Masculinity is in a sort of crisis, at least in the industrialized modern world. There is a great lack of it and because of this there are all sorts of things that have began growing up through the cracks. Every healthy society with it’s understanding of the primal and cosmic order as well as how the world works has made an effort to refine males into manhood. To turn boys into men knowing that when neglected all sorts of bad things happen.
Both inside the society and without. Males who are initiated into manhood can cause all sorts of problems within a society, going wrong in all sorts of ways. Likewise when males are lead, tested, and initiated into manhood there are also threats from without the tribe from other that have initiated there own into manhood (or at a higher rate at least) and want things your tribe has.
And so on and so forth. I think more and more people are realizing that something is up with masculinity and males in the modernized world (and this has an effect on everything else from culture to women in those societies as well). Some blame this on masculinity itself which is the opposite of the problem, unless one considers simply being a male to be masculine which it is not.
The Rise Of Compensation
Because of this lack of initation and guidance males find all sorts of ways to compensate for their lack of masculinity. It might be a big truck, a car on 24’s with spinners, some hot rod, a expensive car (notice a trend here) or maybe it’s a bunch of tats that weren’t earned or maybe it’s puffy muscles that don’t have much use to them. Or maybe it’s picking on those that are weaker or a million other things. Males find all kinds of ways to compensate.
And with compensation comes insecurity and with insecurity comes fear and with the combination of those things comes danger (channeling my inner Yoda here). Leading to all sorts of things. In extreme examples it could be death and/or killing. Insecurity can lead to all sorts of crazy behavior especially for those that are filled to the brim with it and don’t know how to change it.
Maybe they internalize this into depression and suicide or maybe they externalize it into bullying or joining a weak form of a “gang” and preying on those weaker. Males have always been violent but healthy societies (AKA not the modernized Western world) have found ways to channel it into good productive avenues. The old two kids fighting after school but then settling their differences (often with teacher supervision). Whereas now violence “isn’t allowed” and you have kids getting jumped and beaten to a coma on the ground or knifed. Not that these things never happened before but the dynamic is not a healthy one.
Removing The Need For Compensation
The way to remove the need for compensation is to actually find ways to be initiated into manhood. To find ways to prove oneself in a healthy masculine way to remove the insecurity and need for validation. Doesn’t matter if you’re a parent reading this or maybe in your 20’s and feeling like you were never initiated yourself there are things to learn here.
The first is that there are ways to figure these things out in the modern world and traditions that still exist that can do this. Boot camp being an example but there is more than that (and without the 4 year commitment, at least in the states). Look to ancient practices of initiation into manhood and adopt some of them yourselves. Find where you feel weak and work to address it.
Yes, this is something your tribe and culture should have “done for you” but it isn’t so you’ll have to figure it out yourself. Maybe it’ll be going into nature for a week and surviving on your own (granted you have the skills, please don’t randomly do this), maybe it’ll be training and taking a fight to get “blooded”, or maybe it’ll be something else. Not everything will work but there are different means of getting there.
Masculinity Is Needed
As always it is true masculinity that is needed. To heal, protect, and change the things that need to be changed. But this requires work, guidance, and initiation. A man is not something you become simply by existing, it’s something that you must grow into and be initiated into. Not necessarily initiated by others but rather (as strange as this sounds) by an almost “higher” source. You can’t just declare yourself a man and be one.
It’s a deep change that’s hard to explain but that fewer and fewer are reaching each and every day. Regardless of where you are this is something that has an effect on you. Whether you still feel like you’ve never been initiated yourself or you worry about those coming after you. It’s something to think about, understand, and then do what needs to be done.
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-Charles Sledge
