Damn, Kim' site seems to be down. Grrrrrrrrrrrrr........

I'm not like that because my wife told me if I kept acting like that I'd never get laid.

My wife told me that if I ever stopped acting like that I'd never get laid. She put only a hold on the racing of cars, not a complete stop. For her sanity.

So, how do you solve this feminization? Do you want a return to the 50s? Women staying home, cooking, cleaning. Love, honor, and OBEY? What I see when I look at the young men I know is not men who are more feminine, but men who have been freed from stereotypes. If you want to be a gun-toting hard dude, do so. But you can also hold and kiss your babies, and even change a diaper. I see men more involved in the raising and nurturing of their children than 50 years ago. I can't believe that's a bad thing. I have to tell you I don't think the young men of today are any less masculine than were the young men of my youth. If some of you feel that way, well, perhaps that's another issue. If I were a man, I think I would want a strong independent woman. Then I would know that if she stayed with me, it was because she loved and respected me, not because I was a meal ticket. There was far too much of that before. How much manly self-esteem can there be when the only reason a woman stays is she can't make a living?

I want an even medium. In the 50's and before we were to one side, we are now all the way to the other.

What you aren't seeing in the young men you know is the fear that they have of women. Say something that could be construed as offensive (even if what they hear is nothing like what he said) and he is out of a job and will have a hard time finding work in their field afterwards.

Have sex with a girl and a year later she regrets it, you're a rapist. Her name is protected, but his is lauded far and wide. And it doesn't really matter if it even goes to trial, he might as well leave town.

I do see the boys of today being less 'sterotypically' masculine. I also see the schools turning out plenty of highly intelligent girls but few boys of that caliber.

One of the main reasons I married the woman I did is because she was strong and independant. I've dated dishrags in the past and found them boring. She married me because I am strong enough to take care of just about anything I or she needs, but smart enough to know when she wants to do something by herself or to ask when I need help.

On the other hand, I know at least three other fellas (the oldest is younger than me by 5 years) who are dishrags. They get walked on by their wives, their needs come last, and the one who has children gets disrespected by his kids. Learned behavior from listening to mom.

His wife is happy though. Except when I come over.

I don't know, while Mr. du Toit has some telling points as does AK, I don't really feel any great pressure here. Maybe that's just me, maybe because I live in a smallish size midwest town where the trends always come late. Maybe because I open doors for my wife, stand until she sits, carry things for her. I think of that as respectful, and she isn't offended.

I change diapers, I watch the kids alot, but I also disciplne and enforce rules. I would put another man in the ground like a tent peg for disrespecting my wife and family, and she knows that. I've put a man a head taller flat on the ground with a knee in his chest to make that exact point. I'm just saying I don't feel any need to rant about this or prove anything.

My son will respect me, respect his mother, and look out for his sister, I was taught that, as he will be. I will fight to the death for them, he will too. If by living this way, other younger men feel somehow slighted or shamed, then that is their issue.

I think that some of us can embody the past without ignoring the future. Our marriage is something like the on screen John Wayne-Maureen O'Hara couple. Cross certain lines with me and we will fight, no debate about it,..but if I fall, beware my wife standing over me with a bat to defend her man.

She has steel that lady does.

Ak's reply to Cait is the clue I think, a middle ground. Strong men, strong women are a good match. Sharing, but still keeping an eye to certain traditional things like chivalry. It doesn't demean women, it teachs men to respect women.

There have always been henpecked men, just as there have always victims of domestic violence We've had this discussion before :). You're right that I'm not seeing the fear of women. As to the problem of men being accused of rape, that may well be. But over the centuries, how many women were raped, then accused of being whores, to excuse the behavior of their attacker? Or made to feel (and believe me, this still goes on) that it's her own fault she was raped. She shouldn't have had on that short skirt. It's pretty much the only crime I can think of in which the victim often gets blamed. And I believe the reason for this is that the overwhelming majority of victims are women. Maybe the overswing (although I'm not in agreement that there is an overswing) of the pendulum is a necessary correction to excesses of the past. The problems for men of which you speak have occurred in the last 40 years. The reppression of women has gone on since humans began to walk upright.

So would another 40 years or so even it up, Cait? How 'bout some reparations?

What the hell does the length of time women have been put down have to do with any of this? That type of moral equivalence is bullshit and you can take it elsewhere.

Same thing goes for the rape charges. Because some women were called whoress after they were raped makes it understandable for other women to file false charges? What the fuck is that?

Yes, there have always been henpecked men, but I do not believe that the percentage was always this high. And I do believe that it is an individuals choice to be henpecked. But when you have an institutionalized form of sexism forcing boys to not act like boys because it is deemed 'un-civilized', it makes it difficult for that to see their other options.

It wasn't so much about the length of time, AK, as about the force of the reaction. Of course it isn't acceptable for women to falsely accuse men of ANYTHING, any more than it was ever acceptable for men to use as a defense against rape that a woman had slept with someone else. I'm not dealing should be, but what is. The point I thought I was making had nothing to do with moral equivalence, as neither behavior is moral. It had to do with the concept that for every action there is an equal and opposite reaction. I think what we have seen for the last 40 years is the reaction (and perhaps overreaction) to what went before it. The pendulum swing, if you will.

As to "forcing boys to not act like boys" are only the boys being forced to act that way? I would assume that the girls are no longer allowed to play cowboys & Indians, etc. either (which I confess was one of our favorites when I was a girl). So, it seems to me this is less about gender roles (speaking of the schools) than it is about the educators' notions of warm and fuzzy. As one who grew up on Western shoot-'em-ups and has not killed anyone (yet) as a result of exposure to cinematic violence, I think we've gone way too far in attempting to blame society's ills on TV and cinema. I think it's because movies and TV shows are too damned loud. (I'm only partly kidding here). All that noise makes people frantic. Listen to Sesame Street sometime. Loud, screeching. Makes me jumpy. It's a wonder more kids don't commit homicides.