True, this title may not fit with what you've seen so far up here, but let me explain. The sitcom (for those who don't know) centres around a man, his brother and nephew and his various exploits with girls. This isn't what I wanted to talk about. What I wanted to talk about was a 'half man', or someone who is a man in all but actions, ie, someone who looks like a man, talks like a man etc but doesn't act like a man. He may be a 'kid', he may be a chauvinist or a misogynist, he may be a slob but what ever he is, he isn't a Man. Read here what you will about my views on certain things; I hope to explain.
A man (according to the dictionary) is any human male, but we tag extras on this definition, requiring a man to be 'manly' - or courageous, strong and masculine (note here not effeminate, a trap that I think that the modern man has fallen into) - to become what is referred to as a 'real man'. This doesn't mean that a man is, to quote Mark Driscoll, someone who can belch the loudest or fart the stinkiest (despite these being qualities that we associate with the male of the species), but someone, I would argue, who is a) willing to stand up for himself, his family and friends (especially those who need help in these things) and what he believes in and is willing to stick his neck out for these things and b) able to pull his own weight in life, business (if that's what he's in). There are other criteria that may feature, but these are the main ones.
Does this mean that a female can be a man? No; a woman may be manlike or mannish, but we tend to look at this as something that isn't normal. But what about what Sandra Bartky says about "We are born male or female, but not masculine or feminine" Not really; if you stick the average 3 year old boy in a room and give him the choice to play babies or cops and robbers he will in 9 out of 10 cases pick cops and robbers and the reverse is true of the average 3 year old girl - these things are wired into our brains at birth. Should we allow children to make up their own minds about whether they are really a boy or a girl? Why not, most of the time they will stick with what they know.
Now I hope that the crux of this is a call for males to be MEN: people who will look after himself and his 'peeps'. This is something that we all should do, but especially men who have been (depending on which view you subscribe to) seemingly designed or evolved for this purpose - something that we have lost in this day and age.
A man (according to the dictionary) is any human male, but we tag extras on this definition, requiring a man to be 'manly' - or courageous, strong and masculine (note here not effeminate, a trap that I think that the modern man has fallen into) - to become what is referred to as a 'real man'. This doesn't mean that a man is, to quote Mark Driscoll, someone who can belch the loudest or fart the stinkiest (despite these being qualities that we associate with the male of the species), but someone, I would argue, who is a) willing to stand up for himself, his family and friends (especially those who need help in these things) and what he believes in and is willing to stick his neck out for these things and b) able to pull his own weight in life, business (if that's what he's in). There are other criteria that may feature, but these are the main ones.
Does this mean that a female can be a man? No; a woman may be manlike or mannish, but we tend to look at this as something that isn't normal. But what about what Sandra Bartky says about "We are born male or female, but not masculine or feminine" Not really; if you stick the average 3 year old boy in a room and give him the choice to play babies or cops and robbers he will in 9 out of 10 cases pick cops and robbers and the reverse is true of the average 3 year old girl - these things are wired into our brains at birth. Should we allow children to make up their own minds about whether they are really a boy or a girl? Why not, most of the time they will stick with what they know.
Now I hope that the crux of this is a call for males to be MEN: people who will look after himself and his 'peeps'. This is something that we all should do, but especially men who have been (depending on which view you subscribe to) seemingly designed or evolved for this purpose - something that we have lost in this day and age.
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