I know a guy, 23, that told me that he has joined a support group for men, they hang out, talk about bbq, sometimes they do work on eachothers houses and will lean on eachother for mateship. I felt pretty sad for this, that the world is so hostile towards men, young men and boys that they need to seek eachother out this way just to do guy stuff. I might even join, but honestly it's a f*cking awful state of the world.
Yes, that is the bad news. But one piece of good news is that it is easier than ever to start a club like this.
Good for those guys. But I'm far less worried about working adult men than I am about teenage (and younger) boys these days.
ReplyDeleteI cannot imagine the damage done to 16-to-20 year old boys by the pandemic lockdowns. As those of us who used to be teenage boys know, it is awkward enough at that age to interact with other humans, especially girls -- it is only by actual interaction with others that we learn how to do it (however poorly it may be).
But keeping boys (esp. those borderline to start with) from that interaction IRL for the past two years, and in too many cases locked away with only p*rn, weed, and video games and no meaningful personal contact, had to have caused unimaginable harm to those now-young-men. I fear we are only beginning to see the effects of that (e.g., school shooters).
Forget the lock down. The biggest problem for boys is the distributed surveillance state.
DeleteKids need to interact with each other, but part of that process is the freedom to fail and mess up. How can any kid do that today when a failure will be recorded, posted to instagram, and remembered and brought up whenever the kid tries to do anything ever again?
At this point I don't blame them staying inside, it's the only place away from the cameras.
Can't disagree with your point, Nate. I certainly can't imagine there being a permanent written record of all of the stupid crap I said in my teenage years.
DeleteThe combination of that with the lockdown is probably worse than we think.
*fist bump pikkumatti* I was a teen right as the internet was birthing so I remember chat rooms and the like.
DeleteSome days I still have nightmares imagining some of my old shames have been found and sent out into the world. (Thankfully I was a bit paranoid and put in some modicrum of privacy efforts but still...)
I was talking with Dave G. about this once when Kavanaugh was being confirmed and he brought up that it was once kind of understood that we all got a pass on our teen years - that something was being broken in social contract with his treatment.
Also see what posted today?
https://thefederalist.com/2022/09/26/zoomers-have-made-peace-with-constant-surveillance-and-its-scary/
So the long tradition of lodges is being reborn?
ReplyDeleteThere may be some hope...
Here is a cool thing that came out of the "pandemic", mostly for boys. My 12 -year old, Alex, is very actively involved: a Tricking Academy One of the owners explained to me that many kids, mostly dudes, spent a lot of time during 2020-21 learning how to do flips on their trampolines. Then they showed up at NEO Motion Academy to hone their skills.
ReplyDeleteFrom the site: "We are a modern gym program based in Avon Lake, Ohio. We provide weekly Tricking classes that blend skills from a variety of styles including karate, tumbling, gymnastics, and ninja warrior."
It is a co-ed place; there is one female I've seen there and she is really good. Most girls don't want boys to see them screw up; boys are less shy about this in front of girls. There is a lot of real male comradery going on.
I looked out the window one day and saw all three of my youngest kids, age 12, 10 and 7, doing back-flips, front-flips and hand-springs on our trampoline. I couldn't fucking believe it.
Insurance people will tell you to never have a trampoline in your backyard. IGNORE THEM.
BTW, "NEO" is an acronym for "North East Ohio".
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