Did the Great Recession Make Men More “Well-Rounded?”
Eve Tahmincioglu at HuffPo has published a piece declaring 2013 the “Year of the Working Man,” contrary to all of the “End of Men” type stories. In particular, she noted that men
“took on even more responsibilities at home — either because they had to or more often than not, because they wanted to — a trend that our research has been documenting more than a decade.”
She further asserted that
“men found themselves wondering if there’s more to life than working all the time. All this, we argue, has not led to the end of men but can and will ultimately lead to more well-rounded male employees as a result.”
I will be curious to see how this plays out. A lot of men still get, and want to get, their identity through work and providing. Similarly, I think the nature of work is changing, away from the full-time permanent job with benefits, and this is going to present challenges to both men and women, even more so to those men who insist on a job as a source of identity.
Image courtesy of Wikimedia Commons
Men were saying this stuff last year and probably the year before and earlier.
For a lot of men the recession was a chance for us to realize that we are more than our jobs and incomes. We actually had the chance to consider our own well (despite the constant assurance that we already only think about ourselves).
As tim says though a lot of guys are still lost and could use a hand.
I thought this might be an article about how men care too much about work. And it is. The Great Recession did not produce the Year of Men. The Great recession broke a lot of men. And it is still happening. Some will not recover. Telling them to find their worth in housework and to stop caring about their jobs, their livelihoods and their vocations is just rubbing salt in open wounds. And those who claim this know it. I was fortunate enough not to go through this myself, through sheer chance and luck. But I know many – many… Read more »
The “end of men” is just so patently illogical. Let’s say for the sake of argument that men are extinct now. Let’s say that men don’t exist anymore. Yet, in many ways society is still afraid of men. Then that means society is afraid of something that doesn’t exist. That’s stupid, stop being afraid of men. When women complain about men, if men don’t exist, then women are therefore complaining about nothing. That is literally complaining about something nonexistent. So, stop complaining about something that doesn’t exist. If I am nothing or don’t exist, then society should really leave me… Read more »