modern-Day Knight.” He defines a man as one who rejects passivity, accepts responsibility, leads courageously and expects a greater reward.

Even if they couldn’t name those principles, fathers used to guide their sons toward these things by assuming roles such as protector and provider. Without this mentorship, it’s little wonder boys from fatherless homes do so poorly. Society also once steered the male sex drive away from instant gratification and toward monogamous marriage. In a committed relationship, a man used his energy and aggression to support his wife and kids.

This may sound old-fashioned. It also sounds a lot better than the alternatives.

Contact Victor Joecks at vjoecks@reviewjournal.com or 702-383-4698. Follow @victorjoecks on Twitter.