Gentlemen in Training
The Case for Manners for Today’s Young Men – Part 6
It’s official: men are creeps. Correction: the flurry of sexual predators, harassers, and the like are creeps. Now is their reckoning. Terrific! Let’s let them all slouch off to therapy in the hot Arizona desert, never to work in politics, sports, showbiz, or wherever.
It would be easy to say that all of this is just generational. Weinstein, Spacey, Trump, Rose, Laurer, et al, are all on the back nine. With their rambunctious youth behind them, perhaps they simply needed to justify their toxic masculinity by advancing on an innocent or subordinate younger person.
It would be easy to say that is about power. The recent fallen, all pedestaled and fixed on the notion that they can have and do whatever they want with no repercussions.
It would also be easy to say that this is about biology. That men, horndogs by nature, must simply satisfy their urges by any means possible.
Age, power, biology, whatever—predatory sexual behavior is wrong, and we need to educate boys early in their sexual development how to identify it. Boys can only grow into gentlemen if they know there is a lady on the other end of the spectrum. It is incumbent on fathers who understand this to have conversations early and often with their sons about how men should respect and treat women. This conversation doesn’t begin and end at puberty. It starts now, when they’re still in their diapers.
I talk with my sons about Mommy, how she is a woman, and how she is the most important person in our home. We talk about their grandmothers and aunts, too. We talk about Miss Mary Ann their teacher, and Dr. Manuel, their pediatrician, Sylvie and Jessica their babysitters—all women, and all deserving of our respect and civilized treatment.
It’s an ongoing conversation that, though they may not understand it all right now, is part of their gentlemanly upbringing.
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Manners Matter: Part 1 of the Gentlemen in Training series
PC or Not PC: Part 2 of the Gentlemen in Training series
Brotherly Love: Part 3 of the Gentlemen in Training series
Gentleman Up: Part 4 of the Gentlemen in Training series
Pick Your Battles:Part 5 of the Gentlemen in Training series
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