3 ms·

Being a Man in the 21st Century (Part 1)

17 points by bhousel 17y ago

zach 17y ago
When function (of manliness, say) is removed, the form is free to be expressed in exaggerated and grotesque ways. Including a more gangsta Luke Skywalker.
electromagnetic 17y ago
I must provide a counter-point in the argument. Whilst only 1-in-5 Young Adult readers are male, the actual reading rate for males is only ~10% lower than females. So with such a small margin of difference, what are the males reading if not Young Adult? I know when I was 12 years old, I wasn't reading young adult. I was reading LotR and Discworld novels. I think I had a brief period of reading YA before I was reading adult fiction. There weren't many good YA fiction when I grew up, most was targeted towards girls and I stopped reading YA before good books like Cirque Du Freak (which I narrowly missed) and Inkheart (which I missed by a few years) appeared. I personally read Terry Pratchetts YA books, but quickly progressed into his adult fiction with the Discworld (there was no Tiffany Aching YA discworlds until the same time of release as Inkheart and I was already well into Discworld by then). Does it not say that if boys are only reading slightly less than girls, but not reading YA, that those boys who do read books are more advanced readers?
req2 17y ago
I'll note that, at least in business, some research indicates that women do not earn less than men: "Women executives who do not have children follow career paths that closely replicate those of their male peers. Successful M.B.A. couples have similar work patterns, said Dr. Bertrand. Women without children married to high-earning spouses are just as likely to work and accumulate post-M.B.A. work experience at an almost identical rate, she said. Call a woman without a child a man." Rather, they work less than men: "When women executives return to the office, after several months of absence, they typically start to work shorter hours, the study shows: 52 hours per week, compared with an average 58 hours for their male peers, as they adapt to their new double task." http://www.nytimes.com/2009/04/29/business/global/29iht-riedgenper.html http://www.nytimes.com/2009/04/29/business/global/29iht-ried... This is not brushing away the problem, but pointing out that wages are a symptom of an underlying cause.
- gaius 17y ago
  Equal pay for equal work, I absolutely believe in, but it goes both ways. Taking a year off - for any reason, for anyone - should mean forfeiting a year's seniority and pay. The truth is that men have always had to choose and to compromise between work and domestic life, there are many men who rarely see their kids not because they don't love them but because they need to earn to give their kids a good start in life. Incidentally here in the UK, deputy PM Harriet Harman (known as Harriet Harperson as she's so PC) had her figures on pay savaged by the National Audit Office - she compared pro rata salaries of women working part-time to those of men working full-time.
  - gruseom 17y ago
    deputy PM Harriet Harman (known as Harriet Harperson as she's so PC) What a delicious sample of British wit.
aarongough 17y ago
I personally believe that a lot of the issues that Men in general face has come from the changing definition of what a Man should in the face of our growing reliance on complex, possibly automated, electrical and mechanical systems. I think a good indicator of this is the reduced standing of skilled trades within most people's minds. Not so long ago being a carpenter or a plumber was considered a great job that paid well, nowadays many people perceive working in a trade as a last option for those that don't have better prospects. Canada is suffering a serious shortage of skilled trade workers and I feel this directly reflects the change in attitude toward those jobs. While this transition is not so bad for those that are more intellectually minded, I have to question whether this change is badly warping what society feels a Man should be... Traditionally I would say that a Man was perceived as someone that could be relied upon in nearly any situation, his working knowledge of the systems around him (mechanical or otherwise, and simpler than they are now) was fairly good and could be brought to bear whenever there was a problem. These days I think it is harder and harder to find people (in my generation at least) that match this description. I think that one of the effects of this is that the stereotypical unthinking, unimaginative young man doesn't see the number of options for his future that he would have 30 or more years ago. Rather than being respected and happy in his job in a trade he feels that he is being marginalized by society. This clearly has the possibility to lead to resentment of and violence toward the world that put him where he is...
10ren 17y ago
The change in action figure suggests to me that our innate drive towards physical violence is not getting a natural outlet elsewhere. Traditional outlets include contact sport (ritualized warfare), litigation (ritualized warfare) and chess (ritualized warfare). That's because the purpose of physical violence is war: to defend the territory that the tribe and family depends on (and attack it). We don't need that any more (...?), at least not in that form (...?), but we can't yet escape our own nature - and it might not be a good idea (consider "The Warriors", Larry Niven). I think humans (men especially) have an inbuilt tendency towards physical violence - just as we have innate curiosity, humour, aptitude for language, mathematics, trade, fairness, cooperation, kindness and a wish to understand. But nevertheless, one of them is violence (consider your experience of anger). Better to harness this productively, or dissipate it harmlessly, than to ignore it blindly. Because there is a very convenient outlet for it readily available to all governments: actual war.
- Tichy 17y ago
  I think it is still a cruel and competitive world out there. Since you mention chess: maybe it is not all solved on the physical level now, but other fights can be just as dangerous. We are competing for jobs, success, ultimately for food on the table and attractive women to marry.
  - 10ren 17y ago
    True in a way, although much of those things follow naturally from creating wealth (i.e. creating value in the world), so much so that if we focus on that, the rest of it works out pretty well. It's like how you can work on building a better app and getting it adopted... vs. fighting piracy/maximizing revenue from customers/trying to beat your competitors. Of course, an organization can do both; but it can't skip the first one.
samuel 17y ago
The new SkyWalker is a men's Barbie. It's not tougher, it's just more sexually attractive to the oppossite sex, and a physical model for boys. That's how I see it, at least.
- jcl 17y ago
  It's not a new development, either. The action figures for He-Man looked just like the updated Luke, if not more exaggerated, and they came out around the time of the old Luke. ("He-Man"... There's a subtle product name. I bet it won only narrowly over "Male Role Model Plastic Toy Adventure Hour".)
bokonist 17y ago
Despite the surface appearance that the gender divide in the workforce has narrowed, it's actually amazing how deep it really is. Men still dominate the "making things" segment of the workforce - manufacturing, engineering, construction, agriculture, transportation. Women are still concentrated in education, healthcare, human resources, administrative, and non-profits. Part of the reason for women doing so well in the work force is the continued growth of government and psuedo-government bureaucracy that generates more education/healthcare/administrative jobs. In the 19th century, the model for wealthy families was that the man would be the bread winner, and the woman would live off the man's support and would work in charity or the arts or reform movements. Now the pattern of work is the exact same at the 19th century. The difference is rather than marrying a man for the income, women vote to tax the income away, and then women get jobs in non-profits or government agencies. Then, to add insult to injury, you get articles like this claiming that men need to get with the program. Would society benefit if the machinist or truck driver who drops out of high school, instead continues his education and becomes a civil service paper pusher? I don't think so, in fact, it is the reverse. (Note, these two paragraphs are observing very general, aggregate trends, obviously there are a gazillion exceptions on the individual level)

17 points by bhousel 17y ago

zach 17y ago

When function (of manliness, say) is removed, the form is free to be expressed in exaggerated and grotesque ways. Including a more gangsta Luke Skywalker.

electromagnetic 17y ago

I must provide a counter-point in the argument. Whilst only 1-in-5 Young Adult readers are male, the actual reading rate for males is only ~10% lower than females. So with such a small margin of difference, what are the males reading if not Young Adult? I know when I was 12 years old, I wasn't reading young adult. I was reading LotR and Discworld novels. I think I had a brief period of reading YA before I was reading adult fiction. There weren't many good YA fiction when I grew up, most was targeted towards girls and I stopped reading YA before good books like Cirque Du Freak (which I narrowly missed) and Inkheart (which I missed by a few years) appeared. I personally read Terry Pratchetts YA books, but quickly progressed into his adult fiction with the Discworld (there was no Tiffany Aching YA discworlds until the same time of release as Inkheart and I was already well into Discworld by then). Does it not say that if boys are only reading slightly less than girls, but not reading YA, that those boys who do read books are more advanced readers?

req2 17y ago

I'll note that, at least in business, some research indicates that women do not earn less than men: "Women executives who do not have children follow career paths that closely replicate those of their male peers. Successful M.B.A. couples have similar work patterns, said Dr. Bertrand. Women without children married to high-earning spouses are just as likely to work and accumulate post-M.B.A. work experience at an almost identical rate, she said. Call a woman without a child a man." Rather, they work less than men: "When women executives return to the office, after several months of absence, they typically start to work shorter hours, the study shows: 52 hours per week, compared with an average 58 hours for their male peers, as they adapt to their new double task." http://www.nytimes.com/2009/04/29/business/global/29iht-riedgenper.html http://www.nytimes.com/2009/04/29/business/global/29iht-ried... This is not brushing away the problem, but pointing out that wages are a symptom of an underlying cause.

gaius 17y ago
Equal pay for equal work, I absolutely believe in, but it goes both ways. Taking a year off - for any reason, for anyone - should mean forfeiting a year's seniority and pay. The truth is that men have always had to choose and to compromise between work and domestic life, there are many men who rarely see their kids not because they don't love them but because they need to earn to give their kids a good start in life. Incidentally here in the UK, deputy PM Harriet Harman (known as Harriet Harperson as she's so PC) had her figures on pay savaged by the National Audit Office - she compared pro rata salaries of women working part-time to those of men working full-time.
- gruseom 17y ago
  deputy PM Harriet Harman (known as Harriet Harperson as she's so PC) What a delicious sample of British wit.

aarongough 17y ago

I personally believe that a lot of the issues that Men in general face has come from the changing definition of what a Man should in the face of our growing reliance on complex, possibly automated, electrical and mechanical systems. I think a good indicator of this is the reduced standing of skilled trades within most people's minds. Not so long ago being a carpenter or a plumber was considered a great job that paid well, nowadays many people perceive working in a trade as a last option for those that don't have better prospects. Canada is suffering a serious shortage of skilled trade workers and I feel this directly reflects the change in attitude toward those jobs. While this transition is not so bad for those that are more intellectually minded, I have to question whether this change is badly warping what society feels a Man should be... Traditionally I would say that a Man was perceived as someone that could be relied upon in nearly any situation, his working knowledge of the systems around him (mechanical or otherwise, and simpler than they are now) was fairly good and could be brought to bear whenever there was a problem. These days I think it is harder and harder to find people (in my generation at least) that match this description. I think that one of the effects of this is that the stereotypical unthinking, unimaginative young man doesn't see the number of options for his future that he would have 30 or more years ago. Rather than being respected and happy in his job in a trade he feels that he is being marginalized by society. This clearly has the possibility to lead to resentment of and violence toward the world that put him where he is...

10ren 17y ago

The change in action figure suggests to me that our innate drive towards physical violence is not getting a natural outlet elsewhere. Traditional outlets include contact sport (ritualized warfare), litigation (ritualized warfare) and chess (ritualized warfare). That's because the purpose of physical violence is war: to defend the territory that the tribe and family depends on (and attack it). We don't need that any more (...?), at least not in that form (...?), but we can't yet escape our own nature - and it might not be a good idea (consider "The Warriors", Larry Niven). I think humans (men especially) have an inbuilt tendency towards physical violence - just as we have innate curiosity, humour, aptitude for language, mathematics, trade, fairness, cooperation, kindness and a wish to understand. But nevertheless, one of them is violence (consider your experience of anger). Better to harness this productively, or dissipate it harmlessly, than to ignore it blindly. Because there is a very convenient outlet for it readily available to all governments: actual war.

Tichy 17y ago
I think it is still a cruel and competitive world out there. Since you mention chess: maybe it is not all solved on the physical level now, but other fights can be just as dangerous. We are competing for jobs, success, ultimately for food on the table and attractive women to marry.
- 10ren 17y ago
  True in a way, although much of those things follow naturally from creating wealth (i.e. creating value in the world), so much so that if we focus on that, the rest of it works out pretty well. It's like how you can work on building a better app and getting it adopted... vs. fighting piracy/maximizing revenue from customers/trying to beat your competitors. Of course, an organization can do both; but it can't skip the first one.

samuel 17y ago

The new SkyWalker is a men's Barbie. It's not tougher, it's just more sexually attractive to the oppossite sex, and a physical model for boys. That's how I see it, at least.

jcl 17y ago
It's not a new development, either. The action figures for He-Man looked just like the updated Luke, if not more exaggerated, and they came out around the time of the old Luke. ("He-Man"... There's a subtle product name. I bet it won only narrowly over "Male Role Model Plastic Toy Adventure Hour".)

bokonist 17y ago

Despite the surface appearance that the gender divide in the workforce has narrowed, it's actually amazing how deep it really is. Men still dominate the "making things" segment of the workforce - manufacturing, engineering, construction, agriculture, transportation. Women are still concentrated in education, healthcare, human resources, administrative, and non-profits. Part of the reason for women doing so well in the work force is the continued growth of government and psuedo-government bureaucracy that generates more education/healthcare/administrative jobs. In the 19th century, the model for wealthy families was that the man would be the bread winner, and the woman would live off the man's support and would work in charity or the arts or reform movements. Now the pattern of work is the exact same at the 19th century. The difference is rather than marrying a man for the income, women vote to tax the income away, and then women get jobs in non-profits or government agencies. Then, to add insult to injury, you get articles like this claiming that men need to get with the program. Would society benefit if the machinist or truck driver who drops out of high school, instead continues his education and becomes a civil service paper pusher? I don't think so, in fact, it is the reverse. (Note, these two paragraphs are observing very general, aggregate trends, obviously there are a gazillion exceptions on the individual level)