When Ashley Montagu came out with his “The Natural Superiority of Women” (1952), I asked him whether it would have been more scientific to write on “The Mutual Superiority of the Sexes.” We had just had a debate in which he opposed my “God is love” to his “Love is god.” He was a feisty character, with a preference for inflammatory utterance. In the debate, I objected that he left God out; in the conversation, I objected that he left men out. They are related: the natural superiority/inferiority of the sexes is a divine design.
Photo your average man alongside your average woman and what do you see? Only the natural superiority of the male, in size and musculature – a superiority decreasingly functional to the protection and control of women and children as societies become more complex. / Since the female is naturally superior in the perception and manipulation of human relations, female power increases with the complexity of society. / As the imbalance increases, desperate males increase their battering of females. / As the muscular battering is visible (though female internal wounding of males is not), social and legal sanctions against it increase. / As society sees men as at least potential batters, male dignity declines in the public mind.
Cumulative effects? Combined with third-wave feminism (its just demands and its radfem overdemands), the increasing feminization of society marginalized males and denigrated the masculine. Girls were growing up in a psychosocial world that fit them to become women, the same world in which boys were not being encouraged to become men. (Beginning in the late ‘70s, a spate of book analyzed the social costs of this angelizing of the feminine and demonizing of the masculine.)
“How to Help Boys Become Men” was the way I put it in a national colloquy I initiated. Speakers addressed both the old “sexism” (male dominance in society’s customs/structures/laws, to the disadvantage of girls and women) and the new “reverse sexism” (female dominance within social structures, to the disadvantage of boys [some boys, in growing up, never having a male leader or model] and men).
As women developed their interpersonal powers in a society no longer suppressing their gifts, they became more demanding of marriage, and family became a more fragile institution. Motherhood? Optional, problematic.
The colloquy “How to Help Boys Become Men” addressed a sickness of society, its failure to balance the helping of boys to become men and of girls to become women - the ideal finding massive and complex support in the Bible. A woman stormed out of the colloquy, and after that session I asked her whether she wanted her daughters to marry men. “Of course I do,” said she. “But,” I replied, “if we can’t now help boys become men, your daughters will have to choose between remaining unmarried and marrying old boys.” In silence, she stared at me. Then she smiled and said, “Thank you. I get it.”
From an un-obvious angle, I have been addressing the current “On Faith” question: “Which ‘ism’ is more entrenched in America, sexism or racism? Which should religion address?” The question how to help boys become men transcends problems we easily clump together as these two “isms.” My biblical-Christian premise is that God intends the removal of impedances to fairness, justice, love; Christian hospitality cancels the category of “stranger”: xenophilia replaces xenophobia, as in Jesus’ parable that we are all “neighbors.”
My way of describing the God-given structure within which we are to try to sweat this all out is “the natural superiority/inferiority of the sexes and races.”
While politicians spin the responsibility for whatever mess is being addressed and who should do what about it, we all know that each of us has both personal and societal responsibilities. Within each race, as well as in the general society, how can we best help boys become men and girls become women?
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