BusterB: Boys to Men

This is my reaction to a paper in the American Psychological Association "Monitor" magazine, VOLUME 30 , NUMBER 7 July/August 1999, at http://www.apa.org/monitor/julaug99/youth.html

The psychologists have discovered boys. God help us.

Yes, I have griped in the past that researchers ignore boys, that all of the research out there was either into "youths" or "girls." How does that old saw go? Be careful what you wish for... you may get it.

If the situation was bad before, when the professionals who ponder human behaviour were ignoring boys, it's about to get worse now that they're paying some attention. If you read this article, it has one clear statement to make: the reason that boys are causing so many problems and having so many problems is that we're doing a lousy job of turning them into girls. Apparently the solution is to find better ways to do just that.

I'm wondering if any of the following has ever occurred to any of the idiots who wrote this paper:

Maybe there is nothing wrong with "shutting down feelings" and not sharing your intimate thoughts and dreams with other people. Maybe the problem is the expectation—established by the psychological professions—that this is a prerequisite to happiness and a fulfilling life.
Maybe the way boys and men have traditionally behaved is valuable and useful. Maybe the problem is that teaching professionals and society at large have been taught by the psychological professions not to value this behaviour. So, boys learn that being a traditional male (stoic, courageous, hard-working, honourable, willing to sacrifice, willing to be accountable) is wrong, and so they aren't sure what to be.

Reading this report I get the idea that the psychologists who wrote this aren't going to help the situation at all. They're going to be passing on a slightly altered version of the same message that boys and men have been pounded with for two decades: everyone should be "nurturing," gentle, touchy-feely, and be willing to gush about their feelings and innermost longings at the drop of a hat. There will still be no one speaking for traditional male values and qualities. Is this because these values and qualities are no longer useful? Well, I see no evidence that any of these twits has ever bothered asking themselves that question.
Maybe there's nothing wrong with boys at all. Maybe there's nothing wrong with traditional male values. Maybe what's wrong is the psychological profession and the new set of values that they're trying to impose on boys.

Let's face it: the "new age male" who is sensitive, nurturing, gentle, and willing to "share his feelings" is a female invention in response to female needs. SNAGs became SNAGs because women said that's what they wanted; it had nothing to do with male needs or building a better society. The psychologists and psychiatrists just took up the beat from the women's movement; it had nothing to do with science or a rigorous determination of the best way to live, if such a thing could even be determined.
Perhaps the biggest myth in this whole thing is that psychologists and psychiatrists have even the faintest idea of what it takes to build a happy, productive society full of people enjoying satisfying and fulfilling lives. None of these jokers have any more of a clue than a guy on the street about how to restructure society so that it works better. So why are we letting them decide what and how to teach our kids?

I want to know where psychologists get off thinking that they understand human behaviour and human interaction so well that they can tell people how to be happy? The modern theory is that you can't lead a happy and fulfilling life unless you can share your feelings and be "sensitive," whatever that is¹. These wonderful new ideas have made life more bearable for some people, but have thrown others into turmoil. Who, exactly, tested these ideas and found them to be solid and well-founded? Who has the research and the "proof" that "Sensitive New Age Guys" are happier and make for a better society? The answer is nobody. Any psychologist who explicitly or implicitly touts these values as making for a superior man is blowing smoke, because at least for now it's all theory. Perhaps in five hundred years of living like this we'll be able to look back and see that it was a good or bad decision, but I won't be around to see it.

In the meantime, these people want to go into our schools and shape the next generation of boys. God help our boys. Essentially what the psychological profession is doing here is what the teaching profession has been doing for decades: testing out every new crackpot notion on a generation of kids and if it fails... well, it fails, and they try something else on the next generation. I consider this criminally irresponsible. What's so professional about testing your theories on live, growing, learning kids, particularly if later on you find that your theories don't work? Oops. Screwed up a few thousand kids. Oh well.

Personally, when I have boys I'm not going to teach them to treat girls as chattel. I'm going to teach them to treat girls with respect. However, I'm also going to teach them that they deserve respect in return, and girls who don't treat them as well as they treat the girls aren't worth spit. I'm also going to teach them that they deserve respect for being boys, not for being as un-boy-like and as girl-like as they can manage. That may mean that they don't "share" their feelings whenever girls demand it; it may mean that they aren't always sensitive to girls' needs; it may mean that they have politically incorrect opinions. The point is that I will want them to grow up to be men, not constantly trying to be what women and the psychologists, psychiatrists, and educators who pander to women want them to be.

I think that boys should be approached on their own terms. I think that boys should be boys², and I think that pseudo-professionals should keep their theories to themselves until those theories are proven superior, and stop experimenting on our kids.

¹ So many people bang on about "sensitivity" and "being sensitive." The problem is, I've never met anyone who knew exactly what this was supposed to mean. If you look at the word itself, women would seem to be asking for men who feel things more acutely. However, if you present a woman with a man who does feel things more acutely, including her sharp tongue, her disrespect, and her endless complaints, she'll be horrified and won't want anything to do with him.

For all of their whining about wanting a "sensitive man," it has been my experience that most women want a man who is insensitive, one who won't complain when he's abused. What they do want, however, is a man who is more attuned to his woman's needs. I wouldn't call this "sensitive." I think that what women want is a man who is more subservient.

Moving this into the psychological field, so psychologists encourage boys or men to express the pain of their own existence, or the tremendous burden that feminism has placed on males? Yes, but then they try to "correct" these improper feelings through therapy. Psychologists and psychiatrists will, as a general rule, tolerate only those feelings that do not contradict feminist / socialist / psychological dogma. Even if a psychologist or psychiatrist were to encourage a man to open up and talk about how he really feels about life, feminism, society, and even psychologists, this hardly does the man a service because it is not preparation for real life, where such feelings in a man are not at all accepted.

The only way to make a man comfortable with such feelings is to give him the company of other men who feel the same. Then, between men, they don't even need to talk about it. The mere presence of other same-thinking men is enough to make one feel validated. However, that's called an "old boy's club" and far from allowing those, we smash them as soon as they spring up. God help our sons.

² I have no idea where people got the idea that saying "boys should be boys" means that they should run about treating girls like sex toys, smashing things, and driving their 4x4s across people's front lawns. When I say that "boys should be boys" I mean that many of the traditional male values of comportment such as honour and stoicism should be valued. I mean that the way to make happy boys is not to figure out how to have them adopt women's values, but to lead them back to the kind of male values that made war heroes and great statesmen. Those men, despite shameless feminist lies and slander, treated their women with kindness and love.

Boys to Men Up Boys to Men Ideological Arrogance
	This is my reaction to a paper in the American Psychological Association "Monitor" magazine, VOLUME 30 , NUMBER 7 July/August 1999, at http://www.apa.org/monitor/julaug99/youth.html The psychologists have discovered boys. God help us. Yes, I have griped in the past that researchers ignore boys, that all of the research out there was either into "youths" or "girls." How does that old saw go? Be careful what you wish for... you may get it. If the situation was bad before, when the professionals who ponder human behaviour were ignoring boys, it's about to get worse now that they're paying some attention. If you read this article, it has one clear statement to make: the reason that boys are causing so many problems and having so many problems is that we're doing a lousy job of turning them into girls. Apparently the solution is to find better ways to do just that. I'm wondering if any of the following has ever occurred to any of the idiots who wrote this paper: Maybe there is nothing wrong with "shutting down feelings" and not sharing your intimate thoughts and dreams with other people. Maybe the problem is the expectation—established by the psychological professions—that this is a prerequisite to happiness and a fulfilling life. Maybe the way boys and men have traditionally behaved is valuable and useful. Maybe the problem is that teaching professionals and society at large have been taught by the psychological professions not to value this behaviour. So, boys learn that being a traditional male (stoic, courageous, hard-working, honourable, willing to sacrifice, willing to be accountable) is wrong, and so they aren't sure what to be. Reading this report I get the idea that the psychologists who wrote this aren't going to help the situation at all. They're going to be passing on a slightly altered version of the same message that boys and men have been pounded with for two decades: everyone should be "nurturing," gentle, touchy-feely, and be willing to gush about their feelings and innermost longings at the drop of a hat. There will still be no one speaking for traditional male values and qualities. Is this because these values and qualities are no longer useful? Well, I see no evidence that any of these twits has ever bothered asking themselves that question. Maybe there's nothing wrong with boys at all. Maybe there's nothing wrong with traditional male values. Maybe what's wrong is the psychological profession and the new set of values that they're trying to impose on boys. Let's face it: the "new age male" who is sensitive, nurturing, gentle, and willing to "share his feelings" is a female invention in response to female needs. SNAGs became SNAGs because women said that's what they wanted; it had nothing to do with male needs or building a better society. The psychologists and psychiatrists just took up the beat from the women's movement; it had nothing to do with science or a rigorous determination of the best way to live, if such a thing could even be determined. Perhaps the biggest myth in this whole thing is that psychologists and psychiatrists have even the faintest idea of what it takes to build a happy, productive society full of people enjoying satisfying and fulfilling lives. None of these jokers have any more of a clue than a guy on the street about how to restructure society so that it works better. So why are we letting them decide what and how to teach our kids? I want to know where psychologists get off thinking that they understand human behaviour and human interaction so well that they can tell people how to be happy? The modern theory is that you can't lead a happy and fulfilling life unless you can share your feelings and be "sensitive," whatever that is¹. These wonderful new ideas have made life more bearable for some people, but have thrown others into turmoil. Who, exactly, tested these ideas and found them to be solid and well-founded? Who has the research and the "proof" that "Sensitive New Age Guys" are happier and make for a better society? The answer is nobody. Any psychologist who explicitly or implicitly touts these values as making for a superior man is blowing smoke, because at least for now it's all theory. Perhaps in five hundred years of living like this we'll be able to look back and see that it was a good or bad decision, but I won't be around to see it. In the meantime, these people want to go into our schools and shape the next generation of boys. God help our boys. Essentially what the psychological profession is doing here is what the teaching profession has been doing for decades: testing out every new crackpot notion on a generation of kids and if it fails... well, it fails, and they try something else on the next generation. I consider this criminally irresponsible. What's so professional about testing your theories on live, growing, learning kids, particularly if later on you find that your theories don't work? Oops. Screwed up a few thousand kids. Oh well. Personally, when I have boys I'm not going to teach them to treat girls as chattel. I'm going to teach them to treat girls with respect. However, I'm also going to teach them that they deserve respect in return, and girls who don't treat them as well as they treat the girls aren't worth spit. I'm also going to teach them that they deserve respect for being boys, not for being as un-boy-like and as girl-like as they can manage. That may mean that they don't "share" their feelings whenever girls demand it; it may mean that they aren't always sensitive to girls' needs; it may mean that they have politically incorrect opinions. The point is that I will want them to grow up to be men, not constantly trying to be what women and the psychologists, psychiatrists, and educators who pander to women want them to be. I think that boys should be approached on their own terms. I think that boys should be boys², and I think that pseudo-professionals should keep their theories to themselves until those theories are proven superior, and stop experimenting on our kids.

	¹ So many people bang on about "sensitivity" and "being sensitive." The problem is, I've never met anyone who knew exactly what this was supposed to mean. If you look at the word itself, women would seem to be asking for men who feel things more acutely. However, if you present a woman with a man who does feel things more acutely, including her sharp tongue, her disrespect, and her endless complaints, she'll be horrified and won't want anything to do with him. For all of their whining about wanting a "sensitive man," it has been my experience that most women want a man who is insensitive, one who won't complain when he's abused. What they do want, however, is a man who is more attuned to his woman's needs. I wouldn't call this "sensitive." I think that what women want is a man who is more subservient. Moving this into the psychological field, so psychologists encourage boys or men to express the pain of their own existence, or the tremendous burden that feminism has placed on males? Yes, but then they try to "correct" these improper feelings through therapy. Psychologists and psychiatrists will, as a general rule, tolerate only those feelings that do not contradict feminist / socialist / psychological dogma. Even if a psychologist or psychiatrist were to encourage a man to open up and talk about how he really feels about life, feminism, society, and even psychologists, this hardly does the man a service because it is not preparation for real life, where such feelings in a man are not at all accepted. The only way to make a man comfortable with such feelings is to give him the company of other men who feel the same. Then, between men, they don't even need to talk about it. The mere presence of other same-thinking men is enough to make one feel validated. However, that's called an "old boy's club" and far from allowing those, we smash them as soon as they spring up. God help our sons. ² I have no idea where people got the idea that saying "boys should be boys" means that they should run about treating girls like sex toys, smashing things, and driving their 4x4s across people's front lawns. When I say that "boys should be boys" I mean that many of the traditional male values of comportment such as honour and stoicism should be valued. I mean that the way to make happy boys is not to figure out how to have them adopt women's values, but to lead them back to the kind of male values that made war heroes and great statesmen. Those men, despite shameless feminist lies and slander, treated their women with kindness and love.