Dudes on the Struggle Bus
Audio version now available.
Nothing frustrates me more than hearing a man complain that his wife doesn’t love him unconditionally.
He’s right. She doesn’t love him unconditionally. And she’s not supposed to. It’s a stupid thing to complain about. It would make more sense to complain that his lawn mower does a shitty job shoveling snow.
How can a relationship that starts with a long list of conditions be expected to magically morph into unconditional love? People partner up for a variety of reasons–popular among the categories are aesthetics, intellect, wit, and charm. If he is looking for unconditional love, maybe he should look to a relationship that’s not completely dependent on so many conditions. His anger is misdirected. But honestly, it’s not his fault.
He’s likely never been loved unconditionally.
And while he knows what to do with a lawn mower, the hole in his soul from a lack of unconditional love is probably a mystery to him. A mystery he keeps shoving down, hoping it will melt away like snow in April.
Men are struggling. Regardless of who is to blame, this is a problem that men are responsible for solving ourselves. So let’s get after it.
Romantic entanglements are negotiations. Short-term sexual encounters are transactional with both parties getting something tangible from the interaction, although they are often too drunk to remember exactly what they got until they have to ask a doctor for a prescription to make it go away.
Long-term relationships are contractual agreements, written or verbal, with both parties meeting certain conditions and agreeing to mutually beneficial terms. The reason President Trump has had so many wives is because, as someone who suffers from an addiction to power, he is a zero-sum negotiator, and mutually beneficial is not a term in his vocabulary. One individual can’t singularly win at marriage. There is a reason a synonym for the word relationship is partnership.
Until sometime in the last hundred years, and going back to the beginning of human existence, physical safety was the most critical offer men made to women. In exchange, women offered sex. We can get in the weeds and talk about dowries and birthing sons to carry on the family lineage, but for our purposes here, the exchange of sex for safety is as anthropologically deep as we need to get.
As our nomadic encampments, hunter/gatherer villages, wagon trains, tribal settlements, governed counties, small towns, and big cities agronomized, industrialized, and grew safer, the primary condition that men met for women shifted to financial security. Think Archie Bunker and Father Knows Best. If you often use the word, “patriarchy,” in a sentence, this societal period is not hard for you to conjure.
In exchange for financial security, men were still getting sex.
In my lifetime, there has been another major shift. Men are still seeking sex and intimacy. The shift has again happened in pursuit of equality and justice for women. As Esther Perel teaches us, marriage was an economic enterprise that was about economic security. But now that marriage is a romantic arrangement, it is about emotional security.
Before I get into how incredibly bad we men are at emotional safety, let me address the recurring theme of men engaging in relationships in pursuit of sex. There are some men for whom sex is not a big driver. Likewise, there are women with strong libidos. Neither outlier is an indication of broken sexuality. Human variety is a blessing to be celebrated. That’s why my kids take such great delight in celebrating the size of my fivehead–biggest in three counties and eight surrounding nomadic villages.
That caveat aside, men often pursue sex selfishly. Anyone familiar with the traditional American abstinence-only-until-marriage public school sexual education curriculum knows that clitoral stimulation for her pleasure is not a topic on the syllabus. We pursue sex selfishly because we wrongly assume our pleasure is her pleasure (only 30% of women can consistently orgasm from penile/vaginal intercourse), and because we are just more selfish in general (there is a surprising amount of research indicating male selfishness).
Now don’t get confused. Many men are quite into delivering sexual pleasure for women. But that doesn’t make us unselfish. Part of our ego-driven stimulation is proving our virility, and that we know our way around a clitoris (once we fumble through the process of finding it, of course). So, still selfish.
Women desire sex, too, but often there is a hormonal and cognitive driver toward procreation that supersedes, or temporarily enhances, a driver for pleasure (which is probably for the best, since very few of us are ever taught about female pleasure (feel free to mumble, “fucking patriarchy,” here)). Procreation is about having offspring to nurture, and about the survival of the species. Sexual desire in women is anything but selfish.
And this link to procreation is also why there is scientific evidence that sexual desire declines in women after they have their babies. A mother’s hormones and cognition give the signal, “mission accomplished, stand down.” There is a lot of confusion and conjecture around the statistical fact that 69% of divorces in the United States are initiated by women. Women don’t need men for physical protection, financial security, or intellectual insightfulness. When our sexual purpose is fulfilled, I think we should consider divorce to be humane. In some species, females eat their male sperm donors when they are through with them.
Men are in selfish pursuit of sex, and women have increasingly attained physical, educational, and financial safety. Nonetheless, men are still trying to barter with things women now have in surplus.
The nexus of the problem with struggling men, particularly young men, is that we aren’t offering anything of value to potential relationship partners.
We are trying to attract bees by offering them honey.
And make no mistake about it. A huge factor in the societal relationship shift we are all trying to navigate is that men get more from relationships than women. Women, especially young women, are physically, educationally, and financially independent. Through the wonders of modern medicine, they don’t even need us for procreation.
And women largely have access to emotional supports. I coach college and high school soccer. My high school girls teams talk openly about therapy appointments and emotional struggles. This past spring, some of my teenage girls asked me for relationship advice, which I mostly declined to offer, except to insist that they demand respect and emotional safety from any potential romantic interests. My men and boys teams would never dream of talking about therapy or asking my advice for an emotional challenge. The only time I hear about sex from the men is when they brag about their fictional conquests and don’t realize I am within earshot. “Coach Matt, what’s the most important thing I can do to be attractive to women?” is a question I have never been asked. Maybe they see my fivehead and assume I don’t have any game.
Our culture is toxic for men in ways we don’t understand because it has been going on for so long. It is not unlike alcohol as an approved legal substance for human consumption. Can you imagine what would happen if alcohol was invented, for the first time in human history, tomorrow? Can you imagine trying to get a beverage through FDA approval that does the cognitive and developmental damage, and will have the tangible societal financial cost, of alcohol? And what about when longitudinal testing proves alcohol withdrawal is more lethal than quitting heroin or methamphetamine? You and your fermented pineapple juice would be laughed out of the building. But because we have been conditioned to accept alcohol, we have been conditioned to accept the consequences, too.
The same is true for the toxic way we raise boys into men. Boys hear messages about sucking it up, not crying in public, and stifling all emotions other than joy and anger. I got to know three guys who work together on a loading dock. They spend long shifts everyday doing a job that they know like the backs of their hands, leaving plenty of time for banter. Do you think they talk about their feelings? No. They cut each other down at every possible opportunity. If one of them was pinned by a fork truck, the other two would risk their lives to save their friend without hesitation. But when it comes to emotional safety, vulnerability is a dirty word. Look for weaknesses and pounce. Emotionally, it is kill or be killed.
Men consume addictive substances and engage in addictive behaviors at higher rates than women. Men are almost 4x as likely to complete suicide than women, and the gender gap in college favors women at a substantial and growing rate. The experts on struggling young men explore important solutions regarding shortages in workers in the trades, an educational system geared toward girls, and the dangers of low-risk sexual satisfaction from porn. The experts are offering tangible cultural changes and policy reform to help solve the problem.
But the thing the experts aren’t discussing is the aspect of the solution with the greatest potential.
I listened to a conversation between Jonathan Haidt, author of The Anxious Generation, Richard Reeves, founder of the American Institute of Boys and Men, and NYU Stern Professor Scott Galloway, leading champion on this topic. The conversation was robust, and viable suggestions were plentiful. But among the mutually agreed upon concepts was that we need to get more men teaching elementary school and back into after school programs like sports coaching.
I believe that these three experts are missing the potential for unintended negative consequences.
More men working with boys sounds like a slam dunk, no brainer. But if the men are going to perpetuate the toxicity of shoving down emotions and gently teasing each other as the primary form of communication, more men interacting with our young boys is not the answer. In fact, men have the potential to be the perpetuation of the problem.
I am not suggesting that we turn to women to solve the problem for us. I am suggesting that men learn to get emotionally intelligent and vulnerable, and then interact with boys in nurturing roles. Just as we are witnessing female equality and justice for the first time in human history, men need to become emotionally mature creatures for the survival of our gender.
How we engage with each other must change. How we engage in romantic relationships must change.
Without emotional safety, all the other suggestions by the experts will suffer the consequences of building a house on a foundation of sand. If a man makes six figures as an electrician, and avoids porn in favor of being home for his kids, but he still tells his wife she talks too much and he can’t take it, he better get comfortable with the statistics around female-initiated divorces. Or maybe addiction. Or suicide.
I opened this piece suggesting that many men have never experienced unconditional love, and that’s why we turn to our partners who are incapable of filling that void. When boys are emotionally abused, or emotionally neglected, by their fathers, mothers can’t make up for what’s missing. In fact, when a mother doesn’t protect her son from the anger, or lack of tolerance, coming from the father, the mother does not feel safe, either. The child being emotionally neglected or abused, often a boy, does not experience unconditional love. The love he is offered is conditioned on good behavior, acceptable grades in school, success on the sports field, holding down that summer job, accomplishment in an internship, etc. Condition met, love offered. Condition unmet, disappointment offered. Look, the world is just waiting to hand out negative feedback. Home needs to be an unconditionally safe place. For many, especially boys, it just is not.
Without experience with unconditional love, how can we expect boys to mature emotionally?
I know a guy who tells a story eliciting laughter from everyone who has ever heard it. They guy explains that as a late teen or very young adult, he ignored a snowstorm while on a date with his future bride. When he tried to make it home, his car got stuck in the snow. His father came to the rescue by bashing his car down the street and into his driveway with a snowplow. That story always brings down the house as listeners picture the cartoonish scene of a fuming father damaging his son’s most valuable possession because the son got a little too distracted by a safe emotional engagement. Everyone laughs.
How do you think the conversation behind the story went? Do you think the father expressed understanding and gratitude for the son’s safety, or do you think he smacked the son on the back of the head and called him a dipshit for getting caught in the snow? I’ve heard the story several times, but I’ve never heard the rest of the story. I bet it was traumatic.
We face a solvable problem, us men, young and old. The first thing we need to do is acknowledge that our society has changed for the much, much better. Equality and justice are desirable. This is the best time in human history to be alive. The abundance in which we are entrenched makes that a hardly debatable assertion.
But we do need to change. Our gender roles require adjustment, and that we leave the toxicity of emotional impotence in the past. Women fought hard for educational and financial opportunities. We need to fight just as hard to catch up emotionally.
Can you tell I’ve thought about this a lot? The good news is that I have just as many potential ways to enhance emotional safety as I have evidence and conjecture as to the damage caused when emotional safety is missing. I have lots of ideas about the solutions.
Are you curious about how we make emotional safety a foundational component of modern masculinity?
If you are ready to reject the addictive substance prominently featured in the fermented pineapple rant above, we hope you’ll join us in establishing emotional safety in our society by considering our SHOUT Sobriety think tank.
17 Comments
Matt, it was traumatic, but after a couple of weeks my dad’s (your Papou’s) unconditional love for me prevailed and life got back to normal. Love you.
I like where this is going and I do want to explore more, particularly as a female teacher of young adult males and females. Emotional safety isn’t something I explored or even heard about until my loved one struggled with alcoholism and recovery, and even when not thinking about my relationship, I see it everywhere. I can’t unsee it. We definitely need more postive male role models in teaching and coaching roles. Specifically at the elementary school level. I see an honest mix. Undconditional love, I would like to explore that more too. I don’t think I’ve even witnessed unconditional love now that I’m thinking about it. Thank you for writing this out. It was a great read. Lots to think about and ponder here. I struggle each day to be apart of the solution and not the problem.
Let’s keep talking this challenging issues through.
Wow! There is a lot here.
I really do ponder this daily. I really do also wish young men/boys had more positive role models and I know I’m not one of them.
Unconditional love doesn’t exist, in my world at least. I am so afraid I am passing down generational trauma and try as I might to be a cycle breaker, I fear I’m promoting a lot of generational male-induced trauma down the line via my implicit biases about men.
I really appreciate the thoughtful nature of this post. Gives me a lot to ponder and talk about in discovery work for the future.
You are fighting the good fight. Keep up the awesome work.
You are a cycle breaker, JR! Keep thinking about and working toward putting an end to the generational trauma you see. Thanks for reading and commenting!
Emotional safety
Without emotional safety, all the other suggestions by the experts will suffer the consequences of building a house on a foundation of sand.
Life hack.
My dad wasn’t known for sharing his feelings – I inherited that but throughout my lifetime experienced the benefits of being more vulnerable and open. If my dad struggled with anything – I never noticed or heard about it. He’s my role model and hero, but I’ve tried to be like him in many ways but unlike him in others.
And to be a cycle breaker – I’m trying in my marriage to be a better communicator and listener. And we both have individual therapists and marriage counseling when we’ve needed it.
But I will tell you – nothing clicked more for me than the light bulb going on when I first learned about emotional safety.
Emotional safety is like the life hack I wish someone told me about. Or maybe people told me about it and I was too stubborn to listen. But right now – I believe emotional safety is the gateway to everything else you want in your marriage.
I transitioned from being someone who tried to fix everything or tried to give a lot of unsolicited advice – to being someone who is 100% committed to providing emotional safety. I’m not perfect about it but it’s a game changer.
1. If I think about emotional safety when we argue or debate. I’m a better listener and it’s a lot easier to listen and acknowledge than it is to try and fix anything.
2. If I provide emotional safety by refusing to yell, scream, interrupt, get defensive, or use passive aggressive eye rolling… (which I’ve done a ton) then I can look myself in the mirror and say that I don’t make things worse, ever.
3. Even when I’m driving in the car / I’m more conscious of how uncomfortable it is for my wife when I speed or change lanes, and instead of convincing her that she’s safe and everyone else on the road is driving like me… I just slow down… and magically there is no argument or anything I need to defend.
I could go on and on – and I’m not perfect and maybe I’m providing emotional safety 80% or 90% of the time but I know I need to get that to 99% or 100%. And it’s worked.
My wife and I argue less and there’s way less to try and fix or change if you’re just in the moment – providing an emotionally safe place.
Try it… I did… it works. I want to get better at doing it. All the time.
That is a glowing endorsement for emotional safety, Hammer!
This is such an important topic and one we must address. Matt, you have a perspective on this I do hope people pay attention to and probe. Thank you for continuing to take on difficult topics head on and with such thought and care. Keep the discussions going!
I really appreciate the encouragement, Matt. Now and always!
I’m really resonating with this direction, and I’m eager to explore it further. Normalizing emotional safety for men isn’t just important—it has the potential to be truly revolutionary. Creating space where men feel safe to express vulnerability, process emotions, and seek support without judgment could transform not only individual lives, but entire communities and cultural norms.
#EmotionalSafety4Men
Revolutionary indeed. Thanks for the support, A!
Matt, thanks so much for this piece. I feel like it’s a conversation so desperately needed, especially given the appreciable backsliding on so much hard-fought-for and won progress. Thinking globally is daunting right now, though, so I’ll relay local (personal) battles that are still being won…To my mind, you’ve laid it out perfectly: from physical to financial to emotional security, this feels like a progress-driven distillation down to the fundamental source of romantic love. Coming out of an exquisite, then exquisitely painful, relationship with an alcoholic whose addiction proved fatal, I was pretty sure that was it for me in terms of relationships. *All men,* right? So, no one is more surprised than me that I find myself in a relationship now, in which emotional security (coupled with what he calls radical transparency) is the main thing we offer each other (and this offering goes both ways). It’s the only offering that would have drawn me out. And it’s hard to overstate the rewards for both of us. It’s foundational. Just a little local reporting from me here, but I’d love to see more conversations about this. Thank you, Matt!
That’s big news from one of my very favorite local reporters. And what a testament to emotional safety that it is the one thing that drew you into a trusting relationship. Big fan of radical transparency. Thanks for sharing, Barbara!
Very well written, “Human variety is a Blessing to be celebrated.” People generally behave in the manner and to the cultural standards they were taught. Thank you for furthering dialogue so that we may all learn from each other and adjust our behavior(s) accordingly. It is a work in progress. But the fact that we are all talking about it, makes it just that, progress.
Progress indeed. This really is a good problem to have.
Thanks for bringing attention to this topic, Matt, and I’ve experienced what you’ve shared with the menfolk in my life. I look forward to hearing more about your solutions!
The solutions are not hard to implement, but they do require a societal shift, which will be daunting. Stay tuned, and thanks for the curiosity!