The Demise Of Boys & Men

In this week’s Success Newsletter, I would like to discuss and reveal the demise of boys & men.

First a quick update:

“6 Signs You Are Dating A Machista?”
Women say they want a masculine or manly man; is there a difference between a masculine man and a machista? Read my insights here 

“How Stupid Are Men?”
The media thrives on portraying men as bumbling buffoons, inept, idiots who deserve no respect, while portraying women as superior, highly intelligent and highly skilled. Read my insights here

“How To Set Your Boundaries and Say No!”
It sounds easy because it is such a simple and powerful word with only 2 letters, and yet, people struggle or freeze up when it comes time to saying no to what they don’t want. Is that you? Watch the video to learn how to say No!

Now, let’s talk about the demise of boys & men.

As the US struggles with the blurring of gender lines and the push to grant people the right to use whichever bathroom they choose based on their own gender identity, there is a group that has been progressively suffering men.

Before you interpret this as a sexist article, please read it in its entirety.

In 2010, I wrote an article that reveals that women are taking over. The following year, Professor Philip Zimbardo presented a TED talk titled The Demise Of Guys.

Both my article and Professor Zimbardo’s video share the same message as summarized here:

“Boys are 30 percent more likely than girls to drop out of school. In Canada, five boys drop out for every three girls. Girls outperform boys now at every level, from elementary school to graduate school. There’s a 10 percent differential between getting BA’s and all graduate programs, with guys falling behind girls. Two-thirds of all students in special ed. remedial programs are guys. And as you all know, boys are five times more likely than girls to be labeled as having Attention Deficit Disorder – and therefore we drug them with Ritalin.”

In my article, I also revealed that there are more women in the workforce than men and:

“Today, women are making the decisions. Women account for 85% of all consumer purchases including everything from autos to health care (91% of new homes and 92% of vacations.)”

“In the US, the CDC reveals that men die six years earlier than women and are less likely than women to be insured; men are 15 times more likely than women to go to prison, more likely to be obese, alcoholic and unemployed.”

There are also 4 other serious problems:

1. Manhood is becoming unidentifiable
The definition of manhood is becoming less identifiable and definable than ever before. What is a man? Is it John Wayne who represents courage, strength, will power while also slapping a woman to set her straight? Many men struggle with the definition of being a man and therefore cling to the definition of a man as someone who controls and dominates his woman, and, if the woman dominates or controls him, he is therefore not a man but rather a girl or girly (derogatory intention.) Is the man a person who protects and provides for his family and achieves material and career success? And if so, what happens when he loses his family or his ability to provide for them? What happens to the man when the woman can provide for herself and she, too, achieves material and career success and/or outperforms the man in this area?

2. Men have to earn manhood
Men need to prove and earn the title & status of ‘manhood’ and can lose it quite easily based on changing variables while women automatically are granted the title of womanhood based on biological markers, and once attained, women do not ever lose the status of womanhood.

As mentioned above, manhood can be lost because it is not tied to biology but rather to various personality traits and social and behavioral markers – wealth, power, career, riches, physical prowess, and so forth. Donald Trump who promotes himself as being really, really rich also resorted to boasting on national television about his genitalia and his adept use of such as a way to reinforce his manhood.

3. Males are escaping to video games
Males are spending excessive time in video games in isolation and this is negatively impacting their social skills.

“By the time a boy is 21, he’s played 10,000 hours of video games, most of that in isolation.” – Professor Zimbardo

Professor Zimbardo believes that this video game usage is tied to the need for constant and varying forms of arousal and is self-perpetuating. Other experts argue that the excessive desire for videogames is a way to escape reality and its responsibilities.

I believe that males are turning to video games because it is one of the last and possibly only venues or outlets where a male can engage in male driven behaviors without being condemned for it – I am referring to aggression, combativeness, violence, competiveness, reward-seeking, etc. which are driven by testosterone. In contrast, in real life interactions, a male who expresses any form of aggression is immediately condemned and expected to soften his tone and become more feminine. Again, note the contradictory messages today – a woman can slap a man (and it’s concluded that he must have deserved it) while a man who slaps a woman is immediately charged with domestic violence/abuse. Both are wrong.

“While playing video games, men have more activity in the mesocorticolimbic center, the region of the brain associated with reward and addiction, than women… The researchers also found greater activation in male brains in three brain structures – the nucleus accumbens, amygdala, and orbitofrontal cortex – and that the brain activity increased according to how much territory they had gained. The female brains showed no such correlation.” – https://www.video-game-addiction.org/boys-and-video-games.html

It must also be noted that video games also have benefits such as the development of cognitive abilities. The concern is when video games are played in isolation and replace real life interaction.

“Being masculine in my father’s generation was spending every night in a pub smoking and drinking and avoiding family life. Those I game with do so around the family time they have.” – Darren Gallagher, age 33

Professor Zimbardo believes that excessive gaming in isolation, along with the point mentioned below, is creating issues for guys such as shyness, fear of intimacy, inability to be intimate and inability to interact with women.

4. Males are running from mating with women and running to porn
Males are consuming porn at an extraordinary level and this, too, is negatively impacting their social skills and creating fear of intimacy.

“The average boy now watches 50 porn video clips a week. And there’s some guy watching a hundred, obviously. And the porn industry is the fastest growing industry in America – 15 billion annually. For every 400 movies made in Hollywood, there are 11,000 now made porn videos.” – Professor Zimbardo

“So the effect, very quickly, is it’s a new kind of arousal. Boys’ brains are being digitally rewired in a totally new way for change, novelty, excitement and constant arousal. That means they’re totally out of sync in traditional classes, which are analog, static, interactively passive. They’re also totally out of sync in romantic relationships, which build gradually and subtly.” – Professor Zimbardo

(There is also a movement called NoFap – an online community that serves as a support group for those who wish to avoid the use of pornography, masturbation, and/or sexual intercourse. The NoFap subreddit currently has over 309,000 members. )

Obviously, all of these challenges and consequences are being created on various levels – technology has changed the way we interact or choose not to interact and, society is redefining by default manhood by denying all forms of previously accepted masculinity and encouraging women to compete with men on masculine terms.

The ultimate result is that neither men nor women seem to be happy or clear about their roles, and relationships are suffering and being destroyed.

Without appearing or intending to be flippant, the solution again sits with parents: you must get clear about what a man is and instill that in your sons and you must limit their exposure and time in all technology (obviously steering them away from porn) and encouraging & teaching skilled social interaction. Read Zimbardo’s book “Man, Interrupted: Why Young Men are Struggling & What We Can Do About It”

You can add to the conversation below.

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I wish you the best and remind you “Believe in yourself -You deserve the best!”

Patrick Wanis Ph.D.
Celebrity Life Coach, Human Behavior & Relationship Expert & SRTT Therapist
www.patrickwanis.com