I find George Will’s arch conservatism dogmatic, predictable and boring. I am unsure of his marital status, but in my mind he is a Stepford husband - a robotic personification of WASP Americana. I wanted to get that cheap shot at George Will out of the way before I move on. It’s my blog and I’ll do what I want.
Regardless of my opinions of George Will’s politics, I admit he is very intelligent and I usually enjoy reading his column when I get a chance. His piece in the last issue of Newsweek was no exception. The Basement Boys is thought provoking, and I assure my chaste readers it is in no way a reference to any kind of pornography.
The article is an introduction to Gary Cross, a Penn State University historian, and his book, Men to Boys: The Making of Modern Immaturity. As best I could glean from Man George’s pithy commentary and a quick read of reviews, the book argues that late Baby Boomer and Gen X men are reluctant to ‘grow up’ because of a social deluge of woman’s liberation, permissive parenting, contemporary marketing’s fetish for youth, and the decline of positive male role models in American culture.
In short, American men are a self-indulgent tribe of Narcissistic teenagers grown old. Some hard data is given to support the analysis. The data includes declining male academic achievements, the number of men living at home with their parents (thus the title The Basement Boys), and a rising median age of when men marry.
Generally speaking, I wasn’t terribly impressed by all of this, and the only reason I read this far is because a female ‘friend’ on Facebook posted it and ranted about how American men suck. Whatever, her rants about the paucity of eligible bachelors on the planet are frequent and I don’t usually pay attention to them anyway, but I would if she was better looking.
The comment in the article about positive male role models struck home, and I became fixated. Man George writes:
“If you wonder what has become of manliness, he [Cross] says, note the differences between Cary Grant and Hugh Grant, the former, dapper and debonair, the latter, a perpetually befuddled boy.”
The best way to appeal to my short attention span is to mention movies and TV. Comparing the two Grants, which are obviously incomparable, did help drive Prof. Cross’s point home. Think about it, the Greatest Generation had Clark Gable, John Wayne, Gary Cooper, Jimmy Stewart, Humphrey Bogart and Cary Grant. These were men! You go away on a weekend fishing trip with these guys you’ll come back knowing how to slay Apache, seduce the most beautiful woman in the city, and maybe dispense a little wisdom to some children in between.
They were decisive, active, romantic, brave, tough, resourceful, witty, and masculine. Let’s face it, most men would follows those guys into battle or pray they were lucky enough to have them as a wingman in a nightclub – anybody out drinking with Carey Grant or John Wayne is going to get laid!
OK, then there’s the 60s, 70s and 80s; you have Steve McQueen, Paul Newman, Robert Redford, Robert Deniro, Al Pacino, Clint Eastwood and Dustin Hoffman, etc. Generally speaking, I have no complaints; they’re all great actors and more often than not their on-screen personas are strong masculine role models; except for Tootsie where Hoffman remarks “I was a better man as a woman…” This might be where the wheels start falling off male role models in Hollywood.
The 80s is a particularly weird decade; you have the rise of Richard Gere’s career right next to Stallone and Schwarzenegger. What is a young man supposed to think? I should wear Armani and accessorize with a 13-inch survival knife in case the Russians invade? INSERT YOUR OWN CHEAP GERBIL JOKE HERE.
From the late 80s, to the 90s and the dawn of 21st Century is suddenly when Hollywood’s dream machine stops producing great male role models. Seriously, George Clooney, Brad Pitt, Leonardo DiCaprio, Nicholas Cage, Johnny Depp, John Cusak, Matt Daemon, Keanu Reeves, Vince Vaughn, Jude Law and Robert Downy Jr.? These all seem like boys grown older. First of all, could you describe any of them as being “rugged”, not likely. Second, think about the characters they play, charismatic, self-doubting, womanizing and weak (if not physically than emotionally). Are any of them someone you want your son to grow up and be?
There are a few exceptions, Denzel Washington is stellar, and the second half of Tom Hanks’ career is as well; less you forget he started on Bosom Buddies. Let me reiterate, I blame Hollywood not the actors for the roles they played. Or to go a step further, I blame America audiences for demanding Hollywood feed us these pretty boys long on looks and short on character.
I owe it to George Will, and Prof. Cross, I have never properly appreciated this phenomenon of American culture before. However, I can readily admit I have heard some discussion on this topic by American women in China. For all I know, European woman are complaining about European men in the same way, but I doubt it.
I hear some (not all) American woman in China say single expat (read American) men in China are a bunch of degenerates with a Peter Pan syndrome, i.e. they never want to grow up. Let me try to summarize their argument, these men:
• Realize that as foreigners Chinese women might find them interesting, therefore shamelessly seize this opportunity to date and sleep with young attractive women.
• Realize that booze is cheap and bars are open around the clock in China, and for some reason expat society in general is susceptible to drunken abandonment, therefore a lot of 40 and 50 year old men party like they are still 20.
• Are far away from family and friends that might subliminally or otherwise nudge them towards marriage, a house in the suburbs, and a couple of dependents to declare on their taxes, and therefore indulge in the first two bullet points.
I am not a woman, so I might have missed some of my and my brethren’s failings, but you get the point. Life in China for American men can seem almost like a long college weekend that lasts for years. Don’t take my word for it; go to the source. The blog China Dirt was a forum for expat women to rant about how much expat men in China suck. The blog has the tagline ‘Could the men living in China get any more retarded? Here are the horror stories from the front lines.’
If you don’t have the patience to scan the blog for estrogen charged horror stories, here’s a review by the City Weekend. The blog seems defunct, either its writers moved home or expat men in China have stopped being lame. I suspect the bloggers moved to greener pastures.
So, where was I? Right, foreign (American) men in China are immature. This leads me to a solution for the Basement Boys. If you are the parent of an unwanted male child residing in your home and you want them to leave (either for your well being or their own) but you just don’t have the gumption to kick their dumb ass to the curb, then buy them a ticket to China.
Here’s why. First, any knucklehead American with a pulse can teach English in China; been there, done that. The money is not bad and you get to meet a lot of girls, be sure to tell your sons this. Second, they will be in good company, there are a lot of slackers, ne’er do wells, and slimy older men to keep them company; everybody needs drinking buddies. Third, man cannot live on woman and beer alone, I know, I’ve tried, man needs entertainment too. Pirated DVDs are $1, so you can get the box set of the Director’ Cut of the Lord of the Rings Trilogy and watch to your heart’s content during your 20 hour work week when you are not sleeping with one of your ‘language exchange partners’.
Look, I’m not writing anything any expat in China doesn’t already know. All I am dong is trying to reach out and help the Basement Boys. Writing as someone who is quickly approaching his 40s and who has spent the majority of his 20s and 30s in China, I know this place has the capacity to keep you chin deep in the quagmire of adolescent fantasy, God bless it! But it also has the ability to make a man out of you if that’s what you are trying to achieve.
My first job out of college and out of the purgatory of teaching English was as a chief representative for a small consulting firm in Beijing, I was 26, signed a couple dozen Fortune 500 companies as clients and managed Beijing operations. This isn’t experience I was likely to get back home climbing up the corporate ladder like everyone else. Before that, I backpacked all over China, these were adventures that taught me self reliance, important social skills, and an appreciation for how hard life is in the developing world, all things the Basement Boys could use a big dose of.
God help the millennial boys and their quest for manhood, especially the ones wearing makeup and have more parts of them pierced than an Amtrak ticket.
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