1950: The Beginning of the End of Men

“A woman should soften but not weaken a man.” ― Sigmund Freud

“When you want to know how things really work, study them when they're coming apart.” ― William Gibson, Zero History

Few people would ever point at 1950 as the beginning of the end of men in the USA. The US economy boomed, everyone was flushed with victory after the second World War, and people marched forward into a brave new world of nuclear bombs and microwave ovens. The wage to living expenses ratio from the end of the 40's through the 60's was such that a single earner could provide for the family. Which the man of the house did so while women exited the job force after the wartime surge to stay home and care for kids. Personal and national wealth grew at a pace unheard of. But the heights of prosperity hid the seeds of decay that had been planted in society by this same sequence of events.

We know from history that a nation's decline follows it's peak in relatively rapid succession and history has given multiple possible triggers for such a thing. Strategic overstretch such as what happened to the English Empire and others. Dilution of core population groups like what happened to the Roman Empire. Rejection of science and lack of advancement as what happened with the Abbasid Caliphate. Food supply issues of one type or another like with the Mayans. Losing a major war like what happened to Germany twice in the 20th century. There's also agricultural disasters, natural disasters, economic disasters, and infrastructure disasters to contend with. Another scourge needs added to such a list: demasculinity of men.

Now you're asking, where the hell is this nutcase going with this?

Dr. Frankenstein.

Let me explain.

Before WW2, from the 1910's into the early 1940's, women had gained a more equal stance in society if they choose to take it. The advent of the Jazz and Swing era encouraged women to be whom they wanted. War footing for both World Wars put them into new jobs they'd never had access to before, giving many new opportunities never available before. But all that didn't last...

Society took a step backwards in the name of progress after the second World War. Men were encouraged to work all day and put their feet up all afternoon, waiting for their woman to make and bring dinner. They ceased having anything to do with the household beyond mowing the yard and general maintenance, letting their woman look after and pay all the bills with the money the man brought home. Women were once more relegated to the household and weren't expected to have any useful skills beyond housework of all types. Boys grew up watching this and being taught it was normal to only go to work and not much else. This taught them they didn't have to take responsibility. The woman would do it. Everything. That in turn led to an epidemic of single parent homes, most of them ran by women, as those boys grew up into boy-men with weak spines that had to have a mother figure tell them what to do. Now we have 'men', really males since biological equipment technically doesn't make a 'man', wearing lipstick, cutting their junk off to try being women, leading the pack in suicide, leading the pack in addiction, leading the pack in early deaths, not keeping jobs, not taking responsibility, sitting around on disability for relatively minor injuries, not being MEN. And we have a bunch of women that hate men in general.

And why not? Dr. Frankenstein hated his monster, too. Why wouldn't a woman hate men that can't hold a job, can't stand upright against pressure, can't focus on a future, wants to play video games all the time, can't get a woman off right, wants to cut their penis off, and runs and hides behind his woman when it's time to take responsibility for something? Why wouldn't they? Especially when 70 years of women bringing men food and beer has created them? God almighty, I'm repulsed by them myself. I can't imagine the depths of my detestation if I'd had a hand in their creation. Not because men that take no responsibility are useless, but they are. Not because I've dealt with some horrible situations created by these boy-men, but I have. Not because I think the concept of 'dad bod' is a ridiculous form of control, but I do. Not because I think skinny jeans and Moose Knuckles deserve smart ass comments, but I'd eat popcorn to some. No, I'm repulsed because of the stupendous lack of standards such things represent.

Fight a war with Russia and/or China? Good luck since ~70% of everyone in the right age category is useless to the military for various reasons ranging from fat to lazy to stupid to criminal to crazy. Bring all the manufacturing jobs back from China to here? Good luck since everyone wants free money or rock star salaries to pay for overpriced phones and iced coffee and people are short for the jobs available. Snap our fingers and fix the issues that's been created by the inadvertent (or not?) social engineering that's occurred since the 1950's? Good luck since it'll probably take as long to reverse the damage as it's taken to create, assuming people can even see the convoluted mess we've created over the course of nearly four generations from under their mountain of debt.

Men have been increasingly treated like boys for about seven decades now. The reasons why they shouldn't have been can be boiled down to one statement: you take kids their food. Men used to fight each other to the death for the biggest piece of meat on the fire. To take such a creature its dinner on a plate is like taking a lion cat food in a dish and then wondering why it's a shadow of its former self. Of course it would be. It can't not be! I'm not saying every mealtime should be a gladiatorial match, but I'm pretty sure the average man can spoon their own food onto a plate and carry that plate to their spot of dining. Just like they can do a lot of other stuff they don't.

I believe some of the pseudo-mother things originally started as marketing gimmicks that ended up being taken too much to heart as opposed to anything nefarious. But the end result is the same. More women took charge of things, not because they stepped forward, but because men stepped back. Men relegated themselves to being told what to do and when to do it. 'I gotta go ask my wife.' 'The old lady wouldn't like that.' That kind of talk is subservient nonsense. It's putting the woman on level of a maternal parent that has to give permission.

Too many modern Western men are useless because they bought into such cultural conditioning. You don't ask permission, you earn permission by being responsible and trustworthy, and you are that by doing what you say and seeing to your duties without being prodded along like a stubborn beast. It's just that too many men want to act like block headed oxen and trample the garden in search of radishes instead of doing anything useful, getting away with it because their wife/girlfriend mother figure enables them to continue a life of no responsibility without serious repercussions. Then that mother figure freaks out because they're dealing with an overgrown child and the circle persists...

However, neither sign waving nor vagina hats are going to change any of that. Women would need to stop letting men take advantage of them financially and set higher standards instead of lowering their standards. It's just that women have also been conditioned to take on a mother-like role to their man which is being doubled down on because it's failing. You don't get a man to do something by chiding them like a kid as the last 70 years of conditioning has led women to do. It'll just reinforce their position of being child-like. Nor do you get them to do something by withholding sex. It's easy to find that if wanted since half the world's population is female. Nor do you do it by thinking they're stupid and have to be told every little thing. That's why men aren't taking responsibility for anything. It's also not done by making excuses for them to not work or do anything useful. That's just more bad social programming that results in a grown man remaining a child.

It'd be done by women purposely choosing men that work, take care of their kids, that can survive on their own, do what they say, and can climb a hierarchy. Essentially, gravitating to a more conservative view on what men should be. Now, I'm not saying to tell your man to come home victorious or dead or don't, I'm just saying it may not hurt things in the long run. I think both parties would benefit, because it would start to dispel the mother-like, protecting role, women have been programmed into applying towards men along with the boy-man role many have accepted in response.