What Men think of Women

Every boy starts out utterly dominated by a female, a domination which requires decisive change to escape. But if he doesn't escape his mother's gravity field, the next generation of women will have no men to marry. That's essentially our present situation. Few American males (myself included) would I call "men" in the real sense.

A woman cannot show a man how to be a man; what she needs is for him to bring her something she doesn't already have--or know. Watch birds courting.

This whole process works just fine, more or less, in other species; but among humans, so much more complicated, with so many "choices," it's gotten seriously derailed. It's not easy being a man either, especially in our time when the traditional processes that used to make men of boys have been lost. The best our culture has to offer these days are military basic training and football--neither of which have ever appealed to me in the least. In Burma, traditionally a young man becomes a monk for at least a few months, up to a couple of years. Having experienced a similar form of Buddhist monastic life, I can say it can be an excellent molder of character, if properly understood and applied.

A friend of mine does summer camps for teenage boys, wherein they learn wilderness skills and suchlike. And how to act. One assignment sometimes given is to sit all day in one place without moving, which is essentially the same thing that Buddhist monks do. It works. Young men need something to push against--preferably themselves--that won't really hurt them or anyone else.

I'd say that male consciousness tends toward abstraction and identifying principles, then ordering thinking and behavior on that basis. While female consciousness is based on feeling and pragmatic in the short term. Each has its place and use, but they are not "equal"; one or the other must be in charge, and it matters absolutely which.

I'm a fan of Jefferson also, though I certainly recognize his character failings. There were "men in those days." They were all classically educated, too.

"If you allow them [women] to pull away restraints and put themselves on an equality with their husbands, do you imagine that you will be able to tolerate them? From the moment that they become your fellows, they will become your masters." - Cato the Censor

Philalethes