Free Republic

Two political icons that cast considerable shadows led the headlines this week. One for his desire to return to the lynchings of the slavery era - through literal castration, the other for his enormous generosity, sense of fair play, and kindness. On Father's Day 2008, when Barack Obama claimed that any "fool" could have child he could have easily addressed those comments directly to the Rev. Jesse Jackson. When Obama also claimed it took a "man" to raise a child, he would have been hard pressed to find a more brilliant example than former press secretary Tony Snow. One had...

In a research brief this month, Bradford Wilcox, a sociology professor at the University of Virginia, analyzed three national studies in order to discover if "there is any evidence that religion is playing a role in encouraging a strong family orientation among contemporary American men?" His research led him to conclude that men who regularly attend Christian services are engaged in happier and stronger marriages and are more involved in the lives of their children than men who do not. "70 percent of husbands who attend church regularly report they are 'very happy' in their marriages, compared to 59 percent...

This is one movie that I have enjoyed as much as the trailer! As the end credits started to roll, my six-year-old (girl) popped up her head and loudly asked if I would buy the DVD. . . THE GUYS...ARE GUYS! They are not "juiced up" thirty-somethings with sculpted muscles and steroids to match, nor are they psychologically tortured, identity-challenged, oversexed teenagers. They are young males who are not afraid to spill some blood when necessary for the greater good. . . THE GIRLS...ARE GIRLS! . . . [T]he usual "girl empowerment" pomposity that almost universally plagues today's child actresses...

If I were the last man on the planet to think so, I would want the honor of saying no woman should go before me into combat to defend my country. A man who endorses women in combat is not pro-woman; he’s a wimp. He should be ashamed. For most of history, in most cultures, he would have been utterly scorned as a coward to promote such an idea. Part of the meaning of manhood as God created us is the sense of responsibility for the safety and welfare of our women. Back in the seventies, when I taught in...

Fort Bend County, TX - Source: KHOU-TV“And I walked out of the house and I went around and confronted those guys on the side of the house. So, I aimed at him and said, ‘You sneeze, you're dead man.’ And I called the other guy out of the garage. I watch a lot of movies it sounded like a good thing to say. It got his attention." VIDEOSpeak softly and carry a 12-gauge11:01 PM CDT on Thursday, October 11, 2007 By Kevin Reece / 11 News Nathaniel Brooks stole a line from an old Western movie to capture a pair...

Virginia E. Fisher  Other Articles by Virginia E. FisherPrinter Friendly Version   Where Have All the Christian Men Gone? My Conversation with John Eldredge September 3, 2007 Many men balk at the idea of going to church. Some resist the tendency in Christian circles to "feminize" God. Others object to how Christian men tend to be so tame and passive — more like women — and very bored. And so, it is perhaps not surprising that John Eldredge's books, especially Wild at Heart, have been wildly successful. Seeking to discover the secret of a man's soul, Catholic and Protestant...

Many academics would consider my lack of manliness a good thing. They regard boys as thugs-in-training, caught up in a patriarchal society that demeans women. But I can't shake the sense that boys are supposed to become manly. Rather than neutering their aggression, confidence and desire for danger, we should channel these instincts into honor, gentlemanliness and courage. Instead of inculcating timidity in our sons, it seems wiser to train them to face down bullies, which by necessity means teaching them how to throw a good uppercut. You can't build a civilization and defend it against barbarians, fascists and playground...

I was genuinely flattered to hear of the worldwide enjoyment of my parody and hyperbolic WND article this last week, "If I am elected President." It is often said that the most powerful position in the world is the U.S. Presidency. But I believe it hits much closer to home than the White House and is a role, quite frankly, that I'm much more eager to fulfill. Before I reveal that commanding position, I'd like to discuss the power utilized in it. The purpose of powerCalvin Coolidge, America's 30th President, once confessed, "I suppose I am the most powerful man...

I'm gonna list what I consider to be the Greatest Weaknesses of Modern Authors, their writings, worldviews, methods of working, work produced, etc. 1. Little or No Real World Experience: Too many modern authors, writers, screenwriters (not to mention artists of all kinds) have little or no real world experience. They go to school to learn how to write, they spend their lives obsessing over writing, they spend most all of their free time writing or learning to write. Yet they never lived and have nothing to write about except what is spawned within their own imaginations. They spend all...

If If you can keep your head when all about you Are losing theirs and blaming it on you; If you can trust yourself when all men doubt you, But make allowance for their doubting too; If you can wait and not be tired by waiting, Or being lied about, don't deal in lies, Or being hated, don't give way to hating, And yet don't look too good, nor talk too wise: If you can dream -- and not make dreams your master; If you can think -- and not make thoughts your aim; If you can meet with Triumph...

Recently, my wife gave birth to our daughter. We used the Bradley Method: natural childbirth, no meds, no epidural, no pitocin. In a way, childbirth is like flying.... On a recent thread, I gave a brief birth story, designed to encourage other parents considering Bradley. But here, my aim is simple: a few words to convict the hearts of cowardly men who are unwilling to help their wives, and instead, weakly lean on medications to get them through the 'trauma' of childbirth. Yes, guys, exclusively, are the source of the epidural problem. One could argue on and on that a...

After almost every column or blogpost I've written about the various idiosyncracies of women, some woman writes to complain that I never criticize men. Of course, there's not exactly a shortage of male-bashing in the mainstream media today, to say nothing of chick rags like Cosmopolitan, Ms., Self and other variants on the Me, Myself and I theme so popular with women. And while there is something about the modern American man that is absolutely worthy of criticism, I don't think it's exactly what these feminists had in mind. For you see, the main problem with men today is that...

In the name of the fatherhttp://scotlandonsunday.scotsman.com/opinion.cfm?id=1033732006 http://tinyurl.com/ozefu DANI GARAVELLI Sun 16 Jul 2006 ONCE upon a time, I believed it didn't matter a whit whether a baby was born into a family with one parent or two. Or with two mothers or two fathers rather than a mother and a father. Why should it? What was important was not the number or gender of the parents, but whether or not they were loving and attentive. That was, of course, before I had any of my own. Now I realise that bringing up children is a challenge even for two well-meaning...

Boys will be boyshttp://www.timesonline.co.uk/article/0,,2092-2230571,00.html http://tinyurl.com/n3g5a DJ Taylor June 18, 2006 Why are fathers snapping up an old-fashioned book of boyhood lore? DJ Taylor looks at the gap in almost every father’s life -- Like practically every human relationship these days, fatherhood has become horribly institutionalised. A condition that was once thoroughly ad hoc and made up as one went along is now caught up in bureaucracy’s stifling grasp. Father’s Day (an American import that didn’t exist in my youth), fathers’ support agencies, parenting classes: on all sides comes evidence of a natural state hedged about with all kind of wholly...

In a widely discussed article in the prestigious journal Behavioral and Brain Sciences (1995), the late Linda Mealy addressed the issue of what makes a sociopath versus a psychopath. She argued that there are two basic types of sociopathy- the primary type which is genetically-based, extremely dangerous, and almost impossible to treat (the psychopath) and the secondary type which can emerge in most highly masculine males when under stress or provocation (the “sociopath” in common terms). That is, there is a small number of persistently dangerous psychopaths out there motivated by their own inner demons (e. g., the monstrous Jerry...

CONSERVATIVES NEED A 12 – STEP PROGRAM TO MANHOOD, Ann Coulter It's pretty pathetic when a Kennedy is too drunk to drive into the Potomac. After the visibly intoxicated Rep. Patrick Kennedy (news, bio, voting record) crashed his car into a police barrier near the Capitol just before 3 a.m. last Thursday morning, he explained to the police he was hurrying back to the Capitol for a vote, a procedure known on the Hill as "last call." It could have been a lot worse: Patrick's designated driver that night was Ted Kennedy. At some point in his scrolling list of...

It's pretty pathetic when a Kennedy is too drunk to drive into the Potomac. After the visibly intoxicated Rep. Patrick Kennedy crashed his car into a police barrier near the Capitol just before 3 a.m. last Thursday morning, he explained to the police he was hurrying back to the Capitol for a vote, a procedure known on the Hill as "last call." It could have been a lot worse: Patrick's designated driver that night was Ted Kennedy. At some point in his scrolling list of excuses, Kennedy eventually claimed he was addicted to prescription drugs and checked himself into the...

Harvey Mansfield, conservative political theorist and academic provocateur, argues that women--and society--need to come to terms with 'manliness' ___ WHO IS NOT JUST a man, but a manly man? And who today can even say the words ''manly man" without smirking? These questions are at the heart of ''Manliness" (Yale), the new book by Harvard government professor Harvey C. Mansfield, who has long shouldered a reputation as the campus's most outspoken conservative. In answer to the first question, Mansfield nominates, among others, the marshal played by Gary Cooper in ''High Noon." When the town's sniveling semi-men slink away from the...

COMMENTARY Supporters grieve as mayor ends campaign Friday, December 02, 2005 ANN FISHER The outer chamber of the mayor’s City Hall office was cool, quiet and somber when many of his closest supporters gathered on Tuesday. To most people, the volunteers and paid staffers were unremarkable and anonymous sidekicks of Michael B. Coleman. When a campaign dies, who writes their eulogies or plots the timeline of their sacrifices, their highs and lows during its 10-month life? There was no call to arms that day, before Coleman announced that his campaign for governor had ended, his spokesman Mike Brown said. "People...

What does the Chronicles of Narnia mean to Christians and why are these books by C.S. Lewis important to our society. The books delve into the crossing from childhood into an age of accountibility and how one is to conport oneself as a man or woman. Where did Lewis get the idea for his masterpiece of children's literature? From the literature of Knighthood. Knights rarely lived up to the idea of the perfect knight but the idea existed of the Christian Crusader who fought in the name of christ against the evils of the world. Who was able to uphold...

Women rule says Michael Buerk, and feminism is triumphant at home, at work, even in TV ads. The woman who coined the word 'metrosexual' explains how men can reclaim their masculinity, and we publish an extract from her new book WHO’D be one of you, eh chaps? Let’s be honest, your CV these days is hardly enviable. Outperformed by girls at school, emasculated by women at home and at work, shockingly dislocated from your emotions and the hapless joke figure in endless TV commercials and sitcoms whose message is that females rule and men are fools. Well wise up, because...

THE BOY sitting next to me on the plane from Toronto to North Bay was 17 years old, a rising high school senior with a slight beard. He had the misfortune to sit next to a child psychologist, a so-called expert on boys, who would pester him with questions for the entire trip about how he was spending his summer, and why. ''This is kind of like a final exam," he observed, trying to get me to relent, but I wouldn't let go. After he had gamely answered a number of my questions about the summer camp to which he...

– Albert Mohler Writing in the very first year of the twentieth century, William Byron Forbush warned America that it faced a crisis he called "the boy problem." Forbush warned that a generation of young males, then still in boyhood, would soon enter the life of the nation without the necessary civilizing influences, discipline, and character. He called for immediate action and directed national attention to the problem. In his influential book, The Boy Problem, Forbush offered a plan for recovering America's adolescent boys. He called for fathers to play a more direct role in the raising of their sons,...

Should we fear a man who prays? Some liberals think that we should. They’re apparently comfortable, to judge from Father’s Day advertisements, with men who fish, golf, repair things and fix hamburgers on the grill. But one who goes to church every week, or who prays daily with his children, is viewed with suspicion, if not downright hostility. W. Bradford Wilcox, a sociologist at the University of Virginia and author of “Soft Patriarchs, New Men: How Christianity Shapes Fathers and Husbands,” made this point in a paper recently published by The Heritage Foundation. Some feminists and journalists believe that religion,...

Lieutenant General James Mattis recently made comments at a forum in San Diego that are now pervading the news; he said, "It's fun to shoot some people… You go into Afghanistan, you got guys who slap women around for five years because they didn't wear a veil. You know, guys like that ain't got no manhood left anyway. So it's a hell of a lot of fun to shoot them." So of course, liberals have now become frantic in their revolted outrage. As the executive director of the Council on American-Islamic Relations (CAIR), Nihad Awad, said, "We do not need...

Your dad had a job, a wife, a house. You've got loans and fear of commitment. Hello, manhood. December 21st, 2004 11:55 AM. Owe no man any thing. Romans 13:8 Don't worry about the loans. I'm doing good, Dad, and it's gonna stay that way. Bud Fox [Charlie Sheen] in Oliver Stone's Wall Street. For me, it was all about easy money. When I started college, I needed and wanted funds—for an apartment, a car, a girlfriend, alcohol, and of course, tuition. Conveniently, the dorms and lecture halls were strewn with credit card applications, which are as much a part...

More than a decade ago the nation was in a stir over the birth of a fictional boy. The boy was Avery, son of Murphy Brown. Television's Murphy Brown, played by Candice Bergen, was a successful news commentator who, after an unsuccessful relationship with a man that left her alone and pregnant, bore a son out of wedlock. The event, popular enough in its own right, became the center of political controversy when then Vice President Dan Quayle in a speech to the Commonwealth Club of California lamented that the show was "mocking the importance of a father." Suddenly the...

More than a decade ago the nation was in a stir over the birth of a fictional boy. The boy was Avery, son of Murphy Brown. Television's Murphy Brown, played by Candice Bergen, was a successful news commentator who, after an unsuccessful relationship with a man that left her alone and pregnant, bore a son out of wedlock. The event, popular enough in its own right, became the center of political controversy when then Vice President Dan Quayle in a speech to the Commonwealth Club of California lamented that the show was "mocking the importance of a father." Suddenly the...

How splendid that Hasbro is to bring out a new version of its G.I. Joe doll meant to look like George W. Bush in his flight suit after landing an airplane on the deck of the aircraft carrier USS Abraham Lincoln last May. Called an "Elite Force Aviator," the action figure representing "George Dubya himself in all his glory and flight equipment" will be available in KB Toy Stores in September and will make a great Christmas present for little boys, with or without a Jihad Joe for him to do battle with. And, as a side benefit, it is...

Symposium: The Return of ManhoodBy Jamie GlazovFrontPageMagazine.com | August 8, 2003 After years of creeping feminization, manhood and masculinity appear to have made a significant comeback in American society. Since the national security crisis of 9/11, America has rediscovered the virtues of soldiers, firemen, policemen and other traditionally male (and masculine) professions that require courage and physical strength. What explains this phenomenon? Why is manhood, once again, being held in high esteem? Or is this all just a mirage, destined to vanish in the near future? In focusing on this issue, Frontpage Symposium did something a little different this time: we joined...