Angry

Why Are Men Angry?

Kay Hymowitz writes a followup to a piece that I didn't link the first time, because it is well-traveled ground for us. Here it is, though, for reference.

Apparently she got some negative feedback.

About a week ago, The Wall Street Journal published an excerpt of my new book, which argued that the new stage I call pre-adulthood—the twenties and early thirties—was not bringing out the best in single young men. Some men didn’t like it. As in, “cancel-my-subscription-the-writer-should-contract-such-a-bad-case-of-carpel-tunnel-syndrome-she-never-writes-again” didn’t like it.

But a lot of the responses unwittingly proved my point—and another one: Men are really, really angry.

I thought her point was that these weren't men, a point with which I completely agree. Now she has a new point, though:

Let’s call it gender bait and switch. Never before in history have men been matched up with women who are so much their equal—socially, professionally, and sexually. By the time they reach their twenties, they have years of experience with women as equal competitors—in school, on soccer fields, and even in bed. They very reasonably assume that the women they are meeting at a bar or café or gym are after the same things they are: financial independence, career success, toned triceps, and sex.

That’s the bait; here comes the switch. Women may want equality at the conference table and treadmill. But when it comes to sex and dating, they aren’t so sure. The[y] might hook up as freely as a Duke athlete. Or, they might want men to play Greatest Generation gentleman. Yes, they want men to pay for dinner, call for dates—a writer at the popular dating website The Frisky titled a recent piece “Call me and ask me out for a damn date!”—and open doors for them.

What was the bait, again? That your intimate life could based on the same ideal of competition that forces you to scramble in every other aspect of your life?

Somebody's really let these folks down, because they haven't conveyed what the intimate is about. The intimate exists for two reasons: to shelter you and give you a place to regain strength; and to let you experience the unity with another that is the true depth of humanity. A man or a woman alone may experience their own depths, and perhaps in contemplation approach some of the depth of being itself: but to experience the depth of humanity requires another.

The marketplace in general has taken over far too much of our lives. There are a lot of modes of human life that aren't based on it, and generally the better ones: love, friendship, service (such as military service), meditation, thought. The last two are solitary occupations. Only in our intimate friendships do we Americans manage to get away from the ruthless competition and find a way to experience another in these better ways.

One intimate mode is the bond between family: that bond created by man and wife and child, which ties bloodlines together and extends across generations. This is the special bond of marriage, which deserves defense as a space consecrated for just that purpose.

Another -- sometimes together with marriage, sometimes not -- is the bond between lovers. This bond exists because of the second function of sex that Thomas Aquinas noted: the unity of the male and female, allowing a merging of individuals that alone creates a truly human nature. Though it is sexual, it need not be the sex of intercourse: it is a depth shared between a man and a woman who love each other with this passion, though they may touch no more than their hands.

Another is the bond between true friends, which Aristotle viewed as necessary to the best life. This bond can be as strong as the others, because trust and love of your friend allows you to understand each other. That common understanding lets you seek the true and the beautiful together.

Insofar as the young are approaching 'the sexual marketplace' as a sexual marketplace, they have made the core error before they appear in it. If they are angry about the results they are getting, the right answer is to re-examine their assumptions about what they should be seeking.