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George Will Would Like To Bizarrely Criticize Your Lack Of Manliness

by Glenn Davis | 1:05 pm, March 2nd, 2010

» 7 comments

Cross says the large-scale entry of women into the workforce made many men feel marginalized, especially when men were simultaneously bombarded by new parenting theories, which cast fathers as their children’s pals, or worse: In 1945, Parents magazine said a father should “keep yourself huggable” but show a son the “respect” owed a “business associate.”

Okay, there are a lot of passages in here insinuating that every gain by women had to come at the expense of men, almost like this was a bad thing. Here’s something, though: if these men were such emotional children that they couldn’t handle seeing women “infringe” on “their” turf, or hearing more than one opinion about raising a child, then they were more immature than these “modern” men that apparently mark the downfall of society as we know it. Or is Will saying that these guys who felt “marginalized” were the immature men who started this whole downward spiral of immaturity? I am so confused.

Although Cross, an aging academic boomer, was a student leftist, he believes that 1960s radicalism became “a retreat into childish tantrums” symptomatic “of how permissive parents infantilized the boomer generation.” And the boomers’ children? Consider the television commercials for the restaurant chain called Dave & Buster’s, which seems to be, ironically, a Chuck E. Cheese’s for adults—a place for young adults, especially men, to drink beer and play electronic games and exemplify youth not as a stage of life but as a perpetual refuge from adulthood.

OK, so I think that solves the issue of who Will’s incriminating here (“everyone” being the answer, but especially hippies). However, this clarification is more than counteracted by utter befuddlement that he used a restaurant as anecdotal “evidence” that today’s men just won’t grow up.

At the 2006 Super Bowl, the Rolling Stones sang “Satisfaction,” a song older than the Super Bowl. At this year’s game, another long-of-tooth act, the Who, continued the commerce of catering to baby boomers’ limitless appetite for nostalgia.

For a guy criticizing nostalgia so much, Will sure seems nostalgic himself for a (possibly mythical) bygone era in which men were real men. For the record, yes, too much nostalgia gets annoying and is useless, but some isn’t so bad, is it? Also, plenty of non-Baby Boomers enjoy the Rolling Stones and The Who.

Last November, when Tiger Woods’s misadventures became public, his agent said: “Let’s please give the kid a break.” The kid was then 33. He is now 34 but, no doubt, still a kid. The puerile anthem of a current Pepsi commercial is drearily prophetic: “Forever young.”

I’m not sure Tiger Woods is an adequate proxy for men of today as a whole. Also, it’s oversimplifying to say that young guys are refusing to leave their childhood behind because they might enjoy going the Dave & Buster’s every now and again. Here’s something else that some people might view as no more than a silly vestigial connection to one’s youth: baseball. Will seems like he enjoys that well enough. And…that’s fine. It’s okay to keep doing some fun things even if you’re not a kid anymore. And also…times change. They just do. It’s inevitable. And despite whatever differences might exist between Cary Grant, Hugh Grant, or anyone else with the surname “Grant,” different, unlike Will’s portrayal of it here, doesn’t always mean “worse.”

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baseball, Cary Grant, Evan Thomas, fisking George Will, George Will, Hugh Grant, Jacob Weisberg, Newsweek, roast beef sandwich, Slate, Theodore Roosevelt, Tiger Woods

Jim R

“In 1959, there were 27 Westerns on prime-time television glamorizing male responsibility.”

Riiight, male responsibility is exactly what I think of when fondly recalling the westerns I grew up on.

Hey, George, better stick to climate denialism and Lassiez Faire economics; subjects where you’re no less laughably incorrect but at least you have the repetition thing going for you.
Azarkhan

Glenn, you seem a little touchy about this. You, uhmm, don’t live with your parents, do you?
Glenn Davis

Azarkhan –

I sure do. But then again…as i said, I’m 22. No shame in it for me…yet. (Been out of school less than a year – George isn’t giving me a ton of breathing room to work with.) Didn’t mean to imply “touchiness” so much as, “Wow, some of these points are really strange,” but yeah, I’d allow my own situation colored my view of his piece to some extent.

To me, the really weird thing was he included 18-year-olds in the “living with parents” analysis. Seems like they kind of SHOULD still be at that point, unless they’re in college already.
Azarkhan

Big points for honesty, Glenn. And there is no shame. In fact, if I don’t get a job soon (laid off a year ago) I may have to clean out Moms basement and move in myself.
scott w

Good job, Glenn.
I’d like to see the methodology Mr. Cross employed in quantifying and analyzing the vanity levels of every generation in history, and then concluding that the Boomers rank #1.
“Infantilized” ? I think this “aging academic” and former “student leftist” should speak for himself -and maybe he is speaking about himself.
jophis

A generation of “youth” that spends all of its money on I-phones and then demands free healthcare is beyond vain. …yeah, Will is wrong- keep beleiving it. The biggest shame is not that many of these adult infants will be eaten by the world, but that they are completely unprepared to take the reins of social and political responsibility from their elders whom they detest. As the greatest generation fades, the final one stumbles to its demise.
http://www.facebook.com/people/Bob-Thompson/1389669429 Bob Thompson

Why it is that when men were better educated, higher paid, move out faster and climbed the ranks higher than women, everyone had a fit about it (re: the “glass ceiling”). But when the scale tips the other way and women get a full 60% of Bachelor’s degrees, everyone sings Kumbaya. So, Glenn, you don’t think the male drop-out rate in high school and college is a problem?

As for the 22.5 median marriage age for men in 1952, I wonder what the divorce rate was back then, compared to today’s? Before you denigrate 22 as being “too young” for marriage, why don’t you look at the consequences of immaturity and what it’s done to our society. People weren’t shooting up schools in 1952.

Also, about the 55% of 18 – 24 year olds who still live at home, remember that once upon a time people went away to college or joined the military at 18. Was that so bad? I think the 13% between 25 and 34 who still live at home, compared to only 8% of women, is a bigger problem, don’t you? Oh that’s right, men are in the minority. Now, if it was 13% of women then NOW would be whipping up a media storm about it.

One last point. Last November, when all of Tiger Wood’s infidelity problems hit the media, one reporter said, “Leave the poor kid alone”. That “kid” was 34 years old.