Now one could argue that these man-boys, still reading Maxim, playing Xbox, and living with their frat brothers, should take responsibility for their own failings. I somewhat agree, but the subject of this post isn't the cause of the problem, but rather the mere existence of extended adolescence as a common social phenomenon. And while we'll avoid broaching the underlying causes (i.e. liberalism), we can however discern exactly why so many men feel comfortable in listless purgatory. First though, let me present a fantastic illustration of this phenomenon. It perfectly represents the kind of men Ms. Hymowitz rightly characterizes as not "good":
If you're not familiar, that hand symbol is the infamous "shocker" which I refuse to explain on a family website like this one. Suffice it to say that you can't get more puerile than displaying that gesture. Yet even as these two overweight, drunk tools make a hand symbol befitting of a retarded 15 year-old, their faces reflect a lack of self-consciousness. In their social milieu, such ostensible acts of immaturity are largely acceptable. One asks then - why do so many men feel comfortable in this type of environment?
Perhaps they understand the futility of financial and social independence prior to their early 30s and instead accept extended adolescence as a hedonistic alternative. OK, but it wasn't always like that. What then has changed that men can find themselves in this situation and even view it as quasi-normal?
I'll go through these quickly because they're largely self-explanatory. First, people are having children later in life and thus men do not have any family to care for. They don't have a family that forces them to understand their role as an adult man. These men can live carefree and view themselves as pseudo-children because no urgent responsibilities demand their attention.
Second, it's hard to start an adult life with massive amounts of debt, especially when that debt was accrued along with help from one's parents. As college costs rise to astounding levels, almost all middle-class men (and women) have to pay off debts they started accumulating at age eighteen. Since almost all parents help out in this regard, there's a financial and social connection to college, the intermediary between childhood and mature adulthood, that's not fully broken until one's 30s.
Finally, and perhaps most importantly, since marriage rates have fallen and many middle-class urbanite women revel in living out their Sex and the City lifestyle, the sexual marketplace remains open for many 20-something men. It's been said that civilization is merely a way for men to attract women, implying that men's actions derive largely from a desire to attain sexual success. These "shocker" men engage in such acts because they presume, or hope, that such subversiveness (a timid attempt at being a bad boy) will make them popular with women. In essence, they still act like the frat boys they once were, with frathood largely an aspect of social proof for attracting naive sluts.
So how then do we remedy such a situation? How do we force men to grow up and repudiate such behavior? Well, by undermining the three negatives above. So women having babies earlier, education bubble pops, and reconstructing a slut-shaming popular culture to dampen modern lasciviousness.
46 comments:
Who wants to grow up? Adulthood is overrated.
Don't go to college.
Another contributor is the "pornification" of mass culture. Men are encouraged to be frat boys 24/7, instead of only at the occasional bachelor party.
http://www.crosswalk.com/blogs/dr-james-emery-white/pornification.html
you don't have to force it, you have to remove the artificial barriers that are preventing it
There's something really immature in that photo, worse even than flashing "the shocker" and the shit-eating grins, that you don't even bother mentioning: Beavis dyed his hair black.
Excellent article with excellent comments guys. I would add that many men feel relieved to not take on responsibilities since only men understand the gravity of responsibility.
"How do we force men to grow up and repudiate such behavior? "
I dunno. I think the locker room culture will always be there to a certain extent. Call it the extension of the treehouse if you will.
They key I think is to entice fellows to put down childish things. Like being beer-swilling "shocker" sporting pigs.
There's no forcing that...only correctly configured enticements. Ones that are sorely lacking in this day and age. Indeed, everything seems to work the other way.
There is every reason under the sun to avoid domesticating behavior such as marriage and family and other social behaviors that reinforces constructive patriarchy.
I make good money and have a stable career. I could go a step further, but I've yet to start a family and have no good prospects. I already make more money then I need myself and without a family to provide for I just don't see the impetus to increase my provider bonafides if I have nobody to provide for.
I think you have to tie this together with men getting screwed in family court and white men getting screwed. With these things, why work hard? You would only be working for your own destruction.
GlobalMan and other claimed this happened in Russia. The family was destroyed by the Bolsheviks, then men lost their incentive to protect and care for women.
"How do we force men to grow up and repudiate such behavior?"
Stop blaming the men. What does America offer men? It offers us the choice between hook-up / frat boy culture or... nothing.
You complain men pick "not growing up" and yet we are given no other real options. Well the other option is coming home, sitting around looking at four walls. Yeah,that's really living; thanks America.
Women don't want to form families until they are old and whored-out, so what are we supposed to force them to marry us?
Between frat boy culture and nihilism most will pick frat-boy.
Give men other options and at least some will pick something else.
@ Walenty:
I was trying to avoid the underlying-underlying problem (yes two underlying's). The underlying problem is what "America offers men", which is to say feminism and liberalism and the women nurtured by those schools of thought. But the focus of this post is more "why do men feel comfortable in this environment", not so "how did they find themselves in this environment?"
So while the main issue is liberalism, in this post I focus on the next step up in looking at what social phenomena liberalism has caused - later and few families, college debt, and slutty women. Those factors motivate men to extend their adolescence.
Have you seen the previews for the remake of "Footloose"? A comparison with the original makes for an interesting illustration of the points made here.
Mandatory military service at age 18, with an appropriate educational component (trade school stuff for blue collars, college credits for for white collars).
I don't really see this as politically feasible (at the moment) for a host of reasons, but it would solve the problem of extended adolescence, people being yoked with excessive debt and useless degrees, and would raise up a crop of reactionary, Spartan men (in direct contrast to the limp wristed hipsters the college industrial complex currently churns out).
"why do men feel comfortable in this environment"
Comfortable does not mean happy. I'm comfortable staying in and watching the game. There are more enjoyable things to be doing, but if the price in money/time/effort is greater then the increase in enjoyment, I will settle for comfortable.
People respond to incentives. The incentive structure for the median man promotes mediocrity, since anything less then apex achievement is more or less the same in terms of payout.
Adolescence can be defined as any condition wherein you're not responsible for another human being. So if you have no children, or a wife or an elderly parent whom you support financially, you are a adolescent.
And if such an avoidance of responsibility is something a man pots out of given today's incentives structure, more power to him.
My and perhaps your beef is, why such undignified, goofy, grinning behavior in public.
I think it's mostly financial. Things are so expensive these days that a lot of men can't really hope to provide for a family in the way that they feel they should. Plus there is the debt that OneSTDV mentioned. Also, jobs are far less stable, which makes guys less stable. The days of working for the same company for 30 years are over. Finally, there are fewer prospects for advancement these days. The Boomers have all of the senior jobs, and don't want to leave them, which means that young guys can't move up as easily.
Also, and this is harder to explain but I am sure there is something to it, I think there is an intangible component to all of this. Back in the day, the institutions of our society actually reached out to young guys. Big companies had "executive training programs," the unions had apprenticeship programs, etc. The institutions of our society were actually reaching out to young men, saying "come work with us," and "we need you."
That stuff really doesn't exist today. Instead of going into an "executive training program" for IBM or GM, most people who finish college do temp office work for a few years until they eventually find something permanent, and then they change jobs every couple of years because they have to.
I am 40, but this is basically what it has been like for me. When I started out doing temp work, it wasn't because I was a slacker who wasn't "interested" in a real job with real responsibilities. I desperately wanted a permanent job. but there just wasn't one to be had. Similarly, no one wants to still be clubbing at 30 or 35. Most guys are a little leery of the responsibility of having kids, but they still want to get married.
In all, I think that it's mostly economic. If young guys today had the opportunities that young guys used to have, they wouldn't be wasting time doing "the shocker." Instead, young guys today have a tougher road ahead. Of course they should be manning up and fighting harder; that's the ideal way to handle the situation. But I'm not going to diss guys who get lost in the popular culture, we've all been there. We've got to show those guys the right path rather than diss them.
The more I think about this, the more I believe it all comes down to the removal of stigma regarding pre-marital sex. If men can get all the sex they want without marrying, they simply will not marry. Which means they won't get a real job for a long time, and they'll spend as long a time in college as they like.
I say this coming from a religious culture in which premarital sex is verboten, and consequently men marry and start having kids in their early twenties and aggressively pursue their education and careers.
As always I enjoy reading the comments there are some great observations. One thing I noticed missing was biology. Simply people live longer couple this with the problems already stated such as non-incentive, financial, women, etc. A protracted adolescence is unavoidable.
MuayTyson
The counterpart to Hymowitz's slacker guys are the "New Girl Order" which she praises, as it consists of mindless female fashion consumption, sex along those consumerist lines, and avoidance of responsibility.
There is no real solution, and none will be in offing, as long as women remain part of Hymowitz's New Girl Order. They may well be "fabulous" but when they age into their thirties they don't inspire much devotion, on either side, to put it mildly. Extended permanent adolescence occurs because their is no real reason for Men to modify their behavior.
Hymowitz tried yelling at them, that did not work. Only (and for men in their twenties) a far more attractive alternative -- stable and prosperous marriage in their early twenties to an age-peer or near it will suffice, and I don't see that happening. Among other things the consumer base in the West is all about female consumption, for the most part. I was shocked the last time I visited an Apple store -- nearly 80% of the customers were women!
The Male Slacker and the New Girl Order are both built on (probably long-term unsustainable) female based consumerism (men also engage in it but don't spend as much). But it can go on for a long time.
Those two have the unmistakeable look of guys who work for a stock brokerage house (not necessarily on WS). This kind of randy boys-will-be-boys presentation is probably indistinguishable from one that you'd see from a 1980's Dean Witter get-together, so I don't think it's all that telling. To me the extended adolescence thing is mostly a result of the fact that lots of women under 45, who were in their teens 1983-90 or 1993-00, experienced affluence that prior generations never knew. Since women always expect to maintain in marriage the same lifestyle they knew as girls, and since fewer men (by percentage) can help sustain that level, more women are going to be unavailable for marriage until their mid-30's. It's easy to misread this as a desire for a period of "slutting." All it really is, as Barbara Ehrenreich would say in a slightly different context, is "fear of falling." Men just react to that.
Anonymous at 1:44pm said:
"Also, and this is harder to explain but I am sure there is something to it, I think there is an intangible component to all of this. Back in the day, the institutions of our society actually reached out to young guys. Big companies had "executive training programs," the unions had apprenticeship programs, etc. The institutions of our society were actually reaching out to young men, saying "come work with us," and "we need you."
That stuff really doesn't exist today."
Instead we have minority outreach programs and the career section of every employer's website goes on and on about being committed to diversity.
I'm 43. Married with four daughters and I've never heard of this hand gesture "shocker" thing. The thing that worries me about the future of our nation (and the planet) is the number of adult white males who are still pretending to be black and who still play video games and spend prolonged periods of time thinking and talking about video games with other adult males.
SeanS
"To me the extended adolescence thing is mostly a result of the fact that lots of women under 45, who were in their teens 1983-90 or 1993-00, experienced affluence that prior generations never knew"
This is a very good point.
"So how then do we remedy such a situation? How do we force men to grow up and repudiate such behavior?"
Sorry, OneSTDV, the men are acting rationally vs. rampant slut behavior, no fault divorce and nonsensical over credentialing females.
These guys remind me of "girls" in bridal parties drunk out of their minds, yelling "woo-hoo!" and stirring their drinks with penis-headed stir sticks. Women these days speak in pitch four tones higher than in 1970, and generally strike one not as 'strong' and 'independent' but entitled and deeply immature, like overgrown teenagers, on whom they fashion themselves, their looks, their behaviors. Looking at film of men and women from 1970 just impresses with how much more mature everyone seemed then.
So why are the guys in the pic so unself-conscious about their mook-ness, their cheesebread natures? Simple...they're everywhere. There's no reason for them to be ashamed. They fit right in today. And barring some economic catastrophe, there's no reason for them or today's horribly immature unsexy "women" to change.
These guys remind me of "girls" in bridal parties drunk out of their minds, yelling "woo-hoo!"
I've said it before - if a girl has ever yelled out "woo", it's almost guaranteed that she's a dumb slut.
The high-pitched "wooo" exclamation should be right up there with lower back tattoos in identifying sluts.
I'm probably one of those guys, by some people's definition.
I dropped out of my PhD program, have a Master's that is nigh-useless without 5 years of industry experience, and acquired significant debt from a divorce last year. I occasionally tutor rich children to keep myself at a subsistence level. I bought a crappy motorcycle on Craigslist for $850 and spend my days either working on it or riding it.
Nowadays I get laid like crazy. I live in my parents' basement. I just stole a 19 year old teenage Brazilian from her boyfriend (with a very respectable job working for Google) and have more interaction with her than I could handle. The careerist chicks my age don't find me respectable but their little sisters do and that's actually preferable.
Other than wanting to eventually be able to buy a new Ducati (which is pretty cheap in the scheme of things) what is my motivation to grow?
Why do I want to bust my chops for that nice 14 hour a day gig? When I was on that track all I attracted were older status and money seeking women looking to settle down after a long spell of having "fun." Now that I'm a negative contributor I'm reaping the benefits in quality of life and access to high quality women.
If you encourage a certain type of behavior don't be surprised if some men decide to accept your encouragement.
We've previously discussed the concept of an extended adolescence, especially for men.
Why especially for men? Women seem to be far more prone to an extended adolescence. In fact it's so common in women that it's not often remarked on.
I have a twelve year old niece. She's a nice girl, and seems grown up for her age. She's into clothes and shopping, and hanging with her friends, and likes music - rather bad music IMO.
There's nothing she does which she'll have to give up when she becomes an adult woman. To put that another way, adult women are not expected to put aside childish things in the same fashion as men. A man with an expensive train set is being a boy, but a woman with an expensive shoe fetish is seen as a grown-up.
I hear people say "Girls grow up faster than boys". Maybe they do, but maybe it all comes down to women not being especially mature.
A little anecdote... about five years ago, my wife and I drove to Niagara Falls from our DC area for a few days. She was 25 at the time, already married to me for 3 years. I was in my mid 30s.
We got to our hotel in the evening, and she, being tired -- it was pouring rain for most of our drive through Pennsylvania -- went to sleep in the hotel room. Me, after eight hours of driving, I was in a mood for a few drinks and some music. So I went to the hotel bar. It had a lively crowd.
I sit at the bar, order something strong, and relax as good music is playing. There is a bachelorette party going on in that bar. Late-20s and early 30s girls. The bride-to-be recognizeable by her tiara. Flirting with every fucking guy in the place. Her girlfirends, equally drunk, do the woo-hoo thing. A complete friggin spectacle. One of them gets up near me (I'm good looking; might as well say that) and starts flirting with me.
The reaction I feel then was visceral -- I was disgusted with those women. I paid for my unfinished drink and went up to my room.
I think more men would be interested in marriage if families pretty much expected their daughters to get married right out of high school, and actually taught their daughters to be kind and respectful. A sweet fresh lovely uncorrupted 18 year old who is in love with you is pretty attractive to most normal males. Hardened used bar flies, ugh, well they keep the bed warm but uh, as wives, ...shiver.
Anon, my anecdote was leading up to what you just wrote
- PA
Most of the commenters here explain this extended adolescence thing as a result of financial burden and impoverishment and a result of limited opportunities.
However, I most often witnessed such behavior in young men who were accorded perhaps too much status and financial privilege too soon; in my first career, i worked in various media and talent positions in the music industry, which included frequent junket to L.A. and occasionally, N.Y. And while most of the struggling or middle-class-track peers of mine back home in the Midwest would sort-of take on marriage and entry-level middle-class professions as a sort-of exit strategy to extended adolescence ----- which was basically a predictable, ho-hum mix of binge-drinking, occasional controlled-substance-ingesting and trying to get laid by bar time.
But amongst a lot of young L.A musicians, publicists and other peripherals, who were of that age but fortunately accorded quite higher salaries and very generous expense accounts? They'd make the locals back home look like choir boys; the combination of that youthful energy and excess with the material means to make it happen inspired the most juvenile and often mean-spirited stuff you could imagine.
Usually, the only barriers to such excess was a sudden adn drastic about-face in financial position (getting fired and no longer being able to afford a massive drug habit) and/or failing health and a arrest, in which required rehab had to step in and play the role of parental authority.
I see what the other commenters are getting at, but to some extent I think the current economic climate and the financial burdens of young adulthood actually help corral youthful impulses out extended adolescence.
I thought the answer was pretty obvious - young people have the option to extend adolescence. It's only been in the last three or so generations in which people could have this option. Back in the "good old days" there were no options. If you were male you went to work from a young age married a woman in your teens and became a father. If you were female you stayed with your family until you got married in your teens then you started to pop out babies every year or two or so. I'm sure the people of yore would have loved to extend their adolescence too.
I'm sure the people of yore would have loved to extend their adolescence too.
Maybe, but "extending one's adolescence" be something better than the picture shown or those drunk bachelorette parties others have mentioned?
Why are we even concerned about this?
CS Lewis got this right
Critics who treat adult as a term of approval, instead of as a merely descriptive term, cannot be adult themselves. To be concerned about being grown up, to admire the grown up because it is grown up, to blush at the suspicion of being childish; these things are the marks of childhood and adolescence. And in childhood and adolescence they are, in moderation, healthy symptoms. Young things ought to want to grow. But to carry on into middle life or even into early manhood this concern about being adult is a mark of really arrested development. When I was ten, I read fairy tales in secret and would have been ashamed if I had been found doing so. Now that I am fifty I read them openly. When I became a man I put away childish things, including the fear of childishness and the desire to be very grown up.
If we get over the energy issue (tricky) we will be entering an era in which the seriousness required of previous men is not necessary for well much of anything.
We will be lucky if there is much work to be done by anybody.
As I see it there is no reason to artificially encourage old traits that may not serve us well in the future.
And sure this doesn't apply to men with a family and kids if he can get a quality wife and such but given that most women are not going to back to their old roles, no need for most men to either.
Why? Girls want to play--they've been told by our culture that they can screw their brains out, just like guys. What guy would ever say "no" to that prospect? One rule of life, no matter where you stand: Women choose, men are chosen.
How do you change that? Teach women economics. Any commodity in high demand ought to garner a high price, but women give it away for free, flooding the market. And any free good, by definition, is worthless. By being sexually "empowered" women have devalued themselves to a level of worthlessness.
Other than pump and dump, what's a women good for?
Men used to marry and establish themselves earlier in life because most women had virtue. As varying degree of slutiness become the norm, a lot of guys are content drinking the milk for free for a long time instead of buying the cow.
Also contributing to this:Lack of jobs.
You wanna change this? Here's how:
1. Repeal no-fault divorce and anti-male family and relationship law.
2. Bring back slut shaming.
3. End welfare.
4 End abortion on demand.
5. Bring back shotgun weddings. Make both whores and cads both pay for the consequences of their promiscuity.
OR... get ready for fifty-somethings with long gray ponytails throwing shockers with one hand while adjusting their dentures with the other.
"1. Repeal no-fault divorce and anti-male family and relationship law."
I'm an "extended adolescent" (36y.o.). This quote is the main reason I am who I am and choose to remain so. I see my fellow men getting divorced and being literally raped by the system. Losing HALF their net worth to women that cheat, then file for divorce when discovered, get alimony for life AND take his children (over 70% of child custody goes to the mother regardless of fault and/or fitness as a stable parent). All she has to do is call the police and I'm LEGALLY not allowed to re-enter my own home, even if it's in my name.
What incentive as a male do I have to work hard, marry young and bring children into a world where it can and will be taken away from me through no fault of my own?
A lot of it is helicopter parenting, too. My brother and I (3.9s at very good schools for undergrad, shitty jobs afterward) simply kept coming back to the nest (i live in my parents' basement now), in large part because having everything organized or done for us as kids made us incapable (or rather made us believe that we were incapable) of accomplishing things on our own.
Why leave the nest if you are told you can't fly (and never pushed to try?)
I work with a girl covered in tattoos. She is a year my senior. Her first few days on the job she would loudly exclaim "Mother f*****" or "son of a whore!" when she would make mistakes.
She did this because she thought it was cute. No one was laughing and eventually she stopped. Turns out on top of her tattoos that she is pregnant, out of wedlock, with her current boyfriend.
Between her boyfriend and herself they bring in $65000 a year in a cheap area to live. Every week before payday she's on the cell phone, storming out of the building screaming at her boyfriend that they are both out of money until payday and she's always asking how anyone can expect them to make it.
She was recently offered a promotion at our work but turned it down because she wasn't the first choice. She threw a fit during out employee of the month ceremony because (even though she'd only been there four months) she didn't get the award, despite all the extra hard work for other departments she does.
She has repeatedly taken credit for things she clearly did not do. She's always on the verge of breaking up with the father of her child, threatening him with the fact that he'll never get to see his daughter. She once complained that she had to eat the same kind of sandwich two days in a row because he had spent all their money on beer.
Despite never having money she spends twenty to thirty dollars a day on food on herself. She simply has to get her nails done once every two weeks. She's constantly coming in on Monday's talking at lunch about all the great deals she found at Wal-Mart.
She arrives fifteen to twenty five minutes late daily, always ready with an excuse as to why. She takes 1 hour 15 minute lunches (we're allowed 30). She slops through her job when it is convenient for her. she's hardly worked a full 40 hour week since starting due to "circumstances beyond my control".
In spite of all this, she is overworked and no one understands the struggle she has being a pregnant "single" mom. Her pregnancy is unique from every other woman's. No one has had it quite as difficult yet pulled it off with the grace and style she has.
Reading over all this I am baffled why I haven't gone out and found me two just like her.
Correct me if I'm wrong. But it sounds like you guys are defining making the rational choice to avoid 20 plus years of wage/debt slavery as "extended adolescence.
First, being a slacker is a perfectly rational choice in a no-growth economy.
Secondly, adulthood is defined exclusively in terms of accepting responsibility for one's own actions and being financially independent. There is nothing in this definition that says anything about being responsible for other people.
Lastly, I have been in business start-ups on two continents and have several patents in materials science. To suggest that I am any less of an adult, despite my accomplishments, because I choose not to do the marriage and family thing is obscenely offensive.
I live by my own standards and objectives. I do not live my life by the standards of others.
Another viewpoint on this issue:
http://www.eurekalert.org/pub_releases/2011-09/giot-stb092011.php
These kinds of stories are becoming more and more common.
I think we're going to get radical life extension in the next couple of decades, and it will make the whole conventional life cycle as obsolete as the horse and buggy. Discussing family and demographic issues today is like discussing the problem of accumulating horse manure in city streets in 1900. There's always a technological solution that allows everyone to get what they want. This is called positive-sum solution.
People are living longer and evolving later, it happens every generation.
Another factor is the economy and job market, if there are no jobs many of these "adolescent" adults go back to school to better their educatation or major in something else.
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