Sturdy: How does a modern man lead a meaningful life? Credit: Power Sport Images/Getty
Contemporary manhood is under threat. From man-caves up and down the land, the resentful grumble is increasingly audible. The right to be a man — a real man — is being assailed from all sides: by feminists, gender non-conformists, and as a new book puts it, “chaos, vulgarity and meaninglessness”.
In The Seven Ages of Man: How to Live a Meaningful Life, James Innes-Smith writes that “Today, masculinity itself has come under attack, relentlessly maligned in the media”. The book glances wistfully back to an era of sturdy men and sturdier moral certainties, a time when gender roles were more clearly defined.
The 20th century was characterised by a surfeit of meaning. Everyone from Bolsheviks to National Socialists to Cold War liberals had a clear and discernible idea of what a good and fruitful life entailed. All were willing to spill blood (usually other people’s) to bring that vision to life. Yet barely three decades after the official termination of the conflict between East and West, we are awash with angsty books admonishing us (and by us I mean men) to “quell our deeper yearnings”, as Innes-Smith puts it. Bursting from every self-help bookshelf one now finds the gruff, rugged-bearded traditionalist rallying men to eschew materialism and seek out what Innes-Smith calls “deeper truths”.
The book guides us didactically through what he describes as the “seven ages” of man. These are childhood, adolescence, relationships and parenthood, work and providing, middle age, old age, death and legacy. The taut compartmentalisation of life is a giveaway in terms of the author’s broader moral outlook: a man’s life should be defined by “fundamental truths”. The author believes his interpretation of the good life — marriage, discipline, deferred gratification, strict child rearing, age-appropriate dress codes — is a universal one, which when you think about it is quite a large claim for a journalist to make.
This is unusual for a British author too, for it tends to be American readers who seek out guidance in everyday matters (the self-improvement industry in the US was worth $10 billion in 2016). But Innes-Smith forges ahead in the guise of the sagacious older male, proffering advice on every topic under the sun. Deep fulfilment in his moral universe is derived from putting oneself at the service of others. And getting married. The author is extremely keen on men getting hitched; younger readers are encouraged to settle down as soon as possible (he even marshals the claim, which worked to frighten me at least, that middle age begins at 35!).
Like other moralists Innes-Smith is keen to let you know that “recreational copulation soon loses its appeal”. This recalls something once said about Malcolm Muggeridge: that he was against everything he had grown tired of doing himself. Innes-Smith similarly counsels young men to abstain from sex for 12 months during the quest for a spouse and in the process to avoid the “pouting sirens” who are “fighting for your attention on every street corner”.
We’ve heard some of this sort of thing before. It is 30 years since Robert Bly published Iron John, an earnest Jungian treatise encouraging men to go off into the woods with other men and get in touch with their wild nature. Bly interpreted the allegorical fairytale of Iron John as a call for men to locate within themselves the “deep male” — and with it to reassert patriarchal authority. “Zeus energy is male authority accepted for the sake of the community,” wrote Bly. Women’s role was to submit to this “energy”, with their reward coming later on in the bedroom.
Yet the earnestness of Bly’s endeavour set it up for mockery. Martin Amis (who might have been writing about Jordan Peterson) remarked on Bly’s “impregnable humourlessness”. His fellow poet Charles Upton described Iron John as “utterly devoid of irony”. Ploughing through Innes-Smith’s short book (it is just 198 pages long) I too found it hard not to snigger as earnest prescriptions on erectile disfunction, strict portion control, and how to wear flat-fronted trousers rolled off the authorial pen.
But he’s right that men are in a pickle. The #MeToo movement, the decline of marriage and traditional forms of masculine work, as well as “gender fluidity” — all have discombobulated the contemporary male. In one ear we hear feminist complaints about gender pay gaps, toxic masculinity and the predatory sexuality of the Harvey Weinsteins of the world. In the other, we pick up grumbles from female contemporaries about the lack of “real men” amid the conformity and sterility of the commute and the office nine to five.
Male discomfiture is increasingly audible today on YouTube, where Bly’s ideological descendants mix Spartan asceticism with entrepreneurial uplift. It is traditionalism with a softer edge, in which self-development, stoicism, pseudo-scientific “life hacks”, and tips for developing rippling musculature sit alongside a new-age willingness to talk about feelings and vulnerability.
Deeper down this rabbit hole are the “neo-patriarchs” of the manosphere. These self-proclaimed alpha males rage against society’s feminisation of “soys” and “betas”. Covid-19 denial is rampant in the manosphere, where face masks are viewed as synonymous with emasculation and enfeeblement. Academics who recently surveyed nearly 2,500 American adults found that many men considered them “shameful, not cool and a sign of weakness”. This attitude — part insecurity, part bombast — goes to the very top. When the Trump White House announced in October that the President had “defeated” Covid-19, it was difficult not to read into it the corollary — that those succumbing to the virus were somehow being cast as weak and inferior.
Innes-Smith’s book also offers a more benign set of prescriptions for masculinity in the 21st century, though he does enjoy summoning the odd penis-shrivelling vision of a world in which men are “pacified, submissive and emasculated”. Most of the book is given over to encouraging readers to improve themselves through rigorous exercise and the imbibing of higher knowledge derived from authors such as Dostoevsky. Though readers are sternly warned to avoid popular culture where “pornography and funny animal videos” are corrupting young minds and where “triviality is the order of the day” (presumably those “pouting sirens” again).
The author is right to flag the uncertainty that surrounds the role of the traditional male breadwinner in the 21st century, especially among the working class, where identity has historically been wedded to productivity. Moreover, women show markedly less interest in pairing off with men who occupy a lowly position on the status hierarchy, compounding the misery for working-class men. The result is a growing mass of resentful, low-status men who are forming angry online subcultures that come marinated in misogyny and bile. Suicide rates among males are at record highs.
Nor should it be taboo to say that boys require male as well as female role models. This needn’t be about demonising single mothers; however we should perhaps look more judgmentally — a deeply unfashionable word these days — upon those weak and selfish men who refuse to take responsibility for the lives they bring into the world.
Innes-Smith wants men to find deeper meaning in the universe. Yet like so much of the Calvinist-inspired self-improvement oeuvre, this unrelenting search for betterment — the author fixates on “discipline”, “meaningful tasks” and “true fulfilment” — conflates suffering with a higher morality. He urges readers to cycle to work in a downpour. He warns against giving children access to computer games that provide “instant fun” and are thus “addling young men’s minds”. But where is the virtue in contracting pneumonia? And while there is something to be said for moderation in all matters, computer games have been shown in numerous studies to be beneficial for cognition.
I ought to confess that I spent most of my own youth railing against this broad-shouldered, unyielding masculinity. Innes-Smith is the type (because he says so) who believes you can “tell a lot about a man by the way he behaves on a sports field”. Which is to say he would not have thought much of me: one of my school reports contains five solitary words appraising my desultory performance in the sporting arena: “Not seen on the pitch!” Sloping off behind the bike shed for a fag – rather than putting my scrawny frame through a brutal pasting on the rugby pitch — may have been a moral failing yet somehow I don’t quite believe it.
It’s not that I view physical prowess as an irredeemable expression of “toxic masculinity”, as some contemporary feminist authors appear to. It’s more a question of everybody being different. Indeed, I’m pleased to discover that my first conscious political belief — a bastardisation of the harm principle: you should leave a person well alone unless they’re hurting you in some way — remains the most enduring one a quarter of a century later.
But invariably this works both ways. If you believe — and the overwhelming evidence suggests this — that gender is a product of nature as well as nurture, then reframing every male pursuit as toxic will surely have a detrimental effect on young minds. Amid rising levels of involuntary celibacy, pretending that going to the gym and increasing one’s social standing will do nothing to improve a young man’s chances of finding a mate does him a horrible disservice. And I suspect there is something to be said for stoicism, courage and risk-taking over the narcissistic emoting that prevails among today’s ultra-woke.
However, I doubt younger readers will recognise Innes-Smith’s gloomy depiction of contemporary Britain as a “broken society [that] is crying out for a return to meaning and an appreciation of… deep, life affirming truths”. Not because alienation, frustration and malaise don’t exist. But the author’s impression is too bleak and his prescriptions too rigid.
There is an abundance of potential paths to the good life for men. Some involve ancient traditions, “new warrior training”, marriage by 35, flat-fronted trousers and restorative sex once a week in the missionary position. But other paths will — and really ought to — feature self-criticism, openness, adaptability and gender fluidity. Some may even have sparkly outfits and fluffy unicorns. Though we should expect this sort of thing to bring out a steely grimace in the deep male, who would prefer us to be rigging up a tent and marching off into the woods to do some yodelling.
James Bloodworth is a journalist and author of Hired: Six Months Undercover in Low-Wage Britain, which was longlisted for the Orwell Prize 2019.
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SubscribeAn inconvenient truth that practically all of our greatest pop’n’rock artists didn’t go to uni and that the post 92 meat grinder money making universities don’t give a toss about the students as long as the numbers are high, and in fact many students are thrown on the scrap heap
It has been obvious for some years that higher education in the UK and the US is primarily – and often solely – about money.
If you come out of university with a degree that does not gain you employment, you are forced to take any job available, however menial, Your schoolmates, on the other hand, have had three years’ experience in the workplace and so are at an advantage.
It is in the best interest of the students that courses are assessed and students are aware of the job opportunities that are available for graduates with only limited academic ability..
You are quite right Iris. In fact I’m reminded of the old joke ‘What do you say to a media studies/social sciences graduate? – A big mac and fries please.’
entrepreneurs who create the wealth that employs graduates more often than not, did not go to university… as has always been the case.. It is often just a wage slaves academy!
It’s very simple. Make universities responsible for student loans. That will encourage them to produce employable graduates. Close any university with a dropout rate of over 20%.
Carpenters, Plumbers, Electricians, Engineers, Transport Professionals, etc. Some need a degree, some need an apprenticeship, some need on-the-job training or vocational training. Far better than a degree in ” ” Studies.
I keep saying that there is nothing useless or non-vocational about a humanities degree per se. I read history at university, and I would defend that discipline against all-comers as being a training in considering evidence, establishing the relevant facts, and drawing conclusions, i.e. a training in reasoning, which is essential for any profession and especially for management and leadership roles. A high-level training in, say, mathematics, certainly imparts logical rigour and attention to detail, but it has little to do with the more intangible, but vital, skill of good judgement.
I agree, Jonathan, a good humanities degree from a good university is a valuable thing and usually leads to enhanced earning potential. Unfortunately, the reckless expansion of the sector has resulted in a profusion of graduates with second class degrees from third rate universities. This helps no-one, except of course the ridiculously well remunerated Vice Chancellors.
I believe it was Vince Lombardi who corrected the saying “practice makes perfect” to “perfect practice makes perfect”. If you are studying any subject to a high level, you will be developing valuable skills. If you are not, you may merely be practicing errors. In technical degrees the errors are immediately obvious and cannot be hidden.
I think you need both good judgement and some attention to detail (from your remarks I’m quite sure you have both).
However, there is a belief in this country (and the US and many others) that you do not need technical competence or experience in the relevant industry to be a good manager or leader – i.e. that “management” is a generic discipline that is portable across industries. I strongly believe this to be false and my experience in technology businesses shows that those which succeed and survive are the ones whos leaders have both deep domain (technical) skills and experience with leadership and management skills.
My experience is that the number of people with both exceptional technical and leadership and management skills is very small. But these are the people you certainly need these days.
We should not knock the uni’s. They do a remarkable job on their inmates, training them in the virtues of being hyper-sensitive non-resilient weaklngs, quick to take offence at almost anything, seeing micro-aggressions in the blink of an eye (someone else’s), for ever feeling ‘unsafe’, requiring an endless stream of trigger-warnings (from Beowulf through Lear — King , but probably Edward as well –to Pride and Prejudice and onward), shutting out debate, by violence if necessary, and so forth — and that is not to mention vilifying as much of our history as imagination can manage, and hating our country, all accompanied by narcissistic self-flagellation for white, or any other, guilt.
Do you want your, or anyone else’s, child to emerge from uni in that state, part of a failed generation?
Reopen polytechnics teaching career subjects at night school and day release
Sadly this educational fiasco can firmly blamed on John Major Esq, and his 1992 ‘Further & Higher Education Act’, and not on the wretched Tony Blair, as is so often assumed.
The damage done is probably terminal.
I think it began even earlier. It was in the late 1980s when I first noticed that even the dimmest offspring of the middle classes were going to university, and referring to it as ‘uni’.
It must have some relation to the destruction of the Tripartite education system. Once everyone went to comprehensives then they must all go to university. All that is needed is the willingness to drop academic standards and to drive up public and private debt.
The late 80s was when norm referenced marking was ditched,
The problem is exacerbated by the quasi religious desire to overrepresent certain groups at what were great institutions.
I would put forward the view that allowing polytechnics to become universities made little difference as they had long forgotten their remit of providing technical education and training with a vocational focus and had been churning out graduates in Marxist drivel for years. But you may have a point that Blair only ramped this up.
You are right to highlight John Major’s policies as starting the rot. It was under his premiership that the polytechnics, which provided excellent vocational training programmes and educational qualifications, including degrees, were converted into universities, many if not most of which became second rate and remain so to this day. Tony Blair substantially worsened the situation by decreeing that 50% of school leavers should attend university – an approach enthusiastically adhered to by David Cameron, who likewise tripped out on diversity and inclusion rather than academic prowess. Both Blair and Cameron introduced tuition fees, which have crippled many graduates with debts for degrees that they struggle to pay off in low paid job just above the threshold for non-payment.
The over-expansion of higher education in the UK is turning the country into what I would call a “Dunning-Krugerland” – i.e. a society with a huge number of people who are educated just enough to believe they are experts, but not sufficiently to realise they are not. Social media makes this painfully visible.
You can see the mediocrity and ignorance all around you. The quality of analysis, debate and discussion in newspapers, TV and radio is vastly inferior to the 1970s and 1980s. “Presenters” constantly interrupt and try to make it all about them and “build their brand”. No politician is allowed to talk for more than one or two minutes without some trite question or interruption. Almost all questions are leading ones. Original and challenging ideas are condemned out of hand.
It is time that universities suffered financial penalties if the graduates they produce are not up to scratch. Those that aren’t good enough need to close.
There is a real – and huge – opportunity cost in tieing up people and resources in wasteful activities. But even more so by mis-educating people – persuade me that the majority of today’s “protestors” and “campaigners” – the ones gluing themselves to roads – aren’t or negative value to society as a whole.
Then add in the massive student loan debt default being built up which will fall back on the taxpayer.
Blair may be gone, but the evil he engendered lives on.
You can defund the humanities at the government level without abolishing them. Plenty of people who do stuff in the humanities make their living by selling books, talks, and obviously, university courses. The “barbarous” idea that without government funding the humanities would disappear seems to imply that nobody cares about them and have to be forced to fund them, which if true, is by itself an excellent reason to defund them.
A reevaluation of the university system is long overdue. Humanities degrees have a place. Society should always be producing people who write well. I totally agree that where possible all degrees should entail a wage earning element as part of a condition for admission. I hope Sunak seeks to defund all these wacky lefty courses that exist now. I doubt this will happen however.
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There is a simple way round all this – if you want to do a Humanities degree, then before you can do that, you do a year min three max, in the workplace, anywhere in the country, paid min wage, but with government provided student dorm style subsidised accommodation. Govt responsible for placing you, but system similar to UCAS. Businessess who take on young people at 18 in this way to get tax breaks. No such requirement on STEM degrees, for the simple reason that you would not want to lose any of the most creative STEM period in young people, which starts at around 18.
Wouldn’t it be easier to insist that Humanities and Social Sciences courses require 3 As at Alevel, one of which must be maths. Those that don’t are not eligible for Student Loans.
STEM and vocational courses and apprenticeships are funded as now.
The objective should be that only the very brightest and most committed do history or psychology etc and these courses make up 5-10% of university placements.
Crikey, the Maths stipulation would rule out literally everyone wanting to take a Humanities or Social Sciences degree. Of course, this is not necessarily a bad thing.
Latin in preference to Maths perhaps?
Nice idea
That would certainly have suited me. I was good at Latin, whereas my maths stopped when confronted with long division, aged nine.
There are quite a lot of people from the humanities side of things who have contributed greatly to society but were crappy at maths.
I like the idea of a higher grades requirement, but 3 As seems harsh. Perhaps allow leeway for a B or even a C if you get an A* somewhere else.
I was being a bit tongue-in-cheek but the grade requirement should be raised and the ratio of these courses to STEM/ vocational should be 1 in 10.
I also like the idea of people having to have a “difficult” A Level too – maths or Latin would be acceptable.
The current option of mediocre A Levels in psychology, English and media studies and then a 2:2 in sociology at the University of Nowhere is a waste of the student’s time and the taxpayer’s money.
Minimum university entrance requirement: one of: one A-level in a STEM subject, a qualification in a trade with work experience, a year in the armed forces or on a ward on the NHS, or a foreign language to B2 level. (I started the comment as a joke, then realised there might be something in it)
I agree there might be something to it.
From 2000 to 2016 I taught part-time at University of Bradford, Yorkshire UK. I saw the quality of the intake gradually go down during that time. Similarly, the motivation and enthusiasm of the students began to wane – it was totally pointless for at least a third of the students I reckon. And that was in engineering! Eventually the department was wound up and remaining staff redeployed. It was a standing joke that while the official entry requirement was 2 Bs, we would accept any student with 2 Ds who didn’t need life support systems. Just a failing industry doing the “bums on seats” exercise to justify it’s existence. The best teaching I ever did was three years (1973-1976) at the Kenya Polytechnic where the students were keen as mustard to learn real skills for their jobs in telecomms and electronics.
A very good blog, Frank, and spot-on with regard to our need for respected, high quality technical/vocational education, and on the fact that our universities are full of young people with no real interest in their studies, who also provide a depressing milieu for those fellow-students – and there are plenty – who DO have that interest. (And I speak as a former university lecturer). My only quibble might be regarding the German situation. Having just spent a week with two Germans, one of whom spent some time teaching in a technical school, I was made aware that lack of interest and motivation has also become prevalent amongst many young Germans in such schools.
The expansion of tertiary education was a genius move by Tony Blair. Get young people to take out huge loans to pay to remove themselves from the youth unemployment figures, at the same time creating a huge number of jobs for lecturers, most of whom would vote Labour. Brilliant.
Whether the degrees themselves would be useful for those taking them was beside the point.
Cracking good blog!
I’d welcome some kind of action around worthless degrees, but the idea that their worth would be decided on the basis of what kind of income the degree leads to is crazy.
Then what is your alternative ? How would you measure “worthless” ?
As a former full-time lecturer (second career after a lifetime in senior/top management) in a UK university business school and a BA graduate in English (from a world class university in its day), I feel I have some basis for adding to the discussion. Some points for consideration:
The fundamental purpose of the university is to be a collection of scholars looking for truth. And to train younger people to replace them, or who will benefit in their eventual work from learning from them.
That sound high-falutin’ but that’s it. The other things the university does stem from this basic purpose.
So a good program involves serious, rigorous thought, original ideas, involves people who are real scholars not just in one area but have a wide basis of scholarship.
The degrees that are worthless are those that undermine this. In humanities and sciences, those that have poor standards, mainly.
But also the proliferation of professional qualifications that are basically cash grabs by universities are a serious problem.
I utterly loathed every second of Kings College London… nearly as much as my fellows who actually wanted to be ‘ slisters’.. I did not finish the law.
Yeah