The last few days I have watched a few different movies that have gotten me thinking about people I have known in the past, as well as the state of our culture. I am not a big TV watcher, but my body and brain have needed a break before I make the push through midterms into term papers and then onto finals. Why would I even be able to speak on the topic of the wounded men in our culture? Well, because I spent much of my Twenties engrossed in the thoroughly secular culture of men and women while I was in the Navy. For a while I was the only woman on my watch-team and almost all of my friends were men. In fact, for most of my life, until marriage, my friends were predominately male. Male friends of mine have confided in me through broken relationships, promiscuous behavior, divorces, thoughts of adultery, pain, and a lot of brokenness. I am also married and observe how my husband is different from me in many ways. This is not meant to be an exhaustive account, but it is about what I have learned through my love of the men in my life from my dad, to my husband, to friends.
I watched three different movies with the same actor in them. They were thoroughly secular, especially in discussion. There was nothing graphic per say, but the discussions were anything but pure. I watched them in order to observe our culture. It reminded me of what I was privy to and observed in the past. While these films were describing a culture that is counter to the Catholic’s knowledge of truth, a bit of truth would shine through the darkness and despair of it all. These people could not tell outright that they were in despair, but I could see it. I see it on TV and I have seen it in the faces of people I have known. It is the unquenchable thirst that cannot be satiated by this world.
There are many articles and blogs on the brokenness of women in the face of the Sexual Revolution. I myself lived that lie for 3 years when I cohabited with the man I dated before my husband. A man whom I had no intention of marrying. It is the biggest regret of my life and it opened my eyes to the lie of our culture. Cohabitation is not marriage. Men and women are different. We are unique in creation, but equal in dignity. We are complementary and meant to fit together. Men are not meant to be women and women are not meant to be men. Today I want to focus on cultural tendencies and the way we treat men, especially how women treat men.
1. Men are sexual animals who are incapable of monogamy.
I have heard this statement a lot, not just in media, but from friends. Yes, men are wired in a more sexual manner than women. They think about sex all of the time, but as I read earlier today, that does not mean that men are incapable of self-control. What kind of message do we send to men by this accusation? When we accuse men of only being capable of promiscuous sex, what are we demanding of them? For women, nothing. We discard them and either give into this tendency or treat these men with disdain. Yes, I have known some real jerks. I had conversations with a few Marines I dated that I never expected to have, but I stood my ground. But in my youth, anger, and rush to judgment, I discarded them. Now I wasn’t going to continue to date men who were only interested in using me for sex. First, I practiced abstinence the entire 6 years I served and did not make an error in judgment until I was 26. But, I should have paid more attention to what was going on. I should have seen all of the pain going on around me in both men and women. It was everywhere.
Men tend to be promiscuous for a few reasons. First, women have given in and believe that they must be promiscuous as well. Women have bought the lie that promiscuous sex is the answer to true freedom. Tell that to my female friends who slept with entire platoons of men, who came home crying and broken, only to do it again. Men actually do need guidance from women. It is not that men are incapable of self-control, but they need the help of their partner, as does the woman in the situation. The sexual passion is one of the strongest forces on earth and men and women should be helping each other practice self-control. Sometimes men need more help than women. It’s okay to admit that.
Second, men who are aggressively promiscuous are usually wounded and hurting. They go through woman after woman in order to erase a relationship or relationships from the past. It is their way of numbing the pain or it is their revenge. I have known quite a few men like this. I have seen this depicted in multiple movies, but it is something that we don’t pay much attention to. Men are suppose to be incapable of suffering and pain, so we brush it off. They are getting their fill of sex, so why does it matter that the root of their pain is not being addressed? No one encourages the man in this situation to heal. Instead our culture applauds his conquests. We need to start acknowledging that men feel pain. It may be different from a woman’s pain, but it is no less deep.
Third, these men usually come from families that were either broken or lacked a strong mother or father. Promiscuity usually points to a lack in understanding of how men and women should interact. They either lacked a father to show them how to treat women with respect or a mother to show them how to love women. Once again this is a problem that our culture wants to ignore because the reality of fatherlessness, divorce, adultery, etc. points to the brokenness of that way of life.
2. Men are expendable.
As women have convinced themselves that their sexual freedom rests in being like a promiscuous male, a discard culture has emerged that is the opposite of what many men do to women. Women are discarding men all together. They use the men and then throw them to the curb, including many women who have become pregnant. How often do we see the go it alone mother who doesn’t need the man who impregnated her? How often do we see depictions of women in their 30s or 40s going to a sperm bank in order to have a child without a male partner? Whether we believe it or not, men absorb this sentiment. They know that they are seen as expendable by many women and so they in turn treat women in that manner. So we end up with the sexes competing and discarding one another, and then everyone wonders why marriage is falling apart?! Is it really so shocking that people in the generation behind mine are not getting married? With this lack of trust, what would make someone want to marry? The sexes are not meant to use and abuse one another, but love and serve one another as Christ loves the Church.
3. Men are stupid.
One of the reasons I loathe post-modern sitcoms is because of how men are depicted. In almost every single one of them, the father is an impotent and idiotic man who can get nothing right and the woman has to fix him. This is so offensive! Men are incapable of fathering, men are incapable of grocery shopping, men are incapable of providing for their families, and the list goes on and on and on. No matter what the man cannot get it right. ONLY a woman can do things in the proper fashion. What do we think this does to men?
It creates a generation of men who lack work ethic and direction. Men need to provide for their families. Men need purpose, as do women, but those purposes are equal but different. Men need work. But if women tell them they are useless and stupid all of the time, then they stop trying. They lose that sense of purpose that God gave them. They lose that sense of who God made them to be. When a man falls in love and desires to marry a woman, it means that he is willing to die for the person he is marrying. He will give everything to her. This is not sentiment. This is reality. This is how men are wired. There is a reason men are the ones who go to war. They instinctively grasp honor, courage, and selfless sacrifice for their loved ones and the brothers next to them. This is not something to be mocked. It is something to be admired. Men are not stupid. They just aren’t women. That is the real issue.
4. Men should be more like women.
Yes, there have been great strides made in men becoming more involved in the home life. This is a positive, but men are not women, nor should they be asked to be. I struggle in this department. I am constantly telling my husband to stop trying to fix everything and just let me vent. Well, men fix things. If someone they love is hurting, they just want to fix it. Well, women sometimes just need to talk it out. This is a balancing act that they have to work out within their marriage. That being said, we cannot expect our husbands or boyfriends to be like our best girlfriend. My husband is never going to enjoy going to the ballet, a musical, or a chick flick. I cannot expect him to love it. He goes with me, because he loves me and I go to movies or other activities with him. Marriage is about compromise, but we cannot expect or force our interests, especially more feminine interests on them. Some men love these things and that is great, but my husband is not one of them. I have to accept that about him.
Men and women think differently. In one of the movies I was watching the married couple was having a fight that sounded exactly like one I would have with my husband. Men don’t like fighting. They just want to know when it will be over and they can fix the problem. Women on the other hand may want to vent and pout. The point is that none of us are mind readers and I cannot expect a man to think as I do. So let’s stop! Men are not women and women are not men. That’s okay! That’s how God made us. We are still equals even if we are different.
Conclusion
The woundedness that I have seen in both men and women is heart-breaking. The real answer is in Christ and His Church, but I wanted to share some of my own experiences and observations. Sometimes we women railroad men too much, and that includes inside of the Church. I will address the latter in a post at a later date. It’s important for us to remember that men hurt and suffer, that they are not stupid, not incapable of love, and that they are meant to be men. If we want to heal the culture then we have to stop treating men poorly in the name of feminism. Men are capable of great things and they deserve our love and respect. If, like me, you struggle with some of these tendencies, make an effort to overcome the lies of our culture. God bless.
Swimming the Depths 