Order of Man - An Attack on Masculinity？

00:00:00.000 You're a man of action. You live life to the fullest. Embrace your fears and boldly chart

00:00:05.000 your own path. When life knocks you down, you get back up one more time. Every time.

00:00:10.440 You are not easily deterred or defeated. Rugged. Resilient. Strong. This is your life. This is who

00:00:17.240 you are. This is who you will become. At the end of the day, and after all is said and done,

00:00:22.800 you can call yourself a man. Gentlemen, what is going on today? My name is Ryan

00:00:27.500 Michler, and I am the host and founder of this podcast and the movement, The Order of Man.

00:00:31.700 I want to welcome you, whether you're joining us for the first time or you've been with us

00:00:35.520 for any amount of time. I'm not going to really get too much into what we're all about here

00:00:40.200 on this podcast right now because the topic of the conversation today will let you know

00:00:47.060 if you're in the right place or maybe you don't feel like you are at all. So I'm going to cover

00:00:50.800 that here in a little bit. This is your Friday Field Notes where you get to hear me and listen

00:00:54.840 to me and some of my thoughts and ideas that have been bouncing around in my brain from

00:00:58.820 throughout the week. But we also have our interview show where I'm interviewing some of the most

00:01:03.360 successful men on the planet. These are guys like Jocko Willink, Andy Frisilla, Grant Cardone,

00:01:09.100 Tim Kennedy, Dakota Meyer, David Goggins, Donnie Vincent. The list is incredible. We just had

00:01:14.640 TJ Dillashaw on. Absolutely incredible lineup of men who have come on to impart some of their wisdom

00:01:20.800 and share that with us so we can in turn take that information and apply it in our lives.

00:01:25.340 And then we also do the Wednesday show, which is our Ask Me Anything, where I am joined by my

00:01:29.380 friend Kip Sorensen to cover questions from the Facebook group and our exclusive brotherhood,

00:01:35.640 the Iron Council, our Patreon account, and everywhere else that we're showing up. If you

00:01:39.280 have questions, you can pose those there and we'll answer those on Wednesday. But again, this is the

00:01:43.100 Friday Field Notes and I'm going to talk about this attack, quote unquote attack on masculinity

00:01:48.580 and whether or not exist and if we should acknowledge it or not. And if we do what it is we should be

00:01:54.420 doing about it. I'm going to get to that here in just a minute and riff on some of those ideas that

00:01:58.660 I think are much needed conversations and topics to discuss. But before I do that, I want to mention

00:02:05.100 fellow podcasters and supporters and friends of mine. It's Pete Roberts and Brian Littlefield with

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00:03:08.900 All right, guys, let's get into this conversation today. I titled this one,

00:03:14.020 The Attack on Masculinity. And if you look at the title, you'll see there's a question mark there.

00:03:18.140 And the reason I put the question mark there is because we need to actually decide and determine

00:03:22.720 if there is an attack on masculinity at all. And if there is, what are we going to do about it? And

00:03:27.080 how do we address this thing? Because it's apparent to me anyways, that there is at a minimum,

00:03:32.400 a dismissal of masculinity. Now, some of this is by design. I think some of this is probably

00:03:37.040 unintentional. And I think a lot of it is very, very calculated as to dismissing what masculinity

00:03:42.980 is and dismissing and undermining manliness altogether. Now, anytime I say this, anytime I

00:03:49.760 bring something like this up, I always inevitably have somebody who says there is no attack. There

00:03:56.280 is no assault. Nobody's undermining masculinity. And I disagree. Frankly, I think again, at a minimum,

00:04:03.560 it is being undermined. I do believe that there is a greater agenda to dismiss what men bring to the

00:04:11.220 table. There's a greater agenda to quote unquote, redefine somehow what masculinity is. And we hear

00:04:17.860 things like toxic masculinity. And we watch videos from companies like Gillette, which I'll mention

00:04:23.980 here in a minute. And the quote unquote study, and I use that term very, very liberally here is

00:04:30.340 this study from the American Psychological Association that says, quote, traditional

00:04:35.260 masculinity is somehow inherently bad or evil or wrong. And so if you believe that there isn't

00:04:42.520 some sort of assault, some sort of threat to masculinity in general, I've got to assume that

00:04:48.680 maybe you're hiding under a rock. I mean, it's very, very obvious to me. And maybe that is because

00:04:53.900 in all fairness that I'm hyper involved in this masculinity, manliness conversation, but I think

00:05:00.800 it's very, very apparent that something is going on. And I want to talk about that today. I want to

00:05:07.780 talk about the victim mentality, which is something that people have said of me. I want to talk about

00:05:13.140 toxic masculinity. I want to talk about how I believe this whole thing started in the first place and

00:05:18.060 what the ultimate objective and goal is, why this is happening. And then most importantly,

00:05:23.140 I'm going to wrap this thing up by giving you 10 strategies, 10 tips, tools, tactics, strategies,

00:05:29.320 ideas, whatever you want to call it, that I think will help you and me and every other man listening

00:05:34.680 to this continue the discussion in a powerful and positive and an uplifting way. And one that I think

00:05:41.200 will benefit society. All right. So, so let's talk about this. We already covered it. I believe there

00:05:45.740 is a dismissal at a minimum of masculinity. And by the way, I also believe that any dismissal or

00:05:51.320 attack of masculinity happens to coincide very, very nicely with the attack or dismissal or assault

00:05:57.840 on femininity as well. I think there's this, there's this narrative out there that says that

00:06:02.740 men and women are all the same and we should be all the same. And it's not just about stripping

00:06:06.480 away any masculine virtues. It's about stripping away feminine virtues as well. That's I'll save that

00:06:11.540 for a different conversation, but we need to understand that it's not just one sided. But the thing I

00:06:16.060 really, really want to make sure that you hear me on is that I don't consider myself or even men in

00:06:21.880 general, the victims. And anytime I bring up this conversation, somebody says, Oh, Ryan, this is the

00:06:26.880 victimhood mentality. And you're placing men in the category of victim. No, that's absolutely not

00:06:31.880 happening. If you look at what a victim is, a victim is somebody who is helpless, helpless against

00:06:38.580 some sort of atrocity or violent encounter or injustice. And certainly I don't believe that we as men are

00:06:45.360 helpless. I believe that if anything, that we ought to acknowledge and recognize that there is this

00:06:50.640 dismissal of masculinity. So we take ourselves out of the victim category. Ignorance was never a

00:06:56.740 successful strategy on the battlefield or even the battlefield of life. It's imperative that we as men

00:07:03.880 understand why, understand how this battle is being waged. And that way we're going to be more

00:07:11.740 adequately equipped to address it and deal with it. And frankly, it's not even for us. It's for those

00:07:16.960 we would serve. It's for our businesses. It's for our family members. It's for our sons and our

00:07:21.860 daughters and the future generations and our communities and everybody else that we as men

00:07:26.460 are called to serve. That's why it's so important that we don't just bury our heads in the sand and

00:07:30.760 pretend nothing is happening or this doesn't actually exist. We've got to open our minds and we've got to

00:07:36.500 open our hearts and open our ideas to what is actually going on here so that we can adequately

00:07:41.300 face it, address it, deal with it, and then create a positive course of action moving forward.

00:07:47.420 And that is the ultimate goal of masculinity. The ultimate goal is for us to be protectors,

00:07:52.320 providers, and presiders. Now I've been talking about how to do this for the past four years.

00:07:56.380 So if you're questioning what that means or how we can more adequately step into those roles,

00:08:00.900 I would encourage you to go back and listen to the past, oh gosh, 300, 400 or so episodes now,

00:08:07.260 and really learn about what we're doing here. And of course, make sure you subscribe too,

00:08:11.480 because we're going to continue to talk about these things moving forward. And what I really

00:08:16.040 want to make sure that we address here is this idea that seems to have permeated just about every

00:08:22.640 conversation when it comes to masculinity. And it's this idea of quote unquote toxic masculinity. I mean,

00:08:29.860 I've heard it in the news and I heard it in media outlets. I read it in magazines and articles and

00:08:35.760 it's just like, I'm inundated with the word and the idea of toxic masculinity. What I want to do here

00:08:43.540 is tell you that we need to be level-headed about this because usually what happens is when we have

00:08:51.340 these very polarizing statements, these very polarizing claims is people are very quick to

00:08:59.440 jump on one side of the aisle as opposed to the other. And I think that usually the right answer

00:09:08.180 lies somewhere in between. So I used to be on this thing that said, there is no toxic masculinity. It's

00:09:14.500 a misnomer. It's ridiculous. We shouldn't even use the word. And yeah, I still subscribe to that.

00:09:20.620 But what I need to make sure that all of us understand is that this is defined. This idea of

00:09:27.760 toxic masculinity is defined as two different ways or two different things. See what a lot of people

00:09:35.060 think toxic masculinity is, is that it's taking this concept of masculinity, the inherent masculine

00:09:41.920 virtues inside of us and using them in a destructive manner. I acknowledge that. I recognize that. I

00:09:48.860 recognize that anything can be taken to the extreme. I recognize that if masculinity isn't

00:09:54.760 harnessed correctly, that it can become damaging to the people that are impacted by it. There's

00:10:01.100 another school of thought that says that toxic masculinity somehow makes masculinity inherently

00:10:08.140 wrong. That all masculine behavior, whether it's violence or aggression or assertiveness or strength

00:10:16.360 and competitiveness, these things that we would generally consider masculine, that those are by their

00:10:22.340 very roots and inherently toxic or dangerous. Obviously that is not the case, or, or at least it should be

00:10:29.720 obvious. And the reason I don't subscribe to the notion of toxic masculinity is because most people

00:10:35.920 don't even know what it is they're talking about. They're actually mixing the two thoughts up.

00:10:41.780 Most people I think are beginning to fall into the camp that somehow masculinity is inherently wrong. And so I

00:10:48.200 choose not to use the term toxic masculinity, although I know what some people are saying when they say it.

00:10:56.040 And this idea of discernment, which seems to be a lost art is so important when you're having a

00:11:01.460 conversation with an individual, what is it that they're actually thinking and what are the words that

00:11:07.060 they're actually using? Words guys are powerful, but they're only as powerful as the meaning that we give

00:11:11.580 them. And the idea that somehow masculinity is toxic is, is an idea that is used when the term toxic

00:11:19.700 masculinity is used. I don't even like the term. What I would rather use is undeveloped masculinity,

00:11:27.880 maybe even potentially unharnessed masculinity. I look at my boys, for example, I've got young,

00:11:32.420 young kids. I've got an 11 year old, a, an eight year old, and then I've got a five-year-old little

00:11:38.080 girl and a three-year-old boy. And just talking about my boys specifically, I would never consider

00:11:43.920 their behavior toxic in the Gillette ad. What they showed is they showed some kids rolling around or

00:11:49.220 wrestling on the ground and the dad rushes over and he, he saves the day and he tells him we don't treat

00:11:54.220 each other like that, even though it wasn't apparent that they were actually doing anything wrong. I don't

00:11:59.420 consider that behavior toxic. I would consider it masculine, but not toxic. It's the development of

00:12:04.620 that masculinity that is critical that they'll be able to go out and serve the way that men have

00:12:09.060 traditionally served in the way that we will be continue to ask to be served. So if anything,

00:12:13.780 there is an undeveloped masculinity in boys, and it's our job and our responsibility as men to step

00:12:19.900 up and to be those who are developing masculinity, who are exhibiting the proper examples of what that

00:12:26.780 looks like, instilling those virtues into our boys and into our youth, and then allowing them to tap

00:12:32.980 into the power that is masculinity and use it for the productive outcomes of society. And the only

00:12:38.900 reason that it's ever destructive is because it's undeveloped. It's untapped. It isn't harnessed the

00:12:45.580 way that it should be harnessed. So that's the distinction that we need to make there. I try to

00:12:49.460 be level-headed about this. I don't want to be so polarizing. And look, if I was polarizing,

00:12:54.780 more polarizing, uh, I think that, you know, maybe we'd get some more downloads or we get some more

00:12:59.760 likes or some more followers because we're polarizing, but we don't need that guys. We don't

00:13:05.240 need that. What we do need is we do need a very level-headed approach in conversation to this whole

00:13:10.420 idea. And when we are level-headed, it gives us more credibility. So no, I don't subscribe to the

00:13:16.000 term of, uh, the idea or the term or the notion of toxic masculinity. I do understand there is

00:13:21.340 undeveloped masculinity. And I also understand that masculinity inherently is not bad or evil or wrong.

00:13:27.340 And what we also need to understand is that through this, I wouldn't say threat necessarily,

00:13:33.500 but through this, this attack or assault or dismissal, we have a spectrum of, of responses

00:13:42.720 to this. All right. If you look at, for example, the Gillette commercial, that's all the rage and

00:13:47.000 everybody wants to talk about, I'm not particularly upset about that commercial because I actually

00:13:52.800 believe and subscribe to a lot of the words that are shared in that commercial. Now the premise and

00:13:57.120 the underlying tone, I don't agree with, I don't believe that all men are inherently bad. And I

00:14:01.260 think what that commercial is trying to do is place all men in this category of needing to improve.

00:14:05.940 The fact of the matter is that some of the things they talk about in that Gillette commercial

00:14:09.320 are the very things that men have been doing since the dawn of man. So it isn't that all men need to

00:14:15.600 be redefined or need to be bridled or whatever it is they're trying to portray there. It, it's just not

00:14:22.400 true. Men are, and have been great contributors to society at large and they will continue to be.

00:14:32.080 But what we need to understand is that there's varying degrees. Now Gillette, let's be real here,

00:14:36.160 guys. They're trying to sell more razors. And the fact of the matter is that polarizing

00:14:40.780 comments and polarizing videos and polarizing statements, just like I said, a minute ago,

00:14:45.480 basically equates to selling more razors. That's it. And some people say, Oh, this plan will

00:14:50.280 backfire. No, it won't. Gillette will be fine. Procter and Gamble will be fine. They know what

00:14:54.940 they're doing. They're trying to polarize. So they get more eyeballs on their company and in turn,

00:14:59.980 sell more razors. That's it. Now with that said, and that's all I'm going to say on the subject,

00:15:05.020 because it's not credible. It's not relevant. Even there is other things, other reports,

00:15:13.000 other movements, other initiatives that we probably ought to take a little bit more seriously.

00:15:18.820 The one that comes to mind is the, again, quote unquote study from the American Psychological

00:15:24.860 Association that has stated that somehow quote unquote traditional masculinity, it's no longer

00:15:29.760 even toxic. Notice that subtle change. It's not toxicity anymore. It's traditional masculinity that's

00:15:35.340 bad. And what they're saying is that that is inherently wrong, evil, bad, destructive, blah, blah,

00:15:40.620 blah, blah, blah, blah, blah. We need to be very, very aware of that. We need to dismiss and reject

00:15:46.080 that idea because the American Psychological Association isn't some company trying to hawk

00:15:51.600 their latest products. It's an organization that is literally the gatekeeper with regards to how

00:15:57.940 medical treatments and medical training is prescribed throughout the US on university campuses

00:16:04.640 and medical programs, and then ultimately implemented with the public. So if you have an organization

00:16:09.380 that has outright said and claimed that masculinity is somehow a detriment or an injustice or something

00:16:15.040 wrong with society, what does that open up? What does that open up to our healthcare practitioners?

00:16:20.580 The reality is, is that a lot of what we're talking about here with regards to masculinity has been

00:16:25.680 taken over through government programs, has been taken over through the educational system. And now we

00:16:30.720 have this third tier of what we're talking about here. It's the threat from the healthcare system.

00:16:35.760 Now, this is a very real threat. This is something that's a little bit more credible.

00:16:41.060 And I think we ought to address this. I think we ought to talk about this because if we don't,

00:16:46.340 if we don't, and we let things continue to happen the way they happen, sooner or later,

00:16:50.500 we're going to wake up and say, what went wrong? Where did this go wrong? How did this happen?

00:16:54.560 And why are we struggling? Why are boys struggling? And they are. Look at every metric possible from

00:16:59.540 violence to drug addiction, to depression and suicide, to dropout rates, to employment rates,

00:17:06.600 imprisonment rates. Boys are falling behind. Boys are struggling. And there's a reason that is. And

00:17:12.120 I'm telling you, it's not because of quote unquote, too much masculinity. It's the lack thereof. And that's

00:17:18.000 the reason that boys are struggling. It's the reason is, is because there isn't enough male influences

00:17:23.480 in our young men's lives. And that's what I wanted to address with you here. One of the things

00:17:28.720 is how this whole thing started. See, very few people talk about how this all started. We talk

00:17:34.020 about the problems and the symptoms and what we can do. And we get on our little soap boxes, which

00:17:37.860 I know I'm guilty of as well. But very rarely do we talk about how this whole thing started. Look,

00:17:42.440 I think it's important that we revisit the past and understand, okay, what happened here? What went

00:17:47.900 wrong? Where is it that boys began to become the target and the problem in society? And I'll tell

00:17:56.760 you what I think it was. I think what happened is if we go back to the late 1700s to the early 1800s,

00:18:02.600 and we look at what happened to society as a whole, and specifically, I'm talking about the

00:18:07.380 Industrial Revolution. Now, there was so many great and wonderful things that happened during the

00:18:12.440 Industrial Revolution that allowed us to be more effective, more efficient, that allowed us to

00:18:18.560 pursue and build greater wealth. And so, we have personal wealth that's increasing. We have standard

00:18:23.280 of living that's increasing. And then in turn, of course, we have access to better healthcare and

00:18:28.140 better ideas and information. The Industrial Revolution was an amazing, amazing time. But the unintended

00:18:35.320 consequences is we moved from an agricultural society and a society of apprentices and journeymen

00:18:41.660 and boys who were learning in the field and in the blacksmith shop and these other apprenticeship type

00:18:48.540 positions how to be a man from their fathers. And what ended up happening is the men left the home.

00:18:55.020 They put down their rakes, they put down their plows, they put down their hammers, and they put down

00:18:59.400 all the responsibility that they had to stand shoulder to shoulder, eye to eye, face to face with their

00:19:04.860 boys and raising them. They put all of that aside and they left the home. And what did they go do?

00:19:09.940 They went out into the workforce and they started working on the assembly lines and they started

00:19:14.620 working in the factories and they started to distance themselves emotionally, physically,

00:19:20.020 and mentally from their boys. And what happened there is we left now this entire generation of

00:19:26.320 young men to be raised by who? Their mothers. And look, bless mothers. I was raised by primarily a single

00:19:34.820 mother. She did absolutely everything that she could to raise my sister and I in a way where we never had

00:19:41.460 to worry about food on the table, a roof over our head, making sure we got the education, making sure

00:19:47.560 that we were engaging in extracurricular activities. I never had to worry about that stuff. Looking back

00:19:53.520 on it now, I know for certain that she had to worry about those things, but I never had to because I had

00:19:59.860 a mother who was willing to do what she needed to do to step up. Now, she'll be the first to tell you

00:20:05.280 that it wasn't ideal. And that's the point. It's not ideal. Can we make it work? Can a woman make it

00:20:13.020 work? Absolutely. Millions and millions and millions of women throughout the world have been making this

00:20:19.980 work for a very long time, but it is not ideal. And because my mother recognized that in us,

00:20:27.200 in our situation, she got me very, very involved in competitive sports. So I learned from other boys.

00:20:33.040 I had great coaches who stepped up into my life and taught me on the baseball field and the football

00:20:38.440 field and the basketball court, what it means to be a man and how a man shows up. Without that,

00:20:43.720 I'm not sure I would have been the same man I am today. In fact, I know I wouldn't.

00:20:48.500 So what we had in the late 1700s and early 1800s for a little history lesson here is that we had the men

00:20:53.660 in droves, leaving the homes, leaving the farms, leaving the family shops and leaving their boys

00:21:00.700 to go work in the factories and create some level of wealth. Now the boys are at home and what are

00:21:05.120 they doing? They're learning how to engage with life from women. And so they turn out more effeminate.

00:21:12.000 They start addressing issues based on how a woman would address issues. And not that there's anything

00:21:16.980 inherently wrong with that, but certain instances and circumstances require feminine energy to address

00:21:23.660 that situation. And other situations require masculine energy. And if the young men aren't

00:21:28.400 getting any of this, it's a problem. So then what do we have? Well, let's fast forward about 150 years,

00:21:33.720 maybe 30, 40 years is into the 1960s. We start to see this feminist movement.

00:21:40.620 So what happens is we've had 130 years of boys growing up without a dad in the home. He's gone

00:21:49.280 off to work. He's working in the high rises. He's working in the city and, and, and, and mom's there

00:21:54.680 left to raise little Johnny and little Billy. Now during the 1960s, we have the beginnings of the

00:22:00.700 feminist movement. And so what happens is women are now told that in order to be equal, you need to go

00:22:06.080 out into the workforce. You need to go out into the workforce and do everything that a man can do.

00:22:12.720 And women have started to buy into this. Well, what did this do? This left little Billy and Tommy,

00:22:18.040 and now Sue and everybody else that they were watching left them at home. Well, dad was gone.

00:22:23.580 Now mom's gone. What are we going to do with the kids? I got an idea. Let's put them into the school

00:22:28.460 system. And so these boys go into the school system. These girls go into the school system and guess who

00:22:33.820 else they're learning from? They're learning from women. Because if you look at the statistics,

00:22:39.440 most school teachers in America anyways, and I'm assuming this is the same throughout the world

00:22:44.400 are women. And so these boys are being indoctrinated and I don't think it's all

00:22:51.060 devious. All right, please understand me. This is not all devious. I don't think dad leaving the home to

00:22:56.980 go out into the, into the factories was devious. I don't think that a mother who wants to enter the

00:23:02.460 workforce and, and start providing her way financially is devious. But the problem is still

00:23:07.880 the same. The problem is that little Billy and Tommy are not receiving a masculine education. And

00:23:16.360 I'm not talking about formal education. I'm talking about learning the way of men from men. They're not

00:23:21.560 having any exposure to that. And needless to say, now we're falling behind. Boys and men don't know

00:23:28.760 how to act like men. And then we continue to get conditioned and told that we're, that we're bad.

00:23:34.680 And that if, if you want to go out and you want to fight and you want to be aggressive and you want

00:23:39.000 to compete and you're violent, that somehow there's something wrong with you. So what did we do?

00:23:44.140 What did we do once we left the home as mother and father, we pawned our kids off to the school

00:23:49.500 system. And then the boys can't sit down, shut up and be still like they're quote unquote,

00:23:53.320 supposed to do. I got an idea. Let's pump them full of medicine. Let's pump them full of every

00:24:00.240 little toxin and little medicine that we possibly can in order to get them to, to be the little,

00:24:06.800 the little good boys that they're supposed to be. And so now we've got millions and millions and

00:24:13.040 millions of boys whose systems are just pumped full of toxins to sedate them, to get them to be

00:24:21.000 something other than they're really not. Do we see a problem here? At any time a boy exhibits any

00:24:27.340 sort of masculine characteristic, he's docked for it. You get in a fight at school. Oh, you're

00:24:32.340 grounded. You're expelled. You're out of here. You're suspended, right? He talks up in class or

00:24:36.760 he tries to do something maybe outside of the box a little bit, or he, or he wants to go on an

00:24:40.940 adventure and somehow he's got ADD because he can't sit still and shut up. It's absolutely ridiculous.

00:24:46.340 It's a very real problem. And the reason that it's a problem is because it's nuanced. A lot of people

00:24:53.540 haven't taken the time like you have, and like I have to actually think about what's going on.

00:24:58.100 And because it's nuanced and it's difficult to see, we just think this is the status quo.

00:25:03.200 We just think this is the way that we're supposed to operate and everything is fine and well. Well,

00:25:07.960 how do you boil a frog? You don't just throw them in a tub of hot water. You put them in the tub of

00:25:12.560 cold water, gradually turn the heat on, and he'll stay in there without jumping out. That's what's

00:25:17.000 happening in society today. As we look around and we see a lot of people who are complacent

00:25:21.520 and mediocre and satisfied, and yet they're sitting in that cooking pot, and I'm saying they,

00:25:27.320 all of us, we're all sitting in that cooking pot waiting to be boiled by the head cook or chef or

00:25:34.560 whoever that is. And I'll tell you who it is. It's the government, it's the education system,

00:25:39.300 and now it's the healthcare system. Those three institutions are the perpetuators of this problem.

00:25:49.220 And we've got to recognize that. We've got to understand that so that we can inoculate ourselves

00:25:53.900 against what is going on because we opened ourselves to the actual evidence to what we're

00:25:59.260 actually seeing here. And now, because we know what it is, we can address it. And that's what I

00:26:04.220 want to share with you right now. How do we address this? Because here's what everybody will do.

00:26:07.580 Everybody will jump on social media and they'll make a post and they'll bitch and moan and complain

00:26:12.120 about how the Gillette commercial and how the American Psychological Association, how this and

00:26:16.680 how that, and they'll complain, right? Because they're rewarded for complaining. The one who

00:26:21.880 complains the loudest gets the most likes, gets the most shares, gets the most attention. And so what do

00:26:26.400 we have? We have people on both ends of the aisle, opposite ends of the spectrum, complaining and

00:26:30.940 bitching and moaning and griping about each other, not really coming up with any clear solutions.

00:26:34.920 And we're like, oh, this side's winning. Oh, now this side's winning. Oh, now this side's

00:26:39.140 winning. And yet everybody isn't looking at the actual solution to the problem because they're

00:26:44.980 worried about being loud and obnoxious and right. So let me share with you what I think is the best

00:26:51.960 approach. I'm going to break each one of these down, but I think I've got 10 here and I've written

00:26:55.380 them down here on my notes, but I've got 10 strategies that I think we all ought to incorporate

00:26:59.860 and embrace not only as men, not only as the fathers of our sons, but as the, as the women

00:27:06.080 too, as the mothers of these sons. We as a society need to understand that if we can incorporate

00:27:12.420 and adopt these 10 strategies and instill and incorporate these into our daily lives,

00:27:16.960 that everybody will be served. Not just men. It's not about the quote unquote patriarchy that,

00:27:22.740 that, that, that is tyrannical and has pushed everybody down. That's, that's not a thing.

00:27:26.660 It's about lifting everybody up. When we serve men the way they are meant to be served,

00:27:33.040 women win. When women know what it means to be a woman and she's allowed and capable and,

00:27:38.740 and given access to, if you will, opportunities to be more womanly than men win. Masculinity

00:27:46.540 doesn't need to come at the odds of femininity. Femininity doesn't need to come at the expense

00:27:51.660 of masculinity. We're here to compliment each other. We're here to work together. So I'm calling

00:27:56.640 both men and women to listen to what I have to say and hopefully incorporate some of this stuff

00:28:02.340 into their lives and the lives of the young people that they're called to serve as fathers and mothers

00:28:09.020 and community leaders and business owners and every other fast politicians, every facet of life,

00:28:15.060 educators. So here it is. Number one, we need to dismiss this fallacy that men and women are the

00:28:22.320 same. We're not the same. We are of equal worth. I will say that we are of equal worth,

00:28:28.700 but men generally bring something to the table that women don't generally bring. And women generally

00:28:34.480 bring something to the table that men don't bring. This is the grand design. And I don't care if you

00:28:39.980 believe in, in, in creation or you believe in evolution or you believe somewhere in between,

00:28:45.320 it does not matter to me. The reality is based on whatever you believe that men and women,

00:28:51.660 male and female are there to compliment each other. And when we recognize that men are good at some

00:28:59.480 things and women are good at other things, then we can tap into the tools that we have reserved for us

00:29:06.260 to be able to produce effective outcomes as men and as women. Number one, dismiss the fallacy that men

00:29:12.620 and women are the same. Number two, embrace masculine virtues in ourselves and our boys. Stop

00:29:19.620 ridiculing, stop mocking, stop undermining, and stop telling boys that because they're boys and they're

00:29:27.920 behaving like boys, that somehow they're wrong. If a boy is aggressive or he wants to compete or he wants

00:29:35.740 to protect or he wants to be violent, all of those are masculine traits. Instead of not embracing

00:29:42.540 that, instead of us saying that that's bad, you shouldn't behave that way, teach a young man how

00:29:47.120 he's able to harness it. Why should he be competitive and how will that serve him? In what

00:29:52.720 situations is it okay to be aggressive? In what way should he be violent? How should he control that?

00:29:58.400 In what way should he be stoic? Meaning understanding his emotions so that he can use them to better his

00:30:04.760 life and his family's life and his society and culture and communities life. Stop

00:30:09.940 villainizing what it means to be a man. Number three, teach and model accurate gender roles and

00:30:17.280 responsibilities. I always get some pushback on this one because people will say, well, what is a gender

00:30:22.800 role? This is, this is socially constructed. Well, if that were really the case, if gender was a social

00:30:29.660 construct, we likely wouldn't see some very striking similarities between the way that most cultures

00:30:37.180 throughout all of time in history operate. There has been study after study after study that has

00:30:45.360 studied and, and researched differing cultures, cultures that haven't even been exposed to each

00:30:52.400 other. And they have a very similar concept and idea of what it means to be a man and what a man's

00:30:58.520 role is and what it means to be a woman and what her role is. If that was societally constructed,

00:31:03.580 we wouldn't see those similarities as starking as we do. The reason that we have these roles and the

00:31:09.160 reason that it's traditionally been this way is because they work and they play to our strengths.

00:31:13.200 So let's recognize that a man is strong, that he is assertive, that he can be violent at times,

00:31:20.960 that he is competitive. And let's, and I'm speaking in generalities here, but let's also recognize

00:31:25.320 that a woman is lovely and she is kind and compassionate and nurturing and caring.

00:31:32.220 Now, can men exhibit those? Yes. Can women exhibit the traits that generally we would consider

00:31:36.480 masculine? Of course, but generally speaking, these are the roles because they work and they have worked

00:31:43.880 for thousands and thousands and thousands of years. Number four, let's reject this assault and

00:31:49.960 dismissal of masculinity. And I'm not talking about rejecting a Gillette commercial. Again,

00:31:55.140 they want to sell more razors. All right. That's why you see the thing that everybody's posting where

00:32:00.700 it has all these beautiful and these attractive women in skin tight, leather blue suits with Gillette

00:32:06.500 across their backside because they don't care. All right. It's not some deeply rooted belief

00:32:15.500 in the organization that somehow they care about what it means to be a man or a woman. No,

00:32:20.680 they want to sell more razors. So I'm not talking about rejecting that. I'm talking about rejecting

00:32:25.300 what we societally are doing in the government, in the educational system, and now the healthcare

00:32:31.420 system. Reject the idea, reject the dismissal of masculinity. I think I'm on number five. Guys,

00:32:38.140 it's up to us to lead our families and our businesses and our communities effectively.

00:32:42.760 Secondly, this means that we serve. A leader is a servant. A leader is not a boss. A leader is not

00:32:50.320 a manager. A leader is a servant of those he is trying to lead. The best description I've ever heard

00:32:56.360 with regards to leadership is an individual who helps other people get to a place they could not have

00:33:02.020 imagined or dreamed of going on their own. That requires sacrifice. It requires love,

00:33:11.500 discipline, guidance, structure, determination, grit, strength, resolve, vision. These are all things

00:33:22.640 that leaders possess in droves and they understand how to use these things effectively. They're not

00:33:27.980 using titles or authority to push other people down, to manipulate, and to coerce other people to do

00:33:35.480 something they wouldn't do on their own. No, they're getting people to voluntarily follow an

00:33:39.780 individual. When I'm more influential in the life of my family and even with you guys, you are

00:33:44.720 voluntarily deciding to be influenced by me. That requires a level of moral and ethical responsibility

00:33:54.200 on my part. We've got to lead our families, our businesses, and our communities effectively.

00:34:00.920 Number six, serve the young men in our neighborhoods. I already talked to you about how this whole thing

00:34:08.400 started. I already told you that there's millions of millions of boys out there who are growing up

00:34:13.580 without a father figure. I was one of those boys and I had men in my life, specifically one that I can

00:34:19.240 think of and one I've had on the show was my old football and baseball coach, high school football

00:34:23.160 and baseball coach, Matt Labrum. I had men of his caliber, not only him, but others, men of his caliber

00:34:28.980 step up into my life and speak to me as a young man when they didn't have to. They didn't have to do

00:34:36.880 that stuff. They had their own lives and they had jobs and they had their families they needed to take

00:34:42.300 care of and provide for and yet they willingly stepped into the calling of leader, not only within

00:34:47.600 the walls of their home, but the walls, or excuse me, I should say their community. They jumped outside of

00:34:53.780 themselves and their, what was right in front of them and decided to expand their reach. Guys, millions

00:34:59.000 of young men in your neighborhoods need your help. Volunteer for a big brothers program, volunteer at

00:35:04.860 YMCA, volunteer for some sort of scouting type organization, volunteer for coaching or extracurricular

00:35:13.200 activities. The more that you get involved in your neighborhoods and specifically the lives of the

00:35:17.320 young men, the better off you will be. You will be served by that and the better off they will be.

00:35:21.280 Uh, number seven, only have children. Please listen to me closely on this one. Okay. Don't

00:35:28.840 misunderstand what I'm saying here. Only have children. Once we are physically, financially,

00:35:34.580 mentally, and emotionally mature enough to do so. Please note that I did not say ready. Don't email

00:35:42.340 me or message me and tell me, well, you can never be ready for kids. That's not what I'm saying.

00:35:46.940 Nowhere in that sentence did I say that you're ready. I said mature enough, meaning that you have

00:35:54.560 a head on your shoulders, that you're in the right space physically, mentally, emotionally,

00:35:59.120 where you can deal with the difficulty that is raising kids. It is not an easy ride. I've got four

00:36:06.340 kids. I know it's not always glorious and it's not always fun, but the good times certainly outweigh

00:36:13.160 the hard times. And I would do it again in a heartbeat, but I want to make sure that if you

00:36:18.420 are going to bring kids into this world, that you are mature enough to do it. Because if you're not,

00:36:24.420 what's going to happen to these kids? The same thing that's been happening now for decades. We've

00:36:30.400 got this generation of fatherless children growing up and what kind of people are these going to turn

00:36:35.000 into without any guidance and direction and clarity and focus and teaching them how to embrace who it is

00:36:41.200 they are naturally. Number eight, commit to our marriages and do everything that we can to honor

00:36:49.780 our marital vows. I believe that it is our responsibility and each child's, I don't want to

00:36:57.140 say right necessarily, but I do. I think that's the right word is that it's their right to grow up in a

00:37:03.040 home with a mother and a father. So they get both the masculine, the femininity, and they get both of

00:37:09.360 those influences in their lives so they can use that to produce effective outcomes in their lives.

00:37:14.840 Now, can a child turn out fine without one of those influences? Yes, certainly. But I think most

00:37:21.260 reasonable people, if they're thinking about this from a level-headed perspective, would agree that

00:37:25.640 it's not ideal. It's not ideal to have little Billy or little Susie grow up without a mom or little

00:37:31.960 Billy or little Susie to grow up without a dad. In an ideal situation, little Billy and little Susie

00:37:39.480 would be raised by loving father and mother in a home that they teach how to embrace who they are

00:37:46.120 naturally and how to harness it to produce, again, effective outcomes for themselves and the people

00:37:51.480 that they will eventually have a responsibility for. You've got to honor your marital vows. And if you

00:37:57.760 can't, first of all, don't have children. And I would even go so far as saying, not only don't

00:38:03.080 have children, just don't engage in sex at all because we hopefully know where kids come from.

00:38:07.960 If you're not committed to a woman, don't have sex with her. And if you have committed to her,

00:38:15.400 then be committed. Don't step out on her. Honor your marital vows. Lead the family the way it needs to

00:38:22.140 be led. Lead her. Lead your children. And be a man of your word. Number nine, hold ourselves and

00:38:28.620 our boys to the highest moral and ethical standards. There is a disturbing, disturbing trend in society

00:38:34.820 that says we don't have to be accountable to our choices. And if you mess up, somebody in will swoop up

00:38:41.100 and rescue you and save you. But you know what? Here's what's not spoken, is that you will owe whoever

00:38:48.520 it is that comes in and rescues you. If you're collecting, for example, welfare, and look,

00:38:54.680 there's a time and a place, but if you're perpetually collecting welfare from another individual,

00:39:00.880 don't you believe for one second that there isn't going to be a day of reckoning that you will have

00:39:07.520 to pay that piper. There will be. Anytime that you accept a quote unquote handout from somebody who

00:39:14.380 doesn't care about you, know that you are beginning to enslave yourself to that individual or that

00:39:20.500 organization. Do not allow yourself to be enslaved. How do we do this? By holding ourselves and our boys

00:39:28.720 and daughters, holding all of us to the highest moral and ethical standards. When we learn to be

00:39:34.480 accountable for our own choices and we live with the consequences of those choices, we are less likely

00:39:39.180 to make those stupid decisions in the future. There's participation trophies and there's all

00:39:44.700 kinds of little forgiveness programs and everything that we possibly can to keep our kids from feeling

00:39:49.520 bad. What a destructive, damaging, poisonous thought. Allow your children to experience the full weight

00:39:58.640 of their choices, both positive and negative. And number 10, continually develop the skills

00:40:05.420 and the ability to protect, provide, and preside over ourselves and those we have a responsibility

00:40:11.400 for. Pretty self-explanatory on that one. And if it isn't, go back and listen to my other podcasts.

00:40:17.300 We've got 300 plus podcasts now. And every single one of them speaks to being a better protector,

00:40:23.200 provider, and presider over ourselves. And again, those we have a responsibility for.

00:40:28.400 There it is, guys. That's a lot of information. We talked about the assault on masculinity. We talked

00:40:34.940 about not making ourselves a victim. We talked about the idea of toxic masculinity and why I

00:40:39.620 don't subscribe to that term, although I understand the sentiment. We talked about how this whole thing

00:40:44.340 even started in the first place from the industrial revolution to a feminist movement in the 1960s.

00:40:51.020 And of course, we just wrapped up on what to do about it. So I would encourage you to go back and

00:40:54.900 listen maybe even to the last half where I actually talk about what to do about it, because

00:40:58.860 it seems like that's where most people leave off and they don't ever really get to that problem.

00:41:02.780 They just like to complain. And the last thing I want to do is be a complainer.

00:41:06.660 All right. I recognize that there's some things wrong, which is why I started this movement in

00:41:10.000 this organization four years ago. But it's not enough just to recognize something's wrong.

00:41:14.520 It's up to us as men to figure out how to solve it. And by embracing the 10 strategies,

00:41:20.840 we'll call them, that I just shared with you today, I think we begin to correct the problems

00:41:26.060 that we've seen over the last, well, a little over 200 years now. Anyways, guys, that's what I got for

00:41:32.960 you today. I hope that helps and give you some insight. I would ask if you would, please share

00:41:37.200 this episode. All right. A lot of people have asked me, how do I, how do I begin to express my

00:41:41.440 thoughts? Because a lot of you have similar feelings and sentiments as I do. That's probably why

00:41:46.800 you're listening to the podcast. And so you're asking, how do I share this with somebody who doesn't

00:41:50.680 necessarily ascribe to the same things I do? This is a great start. Have them listen to this

00:41:56.020 podcast and not very long. I'm very clear, hopefully in it. I articulate what the problem

00:42:00.680 is and I articulate hopefully well, what it is we're supposed to do about it. This is a great

00:42:04.700 starting point for a discussion. So go out there, please share it, share the podcast, share this

00:42:09.540 episode, leave a rating and review. All of this helps promote the visibility. And of course,

00:42:14.120 ultimately gets us back on track. I am honored to be in this battle with you. And I believe it is a

00:42:20.480 I believe that there is an assault. I believe that there is a spectrum of that assault, some not so

00:42:27.540 devious and others very deliberate and intentional. I will leave you with this, that I think ultimately

00:42:33.360 the goal here of the institutions I talked about earlier is to undermine what it means to be a man,

00:42:39.920 to undermine what it means to be a woman and to undermine the family unit. And I think the reason

00:42:47.200 that is, is because men and women and the family represent the last line of defense against those

00:42:55.820 who would control us. Guys, we've got to exercise our own sovereignty. We've got to lead ourselves.

00:43:02.600 We've got to lead our families because if we don't, I can guarantee you that there is always someone or

00:43:09.300 some organization who is more than happy to do it for us. I'll leave you there, guys. Go out there,

00:43:15.800 take action and become the man you are meant to be. Thank you for listening to the Order of Man

00:43:20.720 podcast. If you're ready to take charge of your life and be more of the man you were meant to be,

00:43:25.500 we invite you to join the order at orderofman.com.

Order of Man - January 25, 2019

An Attack on Masculinity？

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