Are the lads stigmatized? - Politics Forum.org | PoFo

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By MB.
#14718460


I am curious to what the forum's opinions are about the changing perspective on male and masculine roles in society, and in particular, how any (perceived or real) changes relate to your appreciation of recent socio-economic changes in society.
#14718467
I think that modern society is extremely damaging for young men in particular. Natural male behaviour is stigmatised and punished by society. When a couple of boys rough house in school, they are chastised for it and instead forced to explore their feelings and feminine nonsense like that. I'm not saying that society is ideal for women, they of course have challenges too. But men are expected far more than women to curtail their natural behaviours by infecting traditional outlets such as sports with "health and safety" bullshit.

As a man gets older, his tempers cool and things are more manageable.
#14718468
Depends where you are. Not on a building site or down a mine or in a factory but if you work in some sort of effemente middle class office job maybe that might be the experience you would have. I don't really see how people can complain about it though. If you choose to work in that sort of environment you must surely know what to expect?
#14718478
Tom, I sympathize with what you're saying, but how does "society" change to allow kids to rough house? School districts are just on damage control so they don't get the shit sued out of them by parents.
#14718669
Red_Army wrote:Tom, I sympathize with what you're saying, but how does "society" change to allow kids to rough house? School districts are just on damage control so they don't get the shit sued out of them by parents.


As a society we need to understand and accept that rough housing and aggression is normal for boys and your son getting a black eye from the kid down the street is not cause for litigation or an arrest warrant.

We need to let kids take risks: climb trees, go hiking with their teachers and play full contact sports without this constant need to check, check and double-check for health and safety.

Above all, we shouldn't treat boys who engage in reasonable levels of adolescent violence and aggression as being some kind of psychopath who needs to be pumped full of drugs or make them feel like there is something wrong with them.

We can of course pass some laws and whatnot to help with this, but it mostly requires a cultural change and acceptance that masculinity DOES mean aggression, violence and so forth. These aren't bad things, we need them in fact. We just need to find ways to channel those feelings into something productive. School sports is a great way to do that.
#14718675
That sounds great, but how would you propose enacting that change? You can keep waving the "as a society we should" wand all day, but it doesn't do anything. As a society I should have a bigger dick Tom, but life ain't fair!
By Rich
#14718692
We have had a crisis of masculinity for at least four thousand years, at least four thousand years. I mean that totally seriously. The history of civilisation to a large extent is the history of the crisis of masculinity. Conservatives look back to a mythological idealised past. Liberals look forward to a mythological idealised future.
#14718796
Rich wrote:We have had a crisis of masculinity for at least four thousand years, at least four thousand years. I mean that totally seriously. The history of civilisation to a large extent is the history of the crisis of masculinity. Conservatives look back to a mythological idealised past. Liberals look forward to a mythological idealised future.


Could you elaborate? What do you consider the crisis of masculinity to be, and how has it manifested itself the past 4000 years?
By Rich
#14718816
quetzalcoatl wrote:Could you elaborate? What do you consider the crisis of masculinity to be, and how has it manifested itself the past 4000 years?
Um well for starters any division into classes involves a constraint or a suppression of the masculinity of all but the highest class. I would argue that similarly religion almost always involves a suppression of masculinity.

Or to try another angle consider the relations between natives and Whites on the American frontier in the nineteenth century. Here you had the meeting of two cultures, one that was totally uncivilised and one that had been civilised for thousands of years, our heritage going back through Rome and ancient Greece. Young native men would leave the reservation and go on a killing, rape, torture and mutilation spree. We still use the term "off the reservation" from this period. If I'm feeling a bit uptight a bit stressed, particularly if I've spent too much time on a computer I might need to go out and kill a few people, rape a few women mutilate their bodies, burn some children alive, you know just generally let off a bit of steam. Now the fact that I face life imprisonment, hard labour or even the death penalty if I'm caught, I don't have a problem with. When a young brave went out on a war path if he got caught by an enemy tribe, he would expect more than a slap on the wrist. Native Americans weren't really big on community service. No my problem is I would be demonised, despised, treated as some sort of sick, pathetic pervert for actions that would be accepted as perfectly normal and natural expressions of masculinity from the Lakota to the Iroquois, to the Vikings to the Zulu.

Now I don't know if the the pre civilised horticultural societies of the Iroquois and the Lakota were natural. I don't know if their cultures allowed natural expression of cis heterosexual masculinity, but I'm damn sure civilised societies aren't.

What I'm trying to get at is that the idealogical wars that have plagued civilisation from the beginning have all been about regulating the competition between men. Even the regulation of women's sexuality is essentially about the regulation and avoidance of conflict between men. But since civilisation has begun we've been in constant ideological melt down. There has never been a time when society just worked. The golden patriarchal age before progressives messed it up is a total myth.

Take the first world war. Here was a time before society was messed up by women getting the vote,before the health and safety crew spoiled all the fun. A time when men were men, women were women and small round furry things from Alpha Centauri were small round furry things from Alpha Centauri. World War I was amazing, the biggest ruck in history (up until then), fought with the best toys and millions of men got not just to fight for free, but get this, they were actual paid to participate. Amazing! But instead of gratitude for this orgy of fun, it actually unleashed an orgy of whinging and moaning. And please don't give me that Marxist bullshit about everyone was tricked into WWI by some evil Capitalists. I wasn't around for world war I, I was around for the golden age of British football hooliganism. i know why young men fight. if you want to understand the cause of WWI don't read Lenin, listen to Elton John:

[youtube]pSA_RLCriHs[/youtube]

Anyway hopefully that gives some indication of what I was trying to express.
#14718819
:lol: Great post, Rich. I got a lot of laughs out of it.

No. I don't think lads are being stigmatized. Rubbish whining by lads who think they are, but are really just sissy-fucks.

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