No one expects young men to do anything and they are responding by doing nothing
robkhenderson.substack.com
No one expects young men to do anything and they are responding by doing nothing
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Re: No one expects young men to do anything and they are responding by doing nothing
#2No post body was provided.
Re: No one expects young men to do anything and they are responding by doing nothing
#3This is an important read, especially this part.
> This highly educated and affluent person prioritized stability for her own children. But refused to publicly endorse this value so that less fortunate children could also benefit from family stability.
I’m from a rigidly socially conservative immigrant family that professes fashionably liberal values in public—imposing a double standard between “us” and “Americans.” Meanwhile my wife’s family is from a working class part of the Oregon coast. Watching and hearing about the family instability in these communities is heartbreaking. Half or more of everyone’s parents are divorced. The kids float around seeking stability and the adults can’t provide it.
The article is right on the mark talking about the importance of social expectations for men. My family’s rigid expectations have been such a blessing. It made a difference that the way to earn their respect was to get an education and a good job and support my family, and knowing that I would lose that respect if I did anything selfish to destabilize my kids’ lives. The contrast made me realize that professing liberal social values that one doesn’t live by harms society. It matters what we say about what’s good and what’s bad, what works and what doesn’t. Creating a culture where men can attain dignity and social respect by providing for their family and staying with the mother of their kids matters. And creating a culture where men are told it’s okay not to do those things creates harm.
This isn’t really a political point though it sounds like one. Social change has swept through America so thoroughly that the head of the “conservative” party is a three-times-divorced man of little character. The social and cultural guard rails have been removed from the whole country. But the impact is obviously felt most damagingly in parts of the country where men need to find dignity in working at the animal feed plant are harder hit by that cultural change than parts of the country where men can find dignity earning half a million dollars a year doing interesting knowledge work.
Re: No one expects young men to do anything and they are responding by doing nothing
#4> The people with the most money and education—the class most responsible for shaping culture and customs—ensure that their children are raised in stable homes. But actively undermine the norm for everyone else.
Yep. If you were raised in poverty, the WORST thing you can do is listen to "approved" mainstream advice. That culture / media isn't there to help you, but to sell you things or make money on telling you what you want to hear.
I'll go one step further and say that if you are a man born into poverty, check out Aaron Clarey's asshole consulting. Don't agree with everything he says, but as a starting point, that's 10 times better than what your guidance counselor will tell you.
Re: No one expects young men to do anything and they are responding by doing nothing
#5This has been a really good read! Thanks for sharing, the only place where I had a strong disagreement was this, which could definitely be based on cultural differences:
> The people with the most money and education—the class most responsible for shaping culture and customs—ensure that their children are raised in stable homes. But actively undermine the norm for everyone else.
I am not from the USA but I don't believe this is true in e.g. Europe. At least in my country (Spain) and where I live now (Japan), it is understood even by the upper class that it's better to live in an educated society than in a criminal one. Sure there's some within that upper class that might want it, but I'd say it's a tiny minority of classists and not the upper class overall. But I also believe that in these countries the upper class is closer to the middle/lower classes, while in the USA I can see how the huge gap might make more people in the upper class think that it's an impossible goal and just give up and try to isolate the classes.
Re: No one expects young men to do anything and they are responding by doing nothing
#6This is an important read, especially this part. > This highly educated and affluent person prioritized stability for her own children. But refused to publicly endorse this value so that less fortunate children could also benefit from family stability. I’m from a rigidly socially conservative immigrant family that professes fashionably liberal values in public—imposing a double standard between “us” and “Americans.”…
Maybe for those men lucky enough to have families. A growing issue is the large percentage of men who do not and will likely never have families to ever take care of. If we think deadbeat dads unstable, the incel community is a madhouse.
Re: No one expects young men to do anything and they are responding by doing nothing
#7This is an important read, especially this part. > This highly educated and affluent person prioritized stability for her own children. But refused to publicly endorse this value so that less fortunate children could also benefit from family stability. I’m from a rigidly socially conservative immigrant family that professes fashionably liberal values in public—imposing a double standard between “us” and “Americans.”…
We need to find a better reason why this happens. I don't believe it's liberal social values which are not lived by.
First of I would believe it's an educational problem and second it's a 'who cares' problem.
There are plenty of areas/ghettos of low income and low education around.
The blog also contains the following:
"The people with the most money and education—the class most responsible for shaping culture and customs—ensure that their children are raised in stable homes. But actively undermine the norm for everyone else"
How do they undermine the norm? They don't do this on purpose they are also just humans.
Re: No one expects young men to do anything and they are responding by doing nothing
#8> Although this may be considered an unflattering characterization…we have found no evidence to contradict the basic general principle that men will do whatever is required in order to obtain sex, and perhaps not a great deal more.
I just watched "Dancing with the Birds", a documentary on Netflix with great footage of male birds of paradise and bower birds seducing their mates. It strongly underlines the above proposition. These birds perform absurd, bizzare, wildly expensive behaviors for no other purpose but that the chicks dig it. After that the male gets under the female tail feathers, and that's his last contribution to fatherhood.
I think we typically underestimate how much this applies to humans, and how much female political power is also sexual power, and visa versa, for good and ill.
Re: No one expects young men to do anything and they are responding by doing nothing
#9This has been a really good read! Thanks for sharing, the only place where I had a strong disagreement was this, which could definitely be based on cultural differences: > The people with the most money and education—the class most responsible for shaping culture and customs—ensure that their children are raised in stable homes. But actively undermine the norm for everyone else. I am not from the USA but I don't beli…
Criminality and education are not distinct. Better-educated people commit crimes at roughly the same rate, they are just far less likely to be caught. Either the nature of thier crimes does not lend itself to reporting (embezzelment v. bank robbery) or they recieve different treatment by the legal system.
Re: No one expects young men to do anything and they are responding by doing nothing
#10This is an important read, especially this part. > This highly educated and affluent person prioritized stability for her own children. But refused to publicly endorse this value so that less fortunate children could also benefit from family stability. I’m from a rigidly socially conservative immigrant family that professes fashionably liberal values in public—imposing a double standard between “us” and “Americans.”…
Maybe for those men lucky enough to have families. A growing issue is the large percentage of men who do not and will likely never have families to ever take care of. If we think deadbeat dads unstable, the incel community is a madhouse.
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