Stanley Hall, who went on to influence John Dewey) founded the American Psychological Association, which reconstructed the failing enterprise of early 20th century German Psychology. Whether William James had a soul or not, he understood how people worked. In this article, I hope to answer that question by weaving a tapestry of universality and particularity that address several of the critical insights offered by Aaron Renn in this conversation’s inceptive article. So, where does that leave a man? Where does that leave, let’s say, me? Voltaire knew that a man can never hide from the particulars of his life in his cozy transcendental corner, and Kierkegaard knew that he cannot run from the terrors of transcendental dread through escapist indulgences, which he called “acts of despair.” I do this because all of them weigh equally on each man. I hope with these questions to descend from the transcendent to the immanent - from the universals of maleness to the particulars of maleness. It’s easy to Mad Lib our answers to these questions with theological tropes, but do they work? Can you give an informed and justified answer to any of these questions that comes within striking distance of certainty? These questions highlight the speculative nature of this conversation. These are not uncommon experiences in American male life-not as uncommon as we would think.
#A measure of a man full#
What are theologically (and socially) acceptable methods available to a man to cope with sub-optimal life circumstances? What should a man do when he wakes up full of suicidal anguish and can’t help but start drinking every day at 2pm? What should a man do when his wife leaves him for another man and sues to take his children? How should he respond when she documents all of his private failings before a judge as a means to remove his children from his custody? What is a contrite single father supposed to do after he strangles his son with an electrical cord in a drunken rage, and doesn’t remember the next day? What happens when he does it again the next weekend? What is the son supposed to do? What is the son supposed to do 20 years later when all of the Christian men in his life are telling him that he is too angry? What happens if a man crosses a boundary? What happens if he crosses it twice? What degree of punitive severity should he expect in proportion to the intensity of his transgressions? What opportunities are available to a man qua man? To what degree are those criteria fixed or flexible? Who sets them, and how, and do they take macro- and micro-social factors into account? Can we know the verdict? Can we appeal the criteria? How ought they to be understood and applied directly? People are exhausted by the issue of masculinity.īut what is a man, really? A collection of necessary properties? Operations? Can a man be uniquely evaluated meaningfully in any way? Can he fail? Can he do what he wishes? What liberties does he have-from whom, and to what? What rights is he able to exercise, and how are those rights sourced, defended, properly and improperly exercised, and most importantly, how are they bounded? Who draws the lines? How are they drawn? Where are they drawn? Why are they drawn there? Why does his maleness shade these questions with gendered idiosyncrasies? “Act like men, be strong.” -The Apostle Paul
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