Deindustrialization, automation, free trade and peacetime have shifted the labor market dramatically, and not in men’s favor — the need for physical labor has declined, while soft skills and academic credentials are increasingly rewarded. Growing numbers of working-age men have detached from the labor market, with the biggest drop in employment among men ages 25 to 34. For those in a job, wages have stagnated everywhere except the top.

Meanwhile, women are surging ahead in school and in the workplace, putting a further dent in the “provider” model that has long been ingrained in our conception of masculinity. Men now receive about 74 bachelor’s degrees for every 100 awarded to women, and men account for more than 70 percent of the decline in college enrollment overall. … Men also account for almost 3 of every 4 “deaths of despair,” either from a suicide, alcohol abuse or an overdose.

I’ve written about this before, most recently in Red State Culture and Cornered Animals (June 2022) and Josh Hawley’s “Virtuous Men” Should Grow Up (November 2021). And I think that a whole lot of our societal malfunctions can be traced to this. I’m thinking the gun culture and mass shootings in particular, but IMO this also reaches into most of the tangle of pathologies that pass for “American conservatism” these days.

Hawley et al. blame the Problem With Men on “the Left” — “They want to define the traditional masculine virtues — things like courage and independence and assertiveness — as a danger to society,” which of course is pure horse crap. The Left admires courage, independence and assertiveness (as opposed to aggression) and will be overjoyed if any of those virtues ever make an appearance in MAGAland. However, we are not holding our breath.

The Right says that these poor misunderstood men are being driven to pornography and video games by feminism and woke ideology or something. It’s not their fault, of course. Heaven forbid they would ever take personal responsibility for anything.

I say the problem is that too many young men are stuck in some cartoon version of “traditional masculinity” that they mostly got from watching movies. They’re stuck in a weird box of old cultural stereotypes that serve no purpose in 21st century life. They’re alienated from the larger culture. Their ideas about what their lives are supposed be gave them a truckload of expectations that are not being met.

It is a lot harder for most young folks to get started in adult life, to get a steady job that pays a living wage with benefits, never mind buy a house and the other trappings of American middle-class life they were raised to expect as “normal.” But that’s true for young women also. The difference, IMO, is that young women have different expectations. The girls know that The System isn’t going to give them anything. They know that if they want something, they’re going to have to make plans and work their butts off for it. There are young men out there who are working their butts off also, of course, but they aren’t the ones who are adrift.

I keep reading that “traditional masculinity” is stoic. I infer this is not a reference to the old Greek philosophical system but an ideal that men are not emotional. That’s the old stereotype that helped keep women subjugated for so long; women are too emotional while men are logical. Never mind that the huge majority of homicides and bar fights are perpetrated by men (see also). People who are taught to repress and deny their emotions are people who are not good at processing emotions. Throw in alienation, disappointment, lack of purpose and direction, and lots of guns and watch the mass shootings commence.

Comments to the article tend to fall along the lines of (a) What problem? Who cares? Why is this article so long?; (b) Men brought this on themselves and can kiss my ass; and (c) Let’s just have a genderless society. None of those are helpful. I think there is a real societal problem that needs addressing. However, I have no idea how we’re going to address it.