What We Should Do to Help Men

Three policies we can--and should--enact right away.

Everyone’s been talking about Democrats’ recent realization they need to do something to win more male voters. Unfortunately, as with everything political, the reaction is to be expected: cynicism, infighting, and mockery. It doesn’t help that Democrats always do these things in the most corporate, inauthentic way possible—they might want to start saying what they actually believe and being leaders as opposed to poll-testing everything to try to triangulate their messaging…just sayin’.

However, let’s focus on the problem itself and possible solutions. Men are struggling in the modern Western world. The question is why.

I’d argue it’s that modern men lack three things we need to live productive, happy, and healthy lives:

• Purpose or mission. Men do much better if they have a guiding light to follow, in the form of a long-term goal or ongoing project.

• Community. Men aren’t good at forming relationships outside of some larger structure, like school, the military, a team, or work. With more men working remotely or on their own (like Amazon truck or Uber drivers), once they leave these organizations, they lose their connections with others.

• Self-discipline. Men more easily fall into hedonism and self-destructive behavior than women. We’re more likely to form addictions, take dumb risks, forget or forgo obligations, and fail to practice self-care in the form of regular exercise, a healthy diet, and good hygiene.

The reason women are doing so well is that they’re better at this stuff naturally—studies show women are just plain more resilient than men. For example, girls who grow up in single-parent households and/or in poverty tend to do almost as well as girls who grow up with two parents in stable economic conditions. Boys who grow up in single-parent households and/or in poverty, however, do far worse than their peers.

Policy #1: Helping Boys Become Productive Men

This leads to my first suggestion: we need local, state, and potentially even national organizations that provide structure, mentorship, and community for boys ages 5-25. There are lots of boys out there whose parents aren’t able to get them on a sports team or enroll them in jiu-jitsu or band or theater or some sort of organization where they can explore the outdoors or build things.

We should ensure that every boy across the country, whether in cities or rural areas, has the opportunity and is encouraged to join such an organization. These could even be based on public service projects, like restoring wetlands, building playgrounds, clearing parks, planting trees, or building more housing. To accomplish this would require full-time employees who could organize this effort and make reaching every parent and their boy(s) a top priority. No son left behind.

These need to be fully male organizations. If we want to do something similar for women, I’m all for it, but it’s important for men to do things with other men—and men only. More on this later.

Such an organization, or constellation of organizations, would address all three problems men face: they would provide purpose, community, and self-discipline for all the boys enrolled. This would also be a great way for older men, age 25+, to get the same benefits as leaders. Democrats should propose this immediately, and if they don’t, Republicans should.

Policy #2: Mentorship Programs for Adult Men

We should create similar networks of mentorship where older men who have life and work experience can teach those skills to younger men. Local schools, universities, libraries, and other public spaces could provide classrooms and lecture halls for these meetings. Like the first proposal to help boys, there needs to be infrastructure and a full-time, paid organization to find mentors and reach out to men who need apprenticeship. This addresses all three problems men face: it provides purpose, community, and self-discipline—because mentors will hold their students accountable. Again, this needs to be men and men only.

Policy #3: Robust, Efficacious Addiction Services for ALL

Third, we should provide far greater resources, more counseling, and intentional community and outreach for those experiencing addiction. Unlike the first two proposals, this should include everyone. However, because men are far more likely to become addicted to drugs and alcohol than women, the greatest impact would be with men.

Currently, the most likely reason an addict enters treatment for addiction is because they broke the law, whether a DUI or some other crime in service of their habit. This is tragic, not only because most treatment programs are woefully inadequate, but also because becoming entangled in the legal system, prison, and the police is DANGEROUS. Our legal system is built to punish people as harshly as possible and, once they’ve committed a crime, to make it extremely difficult to become unentangled. Like, if an addict can’t get a job or rent an apartment because he’s committed a crime, has unending court and legal fees, and at the same time is battling addiction... is it really any surprise he might end up on the streets?

Addicts should be punished if they break the law, of course. But if we batter them too harshly, it doesn’t solve the problem addiction creates for society—it exacerbates it. To end this terrible dynamic, we have to reform our laws and the legal system so as to facilitate a full recovery for the greatest number of addicts. We also need a robust support system that provides people experiencing addiction with counseling, community, and resources so they can beat their addiction and become productive members of society. This will be good for everyone, but as mentioned, most of the people this helps will be men, because most addicts are men.

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Now, I’m sure there will be objections.

#1: Why do the the first two organizations have to be men and men only?

There are four reasons:

1. Men need to be able to talk to each other about male-exclusive experiences. Whether this is a young man who’s beginning to discover his sexuality, or an older guy needs advice on his marriage, the moment you bring women into the fold these conversations become impossible.

2. Men have a different life path than women and need to plan their lives accordingly. Young men aren’t being offered free trips to Dubai or attending parties with athletes and the rich and famous for being young and beautiful the way women are through apps like TikTok, Instagram, and OnlyFans. Young men need to work and suffer and fail for a long time to become the kind of high-quality men women find desirable. Mentors can show these guys the way, but that can’t happen unless it’s a male-only space.

3. Men simply have different interests and communication styles than women, and allowing men to rap with each other about whatever is good in and of itself. Again, this can’t happen if there are women in the group.

4. If women are involved in these groups, some of the men will try to engage in sexual relationships with them. I wish this weren’t so, but we all know this to be true. This competition will promote disharmony among the participants, and take away from the focus of the organization and community.

Won't these policies help men to the detriment of women?

No.

Life is not zero-sum. This is about helping men in the ways men are struggling so they can become more successful. And because men and women naturally gravitate toward different jobs, this won’t increase intersex competition as much as one might think—and to the extent it does, isn’t that good? Like isn’t that the point of having a high-functioning, cosmopolitan, meritocratic, capitalist society—that the best of the best succeed and we all benefit as a result of their innovations and creation of wealth?

Also, this will help women, not hurt them, because we will be enabling more men to become the high-quality guys women say they can’t find in the modern dating and mating marketplace. Far more men will become healthy, productive, mature, and marriageable as a result of these policies.

Also, for what it’s worth, there’s no reason we couldn’t or shouldn’t create parallel organizations for women. I have absolutely no objection to doing so.

What about the cost?

Relative to other government programs, next to nothing. Creating and running the first two organizations I’m proposing could probably be done for pennies on the dollar. All they require is creating networks: most of the actual work would be done by volunteers, or if necessary there could be small stipends for leaders and mentors. We would need paid employees to organize the networks, facilitate communication, and do the outreach to men and boys. We would also need to pay for equipment, like vans for transportation and materials for projects, but otherwise, that’s it.

The organization(s) we would need to create to handle addiction would require more of an investment. I’m not an expert in government bureaucracies, so I won’t hazard a guess at what the cost would be, but it would still be small relative to most other government programs.

The great news is that over time these investments would pay for themselves. Men becoming better humans will increase tax revenue and decrease the costs of social ills men produce considerably. Helping men get better will help everyone. We will have better husbands, better fathers, better employees, better leaders.

Additionally, though we absolutely must not make these organizations about identity, these policies would disproportionately help the Black and Hispanic populations, as these represent the highest percentage of single parent homes.

So like…let’s do this! And frankly I don’t care who does it. If Democrats are serious about enacting policies to win back men, this would be a great way to do it. However, if they can’t because of stupid infighting, then Republicans should do it. It’s the right thing to do for men, and by proxy, the right thing to do for America.

If anyone wants someone to spearhead this effort, or to administer these organizations, I’ll volunteer as tribute. My experience in education (14 years with a Masters degree) and expertise in sales and relationship building make me a perfect candidate. Regardless, I would love to get involved with such an effort in any way possible.

Last point: this doesn’t need to be workshopped or talked to death. These are obviously good policies, and there’s no reason we can’t get started on implementing them right away.

Fortune favors the bold, so let’s take action!

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