Is our postmodern, postindustrial society simply better suited to women than to men? Hanna Rosin makes the case for this claim in the current issue of The Atlantic, and her article demands close attention. Men, she argues, are simply falling behind women in almost every sector of cultural influence and economic power. This shift, she understands, is nothing less than unprecedented in the span of human history.

Rosin begins her article with the fact that sex-selection technologies in the West are now more often used to select a preference for girls than for boys, reversing the historical trend. Why? She explains: “Man has been the dominant sex since, well, the dawn of mankind. But for the first time in human history, that is changing—and with shocking speed. Cultural and economic changes always reinforce each other. And the global economy is evolving in a way that is eroding the historical preference for male children, worldwide.”

Rosin’s article is well documented and forceful in argument. The bottom line is the claim that the trend and trajectory of the global economy have for some time now been headed toward female skills and talents. At the most basic level, this means a shift from physical strength to intellectual energies and education. At the next level, it also means a shift from leadership models more associated with males toward the nurturing leadership more associated with women. In any event, the changes are colossal.

Nothing has brought this into clearer sight than the current global recession. In the United States, the recession has been dubbed a “he-cession,” due to the fact that three-quarters of the 8 million jobs lost were lost by men. Even more devastating to men, most of these jobs will not return, given the vast changes the recession has brought about. “The worst-hit industries were overwhelmingly male and deeply identified with macho: construction, manufacturing, high finance. Some of these jobs will come back,” Rosin predicts, “but the overall pattern of dislocation is neither temporary nor random.”

It’s not just the United States, either. In Iceland, Prime Minister Johanna Sigurdardottir (the first openly-lesbian head of state) ran her campaign for office with a pledge to end the “age of testosterone.”

But the picture in the United States is particularly striking. For the first time in the nation’s history, women now outnumber men in the workforce. The working class, “which has long defined our notions of masculinity,” Rosin argues, is “slowly turning into a matriarchy, with men increasingly absent from the home and women making all the decisions.”

Why? “The postindustrial economy is indifferent to men’s size and strength. The attributes that are most valuable today — social intelligence, open communication, the ability to sit still and focus — are, at a minimum, not predominately male.”

Rosin actually makes two main points, and both demand attention. The first has to do with what is taking place in working class families. The matriarchy Rosin describes is now coming more fully into view. In many cases, it is husbands and fathers who are unemployed and wives and mothers who have paying jobs. This means a huge shift in male function, and many men just exit the family process or forfeit decision making. Rosin refers to these men as “casualties of the end of the manufacturing era.” Across the nation, older men are increasingly unemployed and younger men face little hope of a job in this sector — the virtual birthright of previous generations.

Of the fifteen job classifications marked for future growth, men dominate only two: janitorial services and computer engineering. The same pattern is now extending to managerial and professional roles, where women currently hold 51.4 percent of jobs. Why are women gaining and men falling behind? Rosin explains:

They make up 54 percent of all accountants and hold about half of all banking and insurance jobs. About a third of America’s physicians are now women, as are 45 percent of associates in law firms—and both those percentages are rising fast. A white-collar economy values raw intellectual horsepower, which men and women have in equal amounts. It also requires communication skills and social intelligence, areas in which women, according to many studies, have a slight edge. Perhaps most important—for better or worse—it increasingly requires formal education credentials, which women are more prone to acquire, particularly early in adulthood.

Beyond the numbers, Rosin reports that office environments and corporate cultures are adapting to women, as well, reshaped by the gender transformation of the last twenty-five years.

And yet, even after all this, Rosin makes her most powerful argument when she looks, not at the current workforce, but at what is happening on America’s college and university campuses. There, she explains, “we can see with absolute clarity that in the coming decades the middle class will be dominated by women.”

She continues:

We’ve all heard about the collegiate gender gap. But the implications of that gap have not yet been fully digested. Women now earn 60 percent of master’s degrees, about half of all law and medical degrees, and 42 percent of all M.B.A.s. Most important, women earn almost 60 percent of all bachelor’s degrees—the minimum requirement, in most cases, for an affluent life. In a stark reversal since the 1970s, men are now more likely than women to hold only a high-school diploma. “One would think that if men were acting in a rational way, they would be getting the education they need to get along out there,” says Tom Mortenson, a senior scholar at the Pell Institute for the Study of Opportunity in Higher Education. “But they are just failing to adapt.”

While many theories to explain this pattern have been offered, no one can argue with the numbers. Boys are clearly falling behind girls in both educational achievement and aspiration. The long-term consequences of this shift are momentous and virtually impossible to reverse in a single generation. This pattern has vast implications for marital prospects, since women express a strong preference to marry a man of equal or greater educational and professional potential. The collapse of the marriage culture within the working class, Rosin argues, is due to the fact that women are in control and have set expectations “too high for the men around them to meet.”

Hanna Rosin’s article is not the first salvo of information on these troubling trends, but the fact that The Atlantic chose her essay as a cover story is itself evidence of how this phenomenon is taking hold of attention, even among the elites.

For Christians, the importance of this article is even greater. God intended for men to have a role as workers, reflecting God’s own image in their vocation. The most important issue here is not the gains made by women, but the displacement of men. This has undeniable consequences for these men and for everyone who loves and depends on them.

The failure of boys to strive for educational attainment is a sign of looming disaster. Almost anyone who works with youth and young adults will tell you that, as a rule, boys are simply not growing up as fast as girls. This means that their transition to manhood is stunted, delayed, and often incomplete. Meanwhile, the women are moving on.

What does it mean for large sectors of our society to become virtual matriarchies? How do we prepare the church to deal with such a world while maintaining biblical models of manhood and womanhood?

The elites are awakening to the fact that these vast changes point to a very different future. Christians had better know that matters far more important than economics are at stake. These trends represent nothing less than a collapse of male responsibility, leadership, and expectations. The real issue here is not the end of men, but the disappearance of manhood.

© Dr. Albert Mohler
www.albertmohler.com

The highlight of the afternoon was the famous “Burn Your Bra” Freedom Trash Can. With elaborate ceremony and shouts of joy, the protesters threw away what they identified as male-promoted “instruments of torture”–high-heeled shoes, corsets, girdles, padded bras, stockings, false eyelashes, curlers, and copies of Playboy, Cosmopolitan, and Ladies Home Journal. They shouted “Freedom for Women!” and “No More Miss America” and hung a banner from the balcony reading “Women’s Liberation.”

The display marked the cultural launch of feminism—the philosophy that women have the right to define their own existence. Feminists argued that women had been wrongly defined by men as housewives and/or sex objects. They reasoned that women would find happiness, wholeness, and self-respect when they had the freedom to define themselves. And culture promptly set about giving them the power and right to do so.

Fast forward to 2010.

Last week, Miss USA released the official contestant photos of  51 pageant hopefuls. The look? Lacy black lingerie, fishnets, smudged kohl eyeliner, knee-high boots, stilettos, voluptuous cleavage, and naked flesh, the like of which have traditionally been associated with prostitutes and porn stars, not beauty queens.  The photo shoot, entitled “Waking up in Vegas,” featured steamy, seductive Playboy-like poses on a large bed and other bedroom furniture.

Rima Fakih made history as the first Arab-American to win the pageant. Besides being crowned Miss USA, she also has the dubious distinction of procuring top honors in a pole dancing competition. What’s even more startling than her lewd behavior, is that this behavior is supported by women. It’s women who uphold the right of Fakih and other contestants to break the “princess, good-girl” stereotype. According to female organizers, princess is passé – but the woman who exerts her sexual power is smart, sophisticated, and worthy of a Miss USA title.

What was once considered exploitative is now considered empowering.

How did this happen? The feminists of the past protested against the sexual objectification of women. Thus, it would appear that modern women have rejected the tenets of feminism. Ironically, however, quite the opposite is true. The raunch culture of today is due to the fact that young women have so thoroughly embraced feminist thought.

Feminism taught the new generation that:

1. Men have historically deprived women of power and freedom
2. Women need to reclaim their power and freedom
3. Women exert power and freedom by rejecting the restrictive, male-defined roles and boundaries of Judeo-Christianity
4. Women have the right to define their own behavior
5. Women have the right to define what womanhood is all about

The daughters of the feminist generation were raised on these ideas. They embraced them and took them to heart. Since sex is power, what better way for women to exert their power than through sexuality? They concluded that Girl Power is best expressed by throwing off all boundaries and becoming brazenly sexual. The Spice Girls, The Sex & the City stars, and celebrities such as Britney Spears, Paris Hilton and Lindsay Lohan all modeled the idea that empowerment equals the right to be raunchy. The idea quickly caught on.

Joe Francis, the Hugh Hefner of Gen X and founder of the Girls Gone Wild porn video series, capitalized on the trend. Accompanied by his camera crews, Francis visited beaches, nightclubs, and parties across America seeking “everyday” college-age women who would flash their breasts, make out with each other, and be sexually lewd on camera in exchange for GGW-emblazoned T-shirts or hats. Francis raked in as much as forty million dollars a year from the sale of these videos. When asked why he thought thousands of young women were so eager to exhibit themselves for his cameras, so willing to objectify themselves in exchange for trucker hats and tank tops, Francis simply said: “It’s empowering. It’s freedom.”

This generation thinks that raunch equals power and freedom. Newsweek has dubbed this, “The Girls Gone Wild Effect.” Nowadays, raunchy sexuality has become the prevalent expression of a woman’s freedom and power.

Joe Francis sees the Girl-Gone-Wild phenomenon as the ultimate expression of feminism. Muzi Mei, the Carrie Bradshaw of Beijing who became a superstar by blogging about her sexual conquests, agrees. She told a reporter, “I express my freedom through sex. It’s my life, and I can do what I want.”

It’s the ultimate irony that the foundational beliefs of feminism have contributed to the increased sexual objectification and pornographication of women. Society’s thorough acceptance of feminist precepts is one of the reasons why behavior that was seen as destructive in 1968 is celebrated as desirable in 2010. When Miss America 1968 appeared in an evening gown and swimwear at the bequest of men, feminism identified her as “exploited.” But when Miss USA 2010 appears in fishnet stockings in sexy bedroom porn, and boldly rejects social convention by entering a pole dancing competition—and does so of her own choice, self-determination and exerting her right to freedom—she embraces and lives out feminism’s core tenets. Given a feminist belief system, culture has no choice but to identify her brash, immoral behavior as“empowered.”

Feminism didn’t provide the answer for woman’s happiness, wholeness, and self-identity. It’s just led us further away from the truth. Girls, I’ve said it before, and I’ll say it again…. I think the time is ripe for a new movement—a seismic holy quake of counter-cultural men and women who dare to take God at his word, those who have the courage to stand against the popular tide, and believe and delight in God’s plan for male and female. A revolution of women embracing God’s design is the needed antidote to counter the self-deterministic feminist mindset that unwittingly justifies the Miss USA type of madness.

© Mary A. Kassian

When I was working in rehab medicine in the early eighties, one of my patients was a 24-year old single woman who suffered a stroke from taking the pill, and as a result, was confined to a wheelchair for the rest of her life. That was my first clue that the pill wasn’t as safe and wonderful as the pharmaceutical companies made it out to be. In the seventies and eighties, thousands of women died or were disabled after suffering blood clots or strokes related to the medication.

The pill contains synthetic hormones that override the normal hormonal functions of a woman’s body to prevent ovulation. This is not a natural state for any woman, and opponents warn that women who use the pill leave themselves susceptible to major medical problems that may not show up until later in life. Even though the levels of hormones in the pill have been reduced, the side effects of taking the pill are still complex and long lasting.

Many claim that the pill is responsible for serious long-term medical conditions such as infertility, cancers, strokes, and blood clots. Furthermore, women can experience symptoms like weight gain, breast engorgement and tenderness, bloating, mood swings, severe PMS, and headaches. A recent study in the Journal of Sexual Medicine indicates that the pill can lower a woman’s sexual desire, and lead to sexual dysfunction.

Just last month, about 800 Canadians filed a class-action lawsuit alleging the maker of several popular new-generation pills have put sales ahead of safety, and have caused young women to suffer complications ranging from blood clots and high blood pressure, to cardiac arrest and death. While the allegations haven’t been proven in court, the claims filed last month say that the birth control pills, Yaz and Yasmin, have caused blood clots, gallbladder problems, high blood pressure, cardiac arrest, stroke and at least seven deaths in Canada and more than 50 in the United States. A class action suit in the US is pending. The law groups behind the class action argue that the Pharmaceutical Company concealed the adverse effects of its products from regulatory authorities and from the public and failed to warn customers of the medical risk of birth control pills.

The medical risk alone ought to have curbed society’s enthusiasm for the pill. But the fact is, the pill’s development was championed by women with a specific philosophical worldview. Margaret Sanger, for instance, raised large sums of money to underwrite the research. Sanger, an atheist, birth control activist, advocate of eugenics, and founder of Planned Parenthood, anticipated that the advent of the pill would enable the wholesale advancement of her agenda. And therein lays the rub. Medical hazards aside, the pill has supported the advancement of ideas, attitudes and behaviours that are markedly unbiblical. For example:

1. The mindset that sex can be separated from marriage and children
2. The mindset that sex is primarily about personal pleasure
3. The thought that there ought to be no consequence to sex outside of marriage
4. An increased tolerance & acceptance of immorality
5. A decreased commitment to marriage and family
6. An unbiblical attitude toward children (commodity or burden)
7. A negative attitude toward motherhood
8. A negation of the distinctions between male and female
9. A devaluation of woman’s role in the home
10. The attitude that marriage/family are of lesser priority & value than self/career
11. The exaltation of self and devaluation of others (exalt individual over community)
12. The illusion that we can control our own fertility
13. The focus on personal rights rather than responsibility
14. The mindset that women have the right and power to set their own course
15. The mindset that humans determine what sex, marriage and gender are all about

The pill was not a benign medical advance. It was introduced to advance a particular worldview and philosophy. The approval of the birth-control pill in 1960 ushered in the sexual revolution, buttressed the feminist movement, changed the nature of the relationship between the sexes, and dramatically transformed the shape of society. And women, en masse, have swallowed it. The most recent government data indicates that more than eight in 10 American women, ages 15 to 44, have taken the pill at some point in their lives.

So how do you, as a Christian woman, decide whether you should take the birth control pill? First, it’s important that you ensure that your mindset toward sex, marriage, and children is not based on culture, but on the Word of God.  Do you value marriage and children as the Lord does?  Do you honor His design for sex and gender? Do you welcome children as a precious gift? Does your attitude toward womanhood and motherhood line up with His? Are you seeking God’s input and heart on the matter? Are you allowing the Lord to direct your life, or are you the one dictating the terms? Have you considered the option of bucking the trend and allowing the Lord to determine the number and timing of your children? Are you asking the Lord about how to approach family planning? Have you prayed about how many children He wants you to have? Have you examined whether your views are shaped by culture or by the Bible?

I don’t believe that we can make hard and fast rules about the use of birth control, but I do believe that regrettably, our mindset toward sex, marriage, children and motherhood are often more influenced by the world than the Word. Make sure that you ask yourself the hard questions. Wrestle with what the Bible teaches about the value of children and the meaning of sex… And examine the willingness of your heart to obey.

Second, do not be naive to the potential negative side effects of taking the pill. Don’t think that it couldn’t happen to you. Those women who suffered strokes, heart attacks, and who died didn’t think it would happen to them, either—nor did those who, several years down the road, find themselves struggling with infertility or frigidity. There is a definite risk involved with taking the pill. I advise women who want to use birth control to consider alternate methods to delay pregnancy, or alternate medical treatments for their conditions. Do some research and make sure you are well informed before making a decision.

Pharmaceutical companies, the medical community, and birth control advocates have promoted the pill as a safe, normal part of womanhood—the key to woman’s power and freedom. But in reviewing the risks and the cultural fall-out, I think that the pill has had an overall negative impact on women. This is one golden anniversary that I wouldn’t exactly call a happy one.

© Mary A. Kassian

A visit to your local college or university campus is likely to reveal that a revolution has taken place. On many campuses, young women now outnumber young men, and a gender gap of momentous importance is staring us in the face.

This gender gap has been growing for some time now, as successive generations of young women have entered the world of higher education. Yet, no one seemed to see a gap of this magnitude coming — until it had already happened.

The disparity of enrollment by gender varies by institution, but it is now estimated that almost 60% of all undergraduate students enrolled in American colleges and universities are women. This represents something altogether new in human experience since the rise of the university model as the dominant learning environment for young adults.  For the first time, a generation of young women will be markedly more educated than their male generational cohort.

Is this a bad thing . . . a negative development? Yes — and profoundly so. The problem is not the larger enrollment of young women in colleges and universities. The problem is the phenomenon of missing young men, whose absence spells big trouble for the future.

The numbers point to the problem, but do not explain it. Explanations for the phenomenon of missing young men point to the fact that girls outperform boys at every level in grades K-12, and are thus more ready for the college experience than the boys. Other factors include economic and cultural patterns. Among some ethnic groups, the disparity between men and women entering college is far greater than 60% to 40%. Many young men consider the educational environment to be frustrating, constricting, and overly feminized. Others have lost confidence that an undergraduate education will lead to a job with adequate income and stability. Whatever the reason, their absence makes a big difference on the college campus today — and will make an even bigger difference in the larger society in years ahead.

The New York Times offered an unusually candid portrait of this gender disparity in “The New Math on Campus,” published in its February 5, 2010 edition. Reporter Alex Williams described a radically transformed social scene on some of today’s largest and most historic state universities.

The University of North Carolina, for example:

North Carolina, with a student body that is nearly 60 percent female, is just one of many large universities that at times feel eerily like women’s colleges. Women have represented about 57 percent of enrollments at American colleges since at least 2000, according to a recent report by the American Council on Education. Researchers there cite several reasons: women tend to have higher grades; men tend to drop out in disproportionate numbers; and female enrollment skews higher among older students, low-income students, and black and Hispanic students.

Williams described a campus filled with young women who socialize with each other out of necessity — there are just not enough young men on campus. As Williams notes, this makes some college campuses resemble retirement communities, where women also generally outnumber men.

On the secular university campus, the gender imbalance has forced adjustments in the “hooking up” culture of sexual negotiation.  As Williams reports:

“If a guy is not getting what he wants, he can quickly and abruptly go to the next one, because there are so many of us,” said Katie Deray, a senior at the University of Georgia, who said that it is common to see six provocatively clad women hovering around one or two guys at a party or a bar.

This is a portrait of demographic disaster, and the imbalance is not limited to secular campuses or students. Even as women now outnumber men in baccalaureate programs, they also indicate a desire to marry a man with equal or greater educational attainments. As the numbers now make clear, many of these young women will be disappointed.

Christian parents and all concerned with the coming generation should look closely at this phenomenon and ask the hard question — why is it that so many young men are falling behind in educational attainment? What are we doing that allows or encourages boys to exit formal education at their earliest opportunity? Why do we accept at face value the fact that boys fall behind girls of the same age in maturity and educational level? Why is college now an aspiration for far more young women than young men?

These are hard questions, but the answers will be even harder. We have allowed the development of an elongated boyhood and delayed adulthood. We frustrate them in school and then wonder why they bolt at the first exit from the classroom. We allow boys and young men to forfeit their futures.

All this might be different if the missing young men on our college and university campuses were missing for some good reason — such as military service or similar deployment. But, even as young men are more likely to join the military, the numbers do not explain the differential on campus.

Biblical manhood requires that young men grow up, assume adult responsibilities, and prepare for leadership and service in the home, in the church, and in the larger society.

This much is clear — if this trend is not reversed, the college campus will not be the only place these young men are found missing.

© Dr. Al Mohler

One of the displayed novelty items that caught my eye was a small box called “The Betty Boop Man-Training Kit.” It contained a small collectible Gumby-type Betty Boop doll, about 2 inches tall, displayed behind a heart-shaped window.  Betty Boop’s kiss print was prominent on the front of the box.

There’s nothing unusual about the idea that scantily clad Betty would use her seductive charm and kisses to “train” a man. The classic Betty Boop, and women throughout history, have used that tact. But the other message on the box was startling. With capital letters and an exclamation mark, Betty Boop’s modern Man-Training Kit encouraged women to “WHIP HIM GOOD!” — The innocent looking big-eyed Betty Boop doll sported a formidable black whip in her hand for that very purpose.

The back of the box advises:

“Is your man behaving more like “Man’s Best Friend”? Teach your old dog new tricks with the help of a sexy, sweet, and sassy classic–Betty Boop! This kit includes a one-of-a-kind bendable Betty Boop figurine with whip in hand and a 32-page Betty-style man-training manual.”

The training manual is filled with all sorts of exhortations to the reader about what Mr. Handsome ought to be doing for her – things like stroking her ego, respecting her opinions, knowing her shoe size, serving her breakfast in bed, respecting animals (?!), sending her flowers, massaging her feet, ensuring that he doesn’t smell bad, taking her out, learning to cook, keeping an umbrella handy, opening doors for her.  The final piece of advice is for girls to forever remember that “no man is entitled to your ‘Boop oop a doop!’ He has to earn it!”

There’s no doubt that this “Man-Training Kit” is meant to be cute and funny, but it contains a number of subtle, disturbing, underlying messages:

1. Men are like animals.
2. Women have a right to have men serve them.
3. It’s up to a woman to “train” her man to behave properly.
4. A woman can control her man through sexuality and/or aggression.
5. A woman  can use a whip (punishment) to force her man to do what she wants.
6. A woman should use sex as a reward and/or punishment.

What is particularly disturbing is that if roles were reversed so it were Bobby instead of Betty Boop- if  Bobby were encouraged to “WHIP HER GOOD!; if Bobby called Betty his “old dog”; if Bobby had an attitude of entitlement and forcibly demanded that Betty serve and obey him; if Bobby had demands for Betty’s behavior without any parameters for his own  – we’d decry this novelty item as demeaning, abusive, oppressive, and horribly offensive. Bookstores wouldn’t carry it.

Modern-day women are being encouraged to become the very thing that the feminists of the sixties condemned. Betty Boop’s Man-Training Kit demonstrates that popular culture is cultivating a generation of women who feel superior, and are demeaning, abusive, oppressive, and horribly offensive toward men.

© Mary A. Kassian