Sunday, June 7, 2009

"The Decline of Men"


I was reading some articles on Guy Garcia who is the author of the book, "The Decline of Men: How the American Male Is Tuning Out, Giving Up and Flipping Off His Future." I found it interesting in that with this whole shebang thrown out by IR bloggers and the so-called 'black female empowerment' movement regarding the "damaged black male", we have an author who analyzes such damage, yet does so from the standpoint of ALL males. What you hear from the author sounds quite similar to the various descriptions of black men tossed around by these particular ladies. Here are some excerpts from an interview with the author:

"We do know that men are losing traction in high schools. The same is true in colleges, where 59% of all students are female. Harvard professors tell me male students have lost their drive and ambition, women tell me they can't find a guy who's not a dummy, slacker, cheater or loser. Men of every stripe and part of the country are telling me they feel confused, besieged and worried that they have lost their place in society, that they have lost their bearings as men. They sense the male gender is adrift and increasingly dismissed, denigrated and demonized -- by the media, by women, even by other men. And that's just the tip of the iceberg."
And...

"Let's start with the says-it-all title of Maureen Dowd's post-feminist creed, "Are Men Necessary?" The answer, of course, is yes, we are. The reason is that in this great unraveling of gender roles and male identity, one of the casualties has been the nuclear family. Last year, for the first time ever, single people outnumbered married people. More than ever boys are growing up in single-parent homes without fathers who can guide them into adulthood. And we've known for a long time that boys who grow up without strong male role models are more likely to drop out of school, make less money, be more likely to use drugs or get in trouble with the law and, ultimately, end up divorced themselves. It's a downward spiral."
And more...

"It goes way beyond that. The industries projected to grow in the next few decades are mostly in the service sector, where communication, collaboration and multitasking rule. At the same time many of the industries that favor the physical and mental attributes of males are shrinking or disappearing. Women in their 20s in the 10 largest U.S. cities already out-earn men of the same age. The trend is pretty clear."
And finally...

"Your examples are all symptoms of male decline. Men have been conditioned to be selfish, greedy and aggressive. Infidelity and perfidy are manifestations of insecurity. Society has taught men that it is manly to be competitive, to make as much money as possible, to win at any cost. I would add the war in Iraq and the implosion of Wall Street to the list of troubles that have been brought about by the old-fashioned, swaggering macho approach to politics, economics and life in general. Yet in spite of this -- or partly as a result of it -- other guys have simply given up. They sense that they've lost the high ground (and the future) to women, and they aren't even trying anymore. They've opted out to become jackasses, stoners and slackers. Responsibility is shirked, and adolescence is extended indefinitely."

If we listen to the various IR bloggers and black female empowerment demagogues, one would believe that only such descriptions apply to black men. Of course, they will argue that this trend is at a greater level among black men, but in such a case, should they not argue that the "unraveling of gender roles" that is pushed by the modern woman is at a greater level among black women? Is this push toward dominance the very thing that so many black women call "strenth" and wouldn't their fantasized mass migration away from the black community (black men) and toward white men result in hurrying the process of white men giving up at the level that black men have? How will it affect masses of white men when they are cursed out for expressing an honest view on race to their black wives? We know that black America is always the canary in the mine and as Pat Moynihan showed, black America is often a glimpse of white America's future.

Amanda Platell states it quite well here:

"But perhaps what we should be asking is: who turned men into sissies?

The answer to that is we women. Women wilfully feminised men to make them less masculine, less challenging to our ambitions, less competition for us. We emasculated them.

As a result, we've destroyed the core of their being, their masculinity. We've led them astray and away from the very qualities we intrinsically find most attractive in a man.

We told them we loved their feminine side, then came to despise it. We convinced them we wanted to be equal breadwinners, then began to resent it.

We loved the idea of earning more than our men, more than any man, yet lost respect for them when it was us bringing home the bacon.

But men have been culpable in all this, too. Sure, we gave them a social duffing up, but they gave in to it. The feminisation process sneakily appealed to their intrinsic vanity, and sharing the career workload played to many men's innate laziness.

I disagree with Garcia when he says 'men aren't giving up - they're being run over because they're lazy and can't multi-task'. There is nothing more energised, more vital than a man who is loved and respected for being a successful man, a provider and a father.

But partly because of the way women have systematically traduced men and their manliness, partly because of the way we as a society have feted and institutionalised single motherhood, from the council estate to the boardroom, we haven't left much for men to do or be that is unique to them.

Even the education system is now skewed against them. Garcia is correct when he says that girls are outperforming boys at school, but it's not because they are brighter or more adept at surviving in a post-modern world, but because of the liberal engineering of state education that has made it more sympathetic to girls' learning skills and less so to those of boys.

And with the huge increase in university-educated girls, there is a social timebomb ticking.

In America, over the past 25 years the number of female undergraduates has grown more than twice as fast as their male counterparts.

According to Garcia, by 2006 women outnumbered men on American college campuses by more than two million.

Again, if the tables were turned and women were wildly outnumbered today in universities and if men were overtaking their achievements, there would be an outcry.

The feminists view the current state of play in the war of the sexes as a great victory - they feel it proves they were right and that women were smarter than men all along.

But it's like two armies locked in battle, one armed with bayonets, the other with Kalashnikovs. It's not been a fair fight.

One survey Garcia cites shows that, on average, females between the ages of 21 and 30 earned 117 per cent of males' wages in the same group.

And while women's wages have soared, wages for men have declined.

'Men are not just getting poorer, they're also getting dumber,' he says. And he's right. Beneath the lip gloss of metrosexual modern male, men are in trouble.

Men of all ages are becoming increasingly 'angry, suspicious, reactionary and isolated' because women have treated the men's natural roles without respect.

Who wouldn't become reactionary when all that you knew had been demeaned, taken from you or chipped away?

Who wouldn't feel isolated when society had institutionalised fatherlessness, thus eradicating the most vital and enhancing role any man can play in his life?

Garcia goes so far as to argue that the roles have flipped so much from the way they were, say, 50 years ago - and that men have become so emasculated and feminised - that 'men are the new women'.

If that's true, and sadly it is for some men, then women have a lot to answer for. And perhaps the greatest irony is that it's us who are the losers in the end.

You show me a woman who isn't attracted by strength, success, masculinity and I'll show you a lesbian.

Garcia argues that it is 'an undeniable reality that women are poised to become the dominant gender in America, and in many ways already are'.

With men already in decline, it's only going to get worse. Deep in a recession with so many jobs at risk, a man's native, competitive provider survival spirit has never been more necessary to millions of families' survival, and yet never have these qualities been so systematically diminished.

So when we most need men to be men, we've created a disproportionate number of men who are more pussycats than lions. Perhaps the real Decline Of Men has only just begun.

Or perhaps, just perhaps, they'll throw off their Prada, ditch the pedicures, stop crying and get in touch with their masculine side again. We can only hope."
Well Amanda. Take the negative influences on men you state above, multiply by three or four at the least, and you have the plight of black men in this post feminism world.

15 comments:

RainaHavock said...

Welcome back excellent post.

Anonymous said...

Real talk.

Anonymous said...

Rocky's insightful research hits the nail on the head. I knew that white feminism had pitfalls, but I now see the damage of Sara's black women narcissism. She didn't want Asians posting about diversity, so I was censored.

The oracle of Sara chastises black men in a biased, imbalanced way. The oracle also rejects diversity and favors black female dominance.

Some of these women worship at the altar of white men which is actually ruled by anti-male, racist Amazonian priestesses. White men are merely tools for these crafty, manipulative, cult-like ladies.

To point to an ancient reference, was it not the woman who misled the man to the forbidden fruit? (rhetorical question)

Mr Laurelton Queens said...

I find this very interesting Rocky.

I had a white boy come to my home. He was amazed I worked from home. I said "Technology is amazing". He was selling magazine subscriptions trying to raise money for his record store. I said you know record stores are going out of business.

He cut me off and said "Na dude vinyls I am selling. He was sort of "skateboard kid" in his 20s liked rock music. He hates MTV. He said his father was from New York. His mother is from Montana.

Anyway he was a good salesman. My fiancee was like "he is a nice kid". I said yea, he did go on a tirade how he hates "certain white people".

So there is a fundamental shift with the youth. They are looking for the fast money. I don't know if he is in college. Since this is a college town, I figure he is.

Rocky you make a good point. Like my sociologist Professor says there is a "shortage of white men" for dating also. I don't think Evia and her "ilk" realize this.

I think the new generation are very technically savvy. The problem is they have to finish college. Many kids don't feel college. Just because you go to college does not make a college graduate.

Some sellout black girl said everybody goes to college. A college degree is like a High school diploma.

I said approximately 29 percent of Americans have a Bachelor's Degree. Do you know low that is?

Then it gets lower for Hispanics and blacks.

Obviously the mighty white man is not going to college at a rapid rate. The problem is to many minorities are not finishing even high school. That is very troubling to me.

Women basically are the backbone of relationships. This whole idea lives a upper class lifestyle solely on his own is bullshit. Many of the time it is women who make equal or above.

So yea it is shame more successful black women can't find a black man on their level. Black men don't have to be college educated. They just have to stay away from jail and the system. Once they give that stigma it is hard to escape a lifetime of low wages.

There is a reason why they want to keep black men in prison when they catch them. They make tremendous amount of money off them.

That goes for white men too. They are in the prison system. The media never mentions the rapid rate of young white men going to prison.

Rashida said...

This male shortage is affecting women of all races so I don't know why these "empowerment" bloggers try to pin the blame on just black men.

If there is a shortage of white men what in the world makes them think the few available won't be snatched up by non-black women? They never talk about that. Just the illusion that there are millions of white men ready, willing and ABLE to provide a "QUIALTY" life for all those black women out there that are so deserving.

Blah.

Anyway, men are being marginalized left and right and we are so used to it now that we don't seem to notice.

Women's advancement should never have come at the expense of men's. It's like one supremacy over another.

I fear for the future of American men. You're either a fat, lazy slob or an abusive, womanizing prick. Either way, you're being told that women don't want you and if they do allow you to be anywhere near them you better treat them like gold and be OK with them disrespecting you.

As far as black women not finding men "on their level" this only applies to the small percentage of women who are also marriage material. Having a vagina does not qualify you for marriage. If you were to really break down the numbers and see the percentage of black men who can support a family and compare it to the number of black women who possess qualities necessary for marriage the numbers would probably be about equal.

These bloggers always seem to forget that there are a lot of black women who DO NOT value marriage and that is not the fault of black men.

RainaHavock said...

I'm liking the comments so far. I hope it stays like this.

Rocky said...

I agree Raina. And Rashida...wow! You really laid it down. Give us more sista.

Anonymous said...

Many women use men as fertility machines. The queen bee is the ruler of the hive. The black widow spider will eat a male after mating. The female praying mantis devours the male DURING mating. The list goes on.

Unfortunately, some human men fall into the snares of the she-devils.

Truth B. Told said...

This book is now on my must read list.

Rashida said...

Re: this book

I have read excerpts and I would like to read it in its entirety one day I just don't have the time now.

However, I hope he touches on the disaster that is American family law. Men will not be able to regain their rightful place in society until we examine how family law turns men into babysitters and paychecks. Men need to be fathers - that is an important role that they need to fulfill. Women and the courts are making it harder and harder for men to fulfill those roles. Choosing single motherhood and then whining about how hard it is. Reducing the father of your child to a support check and restricting access if said check is not enough.

I hope the book touches on the courts because they are ruining American families. I hope the book also touches on cultural and racial differences in regards to manhood. Black female supremacy is applauded and celebrated SOLELY because white men have exhausted all options in demonizing black men. If a black man is not in the prison system, he is still likely to be caught up in some baby daddy BS with some deranged, selfish black woman (not all, but most). So hopefully he touches on that. Because black men are unique in this regard because no one - not even black women - want them to be decent human beings. Every single person benefits from black men being deemed violent, lazy, diseased, etc. Black women realized they benefit from that so they jumped on it and used this whole "black men dont want us" spiel to add meat to their argument.

It's so transparent. Women so desperate for power that they throw their male counterpart under the bus. Instead of achieving power through wits, hardwork and determination - they subjugate men, feminize them and then turn around and claim men cannot be trust because they are blah blah blah.

It's like giving a kid candy every day and bitching about having to take him to the dentist.

Anonymous said...

People spend a lot of time talking about bm abandoning their kids. But tell me, where do these men live? In a home all by themselves, while their kids are at home with their moms? Do all of these men have secret hide-outs up in the mountains, where they live alone? When it's convenient people like to quote ratios such as 6 bw to every bm in this city or that little town etc. so let's go interracial. But they never say that in situations like these many men have multiple partners with children in multiple homes. So if a bm have 3 bw and with children, and the 3 women live in different homes, can the man live in 3 homes simultaneously? No. He can only live in one home and be a visiting dad to the others. So what now? Does that mean he ABANDON the other kids he doesn't live with, though he visits them from time to time? And what about bm who were living with their kids and did something stupid and got sent to prison for a long time? Did he ABANDON his kids, because he's absent from the home?

There are a whole range of things that result in a fatherless home, such as the high homicide and incarceration rates among bm, unhealthy lifestyles (drugs,heart disease, hiv/aids), deaths on the job (police, firefighter, military) road traffic accident, lack of social support services for the unemployed, and on and on. And the detractors like to sum up the situation simply as BLACK MEN LIKE TO ABANDON THEIR CHILDREN.

THE SOLUTION: Black men you need to start your own societies to cultivate a new meaning to manhood. You need to cultivate a culture of SELF-PRESERVATION. You need to transform street gangs into brotherhood and self-empowerment support groups. You need to teach your sons martial arts as a means to channel their anger in a way that benefit them healthwise, through exercise and contact sports, rather than a trigger-happy-kill-a-nigga-self-destructive-disconnected-nobody. You need to cultivate a culture of excellence and the pursuit of the mastery of science and technology along with the ownership of the means to invent and manufacture products of every kind. And more than anything else,
you need to cultivate a PATRIARCHAL culture among yourselves without regards for the opposing forces of feminists in your midst. When they are teaching their daughters female supremacy and misandry they don't give a fuck what you think, so waste not a second to all the street protests and screeching noises in the media. Teach them to be men and to guard against those who hate them for being men. If you should look closely at your predicament you'll see that you're the MOST HATED FOR BEING THE LEAST PATRIARCHAL OF THE RACES OF MEN. The white man in Sweden is also derided and spit upon by his feminist woman for being feminized. They have a Feminist Initiative Party that wanted a "Man Tax" to tax the emasculated white male as a group for all manner of things. The PATRIARCHAL taliban men have more respect and love from their women! So does the chinese man who's limit the number of female babies born in their country. Believe it or not, you black men need PATRIARCHY more than ever. Cultivate your patriarchal teachings in your closed door societies and listen not to screeching noise about sexism and racism. Take steps to BALANCE OUT THE NUMBER OF MALES & FEMALES with dramatic reductions in social suicides of bm and the reduction of female births through abortions. When these things come about there shall be a raging storm of hail and fire from the black woman female supremacists in alliance with their kkk white female collaborators, cia undercover klansmen and interracial evangelists bigots. There shall be thunder and lightning everywhere and the gnashing of teeth. But your triumph shall bring untold RESPECT & HARMONY and a new dawning in the black race. Let us begin.

Anonymous said...

I don't see the demonized black males that Sara always seems to talk about in her IR blog. However, black men are targeted more than white men for the same offense or for no offense (DWB - driving while black), and this has been proven in research.

There are more serious problems like the KKK. But Sara is too busy using the white supremacy data to support her anti-male theories.

Rational, intelligent readings begin here. How many rounds must Rocky endure from the IR coven in order to salvage MANkind?

I have seen various races of men who have been harassed and sexually harassed by women in the workplace. These women expect the minority of men to perform all the heavier labor and act as messengers.

Notice that you hear white and black women (as well as other races) talking about "training" their men. That's right - you're reduced to a mere dog in their eyes.

Anonymous said...

We need to highlight more positive things black men are doing to better themselves to encourage other black boys and men, and also counter the slander campaigns of bigots, who say we're only good for killing each other:

http://www.successforblackboys.org/index.html
http://www.futureblackmen.org/
http://www.prodigyproject.com
http://www.100blackmen.org/
http://www.concernedblackmen.org/

These are just a few. They're doing some good stuff, but black men need their own secret societies to network among themselves to build their own economic base, away from the prying eyes of the detractors who like to badmouth and celebrate all things negative about us.

Anonymous said...

I read your post. So what do you expect black women to do, feel sorry for the "male race" and stop being the way they are? Get real. Now that they have proof that they're winning the so-called "war of the sexes", they will become even more aggressive in their hatred.

Anonymous said...

Bro Rocky,

you are welcome to join the debate over here:

https://www.blogger.com/comment.g?blogID=9978178&postID=5269544552330541706&page=1

Its been raging while and your input would be most welcome!

Menelik Charles
London England