Rape, murder, war. They all have one thing in common. Men. Aggression, violence, ambition unchecked by
conscience -- all the stuff of “toxic masculinity,” right? And, the solution is obvious: make men less
toxic. Make men less masculine. Make men more like women. But I’m here to tell you that this way of
thinking is not only wrong, it’s dangerous. Here’s why: When you try to make men more
like women, you don’t get less “toxic masculinity,” you get more. Why? Because bad men don’t become good when they
stop being men; they become good when they stop being bad. Aggression, violence, and unbridled ambition
can’t be eliminated from the male psyche, they can only be harnessed. And when they are harnessed, they are tools
for good, not for harm. The same masculine traits that bring destruction
also defeat tyranny. The traits that foster greed also build economies. The traits that drive men to take foolish
risks also drive men to take heroic risks. The answer to toxic masculinity isn’t less
masculinity; it’s better masculinity. And we know what that looks like. It’s a young man opening the door for a
girl on their first date. It’s a father working long hours to provide
for his family. It’s a soldier risking his life to defend
his country. The growing problem in today’s society isn’t
that men are too masculine, it’s that they’re not masculine enough. When men embrace their masculinity in a way
that is healthy and productive, they are leaders, warriors and heroes. When they deny their masculinity, they run
away from responsibilities, leaving destruction and despair in their wake. The consequences can be seen everywhere: One in four fathers now lives apart from his
children. And children who grow up without a dad are
generally more depressed than their peers who have a mother and a father. They are at far greater risk for incarceration,
teen pregnancy and poverty. Seventy-one percent of high school dropouts
are fatherless. “Of all the rocks upon which we build our
lives ... family is the most important. And we are called to recognize and honor how
critical every father is to that foundation.” That was said by then Senator Barack Obama
in 2008. If “we are honest with ourselves,” he
went on “we’ll admit that ... too many fathers are... missing from too many lives
and too many homes.” As much as we try to deny the need for real,
masculine strength in society, there’s no denying its necessity. Healthy families and strong communities depend
on the leadership and bravery of good men. Yet, the current trend is to feminize young
men in the hopes of achieving some utopian notion of equality and peace. And it starts at the earliest ages. In the school classroom boys are invariably
“the problem.” On the playground aggressive games like dodgeball
have long been banished. We tell young men that their intrinsic desire
to compete is wrong. Everybody gets a trophy. Don’t run up the score. This anti-male tilt continues on through higher
education and into the workplace. It has created millions of tentative men,
unhappy women, and confused boys and girls. Here’s a secret that everyone woman knows:
women want real men: men they can count on and, yes, look up to. No amount of feminist theory will change that. I don’t know any woman, at any age, who
is attracted to a passive man who looks to her to be his provider, protector and leader. Every woman I know wants a strong, responsible
man. That’s not a consequence of a social construct
or cultural pressure—it’s innate. The devaluation of masculinity won’t end
well because feminine, passive men don’t stop evil. Passive men don’t defend, protect or provide. Passive men don’t lead. Passive men don’t do the things we have
always needed men to do for society to thrive. In his book The Abolition of Man, English
social philosopher C.S. Lewis writes about this problem. He describes the tension “between cerebral
man and visceral man.” “By his intellect,” Lewis explains, man
“is mere spirit and by his appetite mere animal.” We need both. Take away one, and you’re left with a man
who’s either weak or wicked. And in a world of wickedness, weak men are
nothing more than enablers of wicked men. Rape, murder, war. They all have two things in common: Bad men
who do the raping, murdering, and warring; and weak men who won’t stop them. We need good men who will. It’s not masculinity that’s toxic. It’s the lack of it. I’m Allie Stuckey for Prager University.
PragerU also has to run their videos as ads to get people to watch them.
I'm not going to watch the video in case he gets ad money, but I'm seeing things like, construction worker as this masculine job, and that is what I am. Not to say that there aren't issues facing women in those jobs, I've heard the horror stories and what not. One fun example is a lot of sites out there don't supply female specific harnesses. The difference is with how you put the harness on, where you strap a male harness to your person, but you step into a female harness like it's pants. The reason this is a problem is the way the pelvis works on men and women, which I didn't know until being told about it.
One negative thing I'm noticing is one of the suggested videos is this one video that got 5.6 million views, so this idea is certainly popular. People like being told they're right.
So I wear nail polish but I also wrestle for fun. Does my icky femme stuff get balanced out by the manly man wrasslin?
Pseudoscience and no citations that even back up what they're saying. There are lots of men who disagree with this video and rightfully so.
Being responsible, providing for the family, and fight and defend for what’s right... shouldn’t that be what we teach both sexes?
Why does it have to be a man thing?
Oh wait ... maybe because when people talk about toxicity, they are not talking about that ...
Isn't it amazing how something supposedly immutable and innate is also in danger of being completely erased by women saying stuff?
Prager “”””””””””””””””””University”””””””””””””””””””
That soldier sure looks happy to be thrust into violence and traumatized
The fact PragerU is a thing could alone explain why people kill thenselves imo