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MenAreGood is a channel for men, boys, fathers, new fathers, grandfathers and women who want to learn about men and masculinity.  Are you tired of the false narrative of toxic masculinity?  Did you know there is a huge amount of research that shows the positive aspects of men, boys and fathers?  That is what we focus on here, being a source of good information and also a place to connect.   Join us!
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May 14, 2024
The Making of Gynocentric Foot Soldiers

This is a post and video from 2015. It continues to offer an important message about our gynocentric world and the making of gynocentric foot soldiers. See what you think.


Psychologists have studied and argued about male sex roles for many years.  They have done a decent job, with a few exceptions, of describing these roles.  These include the independent, tough, competitive and unemotional types and many others.  But they have missed possibly the most important aspect of these roles completely, and that is the connection of the male sex role with gynocentrism.  Without gynocentrism the male role would simply not exist. It is an essential element in the male sex role and only describing the traits that might make up such a role is very short sighted. They have failed miserably at identifying the underlying reason for the roles.  On that point there is mostly silence.  Take the example of the movie titled “The Mask.”  In this film male roles are villainized and seen as a problem that boys need to remove as if they can take off these roles like they might take off a mask. There is zero mention of why those roles have evolved as they have. 

This article will start a discussion about the connection of male sex roles with gynocentrism and how our zest to push boys into male sex roles is actually a push to train them to be gynocentric foot soldiers.


I can remember  in the 1950’s when I was a little guy the common phrase used in my elementary school was “girls first.”  Whether it was a line to get ice cream, leaving a large school assembly, or just getting a drink from a water fountain.  The standard chant was girls first. The girls got to go before us boys si

mply because they were girls.  I can remember asking when the boys would get to go first and was rebuked and told to just wait my turn.  What is the message to boys?  Your needs are secondary.  Your job is to sacrifice and let the girls go first, get used to it. Of course there was never a time when any teacher said “boys first.”  Boys first has a strange ring to it, doesn’t it?  The message was clear.  As boys we needed to put our needs second and allow the girls to go first, simply because of their biological difference,  they were girls. And if you complain about this unfair advantage you will be shamed and labelled as a troublemaker.

If you are going to be a gynocentric foot soldier you had better learn that your needs are never first.  You will be facing many situations in the future where you will need to put women’s needs ahead of your own.  Get used to it.  This is the beginning of basic training. 

While the overt usage of the “girls first” or “ladies first” adage may be diminished I think that the idea is still  prevalent.  All one has to do is search the internet and see how many images sport the “ladies first” meme.  This gives us the odd mix of “ladies first” alongside “we are all equal.”  Yet another bizarre twist in our misandrist culture.

Added into this crazy mix is the big boys don’t cry message.  Nearly every male in the US has heard this.  Much has been made about how this stops men from emoting in public and encourages them to avoid their tears.  Men have been shamed for eons for not “dealing with their feelings.”  I think this obvious blue pill assessment is limited and misses the mark. If one ignores the gynocentric connection then one sees only a man avoiding emotions. But why?  Why would a man want to avoid emotions?  The first reason is that in a  gynocentric world women’s needs and feelings are important and men’s are not. Think back to a little boy being told that big boys don’t cry.  What are they saying to him?  They are saying that his needs and hurts are not as important as his sister’s.  When do young boys cry?  They cry when they have needs that are not being met, or when they need attention to a hurt.  The message is clear.  When you are a boy and you are hurt or have needs, they are less important than your sister’s. And if you dare complain about it you will just hear the same message once again, “big boys don’t cry.”  Voicing your needs is seen as whining.  If you are going to be a good gynocentric foot soldier, that is, be a good provider and protector of women you can’t whine or cry.

But there is another piece of this mess that is rarely mentioned.  By saying to a young boy that big boys don’t cry you are not only telling him to STFU you are also alleviating yourself from any  responsibility to tend to a boy’s pain or to muster even a rudimentary degree of compassion. So the message to the boys is clear, your pain does not matter as much as your sister’s and it matters so little that those who love you don’t feel the need to offer you support or compassion.  Deal with it.  Be a man.   Boys learn to handle it themselves because very few others will step forward and offer them a hand.  But they also learn that others simply don’t care about their pain. This is the basic training of a gynocentric foot soldier.

And then there is the mess that starts for boys in early childhood where they are told to never hit a girl and if they do they will face severe punishment.  This rule is enforced, not only by the parents or authorities but also by the toughest boys. The girls catch wind of this and take advantage.  Some start hitting the boys knowing the boys cannot hit back. But wait, the girls violence is ignored. No one lifts a finger.  The boys already know that no one will likely listen and will turn away and shame them for complaining. Now they find out that violence is just one more area where their needs don’t count. They also know that if they report a girl who hits them they will face a gauntlet that labels them a pussy.  Boys learn to stay quiet about their needs, even safety needs. This is what a foot soldier is supposed to do. The girls learn that they can be damsels in distress and turn on the waterworks to get what they want.  They also learn they can get away with violence against boys. The boys learn they face a very unfair system and they better stay quiet about it.  If any of the boys speaks up and complains they regret it. They get punished for speaking up.  Quiet, you just take care of yourself and take it like a man.  Reminds me of our present day domestic violence system.

These three, girls first, never hit a girl, and big boys don’t cry are the marching orders of the gynocentric foot soldiers. Each one informs the boy of his role.  The gynocentric army is all about the safety and satisfaction of women through the sacrifice of men.  It’s pretty simple and has been functioning effectively for centuries.  “Big boys don’t cry” tells boys that their needs are simply not as important as the tears of women and girls they are destined to sacrifice for.  “Girls first” tells the boys to get used to the idea of sacrificing their own wants and desires in order to help women and girls. “Never hit a girl” marks out who is the enemy (other men) and who is to be protected (women and girls).  All of this goes on under the radar with most people simply being ignorant of what underlies these messages. 

We can’t blame the culture totally for this.  I think there is compelling evidence that there are biological factors that are driving gynocentrism.  If there were no biology involved do you think for a second that boys would do exactly what they are told?  Hell no.  Do boys follow just about any other dictum offered by parents or the culture at large? No.   Do boys unquestioningly follow?  Of course not, boys by nature are rebellious and very slow to do what is demanded of them.  But do they follow through on these three things?  Pretty much.  Not only do they follow through they also patrol the males around them to be sure that they are also following through.  This is more than just culture.

Boys are surrounded by these gynocentric messages.  At home they will likely see their dads put his needs last and focus on what mom wants and rarely saying “no” to her.  In the media they get more gynocentrism. Men saving women from harm and sacrificing their own safety, needs, their desires or even their lives in order to do so.  Worse yet, if they are not saving women they are portrayed as stupid and incompetent  which seems to be a gynocentric man’s way of trying to make women feel better in comparison.  Men are portrayed as being unable to make a simple decision without the help of a smart woman who can show him the way.  Most men don’t complain about this.

Our college campuses are overrun with gynocentrism.  No one dares to cross the gynocentric party line of the women studies departments for fear of their job.  Women first?  Yes, ma’am.

In our legislators the boys see the same.   Like automatons, our gynocentric male legislators do exactly the same thing.  We have seen them focus on women’s and girls needs,  especially for the last 50 years and ignore the needs of men.  Just like the boys were taught, just like the boys saw from their father, just like we see in the media. Now our legislators are acting out this same foot soldier pattern by enacting laws to help women and girls and completely ignore the needs of boys and men.  Domestic violence laws like the Violence Against WOMEN Act, the rape shield laws, sexual harassment laws, workplace harassment, affirmative action for women and girls, title IX and on and on.  Boys and men are an afterthought.

Gynocentrism is bad enough but what happened in the past 50 years put a new sinister spin on the gynocentric foot soldiers  Now it wasn’t just girls first and big boys don’t cry, now the new fabricated twist was that women and girls were oppressed, by men.   Our young men make it to middle or high school after years of gynocentric training and now they must deal with a new monster, the lethal and incorrect mantra:  Men oppressed women and women are victims. If they contradicted or questioned a party line about women and girls being victims or having special needs they would face overwhelming opposition.  Much of that opposition would be from gynocentric soldiers protecting women. 

So on top of the ideas that boys are here to protect, care for, and provide for women is the bizarre notion that the very people who had been providing and protecting them were now guilty somehow of being perennial abusers of women and girls. So now men and boys need to provide and protect women and also atone for some mythical oppression of those they have sacrificed for, for many years.  Really? Maybe put even more simply, it’s like having a slave owner tell his slaves that they had oppressed him in the past and that their ancestors had oppressed him as well and they now need to make up for that with special treatment for him.  Enough said.

Our boys face a routine and unacknowledged training to be gynocentric foot soldiers. The male sex role is based on placing the needs , safety, and desires of women and girls on a higher level than those of men.  If we ignore this foundation we are sure to fail in serving men.   From the childhood messages like big boys don’t cry to viewing the vast majority of male role models who are serving the needs of women and neglecting their own wants and needs our boys rarely see a man choosing consciously and going his own way.  This needs to change.

If we are really going to free men from their roles we will need to help them first with what has been drilled into them and is facilitated by their biology: putting women first.   Instead of trying to teach boys to cry we need to teach boys that their needs are of importance.  We will need to teach boys that it is not mandatory for them to provide and protect for others, that it is also okay for them to simply care for themselves.  We need to help them see the value in their being, not just in their doing and we need to help them see that, in spite of what the culture and feminists might say,  men are good.  Then once they have the data, once they get the information and understand the gynocentric yoke, then and only then should we let them go whatever way they want.  If they want to get married then so be it.  If they want to move to the desert and be a hermit then so be it.  Unlike the feminists who push women into certain roles and shame them for others, we need to bless the boys in their own choices whatever they might be.  Men are indeed good.

00:09:07
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October 02, 2025
Father Custody: The Solution to Injustices Against Men?

In this conversation, I sit down with Stephen Baskerville and Rick Bradford to explore a provocative idea: could father custody be the key to addressing many of the injustices men face? Both men are leading experts in this area, and together they examine some fascinating angles. One insight is that the legal contract of marriage doesn’t just unite two people — it’s also the mechanism that legally creates fathers. Yet when that contract is dissolved through divorce, the law often strips fathers of their rights, reducing them to mere “visitors” in their children’s lives. This and much more is unpacked in our discussion.

We also point to Rick’s and Stephen’s books (linked below) and to AI tools that allow you to interact with their work directly. (also linked below)

If you’ve ever wondered why custody is such a defining issue — not just for fathers but for the future of men’s rights and well-being — this dialogue offers insights you won’t want to miss.

Men are good, as are you.

Books...

01:18:10
September 25, 2025
Dr. James Nuzzo Cancelled for Challenging Feminism and DEI

Join me as I talk with Janice Fiamengo and researcher Dr. James Nuzzo about the shocking story of his academic cancellation. What begins as one man’s ordeal soon reveals how woke ideology and radical feminism are undermining science, silencing dissent, and eroding academic freedom. Thoughtful, eye-opening, and at times heartbreaking, this video exposes what really happens when universities put politics before truth.

Dr. Nuzzo's GoFundMe
https://www.gofundme.com/f/ChildStrengthResearch

Dr. Nuzzo's Donorbox
https://donorbox.org/the-nuzzo-letter

https://jameslnuzzo.substack.com/

Previous Interviews with Dr. Nuzzo on MenAreGood
grip strength https://menaregood.substack.com/p/childhood-sex-differences-in-grip

sex differences in strength https://menaregood.substack.com/p/sex-differences-in-strength-and-exercise

bias against women in exercise research? https://menaregood.substack.com/p/bias-against-women-in-exercise-research

childhood sex differences in strength ...

01:01:31
September 10, 2025
Diary of a CEO's Debate on Feminism: Our Response

This video will be presented in two parts and is a joint venture between MenAreGood and Hannah Spier’s Psychobabble. Hannah’s standard approach is to make the first half free for everyone, with the second half reserved for paid subscribers. To align with her process, I’m setting aside my usual practice of making all new posts free and following the same format for this release.


Janice Fiamengo, Hannah Spier, and Tom Golden respond to a YouTube video on The Diary of a CEO channel, which features three feminists debating the question: “Has modern feminism betrayed the very women it promised to empower?”In their response, Hannah, Janice, and Tom have a lively discussion, highlighting inconsistencies, omissions, and a variety of other notable observations.

Men Are Good

00:36:02
February 07, 2023
The Way Boys Play and the Biological Underpinnings

My apologies for the last empty post. My mistake. Let's hope this one works.

Tom takes a stab at using the podcast function. Let's see how it goes.

The Way Boys Play and the Biological Underpinnings
May 13, 2022
Boys and Rough Play

This is a short excerpt from Helping Mothers be Closer to their Sons. The book was meant for single mothers who really don't know much about boy's nature. They also don't have a man in the house who can stand up for the boy and his unique nature. It tries to give them some ideas about how boys and girls are different. This excerpt is about play behaviors.

Boys and Rough Play
September 18, 2025
Jim Nuzzo Cancelled

I’m sure many of you are familiar with Jim Nuzzo’s work on exercise and strength training. A frequent guest on this channel, Jim offers valuable insights into exercise science. I often call him my favorite researcher—and he truly is!

Jim studies boys’ uniqueness and the differences between boys and girls in exercise approaches and physical traits. He has also exposed distortions in claims that past research was biased against women. In doing so, he broke two “rules” of the woke: celebrating boys’ strengths and challenging feminist disinformation. For this, he was effectively cancelled.

Using the Freedom of Information Act, Jim obtained emails revealing the hate behind his cancellation. This post details that story, and Janice and I will do a video with him next week—so there’s more to come.


https://jameslnuzzo.substack.com/p/my-academic-cancellation-story

The Best, effective and clearest video on this subject I ever seen! Every man and boy should watch and learn.
10 out of 10!!!
A Absalutly must watch!!!

Another great video from Gabby on how Radical Feminism dehumanizes Men. And she showed a pic of Paul Elam and Tom Golden with others. As people trying to humanize and help men.

Worth a watch

October 06, 2025
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Women’s Historical Gift of Love: the Evolution of Empathy

Introduction to Women’s Historical Gift of Love: the Evolution of Empathy

Many of us here know the pain of being hurt by women — through betrayal, false accusation, alienation, or cruelty. For those who have lived that, it can be hard to read praise of the feminine without flinching. That’s natural.

Yet healing often begins when we can hold two truths at once: some women have done harm, and women as a whole have also given civilization gifts. In this essay David Shackleton looks at women’s impact on empathy. Shackleton explores how, across generations, mothers quietly expanded humanity’s moral depth while men advanced knowledge and invention. Both streams were essential to our progress, and both were not mutually exclusive.


Feminists have long tried to obscure this moral achievement because it doesn’t fit their preferred path for women — getting a job. They celebrate women who break ceilings but ignore those who built the foundations of love and empathy that made civilization humane. The following is an excerpt from David Shackleton’s forthcoming book, Matrisensus: The Masculine Collapse and Feminine Shadow. See what you think. How have we ruined this balance and to what effect? Tom Golden


Women’s Historical Gift of Love: the Evolution of Empathy

 


Civilization has been built by two parallel and complementary streams of human achievement. On one side, while most men did not add to the collection of human knowledge, a few exceptional men pushed forward the frontiers of knowledge: explorers charting unknown lands, scientists discovering natural laws, philosophers clarifying moral principles. On the other side, while most women made no difference in their parenting from the way they had been treated in their own childhoods, a few exceptional women advanced the frontier of love – especially empathy – in the private realm of the family, transmitting new ways of caring for children that slowly reshaped society. Both gifts were indispensable.

The historian of childhood Lloyd deMause argued that the deepest motor of history is not politics or economics, but the way parents treat their children. Most parents, he observed, simply repeat what they themselves experienced. Yet in every generation, a few mothers break the cycle, heroically choosing to treat their children with greater tenderness and empathy than they had received. Since mothers in subsequent generations then repeat these new patterns, these quiet decisions accumulate across generations, slowly elevating culture.

To give shape to this process, deMause described six successive childrearing modes, each producing characteristic personality structures and cultural patterns:

Childrearing Mode – Description – Psychological Outcome

  • Infanticidal: Routine killing or abandonment of unwanted infants → Schizoid, fragmented personalities

  • Abandoning: Physical survival ensured, but emotional neglect and use of wet nurses or servants → Masochistic, dependent personalities

  • Ambivalent: Parents swing between affection and cruelty, discipline by fear → Borderline, unstable personalities

  • Intrusive: Parents invade the child’s inner life, controlling thoughts and feelings → Depressive, guilt-ridden personalities

  • Socializing: Parents train children to conform to external norms and roles → Neurotic, rule-bound personalities

  • Helping: Parents empathize with children’s needs and support growth toward autonomy → Individuated, creative personalities

 

(If you find yourself doubting the historical advance of empathy or that childrearing was so brutal in the past, consider that it is less than 500 years since we burned people alive at the stake in public executions. How much less empathy must people have had at that time in order to watch and approve of such horrific spectacles?)

deMause explained:
“Psychogenesis is not a very robust process in caretakers. Most of the time, parents simply re-inflict upon their children what had been done to them in their own childhood. The production of developmental variations can occur only in the silent, mostly unrecorded decisions by parents to go beyond the traumas they themselves endured. It happens each time a mother decides not to use her child as an erotic object, not to tie it up so long in swaddling bands, not to hit it when it cries. It happens each time a mother encourages her child’s explorations and independence, each time she overcomes her own despair and neediness and gives her child a bit more of the love and empathy she herself didn’t get. These private moments are rarely recorded for historians, and social scientists have completely overlooked their role in the production of cultural variation, yet they are nonetheless the ultimate sources of the evolution of the psyche and culture.”

And again, in conclusion:
“Because childrearing evolution determines the evolution of the psyche and society, the causal arrows of all other social theories are reversed by the psychogenic theory. Rather than personal and family life being seen as dragged along in the wake of social, cultural, technological and economic change, society is instead viewed as the outcome of evolutionary changes that first occur in the psyche. Because the structure of the psyche changes from generation to generation within the narrow funnel of childhood, childrearing practices are not just one item in a list of cultural traits—they are the very condition for the transmission and further development of all other cultural elements, placing limits on what can be achieved in all other social areas. … Childhood must therefore always first evolve before major social, cultural and economic innovation can occur.”

To summarize, deMause outlined a new, psychogenic theory of history: that cultural evolution is driven overwhelmingly by the nature of childraising, and that this is dominated by mothers, with those few mothers who courageously advance their own psychic maturity so that they are able to love their children better than they themselves were loved as a child being the engine of advancing social empathy and thus of general cultural progress. Far from being powerless and oppressed figures in history, this theory places women at the centre of cultural evolution, the prime cause. Women provided the substrate, the progressively advancing psychological and cultural backdrop, and men innovated the physical techniques and technologies that delivered greater health, longer lives, better living standards, and increased freedom. It was truly an equal partnership.

A few examples illustrate women’s contribution:

The Breastfeeding Revolution: In eighteenth-century England and France, mothers began to nurse their own children instead of sending them to wet nurses. This seemingly small change radically increased infant survival, deepened maternal bonds, and helped prepare a generation with greater capacity for empathy. Rousseau’s Émile (1762) gave voice to this cultural shift, insisting that “the mother’s milk is the milk of virtue.” Within a century, England and France were leading the world in science, democracy, and industrialization.

Abolitionism: While men like Wilberforce led parliamentary campaigns, the conscience of the abolition movement was profoundly maternal. Writers such as Elizabeth Heyrick, who called for immediate abolition in 1824, and Harriet Beecher Stowe, whose Uncle Tom’s Cabin (1852) moved millions, exemplified how women’s empathy translated into moral revolution. Abraham Lincoln’s (perhaps apocryphal) remark on meeting Stowe — “So you’re the little woman who wrote the book that made this great war” — captures this dynamic.

The Rise of Universal Human Rights: The very notion that all people possess inherent dignity and equal rights, regardless of class, race, or sex, emerged alongside the expansion of empathy across generations. While men codified these rights in declarations and constitutions, women’s work of nurturing developed the human capacity to imagine others as equally valuable. The family was the first school of equality: the mother who held her child in love transmitted, in seed form, the conviction that every human being deserved care and respect. As historian Lynn Hunt argues in Inventing Human Rights (2007), the eighteenth century saw the growth of “empathetic imagination” through novels, letters, and family life, and this undergirded the spread of rights discourse. Without this interior revolution of feeling, the abstract principle of rights would have rung hollow. The Declaration of the Rights of Man and Citizen (1789) and later the Universal Declaration of Human Rights (1948) were thus the public crystallization of a private moral revolution that mothers advanced in the nursery.

Child Labor Reforms: In nineteenth-century Britain and America, mothers and women’s societies were prominent advocates for laws restricting child labor, pressing legislators with the moral claim that children were not merely economic assets but human beings with rights and dignity.

Nursing and Care: Florence Nightingale’s transformation of nursing in the Crimean War and afterward reframed medicine as compassionate service, professionalizing an ethic of care. Her Notes on Nursing (1859) became foundational for modern healthcare.

Education and Literacy: Across the West, women were the primary transmitters of literacy and moral instruction in the home. In the nineteenth century, they became the backbone of the teaching profession, extending their empathic role into the public sphere.

Each of these steps paralleled breakthroughs in men’s domain: Newton’s Principia (1687) reshaping science, Darwin’s Origin of Species (1859) transforming biology, explorers charting the globe, inventors powering industry, philosophers clarifying the principles of liberty and democracy. Men advanced the frontier of truth; women advanced the frontier of love.

The prevailing feminist narrative has been that women were excluded from history’s great achievements and silenced by male domination. But deMause’s research reveals a deeper truth: women were not absent from progress; they were its other half. Their contributions were less visible only because they took place in private rather than public realms.

That this polarized narrative of victim and oppressor was completely mistaken is now clear:

  • Men’s gift of truth expanded humanity’s knowledge and control over the world.

  • Women’s gift of love expanded humanity’s moral and emotional capacity.

This is perfect archetypal balance. Women’s gift was as important as men’s. Both were necessary, both indispensable. Civilization depends equally on both.

Seen in this light, the family hearth was as revolutionary as the laboratory. The quiet choices of mothers: to hold rather than strike, to nurse rather than abandon, to soothe rather than shame, carried forward across generations until they reshaped entire cultures. Just as Galileo pointed his telescope toward the heavens, so did mothers across centuries point their empathy into the hearts of their children, and the world changed.

History must honor both gifts: truth and love, discovery and empathy, masculine and feminine. To overlook either is to tell only half of the human story. We have been doing that for too long. It is time that we stopped.


References

  1. Lloyd deMause, The Emotional Life of Nations, Karnac Books, New York, 2002, p.110

  2. Lloyd deMause, The History of Childhood, Harper & Row, New York, 1974, p.12

  3. Jean-Jacques Rousseau, Émile, or On Education (1762), Book I. Modern edition: trans. Allan Bloom, Emile: or On Education, Basic Books, New York, 1979, p.44

  4. Attributed remark by Abraham Lincoln to Harriet Beecher Stowe, 1862, during her White House visit. Source uncertain; first recorded by Annie Fields in Life and Letters of Harriet Beecher Stowe (Houghton, Mifflin, Boston, 1897), p.133.

  5. Lynn Hunt, Inventing Human Rights: A History, W. W. Norton, New York, 2007

  6. Florence Nightingale, Notes on Nursing: What It Is and What It Is Not, Harrison, London, 1859

  7. Isaac Newton, Philosophiæ Naturalis Principia Mathematica, London, 1687

  8. Charles Darwin, On the Origin of Species by Means of Natural Selection, John Murray, London, 1859

 
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September 29, 2025
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Masculinity: Assessing the Damage and Reclaiming Your Strengths
 

This is the final stretch in the gynocentrism series. In the earlier posts we looked at a definition of gynocentrism from chatgpt, noted that most of us have at least a little gynocentrism , saw how it operates beneath the surface of our culture, and how it offers women both protection and access to resources. We’ve also seen how feminism took that ancient system and weaponized it, and why men often fail to resist.

Now it’s time to turn the focus inward. This essay is about what you can do — not on a political stage, not in the culture at large, but in your own life and relationships. Before we talk about strategies, we need to start with something more personal: assessing the damage.


How Masculinity Has Been Undermined​?

Over the last 50 years, the constant drumbeat of “toxic masculinity” has worn on men. It has told us that our natural strengths are not strengths at all, but flaws. Instead of celebrating courage, persistence, and logic, the culture tells men that these traits are threatening, outdated, or even abusive.

This has an impact. For many men, the constant assault has created a hesitation to speak plainly, to stand firm, or to trust their own instincts. It has discouraged men from telling the truth when it might offend, or from using reason when confronted with a storm of emotion. And it has silenced countless men in their relationships — men who fear that raising their voice will only make them look like the problem.


Why Logic Has Been Pushed Aside​?

One of the deepest wounds of this shift is the cultural denigration of logic. Logic has always been one of men’s great tools. It doesn’t mean men can’t feel or express emotion, but it does mean they often approach problems through reasoning, structure, and clarity.

Today, those strengths are dismissed. Instead, feelings are elevated above all else. We’ve built a culture where “offense” is treated as the greatest harm and “safety” the highest virtue. That may serve some interests, but it leaves men’s natural ways of approaching life and conflict diminished and distrusted.

And when logic is sidelined, relationships become lopsided. Without balance between reason and emotion, one side gains power while the other is pushed into the doghouse.


Younger Men Carry More of the Weight​?

It’s worth noting that not every generation has felt this equally. Older men — say, those over 60 — may have avoided the worst of the cultural training. They grew up in a time when being masculine wasn’t automatically suspect.

Younger men, though, especially those under 30, have been raised in a world where masculinity itself is under constant suspicion. For them, the damage runs deeper. They’ve been told from childhood that to be a man is to be potentially dangerous, oppressive, or shameful. The result? A generation of young men often hesitant to assert themselves, unsure of their own worth, and deeply confused about what it even means to be a man.


The Yin-Yang Distorted

A useful way to picture this imbalance is through the yin-yang symbol. Traditionally, it represents the balance of opposites: light and dark, masculine and feminine, logic and feeling. Each side is necessary, and each contains a seed of the other.

 

But in today’s cultural climate, the symbol is distorted. Instead of white and black in harmony, we are left with shades of gray and black — too much of one side, not enough of the other. Instead of honoring difference, we are addicted to sameness, to the feminine way, to an exaggerated focus on feeling. Masculinity isn’t balanced with femininity; it is suffocated by it.

 

Reclaiming Your Strengths

This is why men need to take stock of their own strengths — not as a luxury, but as a necessity. Ask yourself:

  • Am I able to stand my ground and speak the truth, even when it’s unpopular?

  • Do I navigate the world based on my own values, not someone else’s?

  • Can I hear feedback, weigh it fairly, and adjust my views without flinching?

  • Do I recognize the positive in my independence, self-reliance, and strength?

These are not flaws. These are gifts. They are the building blocks of masculine integrity.

Reclaiming them doesn’t mean ignoring emotion. It means recognizing your value, owning your abilities, and refusing to let a hostile culture tell you that your strengths are weaknesses.


Moving Forward

In this first step, the work is about clarity — seeing where the damage has been done, and beginning to recognize the strength you already have. In the next piece, we’ll get into the practical side: what it looks like to take those strengths into a relationship, how to set rules fairly, how to remain calm, how to frame your truth, and how to resist gynocentrism in the everyday dynamics of love and partnership.

Because the truth is this: relationships are risky, yes, but men who know their worth as men and practice these skills are far better equipped to navigate them.

​Men Are Good

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September 22, 2025
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Dismantling Men's Masculinity

 

 

In Chinese philosophy, yin and yang represent complementary forces. Yin, often linked with the feminine, is receptive, inward, intuitive, and fluid. Yang, the masculine counterpart, is active, outward, structured, and bold. Neither is “better” than the other — balance is the point.

Our culture has slipped into imbalance. Instead of valuing both masculine (yang) and feminine (yin) traits, we treat yang traits in men as problems to be corrected while elevating yin traits as the moral ideal. This creates an environment where boys and men are shamed for expressing natural masculine tendencies, while the feminine is glorified as “healthier,” “safer,” or “more evolved.” To make matters worse, men are framed as the problem—legitimizing attacks against them—while women and girls are cast as victims, granting them cultural permission to adopt masculine traits. Boys watch in bewilderment as this double standard unfolds: masculinity is shamed in men but praised in women, and women are celebrated for both yin and yang traits. It defies logic, yet nearly every cultural institution reinforces it. We are living in a truly unbalanced world.

Let’s look at seven primary yang characteristics and how they’ve been discouraged in men.

 

1. Active / Initiating

Yang energy moves forward, takes initiative, acts rather than waits. In boys, this shows up as physical play, restless energy, and risk-taking curiosity.

In schools, this natural boyish energy is often punished. Boys who get up, explore, or speak out are labeled “disruptive.” Increasingly, they’re medicated for ADHD — not because they’re sick, but because they don’t fit a classroom model designed for quiet compliance.

At the same time, receptivity and patience — yin traits — are praised. The quiet child is “well-behaved.” Girls who sit still are called “model students.” Boys learn quickly: initiative will get you in trouble, while passivity earns approval. Yet in a striking double standard, as boys are shamed for their energy, girls are increasingly praised for showing initiative and taking risks.


2. Rational / Analytical

Masculine energy emphasizes clarity and reason. But in relationships and therapy, men who rely on logic are accused of being “emotionally unavailable.” A husband who responds to conflict with analysis rather than emotional validation is told he’s “cold.”

Media reinforces this, portraying rational men as out of touch. Think of the sitcom father who is clueless and insensitive until the emotional wife rescues him with her intuition. Logic in men becomes something to mock or pathologize.

Meanwhile, intuition and emotional fluency are praised as “true intelligence.” Schools teach “emotional literacy” — overwhelmingly in a feminine key — while men’s rational approaches are sidelined. Yet here again, the double standard is obvious: when girls show clarity and reason, they are celebrated as strong and capable, while boys are criticized for the very same trait.


3. Independent / Self-Directed

Yang independence is about autonomy and leadership. In the past, this was recognized as a virtue. Today, independence in men is recast as selfishness.

In therapy, men who assert boundaries are accused of being avoidant. In family courts, fathers who resist intrusive parenting mandates are painted as uncooperative. At work, men who prefer autonomy are accused of “not being team players.”

Meanwhile, collectivist ideals are glorified. “Community,” “collaboration,” and “consensus” are treated as moral goods. The man who pursues his own vision is suspect; the man who dissolves into the group is praised. Yet when women insist on autonomy or self-direction, they are celebrated as “empowered” and “breaking barriers.” The very trait condemned in men is rewarded in women.


4. Expressive / Outward-Projecting

Yang expression is about projecting energy outward — speaking with authority, asserting oneself, showing presence. Today, this is routinely shamed. Men are accused of “mansplaining” when they speak confidently, of “taking up too much space” when they sit or stand naturally. Even in classrooms, boys who speak out are silenced while girls are coaxed to speak more.

Corporate trainings echo the same script: men must “step back” and “make space.” Male outwardness is recast as oppressive, while passivity and listening — yin traits — are presented as the moral high ground. Yet when women speak forcefully or take command of space, they are praised as bold and inspiring. The same assertiveness that earns men censure wins women applause.


5. Confident / Bold

Confidence, a core yang quality, is easily rebranded as arrogance or entitlement. A young man who asserts himself risks being accused of “toxic masculinity.” Ambition is reframed as greed or patriarchal privilege.

In education, boys who compete hard are told to “tone it down.” In dating, confidence is increasingly viewed with suspicion. A man approaching a woman boldly risks being labeled a predator, while tentativeness is reframed as “respect.”

Meanwhile, vulnerability has been rebranded as the new courage. Being hesitant, emotionally raw, or self-doubting is celebrated — but only when men embody it. Boldness is shamed; vulnerability is glorified. And once again, the double standard is clear: when women display confidence and ambition, they are praised as trailblazers and role models. What is condemned in men is applauded in women.


6. Competitive / Striving

Competition once fueled innovation, excellence, and mastery. For boys, striving to test themselves against others was natural.

Today, competition is under attack. Schools downplay winning, cancel scores, and hand out participation trophies. Boys are told that striving to be the best is unfair or mean-spirited. Even in workplaces, ambition is framed as “cutthroat.”

Meanwhile, cooperation is praised as the higher moral good. Equality of outcome — not excellence — is celebrated. The yin trait of blending in is exalted over the yang drive to stand out. And yet, when girls and women show drive, ambition, and competitiveness, they are praised as strong, empowered, and fearless. The very striving that earns boys censure is reframed as heroic when displayed by girls.


7. Stable / Structured

Yang energy provides order and discipline. Fathers setting boundaries, men building institutions, coaches demanding discipline — all are examples of stabilizing structure.

Yet structure is often demonized. Discipline is rebranded as control. Fathers who insist on rules are called authoritarian, while mothers who allow flexibility are celebrated as “nurturing.” In broader culture, structure is portrayed as oppression, while fluidity and openness are presented as progressive ideals.

And here too the double standard is unmistakable: when women take charge, enforce rules, or demand order, they are praised as strong leaders and role models. But when men do the very same thing, they are criticized as rigid, controlling, or oppressive. The masculine contribution of structure is vilified in men while valorized in women.


The “Male Privilege” Narrative

Layered on top of this shaming is the constant accusation of male privilege. Men are told they benefit from invisible advantages that invalidate their struggles. The boy disciplined in school for his energy is “privileged.” The man told his logic is cold is “privileged.” The father stripped of custody in court is “privileged.”

This accusation functions as a silencing tactic: no matter what hardships men face, their yang traits are delegitimized by the claim that they come from an unfair advantage. It’s a clever inversion — turning natural masculine expressions into proof of oppression.

For boys, the effect is especially disorienting. They are punished and shamed for their natural energy, independence, or boldness, yet they watch those same qualities praised in girls as “empowerment.” Imagine growing up in that atmosphere — told that what comes naturally to you is toxic, while applauded when someone else displays it. It creates confusion, self-doubt, and a sense of injustice that borders on madness. Boys learn not just that they are wrong, but that their very strengths are only acceptable when embodied by someone else.

 

When Yin Is Glorified and Yang Is Shamed

Chinese philosophy has a very straightforward warning: when yin and yang fall out of balance, decay follows. Illness in the body, discord in relationships, collapse in societies — all are traced to one side being exalted while the other is suppressed.

Today, our culture is caught in just such an imbalance. Feminine (yin) traits — receptivity, emotion, flexibility — are not only praised, they are presented as the gold standard for everyone. Masculine (yang) traits — activity, logic, independence, boldness, competition, structure — are not only discouraged, they are actively shamed.

From the Chinese perspective, this is a recipe for trouble. Here’s what they would say is coming:

  • Stagnation and Weakness: Too much yin creates passivity. Boys withdraw, men retreat, societies lose resilience.

  • Anxiety and Discord: Suppressed yang resurfaces in distorted ways — aggression, violence, self-destruction.

  • Collapse of Natural Order: Institutions weaken when initiative, structure, and clarity are attacked. Families fracture, schools falter, social trust declines.

  • Loss of Wholeness: When one side is glorified and the other shamed, the creative power of balance disappears. Everyone loses.


Restoring the Missing Balance

Chinese wisdom is blunt: when yin and yang fall out of balance, decline is inevitable. Our culture has tipped hard toward yin, glorifying receptivity, vulnerability, and fluidity while shaming activity, confidence, and structure. We are out of balance.

And balance will not return by doubling down on yin or by continuing to accuse men of “privilege” whenever they show their natural strengths. The way forward is to restore respect for yang.

That means honoring boys’ energy instead of medicating it away. Valuing men’s rational clarity instead of mocking it as cold. Praising independence and confidence in men just as we do in women. Allowing competition and striving to be celebrated, not shamed. And recognizing that discipline and structure are not oppression, but foundations for growth.

Revaluing the masculine does not mean dismissing the feminine. It means returning to the truth the Chinese saw thousands of years ago: life flourishes only when yin and yang stand side by side, each strong, each respected, each essential.

If we continue to shame one half of the human equation, we invite stagnation, confusion, and collapse. But if we restore balance, we give our sons — and our daughters — the gift of wholeness.

​Men Are Good. So is Yang.

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