Cultural Castration and the Manly Aristocracy of the Future

Rod's got the male fertility crisis; Andrew's got the manliness blog. I've got gents who're just not in the mood:

Peter Bell, Relate’s head of practice, said: “Men used to come to us with   impotence – now known as erectile insufficiency – but Viagra has sorted some   of that problem. What we have is a lot of men who say, as women did in the   1950s: 'I can have sex but I do not want to. It’s not rewarding’.

“It is a serious issue. It counts as a pychosexual dysfunction rather than   just a relationship problem, because these men haven’t simply gone off their   partner but off sex altogether.”

Changing sexual roles for men and women and increasing rates of depression   among men could be some of the reasons behind the change, he added.

I fully recognize these are Britons here we're dealing with, but unless this steady gooey drip of Apatow flicks scabs over soon, we could be looking at a very flaccid couple of generations. With of course exceptions at the margin, where the dictates of diverse pleasures require that there are at least a handful of active male members.

In all seriousness, I think we're a bit too accustomed to take our male stereotypes too seriously, excessively crediting nature for their maintenance. A whole rainbow of men not interested in being manly is now available for cultural reference and imprint -- the schlubby manchild, the bloodless bobo, the queeny TV divo, even, er, the suicide bomber. (Apologies for that last one: but obviously this isn't a moral equivalence story. It's about 'surplus' males in a bear market for manliness.) These unmanly stereotypes themselves can be violated in a manly way, so let's not debunk one caricature for another. But let's consider just how varied and powerful are the cultural side effects generated by the steady transformation of manliness into a niche vocation, and let's not be mistaken about their common source.

I'm even willing to admit that we are 'doomed', at least for now, to push forward with that transformation. But its natural terminus, as I hinted in half jest above, isn't the abolition of manliness but the creation of a small, insular, alienated aristocracy of manly men. Some of these, though not all, are in the army. Some are in business (and think that anyone who doesn't work for themselves isn't worth talking to). Some are artists (right?). And some are intellectuals (danger! danger!). All will keep alive and cultivate an interest in attracting the most desirable of women. The interesting question is whether there will be so many of these [edit: these women] going forward that even the unmanly men will have a relatively unprecedented easy time too. And then whether the manly aristocracy will move to counter that situation through 'polygamist compound' techniques -- punishing and banishing less manly men, while guarding against radical loser blowback.

This would make a highly amusing and grippingly popular sci fi series, you creative exec readers out there.

Comments

[Matt Frost]

Good stuff. But help me out here:

"The interesting question is whether there will be so many of these going forward that even the unmanly men will have a relatively unprecedented easy time too."

Does "these" refer to the aristocratic males or the "most desirable women?" I assume it's the latter that will be in abundance?

[James]

Yes, the women.