Where Did the Men Go?

Women watching boys, America's cultural crossroads, American optimism and more in this week's digest.

Carmel, Indiana, where I live, has been a leader in promoting civility in public life. City councilor Jeff Worrell’s “Project Civility” will be hosting a civility summit in Carmel on September 26 and 27th. Be sure to check it out.

What Happens When Most of the Adults in Boys’ Lives Are Women

The New York Times ran an interesting piece (free article link) on how boys spend most of their lives in settings where the adults around them are overwhelmingly women. Here’s their chart on the share of women in occupations.

The article says:

The importance of role models for girls seems irrefutable. Efforts since the 1990s to provide female role models have had great success opening doors for girls and young women, who now outpace boys in education, outnumber men in law and medical schools and excel in male-dominated fields like tech and politics.

At the same time, boys have many fewer male role models in their daily lives. While men still fill most positions of power across American society, the people who interact with children are largely women. Occupations like pediatrics have switched to mostly being done by women, while those that were always female-dominated, like teaching, have become more so.

At a crucial time in their lives, boys are increasingly cared for by women, especially the many boys whose fathers aren’t a regular presence. This lack of male role models, say researchers, parents, young men and those who work with them, is contributing to their struggles in school and employment — and the overall feeling that they’re adrift.

Click over to read the whole thing. Again, it’s a free paywall bypass link.

America’s Cultural Crossroads

Daniel Cox at AEI’s Survey Center on American Life is out with a very interesting new poll. Some of the findings:

• “College-educated women are uniquely pessimistic about the country’s future.”

• “Democrats are especially cynical: Nearly eight in 10 (79 percent) say elected officials are only in it for themselves, a view held by 64 percent of Republicans.”

• “Although young men swung strongly toward Trump in the latest election, they are uniquely hostile toward the Democrats and Republicans”

• “Overall, Americans have a generally positive view of their fellow citizens.”

• “More than half (51 percent) of young women report that they have no close friends who are Trump supporters”

• “When it comes to receiving regular physical affection, single men fare the worst. Fewer than half (45 percent) of single men report that they received a hug or some other form of physical affection within the past week”

• “Married Americans report feeling far more satisfied with their personal lives than those who are single—with the pattern similar among men and women”

• “Over the past four years, more Americans have come to embrace the idea that society is better off when men and women engage in pursuits that are aligned with their gender”

• “A majority (54 percent) of Americans favor deporting all immigrants who came the US illegally back to their country of origin”

• “Young men have become much more amenable to reducing access to pornography.”

As always, Cox’s piece is full of very interesting charts, like this one.

Click over to read the whole thing.

Where Have the Men Gone?

A woman in the NYT Modern Love column wonders where the men have gone and wants them to come back.

The scene was beautiful — low lights, shared plates, shoulders angled in. The kind of evening people wait for all winter. Still, I found myself watching the crowd as it moved past us: women walking in pairs or alone, dressed with care. At table after table at the nearby restaurants, there was a noticeable absence of men — at least of men seated in what looked like dates.

…

It started to become clear the previous April, when a man who had been pursuing me canceled a dinner at the last minute. There was a scheduling mix-up with his son’s game. I understood. I’m a hockey mom; I get it. Still, I went. I wore what I would have worn anyway. I took the table. I ordered well. And I watched the room.

Only two tables nearby seemed to hold actual dates. The rest were groups of women, or women alone, each one occupying her space with quiet confidence. No shrinking. No waiting. No apologizing.

That night marked something. Not a heartbreak, but an unveiling. A sense that what I’d been experiencing wasn’t just personal misalignment. It was something broader. Cultural. A slow vanishing of presence.

Click over to read the whole thing. The author is 54, single, and used to work on the business side at Playboy, btw.

More on men:

The Dispatch: Men Are the New Women’s Issue

The Guardian: Why are midlife men struggling to make – and keep – friends?

The Blaze: I was a 'problem student' — until all-male Catholic school let me be a boy

NYT: The Death and Life of the Straight White Man’s Novel

Christianity Today: Have Mercy on Me, a Zynner - Oh, boy!

And Anthony Bradley had a great X post about Prince William as a good father.

Never Bet Against the USA

Rich DeVos, co-founder of Amway, wrote a book in the 1970s called Believe! It’s soon to be re-released in a new edition by his youngest son Doug, who is the host of the Believe! podcast. In honor of the forthcoming reissue of the book, he launched a publication on the 4th of July called the Believe Journal.

I was honored to be invited to contribute to the journal’s launch with a piece on why it’s a bad idea to bet against the USA, despite all of our very real problems.

Betting against the United States has never been a winner. America has had what Japanese scholar Fuji Kamiya calls “a reserve power that allows it to overcome both the inadequacies of its leaders and the foibles of its citizens.”

America’s unique genius is that it’s a protean nation. It’s constantly making and remaking itself, pressing forward, heading to the frontier. Destabilizing changes that might sink a traditional country have, in America, been successfully incorporated into an updated national character.

This can be disconcerting to those who prefer that things stay the same, to those who prefer a more rooted and stable existence. But that’s always been a minority position in America, which is one reason a certain kind of conservatism has never had much purchase here. In America, even conservatism is a dynamic force, celebrating the entrepreneur, the innovator, the comeback kid, the one who reinvents himself.

Click over to read the whole thing.

One question to ask yourself if you are a pessimist on America: where other place of any size could you go that would be better? Most places have even worse problems than we do.

I was also very honored that in his editor’s note, Doug DeVos wrote, “Aaron Renn is a Renaissance man whose understanding of modern society is extraordinary.” Thank you for saying so.

Best of the Web

Lyman Stone: Men Doing More Housework Won’t Raise Fertility

NYT: Motherhood Should Come With a Warning Label

Yahoo: I'm single by choice at 42. For some women, prioritizing yourself can be 'beautiful, joyful and full' without a partner

Palladium: Economic Nihilism

Economic nihilism is then the ideology of the young, aspirant class, willing to put in two years—but only two years—at whatever firm is prestigious upon graduation. Economic nihilism is the ideology that celebrates taking shortcuts. The economy itself is abstracted away, what’s left is a salary or its equivalent in crypto payouts.

New Content and Media Mentions

I got mentions recently from Mere Orthodoxy, Christ Over All, Prufrock, and by Paul VanderKlay.

I was in Chattanooga during the Presbyterian Church in America General Assembly. While I did not spend much time at that actual event, I did stop by the exhibitor hall to record an interesting episode with the crew at Theology Pugcast. We talk about the lack of evangelicals at the top levels of society and many other things.

Recent pieces:

• How to Become a High Value Man - It's easier than you think

• Understanding Intersexual Dynamics - The facts you won't get from traditional authorities

• Robert Ordway wrote an essay about the realities of America’s multi-racial working class. I also had him on the podcast to discuss this piece.

• Joseph Holmes wrote about the themes in the Superman film oeuvre.

• Daniel Hess joined me for a podcast about the global fertility crisis.

• Doug Reed joined the podcast to talk about ten men every man needs in his life.

Subscribe to my podcast on Apple Podcasts, Youtube, or Spotify.