How to Be a Man (Blog)

[Marco Polo]

Men and women have different cognitive specialisations. Yes there are significant exceptions to this (Rose of Cairo perhaps? have fun with your experiment ) - but exceptions do not disprove the rule. That's important to keep in mind.

The feminine mind - generally specialized in the preconscious. This is the mode of thinking associated with the "tip-of-the-tounge" phenomenon. Thus you get a lot of women constantly saying things like "there something about him" or "there's something about this situation I don't like", meaning their preconscious made a calculation that they didn't consciously formulate (not saying they COULDN'T, however it just didn't come naturally to them). The feminine person prefers to speak in terms of emotion, energies and such, which are particular to the sub/preconscious. Basically we're talking about intuition here.

The masculine mind - Much more focused on highly conscious thinking. Values truth, and prefers a cold rational atmosphere to one of harmony and togetherness. Steve got it right, more or less. By the way, I personally think this type of thinking is actually quite inferior in some situations, as it can bypass important subtleties.

These fundamental differences play a huge role in attraction. We usually feel attracted to our cognitive inverts, and I suspect this is an essential precondition for heterosexuality. You cannot truly meet your "other half" without meeting your cognitive invert. In such a relationship you can sort of cover each other's "blind spot".

By the way, I think everyone is somewhere along the conscious/preconscious scale - nobody is perfectly polarized one way or the other. And I do believe, quite strongly, that you can never achieve your full potential as a human being until you have located your exact position on that scale. Which might get very complicated.

[Paul C]

Originally Posted by Spartan

Energy is a strictly scientific concept, thus talking about male/female energies is meaningless.

This would all depend on one's definition of energy. There's no doubt there are scientific individuals who might like to think they have a monopoly on the word "energy". The concept itself could apply to so many things.

I had always perceived masculine and feminine energy being the one energy fundamentally, yet expressed in different ways to bring about their sense of polarity within an individual. Which is to say that the structure of a male and female brain bring about masculine and feminine energy respectively, more often than not. That's not to say their aren't many situations were a brain would be structured to be considered an expectation to the whole feminine masculine mentality.

All I'm trying to say is that it's possible that an individual could be predisposed towards to a particular polarity (feminine/masculine) even if they attempt to create a self identity for themselves that's the opposite of it.

[Spartan]

Originally Posted by Marco Polo

Men and women have different cognitive specialisations. Yes there are significant exceptions to this (Rose of Cairo perhaps? have fun with your experiment ) - but exceptions do not disprove the rule. That's important to keep in mind.

Are you actually saying that if evidence contradicts a theory and proves it to be fallacious, we should disregard that evidence and continue to believe in the theory? That is ridiculous.

[ScotiaCoast]

Originally Posted by Spartan

Are you actually saying that if evidence contradicts a theory and proves it to be fallacious, we should disregard that evidence and continue to believe in the theory? That is ridiculous.

I read into this more like.. most ravens are black, and just because you may find one albino raven does not stop the majority of ravens from being black. The exception - the albino raven - does not change the general rule, that ravens are black.

Well, that's probably a very stupid analogy, but that's just how I interpreted what Marco Polo said.. not that I'm trying to speak for the original author or anyone else.. or to take sides in this debate for that matter (how unmanly of me ).

[Bitsy]

Originally Posted by Rose of Cairo

I'm definitely very happy that you wrote this article, Steve. Disagreeing with you forced me to think about it and now I'm going to experiment with these energies. So you tremendously kicked my ass and I'm very grateful to you for that.

I know I'm being potentially wrong too, especially because I don't know much about energies. That's fine, because of #3. Nonetheless, I'll defend my viewpoint to the end, because of #4 and #8

Aha! But Rose, those rules are only for men, so you don't have to do anything .

[Spartan]

Originally Posted by ScotiaCoast

I read into this more like.. most ravens are black, and just because you may find one albino raven does not stop the majority of ravens from being black. The exception - the albino raven - does not change the general rule, that ravens are black.

Well, that's probably a very stupid analogy, but that's just how I interpreted what Marco Polo said.. not that I'm trying to speak for the original author or anyone else.. or to take sides in this debate for that matter (how unmanly of me ).

Good old 'Hempel's paradox of the ravens'.

If I say 'all ravens are black' and find one white raven, then obviously the statement 'all ravens are black' is false. However, the statement 'most ravens are black' may still be true. For example, if 51% of all ravens are black and 49% of all ravens are white, then the statement 'most ravens are black' is true. (That is not the paradox btw)

However, the statement 'most ravens are black' is a weak claim, and thus any argument relying on 'most ravens are black' as a premise can only be considered a weak inductive argument.

[Rose of Cairo]

Originally Posted by Spartan

Energy is a strictly scientific concept

Not for people who are sensitive to energy or into energy healing. I guess that's some kind of energy that science is not able to describe or measure (as far as I'm informed), yet it's very real for those people.

I'm a beginner in this and totally far away from being a master at energy stuff, but I can feel "things" (energy? vibes?) coming from people. Some people feel angular and flat (= square energy) while others feel more deep and smooth (= round energy). Very few people are at one or the other extreme, most of them are somewhere in between.

thus talking about male/female energies is meaningless.

I was very surprised indeed to learn here in these forums that these two expressions of energy are called "masculine" and "feminine" because from my small experience, being angular or smooth doesn't depend on people's gender. Maybe I'm biased because I attract only some specific kind of people?

Why not just use the word masculine/feminine? Instead of saying one possesses 'male energy', why not just say one possesses masculine traits (in the traditional sense)? There's no need to complicate things by adding the word energy.

Well... In my eyes and based on this experience of mine, someone's behavior reflects how square or round their energy is. So for me, energy is essential and doesn't complicate things. On the contrary, it explains a lot.

I refuse to use the words "masculine" and "feminine" exactly because I think it doesn't depend on our biological gender. That's exactly my point.

Socialization makes men want to be more angular and women want to be more smooth and I think we should not reinforce such stereotypes, because there are also many round men and square women who suffer from feeling inadequate and who would be much more successful if they just accepted their dominant energy and learned how to use it efficiently. Both energies can lead to great results, not only the "male" one.

Saying about a man that he has mostly "feminine traits" sounds a bit like he's not really a man, and should be more manly. Whereas saying he works predominantly with round energy is more neutral, it doesn't contain any judgement about his masculinity. Guys with round energy can be terribly manly, I know enough of them to tell

I guess I'm not being clear, it's quite late here now...

[ScotiaCoast]

Originally Posted by Spartan

However, the statement 'most ravens are black' is a weak claim, and thus any argument relying on 'most ravens are black' as a premise can only be considered a weak inductive argument.

Alright then, most observed ravens are black. Now at least it's a strong induction, although admittedly not definite.

[Marco Polo]

Originally Posted by Spartan

Are you actually saying that if evidence contradicts a theory and proves it to be fallacious, we should disregard that evidence and continue to believe in the theory? That is ridiculous.

You are ridiculous for misconstruing my point.

Any given statistical correlation is significant if it occupies a high percentage - life is seldom black and white. If it was, I would not speak of any rule, but rather of truth.

...
Me: So in general, cars seem to have 4 wheels.
You: "No no no, there are like sooo many cars with 48 wheels. Right, I guess you must be full of s*** then!"

Lol, please don't act like you don't know what I'm saying. Get out of your denial - admit there are some significant differences. Come on now, nothing to be ashamed of.

[Spartan]

Originally Posted by Marco Polo

You are ridiculous for misconstruing my point.

Any given statistical correlation is significant if it occupies a high percentage - life is seldom black and white. If it was, I would not speak of any rule, but rather of truth.

...
Me: So in general, cars seem to have 4 wheels.
You: "No no no, there are like sooo many cars with 48 wheels. Right, I guess you must be full of s*** then!"

Lol, please don't act like you don't know what I'm saying. Get out of your denial - admit there are some significant differences. Come on now, nothing to be ashamed of.

Correlation does not equal causation as someone else has already pointed out.

I think differences in behaviour and personality are caused by environmental factors and genetical factors other than gender. But who knows, perhaps gender has something to do with it?

[Spartan]

Originally Posted by ScotiaCoast

Alright then, most observed ravens are black. Now at least it's a strong induction, although admittedly not definite.

Actually that is still a weak inductive claim. The statement 'all observed ravens are black' is an example of a strong inductive claim.

[ScotiaCoast]

Oh, the difference a word can make. Thanks for pointing that out Spartan.

[Marco Polo]

Originally Posted by Spartan

Correlation does not equal causation as someone else has already pointed out.

Oh, I didn't even touch on the causation. The impact of environmental forces vs. predisposition wasn't actually part of my arguement. Again, you skirted around the core of my arguement. But OK.

Originally Posted by Spartan

I think differences in behaviour and personality are caused by environmental factors and genetical factors other than gender.

I think differently.

Sex-specific hormones can play a huge role in how the brain opperates - clicky.

Also, our brain have some subtle structural differences. Men's brains are, on average, 10% larger - and I believe women have a more integrated corpus callosum (more neural connections b/w the brain hemispheres) - clicky II

But yes, environment plays a significant role as well. It's not ALL environment though. Come on, that should be obvious enough.

I'll look up some more sources when I get around to it.

[Spartan]

Originally Posted by Marco Polo

Oh, I didn't even touch on the causation. The impact of environmental forces vs. predisposition wasn't actually part of my arguement. Again, you skirted around the core of my arguement. But OK.

I think differently.

Sex-specific hormones can play a huge role in how the brain opperates - clicky.

But yes, environment plays a significant role as well. It's not ALL environment though. Come on, that should be obvious enough.

Ok, perhaps gender plays a small role in behaviour, e.g. pms. However, I don't think it has a significant impact on one's predominant personality. Perhaps I'm worng?

I don't have a problem with statements like 'most observed women in my experience blah blah blah', however I have a problem with someone inferring from that the generalization that 'all women are blah blah blah'. And I have an even bigger problem with the inference 'therefore all women should behave like blah blah blah if they are to be considered women'.

All I'm saying is don't make inferences from weak claims to sweeping conclusions about the inherent nature of each gender.

[Marco Polo]

Originally Posted by Spartan

I don't have a problem with statements like 'most observed women in my experience blah blah blah', however I have a problem with someone inferring from that that 'all women are blah blah blah' And I have an even bigger problem with the inference 'therefore all women should behave like blah blah blah if they are to be considered women'.

OK, now I have common ground with you. I agree with this.

Although I think my explicit disclaimer on the "significant [number of] exceptions" and finding your personal point along the grayscale covered that. I'm not going to allow minor inconsistencies to blur out my overall point.

But again, I symphathize with what you're saying here.

[songwriter]

I've got to LOL at this post, but not in at bad way. I haven't come here for ages, I would have to check the date of my last post... I had this old trouble on my head, and here it is, like a synchronicity for me.

I think I kind of stick to that. And anyway I'm always "unsuccessful" with women... but I follow my principles, my integrity... I don't surrender to a woman's absolute desires and those stuff. Yes, I've got no "partner", but I would be worse with one except if I find someone who treats me according my beliefs.

kind of this...

A man who claims his #1 commitment in life is his relationship partner (or his family) is either too dishonest or too weak to be trusted. His loyalties are misplaced. A man who values individuals above his own integrity is a wretch, not a free thinker.

A man knows he must commit to something greater than satisfying the needs of a few people. He’s not willing to be domesticated, but he is willing to accept the responsibility that comes with greater challenges. He knows that when he shirks that duty, he becomes something less than a man

I'M NOT WILLING TO BE DOMESTICATED. Aka. I'm a man, not a dog.

[Savage]

Originally Posted by Spartan

Why is this line of reasoning only applicable to the male gender, as implied by your article?

edit: You should probably add a footnote, explaining that all of the traits listed could also apply to women.

That footnote is left as an exercise for the reader.

Note that I never said these traits don't apply to women as well. It would appear that notion came from you.

[Spartan]

Originally Posted by Steve Pavlina

That footnote is left as an exercise for the reader.

Note that I never said these traits don't apply to women as well. It would appear that notion came from you.

Ok, I accept that. However, the title 'how be be a man' implies that the traits listed in the article are 'manly' traits.

Your article was titled 'how to be a man' implying that one must posses all traits listed in order to be considered a man, i.e 'one is a man if and only if one is xyz.'

Thus if one is xyz, then one can derive that one is also a man, and therefore not a woman.

Sorry, I'm just nitpicking now.

[Marco Polo]

Actually, I think it's good that men are finally speaking to men about being a man in todays world.

Women can do the same (but vice versa of course), sans all the controversy. Why should that be?

I mean, I'm against judging people based on gender alone, after all that's not just sexism but actually a sign of weak brainpower.

But when it comes to younger boys, I'm beginning to wonder... perhaps there's just a lack of fatherfigures nowadays, good solid men saying "Listen to me, follow my lead and I'll show you how to be a man". Nowdays the mantra is more like "you're a free spirit, your identity (including gender) is completely fluid and your society lacks structure - just go where your heart takes you". Anyway, that was completely off topic.

OK, more of the controversial topics please, Mr. Pavlina. It's better that way.

[cylon]

Originally Posted by Marco Polo

Women can do the same (but vice versa of course), sans all the controversy. Why should that be?

Because masculinity is shamed in our culture. When's the last time you saw a man in the media who wasn't portrayed as either a complete imbecele who had to have is wife chew his food for him, or a calculating, sexual predator?

When feminism came along it brought good as well as bad. Good in the sense that clearly women deserve equal treatment when it comes to work, legal rights, etc. "human rights" which were not always there. But the other side of that was men were attacked for opressing women for thousands of years, and as a whole, masculinity itself came under attack.

So you have a generation of men feeling this inherited guilt. I know I grew up that way. Shame for being masculine. Now mix that in with misguided men listening to women tell them what they want (sweet, sensitive, expresses his feelings, communicates, doesn't have an ego) yet observing these same women hooking up with the opposite of that, and you've got confusion and guilt.

I believe in our culture now, women are perceived as these mystical, complex creatures (like the funny book Steve linked to) beyond comprehension, and men are perceived as kind of simple, barbaric creatures who are behind the times, like their role has sort of evolved away. So to compensate for this masculinity, women adopted it in themselves to make up for the male leadership that disappeared in their lives, and men took on the female characteristics they were shamed into adopting, ie if they didn't become more feminine and "get with the program", they were not going to be with these women who were shaming them for following their natural instincts.

[Savage]

Originally Posted by Spartan

Your article was titled 'how to be a man' implying that one must posses all traits listed in order to be considered a man, i.e 'one is a man if and only if one is xyz.'

Nope, not at all. There's a higher level of thinking that goes into writing such articles, although I'd agree it isn't obvious at first glance.

I used the title "How to Be a Man" intentionally because I knew it would attract interest. I knew full well that some people would react critically to the title, and I'm not surprised by the high volume of discussion either. Less polarizing titles don't attract readers, and articles that don't get read can't help people grow.

The points in the article are worded strongly so as to provoke an internal reaction. The wording makes you consider whether you agree or disagree with each point. It's hard to remain neutral. This helps people consciously reconsider their beliefs. Do they like this definition of manliness or don't they? Why or why not? What qualities are positive? Which should be replaced? Do these qualities also apply to women?

It's good for people to object to points they don't agree with. It's also good for people to realize there are a lot of different viewpoints out there.

I've learned through trial and error (writing more than 700 free articles) that strongly worded points that provoke an internal reaction are more helpful to people in their pursuit of growth. Such articles push people to decide what's right for them, helping them to achieve greater clarity.

Learning cannot occur unless expectations are violated. If all expectations are met, there can be no learning and no growth; at best old patterns are merely reinforced. So in order to help people grow, I must continue to find ways to violate their expectations.

Consequently, you can expect me to continue to write articles that are designed to provoke an internal reaction, polarizing you to agree or disagree. My goal isn't to convince people to agree or disagree with me one way or the other. It's to help people consciously decide what's right for them.

Personally I'm glad to see you don't agree with the points in the article. It means you're consciously deciding for yourself. That takes courage.

[Savage]

Originally Posted by cylon

Because masculinity is shamed in our culture.

. . .

So you have a generation of men feeling this inherited guilt. I know I grew up that way. Shame for being masculine. Now mix that in with misguided men listening to women tell them what they want (sweet, sensitive, expresses his feelings, communicates, doesn't have an ego) yet observing these same women hooking up with the opposite of that, and you've got confusion and guilt.

I agree. I think it's unfortunate that attributes like courage, honor, decisiveness, and persistence are practically being bred out of the male side of the culture, replaced by a "no man's land" of fuzzy, unfulfilling roles.

It seems like men are fed several poor models, such as:

• the brainless and/or violent action hero
• the wimpy sitcom character
• the competitive, shallow businessman

We're taught that our highest values should found be among victory, success, money, family, and stupid acts of bravado. But none of those values can lead to fulfillment; they only weaken us.

The vision of the neutered, androgenous man is just as wrong as the violent action hero.

[Plato]

Yeah, modern society has issues. One philosopher (MacIntyre) says that the role models are the bureaucratic manager (as you said), the therapist (our replacement for priests) and wealthy aesthetes (e.g. Californian wine "experts").

Thomist values are the way forward he says, but this requires particular social structures to operate. The alternative comes from Nietzsche (the true moral philosopher of modernity, they say) who says set your own standards...

[Bitsy]

Originally Posted by cylon

I believe in our culture now, women are perceived as these mystical, complex creatures (like the funny book Steve linked to) beyond comprehension, and men are perceived as kind of simple, barbaric creatures who are behind the times, like their role has sort of evolved away. So to compensate for this masculinity, women adopted it in themselves to make up for the male leadership that disappeared in their lives, and men took on the female characteristics they were shamed into adopting, ie if they didn't become more feminine and "get with the program", they were not going to be with these women who were shaming them for following their natural instincts.

I agree with this. I'm a girl, but sometimes it looks like I must be the only one on the planet who has felt oppressed by the "feminist" movement, because all others seem to be with it. My mother was in the original "feminist" generation and I grew up suppressing anything I knew in me to be feminine for fear of what she would think or say or feel about me. I had to suppress every feeling I felt to be me because I knew it was feminine, and I knew I had by nature many of the feminine qualities and I think my mother hated feminine qualities. I was afraid to do anything for any man, get him coffee, wash dishes, anything nice at all, not even just for men but for any person, anything that put me in a role my mother would hate, and I had and have by nature a very strong sort of...loving, nurturing and maternal feeling that I have to suppress. I can't even verbalize it because I'm still embarrassed about it.

If it hadn't been for men over the years being more receptive and accepting of me and my more feminine sides, I would be much worse off now. I still don't feel so comfortable with a lot of women though, because I feel the hostility to what I know is feminine, I feel it towards men's masculinity and I feel it towards my own feminine nature.

P.S. I also want to mention that I really love and embrace being feminine, I long to express it and I love my feminine qualities and I'm afraid I just wrote something taboo...but loving it adds to the difficulty in dealing with having to hide it.

[cylon]

Wow great post Bitsy.

[cylon]

And it's kind of sad that expressing your fundamental nature is considered "taboo" because of group-think. What you're expressing is how many men feel about the same thing, expressing their masculine nature... because they feel it's taboo as well.

Which I guess is one of the points of this thread.

All I can say is as a man, and I'm sure you've experienced this, is the qualites you've listed are exactly what a man is attracted to, when he feels he's loved and being looked after, (even in simple ways) at that point we're basically done. Putty in your hands.

[Bitsy]

Originally Posted by cylon

And it's kind of sad that expressing your fundamental nature is considered "taboo" because of group-think. What you're expressing is how many men feel about the same thing, expressing their masculine nature... because they feel it's taboo as well.

Yes, I know. That's why I have always sympathized on the "wrong" side of my gender and stuck up for the men when I've been among girls.

[Marco Polo]

Originally Posted by Bitsy

Yes, I know. That's why I have always sympathized on the "wrong" side of my gender and stuck up for the men when I've been among girls.

Wow, that's rare. That's a nice thing to hear; girls like you still exist.

What could men do better to make others like you shed that social conditioning though? Would you say men are "rewarding" the wrong type of girls?

[Playlife]

The central theme here seems to be that those of us who disagree with the article have been tramuatized into shaming our masculine side. Well, let me tell you, that is most certainly not the case with me(although I agree with the notion in mass media that women are somehow not understandable and men are simpler than a screwdriver).

What this article seems to do is suppress the masculine side of women and the feminine side of men(shaming them, to use the language used here). I don't know if it is more desirable to be one or another, or both simultaneously. Maybe it depends on the particular person a lot, I personally don't want to limit myself.

[Savage]

We're now up to 20 submissions for "How to Be a Woman."

It's interesting to see some common themes running through these, some ideas aligning with points in the "How to Be a Man" article, others going in new directions.