[moches]

_.Spitfire._ summed up my thoughts perfectly. Thank you.

To elaborate, though, we're in a transitional period in society; thanks to feminism women have made a lot of progress and come closer to achieving equality. While that's great, it means that standards men have traditionally defined themselves by - as financial provider, as the man of the house, and more generally speaking as the dominant sex - are no longer relevant (serve to repress people who don't fit within those narrow bounds). We need to think more about how we define and understand men in a way that allows for gender equality and individual freedom.

I'll break the article down in more detail below:

There was once a time when men used to be real men. When they dressed with style, when they had a certain honor code they followed that involved treating not only their elders and each other with respect, but women alike. Unfortunately, those days are far-gone — a thing of the past. What we have now is… to be quite honest, I’m not sure.

Style is a superficial, arbitrary standard by which to define somebody's masculinity. The code of honor is more defensible, but why should that apply exclusively to men? Why is he charging that with a masculine connotation? His entire premise - that there are timeless, fixed standards of what it means to be a man - is flawed from the onset because all of his standards are either subjective or non-exclusive to men, and when there are over 3 billion men in the world it's silly to try and put everybody into a box anyway.

Furthermore, this "golden age" of manhood is a common myth - it came at the expense of women, who were 1) still expected to stay in the household (no longer true), 2) barred from expressing their sexual identities (still true but improving), and 3) deprived of the right to act and think for themselves (because men made their choices for them under the guise of protecting them). His "code of honor" reads more like benevolent sexism to me.

There are of course certain men out there who still have their affairs in order, but we are few in number. What people are most often subject to is the company of boys who are refusing to grow up and man up — boys who prefer to play with their toys than to do their part in bettering society, the human race and the world as a whole. These poor excuses for men have the bodies of adults and the mentalities, as well as the social outlook of toddlers. Horny toddlers, but toddlers nonetheless.

This is so condescending I don't know where to begin. "Men are awful! All they do is lust after women and play Fruit Ninja all day! But obviously I'm not part of this mass of brainless horndogs; if I were I wouldn't be here to show you all the path to enlightenment, right?"

He ties the idea of bettering society and the world to the identity of men, which sounds good on paper but again has the implicit connotation that the same idea isn't tied to women. It doesn't help that he wrote another article about why women aren't really women anymore, either (a summary: victim blaming and slut shaming).

It’s all about character — or in this case, the lack of character. Something has been happening during this era dubbed the “information age.” Social media platforms have taken away the need to interact face to face, taking away the need for actual interaction. (...)

However, much of the interpersonal confrontations are now also taking place online. People no longer feel that they have a need to meet in person to discuss their differences; they can now troll each other online. People are using the Internet as a shield, hiding behind IP addresses in order to speak their minds.

Just because some people behave this way doesn't mean everybody behaves this way. In fact, the Internet has actually done plenty to free men who don't fit a conventional mold of masculinity. I wasn't comfortable with face-to-face interaction when I was growing up: I didn't play sports; I was in ELD until I was ten. I pretty much learned to communicate through the Internet by joining in on groups like FFR and talking to people. The best part of this is that I learned I wasn't as alone as I thought. Internet users may exploit their anonymity, but they also made good use of it. It exposes them to tons of different people and allows them to express themselves more freely than in real life.

This article's a great read (and a good rebuttal to the above argument): it talks about how social media like Facebook has allowed teenage boys to more openly express their feelings, especially their insecurities, without the need to maintain order in a social hierarchy.

Lastly, the Internet as a shield is both a good and a bad thing, depending on what you use it for. And even if people exploit it, it complements real-life interaction by preserving the basic human right to free speech, so it should be protected regardless of whether or not people can use it for questionable purposes.

Personally, when my fight or flight response mechanism kicks in, I always go with fight. It’s not by choice; it’s just the way that I am wired. Online, people have no need to run away because they are already in hiding — so they always choose to “fight.” Although the fighting they do is just about as significant as the fighting I do when I play Call of Duty.

Why is everything with this dude a false dichotomy? Does choosing not to confront every single situation in life make someone a coward?

The same interaction from beneath cover can be seen when we look at the intercommunication between men and women. It is no secret that both men and women alike have sexual urges. Men, however, feel the need to get off more often than most women.

(citation needed)

So instead of having to spend the time to meet a real woman and have actual sexual intercourse, they watch porn.

(citation needed)

Instead of going out into the real world and meeting women, they stalk women on Instagram.

(citation needed)

People now date online as well. It’s much easier to talk to a woman online than it is in person—or rather, it’s not that it’s easier. Both are just as easy, but for some reason, men now prefer to hide their faces behind their monitors. (Every time I use the term ‘men’ in such context I quiver.) It’s out of fear and laziness. Men have become lazy pussies. I don’t even want to use the word pussy because it brings to mind women, who nowadays have much more character than men.

Don't attribute motives to people you don't know. He acts as if the only legitimate way to start a relationship is in real-life. Nice word choice with calling men "pussies" here, by the way: the best insult he has for men is to call them women.

Generation-Y is the instant gratification generation. We want what we want right at the moment we figure out that we want it. We are willingly giving up one of the most important things in life: the waiting period. Having to wait and having to deal with our urges and wants without instantly having them satisfied is what builds character and is what we are now lacking in this fast-paced age.

Good point that has absolutely nothing to do with his argument.

If we want food, we order it online and have it delivered. If we want to listen to our favorite song, we find it on YouTube, iTunes or Spotify. If we want to watch a movie, we either buy it on demand or stream it online. If we want sex, we masturbate. If we want to have a good time, we do drugs.

Because men never masturbated before the Internet, never ever ever.

None of these ideas are exactly new concepts - technology has always developed and will always develop. He puts all the importance on technology and none on how we choose to make it a part of our lives.

We have this false belief that doing things faster will give us a life more fulfilled — that it will lead to us being happier. But that isn’t the case. Most of us aren’t happier. We do more, but we experience less. We are never in the moment because we are always considering what we will be doing next in order to not become bored.

Character is most often built during those moments between activities, during moments of solitude and reflection. Men no longer feel the need to pause and reflect because the options for whatever it is they want are only a click away. The options are endless and therefore we never truly experience disappointment.

This is where this article gets really confusing because this new standard - men wait! - comes out of nowhere. If he's making the point I think he's trying to make, I'd respond by saying that it's a problem with youth in general, not with men.

We never really feel that we are missing out on something because we no longer give things much importance. Jackie never got back to your text message? I’m sure you have several other women in your contacts that you’d equally like to f*ck — once. Then you’ll get bored and move on to the next one.

Again, this reeks of condescension. WHY CAN'T ALL THESE HORNY MEN BE DEEP AND THOUGHTFUL LIKE ME?

Men treat women like interchangeable commodities. I do believe that most men still hope to one day fall in love and settle down. But none of them will unless they change their way of thinking and living.

Uh, with a few exceptions men have almost ALWAYS treated women like interchangeable commodities, and that's actually improving with time. It also has little to do with technology (or access) and everything to do with attitude. Finally, there's a faulty comparison here between settling down (getting married, starting a family) and objectifying women: whether or not you get married has absolutely nothing to do with how well you treat women.

Being focused on self-satisfaction will lead to nothing but broken relationships. Real men are not selfish. Real men are just as concerned for the feelings, needs and minds of women as they are for their own — not just women’s bodies and their sexual usefulness. Real men have a well-defined code of ethics and respect that they follow.

You could flip the genders there and it would be just as true (or false). This is admirable but irrelevant.

How can anyone call himself a man if the last time he had to confront another man — whether it be over a social incident or for business purposes — was before he hit puberty? If you don’t have the twiddle-diddles to approach a woman at a bar in person and have a proper, intellectual conversation, making the woman feel respected and comfortable, then move over for the real men.

I will say this in the nicest way possible: what a condescending prick.

It’s awful because women are becoming accustomed to such boys and believing that these pansies are all that is left of our sex. Some great women are settling for these fools and then finding that they themselves have no choice but to wear the pants in the family because their “man” is PMSing. All I can hope for is that the law of evolution will see the world rid of these weaklings, these characterless, hopeless pseudo-men.

THE LAW OF EVOLUTION I'M DYING

"PMSing" is yet another example of discrediting men by making them women - if the last sentence is evidence he also thinks women are weaklings, characterless and hopeless. He apparently also believes that women taking the initiative in a relationship is a problem because the only reason they would ever "wear the pants" in a family is if they had no other choice. Maybe it's because they, y'know, actually WANT to lead and take an active role in their relationships and families. You're a sexist ass. Sit down.

Ladies… real men do exist; there aren’t many of us, but we’re survivors and will be around for a while. Come find us.

This is the Hershey's kiss on top of this entire shit sundae. It contradicts everything his essay has built up to: if he's such a manly man by his definition, what's stopping him from going after these women? What's the reason he even wrote this essay - to tell women all about how the guys they're dating are shallow, superficial bastards and then ask them to find him? This entire essay reeks of pettiness, entitlement and self-satisfaction, but this...I have no words.

In short, this is a narrow-minded, sexist and ignorant think-piece that makes nothing but assumptions and can't even keep its own arguments straight. For those of you who found something that resonated with you (like popsicle3000), please don't take this the wrong way. I genuinely believe you should do WHATEVER MAKES YOU HAPPY. But know that people like the writer of this article refuse to acknowledge or respect anybody who doesn't think like them, and the longer they try to pull everybody back into the past the harder it's going to be to make any progress.