Someday soon I shall post here again... I have many ideas for posts floating around in the back of my head but school and work seem to be eating up most of my time these days.
Eventually however, I will post another epic for all of you to read. I think the next episode in this grand saga will be about driving.
Saturday, September 28, 2013
Wednesday, September 18, 2013
With Great Responsibility Comes Great Power
Uncle Ben's well worn quote from Spider-Man is certainly true. When you have the ability to do great things you have the responsibility to do those things for the betterment of other people's lives. We are given out talents and abilities so that we can use them for the benefit of our neighbor, that is true. However, I would like to suggest that someone who takes on a great deal of responsibility ends up achieving a great deal of power through their hard work and dedication.
I don't know if I've mentioned this already in a previous post, but I'm a math tutor at my University. In the spring I worked eight hours a week in the tutoring center helping drop-in students who needed assistance, and this semester in addition to working in the tutoring center I'm also working as an assistant for two different math classes as their own personal tutor. Working my job has helped to give me an interesting glimpse into different kinds of students and the way other people approach their problems.
On one end you have the people who might be struggling but will bust their butts and do everything they possibly can to improve and get a passing grade. It may have been ten years since they last took a math class but they will come to the tutoring center for hours a day multiple days a week. They will visit their professor's office hours, they'll watch math videos online, and they'll do dozens upon dozens of practice problems in order to try and make it through a class that is giving them a ton of trouble. These people understand that success in the class depends on them and how much effort and work they put into it.
On the other end you have the people that might come to the tutoring center but they come expecting answers and to complain about their professor for an hour in hopes that you will agree with them and solidify their idea that their F is a result of their prof's bad teaching and not their laziness or lack of ability. These people want to pass without any effort, they want their degree and grades handed to them on a silver platter, and expect everyone else to pull the weight for them. They believe that they have the right to success and that they shouldn't have to lift a finger get it. They will spend hours upon hours just complaining about their professors' accents, speed, examples, and attitude but they just don't have the time to handle the mountainous load of work they've been given. When they ask for your help they are really asking for an answer to their question and don't have any interest in actually learning how to solve the problem.
I love my job because of the first group, and it drives me nuts because of the second group.
The people in the first group understand responsibility and duty and even in the face of probable failure they will keep going and keep trying because they understand that they will only move forward by their own might and ability. The second group of people, when faced with a failing grade, typically seem to try even less and just complain even more as if they expect their whining and moaning to get the job done. Well, news flash. It won't.
This semester I am helping with a College Algebra class and a Pre-Algebra class for people who totally bombed the entrance test. They are the two lowest math classes on campus and the people taking them are either A) people who struggle with math so mightily it is hard to even grasp and B) people who care so little that it doesn't matter what the content of the class is they won't succeed because they don't care. Dealing with these classes has been a really amazing, if painful, eye opener.
My philosophy last spring and over the summer (when I was still tutoring each week in the center for summer classes) has been that anyone can make it over the wall and find the solution eventually and I put a lot of the responsibility for their understanding in my ability to teach them. Well, call me jaded and cynical, but I've come to the conclusion that there are people you can't teach. My dear matriarch always says "You can't fix stupid." Well, let me adjust that to "You can't teach lazy."
In the college algebra class I am helping with, I have hour long "mini-classes" on Fridays each week that people can come to if they are having trouble with the concepts covered in class or struggling with homework. Essentially they are private tutoring sessions available only for that class. The first couple of weeks I didn't really expect anyone to come (and I was right) because all of that is mostly review of previous courses, but a week and a half ago they took their first quiz and the class average was well below a passing grade. Most of the class completely bombed it and it became pretty clear that people were not understanding the material. Well, there is an exam next Monday and to help prepare for the exam I had an additional mini-class this week in the evening so that people would have yet another opportunity to come and get help. Even after seeing their incredibly low grades on the quiz and even with a major test coming up in less than a week now... no one came.
Didn't really hurt me. I still get paid whether or not they show, but I was really frustrated because I want to help these students. I want them to succeed and I'd love to see 100% of the class pass. Well, that's not going to happen. Why? Because they don't care enough. They will not take responsibility, or ownership, of their situation and actually strive toward success. Each week they have at least two online graded exercises they are supposed to complete and close to half the class hasn't even completed one of them yet. Two people, as of Monday, hadn't even signed up for the program yet and we are into week four now. They don't care, they won't put forth the effort and so I can't help them and they are going to fail.
All of college, and really all of life, is about learning to take responsibility for your own actions, choices, and success. What you achieve and how far you go is going to be directly proportional to how much effort you put in. Sure, there people who have greater obstacles than others and there are people who get smooth sailing, but not matter the variables the output of a function is going to depend on what the input is. You might have some kind of a handicap or obstacle that must be overcome, but it is up to you to overcome it. The responsibility to succeed lies in your hands.
Our country doesn't really seem to get that these days. We get away with far too much without actually working for it (this coming from the almost 19 year old living in his parent's basement...), but true success, at least from an earthly prospective, can only come from taking responsibility for your own life.
Speaking from experience, the amount of pleasure and reward that comes from accomplishing something for yourself far exceeds anything that can come from having another person do the heavy lifting. I just very recently got my driver's license and I feel significantly better now that I know driving me to and from work and classes is no longer a burden my parents have to deal with. True, they were happy to do it for me and were willing to make that sacrifice because they love me, but it was time I took that particular aspect of my life into my own hands and started being responsible for getting myself to and fro. Yes, it is a responsibility and paying for gas isn't going to be fun, but I take on that responsibility gladly because I feel like I'm one step closer to actually having the right to calling myself a responsible adult.
If you always let others do things for you than eventually you will be numbed to personal satisfaction so much you can't appreciate a hard days work anymore, but there is something really amazing about having the power to meet your own needs. That kind of a power only comes from taking on responsibility and accepting all the work that goes with it.
In talking with my boss, Captain Kirk, who teaches the College Algebra class I am helping with, we've discussed this topic a lot and how it is all about taking ownership of your college experience, or life, in general. Your success or failure is in your hand. When you put in the work you own the reward. It is a principle this country was founded on and it is a principle that is really woven into reality itself. A worker is deserving of his wages and a diligent student is worthy of their A. My English professor first semester gave me an A on a paper she thought was probably worth a B because it made the different between me getting a B- and a B+ in the class and she told me that, even though my writing wasn't spectacular, I had put a lot of effort into the class over the semester and had showed remarkable progress as a result. They class kicked my butt a number of times and I got a D- on my first paper because I didn't know how to write for an academic audience worth squat. In her mind though, the effort I had displayed, the times I had visited her office, and the emailed questions I had sent her were enough to earn that bump up in my grade. If you take ownership of your life and your work there are real rewards to be had whether they come in the form of self satisfaction, the gratitude of others, or a higher grade.
Theologically speaking the whole pull yourself up by your own bootstraps mentality it all work righteousness and false pride, but even within the Christian faith you cannot live a life of wanton sin and gluttony and expect that all your willful sins will be mopped up and taken care of. It is true that Christ died upon the cross for all people and all sins, regardless of how grievous, and it is also true that without the Holy Spirit we cannot by our own reason or strength believe in the Heavenly Father and come to him, but when given the forgiveness of the death upon the cross and faith through the Holy Spirit we should and are supposed to use our new found faith and freedom for the benefit of other people and do good works for the sake of our neighbor. Even in Christianity where forgiveness is so central to everything you don't get a clear ticket to do whatever you want and expect everyone else to pick up the slack.
I love to help the students that are struggling mightily but want to succeed because my efforts to help them have visible worth. When the light bulb finally comes on and the message finally clicks and sinks in I cannot help but beam with pride at my tutee's accomplishment, but the person coming asking me to solve their homework for them frustrates me to no end.
Your failure or success depends on you. Objects at rest require a push to get them moving, and only you are capable of getting the ball rolling. The next time you feel like insulting your professor or boss suck it up and figure out how to get the problem solved. Other people have been in worse situations than you and have managed to make it through.
You have the opportunity to succeed, but you have to earn it first. Now go for it.
Pax
I don't know if I've mentioned this already in a previous post, but I'm a math tutor at my University. In the spring I worked eight hours a week in the tutoring center helping drop-in students who needed assistance, and this semester in addition to working in the tutoring center I'm also working as an assistant for two different math classes as their own personal tutor. Working my job has helped to give me an interesting glimpse into different kinds of students and the way other people approach their problems.
On one end you have the people who might be struggling but will bust their butts and do everything they possibly can to improve and get a passing grade. It may have been ten years since they last took a math class but they will come to the tutoring center for hours a day multiple days a week. They will visit their professor's office hours, they'll watch math videos online, and they'll do dozens upon dozens of practice problems in order to try and make it through a class that is giving them a ton of trouble. These people understand that success in the class depends on them and how much effort and work they put into it.
On the other end you have the people that might come to the tutoring center but they come expecting answers and to complain about their professor for an hour in hopes that you will agree with them and solidify their idea that their F is a result of their prof's bad teaching and not their laziness or lack of ability. These people want to pass without any effort, they want their degree and grades handed to them on a silver platter, and expect everyone else to pull the weight for them. They believe that they have the right to success and that they shouldn't have to lift a finger get it. They will spend hours upon hours just complaining about their professors' accents, speed, examples, and attitude but they just don't have the time to handle the mountainous load of work they've been given. When they ask for your help they are really asking for an answer to their question and don't have any interest in actually learning how to solve the problem.
I love my job because of the first group, and it drives me nuts because of the second group.
The people in the first group understand responsibility and duty and even in the face of probable failure they will keep going and keep trying because they understand that they will only move forward by their own might and ability. The second group of people, when faced with a failing grade, typically seem to try even less and just complain even more as if they expect their whining and moaning to get the job done. Well, news flash. It won't.
This semester I am helping with a College Algebra class and a Pre-Algebra class for people who totally bombed the entrance test. They are the two lowest math classes on campus and the people taking them are either A) people who struggle with math so mightily it is hard to even grasp and B) people who care so little that it doesn't matter what the content of the class is they won't succeed because they don't care. Dealing with these classes has been a really amazing, if painful, eye opener.
My philosophy last spring and over the summer (when I was still tutoring each week in the center for summer classes) has been that anyone can make it over the wall and find the solution eventually and I put a lot of the responsibility for their understanding in my ability to teach them. Well, call me jaded and cynical, but I've come to the conclusion that there are people you can't teach. My dear matriarch always says "You can't fix stupid." Well, let me adjust that to "You can't teach lazy."
In the college algebra class I am helping with, I have hour long "mini-classes" on Fridays each week that people can come to if they are having trouble with the concepts covered in class or struggling with homework. Essentially they are private tutoring sessions available only for that class. The first couple of weeks I didn't really expect anyone to come (and I was right) because all of that is mostly review of previous courses, but a week and a half ago they took their first quiz and the class average was well below a passing grade. Most of the class completely bombed it and it became pretty clear that people were not understanding the material. Well, there is an exam next Monday and to help prepare for the exam I had an additional mini-class this week in the evening so that people would have yet another opportunity to come and get help. Even after seeing their incredibly low grades on the quiz and even with a major test coming up in less than a week now... no one came.
Didn't really hurt me. I still get paid whether or not they show, but I was really frustrated because I want to help these students. I want them to succeed and I'd love to see 100% of the class pass. Well, that's not going to happen. Why? Because they don't care enough. They will not take responsibility, or ownership, of their situation and actually strive toward success. Each week they have at least two online graded exercises they are supposed to complete and close to half the class hasn't even completed one of them yet. Two people, as of Monday, hadn't even signed up for the program yet and we are into week four now. They don't care, they won't put forth the effort and so I can't help them and they are going to fail.
All of college, and really all of life, is about learning to take responsibility for your own actions, choices, and success. What you achieve and how far you go is going to be directly proportional to how much effort you put in. Sure, there people who have greater obstacles than others and there are people who get smooth sailing, but not matter the variables the output of a function is going to depend on what the input is. You might have some kind of a handicap or obstacle that must be overcome, but it is up to you to overcome it. The responsibility to succeed lies in your hands.
Our country doesn't really seem to get that these days. We get away with far too much without actually working for it (this coming from the almost 19 year old living in his parent's basement...), but true success, at least from an earthly prospective, can only come from taking responsibility for your own life.
Speaking from experience, the amount of pleasure and reward that comes from accomplishing something for yourself far exceeds anything that can come from having another person do the heavy lifting. I just very recently got my driver's license and I feel significantly better now that I know driving me to and from work and classes is no longer a burden my parents have to deal with. True, they were happy to do it for me and were willing to make that sacrifice because they love me, but it was time I took that particular aspect of my life into my own hands and started being responsible for getting myself to and fro. Yes, it is a responsibility and paying for gas isn't going to be fun, but I take on that responsibility gladly because I feel like I'm one step closer to actually having the right to calling myself a responsible adult.
If you always let others do things for you than eventually you will be numbed to personal satisfaction so much you can't appreciate a hard days work anymore, but there is something really amazing about having the power to meet your own needs. That kind of a power only comes from taking on responsibility and accepting all the work that goes with it.
In talking with my boss, Captain Kirk, who teaches the College Algebra class I am helping with, we've discussed this topic a lot and how it is all about taking ownership of your college experience, or life, in general. Your success or failure is in your hand. When you put in the work you own the reward. It is a principle this country was founded on and it is a principle that is really woven into reality itself. A worker is deserving of his wages and a diligent student is worthy of their A. My English professor first semester gave me an A on a paper she thought was probably worth a B because it made the different between me getting a B- and a B+ in the class and she told me that, even though my writing wasn't spectacular, I had put a lot of effort into the class over the semester and had showed remarkable progress as a result. They class kicked my butt a number of times and I got a D- on my first paper because I didn't know how to write for an academic audience worth squat. In her mind though, the effort I had displayed, the times I had visited her office, and the emailed questions I had sent her were enough to earn that bump up in my grade. If you take ownership of your life and your work there are real rewards to be had whether they come in the form of self satisfaction, the gratitude of others, or a higher grade.
Theologically speaking the whole pull yourself up by your own bootstraps mentality it all work righteousness and false pride, but even within the Christian faith you cannot live a life of wanton sin and gluttony and expect that all your willful sins will be mopped up and taken care of. It is true that Christ died upon the cross for all people and all sins, regardless of how grievous, and it is also true that without the Holy Spirit we cannot by our own reason or strength believe in the Heavenly Father and come to him, but when given the forgiveness of the death upon the cross and faith through the Holy Spirit we should and are supposed to use our new found faith and freedom for the benefit of other people and do good works for the sake of our neighbor. Even in Christianity where forgiveness is so central to everything you don't get a clear ticket to do whatever you want and expect everyone else to pick up the slack.
I love to help the students that are struggling mightily but want to succeed because my efforts to help them have visible worth. When the light bulb finally comes on and the message finally clicks and sinks in I cannot help but beam with pride at my tutee's accomplishment, but the person coming asking me to solve their homework for them frustrates me to no end.
Your failure or success depends on you. Objects at rest require a push to get them moving, and only you are capable of getting the ball rolling. The next time you feel like insulting your professor or boss suck it up and figure out how to get the problem solved. Other people have been in worse situations than you and have managed to make it through.
You have the opportunity to succeed, but you have to earn it first. Now go for it.
Pax
Friday, September 6, 2013
Mr. McMusics
I really like music.
I listen to music pretty much whenever I have the opportunity and certain kinds of music can get me rather excited. In part I probably inherited my love for it from my dad who listens to music even more than I do. A lot of my exposure to different bands and genres has come from riding in the car with him as he listens to CD's or playlists he's made. My dad also listens to a pretty wide variety of music and that's probably part of the reason my own tastes vary across a pretty wide spectrum. I can't really say I'm a fan of any particular genre because I have managed to find songs that I both enjoy and abhor in almost every field of music I've been exposed to. Even those genres that I by and large avoid and dislike tend to have a couple of gems hidden amongst the terrible noise that claims to be music.
The thing about music is that, at least for me, it usually gets absorbed without actually being analyzed or thought about too carefully. That may not seem like that big of deal, and maybe it isn't in some ways. I certainly didn't think it was for the longest time. The only problem with just mindlessly listening to music or jamming to a song because it seems kind of catchy and fun is that music is actually a pretty powerful and influential tool that conveys quite a bit of emotion and information even without being accompanied by lyrics.
I know a lot of people who are greatly involved in doing things with music and most of them have talked about how they find music to be a great way for them to express themselves. Music really is, if you think about it, another language. It doesn't really have its own alphabet or culture attached to it, but it is a way of communicating information from one person to another. Additionally, music is incredibly good at getting its message across without us ever really being aware of it. Certain styles of music cause us to react, even unconsciously it seems, in particular ways. Music can excite us or calm us down, and it can play with our moods and emotions like they're puppets on strings. Music is often used to set the mood in movies or at parties of other special occasions and many times it will just be there, almost unnoticed, in the background without us truly being aware of its presents but still having an impact on our minds and emotions as long as we are in hearing distance.
Music in general is a huge part of our society. There are lot of different and varying tastes in music across the country, but it really seems like most people spend a fair amount of their time listening to the stuff. Many stores and restaurants have music playing on the radio in the background which means that even if you don't spend a lot of time listening to music on your own you are probably getting some exposure somewhere. Even if you don't follow the musical trends of our country very closely you can often take a pretty safe stab at what's popular after spending an hour or two listening to the radio where the same half a dozen songs seem to be played in a loop almost continuously.
If you consider how much music people listen to, that music is a language conveying some kind of message and/or emotion, and that music is as incredibly moving and influential as it is then it seems like it would be a good idea to ask what kind of message the music we, as a culture, are listening to is conveying. The music current music industry of any age can help define a generation and set the tone for the majority of the people growing up and living within that age. I hear a lot about 60's, 70's, and 80's era music as though the music that people listened to during those decades helped to shape what kind of society and culture young people made up during that time. When music appears to have that much power over a generation it seems like it would probably be a good idea to know what it is trying to get across to us.
Because I am a terribly bias and opinionated individual, let's start by looking at the music of Taylor Swift. I am no expect on Miss Swift (thank goodness) but I have gotten the impression that she is, at least currently, one of the most popular country singers about and that a very large number of young women in our country listen to her stuff quite frequently and think she is pretty amazing.
Now, on a basic level I actually think Taylor Swift isn't that bad of a musician. She doesn't have a bad voice and I won't deny that, as much as I hate getting them stuck in my head, a lot of her songs are pretty catchy. What I'm looking at though is the kind of message that her songs are delivering to her listeners. I haven't listened to every song she has ever written and song, but I hear a lot of the more popular ones through the radio or when my sister is listening to music and I've got to say that the stuff Miss Swift typically sings about is rather frustrating to me.
The vast majority of her songs seem to be doing one of two things. They are either A) looking at incredibly shallow relationships founded on hyped up emotions without any real grounding or B) bashing the male sex and talking about lame guys are. Maybe I'm just being petty, but those don't really seem like the kinds of mentalities that should be getting enforced in people's minds. No, I do not think that emotions have no place in relationships, and yes, I will admit that there a lot of pretty crummy guys out there but love needs to be founded on a great deal more than just teenage emotions going off the hook and there are guys out there that are actually pretty darn awesome if you bother to look for them and hold them to high enough expectations.
It isn't just Taylor Swift though that is giving off this kind of message. The vast majority of what I hear coming from female artists these days, and to be fair there is probably a lot of it that I don't hear, is all about terrible guys being totally jerks and "love" founded on adrenaline, hormones, and a desire to live in the moment. Maybe this kind of a music is popular because it is a reflection of our young adult and teenage culture these days, but I actually think that that instead of simply resulting from our society they are actually helping to influence it. If young people are regularly listening to music encouraging sexual relationships outside of wedlock and getting deep into relationships with people based on feelings more than anything else then that is going to influence how they view relationships and how they conduct their own lives. I often hear musicians like Taylor Swift described as great role models for young girls and when I can only bang my head on the desk because the stuff I hear her singing about is not the kind of stuff I would want a sister or daughter of mine carrying out in real life.
Let's not be sexist though. Let's look at some of the absolutely terrible stuff that guys sing and listen to as well shall we? Since we talked about Taylor Swift and she sings country let's take a look at what a lot of popular male country singers' songs are about. Well... hmmm... let's see. That ones about shallow relationships based on the appearance of a woman. That one is about alcohol. That one is simultaneously about alcohol and inappropriate activities with numerous women. Yeah, that one belittles women as well... oh and it mentions alcohol. This one talks about women leaving... and so do about a million others.
Yeah, there are a number of actually really good country songs that have some pretty awesome content int hem, but there are also a lot of really popular ones that revel in some pretty terrible stuff. I'm not saying alcohol is evil or anything, but writing a song about how fun it is to get hung over and the stupid stuff you did while drunk... eh... not really sure that's sending the best message.
Actually, in light of what guys typically seem to sing out about a lot of what makes it into the girls' songs starts to make a lot of sense. In my last blog post I talked about what it means to be a man and looking at the general array of popular music sung by males these days I find that the traits and qualities I mentioned in that post to be, by and large, sadly lacking.
Ultimately, we live in the freedom of the Gospel to listen to whatever music we want and listening to stuff that may not be quite so virtuous isn't going to necessarily make us all go out and start reenacting the music, but it is foolish to try argue that the music we listen to as individuals and as a society doesn't have some kind of an impact on us and at the very least we should be aware of what the message we are eating up is.
After all, I think I said already, music doesn't just impart a message to us through the lyrics. It also conveys emotions and a kind of mindset through they kind of sound is creates as well. Classical music can communicate just as much, and sometimes significantly more, than a country, pop, or rock song. While it is usually pretty easy to decipher what message is being given through the lyrics of a song (once you stop and think about them) the emotional message from the sound, or feel, of a song tends to be absorbed more unconsciously, at least for me.
For example, Crazy Train by Ozzy Osborn is one song that I love to listen to. There is something about that song that can make me go from being totally lethargic and lazy to having the urge to get up and do something energetic. A lot of higher energy pieces of music are like that, and that can be a good thing or it can be a bad thing. When you need to get stuff done listening to music that gets you pumped and excited can be helpful but when you are supposed to be driving the speed limit and Crazy Train instills you and urge to put the pedal to metal then you should probably switch listening to something else.
A lot of rap, and heavy metal type music conveys one very strong emotion: anger. There are times and places when feeling angry is very justified. When our safety or the safety of those we love is threatened, or when an injustice is performed we should be outraged, but anger is an emotion that often abused, misdirected and unfounded. In a lot of angry sounded music the message being told seems to not only include anger but, in many cases, violence and hostility. It commonly feeds of the kind of male weakness I talked about in my last post where guys seem to feel the need to express their authority, dominance, and masculinity by getting even with people and by demonstrating their strength through physical prowess and violence. Like I said in the post where I talk about that mindset, that kind of thinking is not what we want to be finding in men and is something we have to strive to avoid. Music that kind of enhances, feeds, and fuels that way of thinking and those emotions can be incredibly dangerous.
So what's the point I'm try to make here? What am I saying and why am I writing this post?
Essentially I am cautioning any who might read this, and really our society as a whole, to think about what you are listening to, what kind of a message it is giving, and why you are listening to it. Music can't be blamed for the problems of our culture and society but they can definitely play a part in influencing the way we think and act in certain scenarios. The information we absorb through music, books, movies and the like is absorbed one way or another and it is important for us to understand what kinds of information we absorbing when we see or hear it.
You are free to listen to whatever it is you want, and the quality or message of the music you listen to doesn't make you a good or bad person, but it will impact you and shouldn't be mindlessly absorbed. There is also plenty of music out there with great messages and very high quality to them that you could potentially listen to and it might be worth asking yourself why you would listen to something that seems to be supporting or advocating immoral and wrong behavior when you could be listening to something else?
Again, why am I saying this?
I am writing this because I love music. I love to listen to it and I would really love it if I was better at creating it. I've made the poor choice to listen to music with some pretty questionable messages in the past and I did so without consciously realizing or processing what it was I was listening to. There was a stretch of several months a while back where I was in a pretty big funk for a while and was dwelling overly much on kind of depressing things. At the same time I was listening to a lot of pretty pessimistic and depressing music and that music, far from helping my mood, was actually kind of reenforcing the self pitying and bummed out thoughts I was having. At several points during this span of time a very dear friend of mine pointed out that the messages being conveyed in the music I was listening to were perhaps not the best for me to be surrounding myself with, but it was quite a while before I took my friend's advice seriously.
Eventually I actually thought about what they had said at some length and that's when I realized how much the music I had been listening to had been affecting my already pretty black mood. That fact wasn't really what ultimately helped me to get out of my funk, but realizing that I was allowing my musical tastes to actually influence and control my emotions was one of the first steps to getting over what I was spending too much time dwelling on.
I still listen to some music that could be classified as being pretty depressing but I'm able to listen to it more objectively at this point and because I am able to better understand the overall message of the music I am listening to I can hear it without it controlling my thoughts and emotions for me.
I could have written a very similar post about the influence of books or movies or any other message conveying media but I think that music is probably the most powerful of any of those. Mainly I would like to see people being more consciously aware of what they taking in and guarding themselves from allowing the less than virtuous messages within a lot of popular culture to influence their decisions and thinking. After all, we are to live in the world but not of it.
Live in the freedom of the Gospel and listen to the music you enjoy, but understand what you are listening to and be the master of your own emotions and decisions.
Anyhow, I have once again failed to express what I hoped to say as clearly and coherently as I had hoped but that's a glimpse at some of my thoughts and musing for today. Now I'm gonna go listen to some more Mumford & Sons and Imagine Dragons.
Pax
I listen to music pretty much whenever I have the opportunity and certain kinds of music can get me rather excited. In part I probably inherited my love for it from my dad who listens to music even more than I do. A lot of my exposure to different bands and genres has come from riding in the car with him as he listens to CD's or playlists he's made. My dad also listens to a pretty wide variety of music and that's probably part of the reason my own tastes vary across a pretty wide spectrum. I can't really say I'm a fan of any particular genre because I have managed to find songs that I both enjoy and abhor in almost every field of music I've been exposed to. Even those genres that I by and large avoid and dislike tend to have a couple of gems hidden amongst the terrible noise that claims to be music.
The thing about music is that, at least for me, it usually gets absorbed without actually being analyzed or thought about too carefully. That may not seem like that big of deal, and maybe it isn't in some ways. I certainly didn't think it was for the longest time. The only problem with just mindlessly listening to music or jamming to a song because it seems kind of catchy and fun is that music is actually a pretty powerful and influential tool that conveys quite a bit of emotion and information even without being accompanied by lyrics.
I know a lot of people who are greatly involved in doing things with music and most of them have talked about how they find music to be a great way for them to express themselves. Music really is, if you think about it, another language. It doesn't really have its own alphabet or culture attached to it, but it is a way of communicating information from one person to another. Additionally, music is incredibly good at getting its message across without us ever really being aware of it. Certain styles of music cause us to react, even unconsciously it seems, in particular ways. Music can excite us or calm us down, and it can play with our moods and emotions like they're puppets on strings. Music is often used to set the mood in movies or at parties of other special occasions and many times it will just be there, almost unnoticed, in the background without us truly being aware of its presents but still having an impact on our minds and emotions as long as we are in hearing distance.
Music in general is a huge part of our society. There are lot of different and varying tastes in music across the country, but it really seems like most people spend a fair amount of their time listening to the stuff. Many stores and restaurants have music playing on the radio in the background which means that even if you don't spend a lot of time listening to music on your own you are probably getting some exposure somewhere. Even if you don't follow the musical trends of our country very closely you can often take a pretty safe stab at what's popular after spending an hour or two listening to the radio where the same half a dozen songs seem to be played in a loop almost continuously.
If you consider how much music people listen to, that music is a language conveying some kind of message and/or emotion, and that music is as incredibly moving and influential as it is then it seems like it would be a good idea to ask what kind of message the music we, as a culture, are listening to is conveying. The music current music industry of any age can help define a generation and set the tone for the majority of the people growing up and living within that age. I hear a lot about 60's, 70's, and 80's era music as though the music that people listened to during those decades helped to shape what kind of society and culture young people made up during that time. When music appears to have that much power over a generation it seems like it would probably be a good idea to know what it is trying to get across to us.
Because I am a terribly bias and opinionated individual, let's start by looking at the music of Taylor Swift. I am no expect on Miss Swift (thank goodness) but I have gotten the impression that she is, at least currently, one of the most popular country singers about and that a very large number of young women in our country listen to her stuff quite frequently and think she is pretty amazing.
Now, on a basic level I actually think Taylor Swift isn't that bad of a musician. She doesn't have a bad voice and I won't deny that, as much as I hate getting them stuck in my head, a lot of her songs are pretty catchy. What I'm looking at though is the kind of message that her songs are delivering to her listeners. I haven't listened to every song she has ever written and song, but I hear a lot of the more popular ones through the radio or when my sister is listening to music and I've got to say that the stuff Miss Swift typically sings about is rather frustrating to me.
The vast majority of her songs seem to be doing one of two things. They are either A) looking at incredibly shallow relationships founded on hyped up emotions without any real grounding or B) bashing the male sex and talking about lame guys are. Maybe I'm just being petty, but those don't really seem like the kinds of mentalities that should be getting enforced in people's minds. No, I do not think that emotions have no place in relationships, and yes, I will admit that there a lot of pretty crummy guys out there but love needs to be founded on a great deal more than just teenage emotions going off the hook and there are guys out there that are actually pretty darn awesome if you bother to look for them and hold them to high enough expectations.
It isn't just Taylor Swift though that is giving off this kind of message. The vast majority of what I hear coming from female artists these days, and to be fair there is probably a lot of it that I don't hear, is all about terrible guys being totally jerks and "love" founded on adrenaline, hormones, and a desire to live in the moment. Maybe this kind of a music is popular because it is a reflection of our young adult and teenage culture these days, but I actually think that that instead of simply resulting from our society they are actually helping to influence it. If young people are regularly listening to music encouraging sexual relationships outside of wedlock and getting deep into relationships with people based on feelings more than anything else then that is going to influence how they view relationships and how they conduct their own lives. I often hear musicians like Taylor Swift described as great role models for young girls and when I can only bang my head on the desk because the stuff I hear her singing about is not the kind of stuff I would want a sister or daughter of mine carrying out in real life.
Let's not be sexist though. Let's look at some of the absolutely terrible stuff that guys sing and listen to as well shall we? Since we talked about Taylor Swift and she sings country let's take a look at what a lot of popular male country singers' songs are about. Well... hmmm... let's see. That ones about shallow relationships based on the appearance of a woman. That one is about alcohol. That one is simultaneously about alcohol and inappropriate activities with numerous women. Yeah, that one belittles women as well... oh and it mentions alcohol. This one talks about women leaving... and so do about a million others.
Yeah, there are a number of actually really good country songs that have some pretty awesome content int hem, but there are also a lot of really popular ones that revel in some pretty terrible stuff. I'm not saying alcohol is evil or anything, but writing a song about how fun it is to get hung over and the stupid stuff you did while drunk... eh... not really sure that's sending the best message.
Actually, in light of what guys typically seem to sing out about a lot of what makes it into the girls' songs starts to make a lot of sense. In my last blog post I talked about what it means to be a man and looking at the general array of popular music sung by males these days I find that the traits and qualities I mentioned in that post to be, by and large, sadly lacking.
Ultimately, we live in the freedom of the Gospel to listen to whatever music we want and listening to stuff that may not be quite so virtuous isn't going to necessarily make us all go out and start reenacting the music, but it is foolish to try argue that the music we listen to as individuals and as a society doesn't have some kind of an impact on us and at the very least we should be aware of what the message we are eating up is.
After all, I think I said already, music doesn't just impart a message to us through the lyrics. It also conveys emotions and a kind of mindset through they kind of sound is creates as well. Classical music can communicate just as much, and sometimes significantly more, than a country, pop, or rock song. While it is usually pretty easy to decipher what message is being given through the lyrics of a song (once you stop and think about them) the emotional message from the sound, or feel, of a song tends to be absorbed more unconsciously, at least for me.
For example, Crazy Train by Ozzy Osborn is one song that I love to listen to. There is something about that song that can make me go from being totally lethargic and lazy to having the urge to get up and do something energetic. A lot of higher energy pieces of music are like that, and that can be a good thing or it can be a bad thing. When you need to get stuff done listening to music that gets you pumped and excited can be helpful but when you are supposed to be driving the speed limit and Crazy Train instills you and urge to put the pedal to metal then you should probably switch listening to something else.
A lot of rap, and heavy metal type music conveys one very strong emotion: anger. There are times and places when feeling angry is very justified. When our safety or the safety of those we love is threatened, or when an injustice is performed we should be outraged, but anger is an emotion that often abused, misdirected and unfounded. In a lot of angry sounded music the message being told seems to not only include anger but, in many cases, violence and hostility. It commonly feeds of the kind of male weakness I talked about in my last post where guys seem to feel the need to express their authority, dominance, and masculinity by getting even with people and by demonstrating their strength through physical prowess and violence. Like I said in the post where I talk about that mindset, that kind of thinking is not what we want to be finding in men and is something we have to strive to avoid. Music that kind of enhances, feeds, and fuels that way of thinking and those emotions can be incredibly dangerous.
So what's the point I'm try to make here? What am I saying and why am I writing this post?
Essentially I am cautioning any who might read this, and really our society as a whole, to think about what you are listening to, what kind of a message it is giving, and why you are listening to it. Music can't be blamed for the problems of our culture and society but they can definitely play a part in influencing the way we think and act in certain scenarios. The information we absorb through music, books, movies and the like is absorbed one way or another and it is important for us to understand what kinds of information we absorbing when we see or hear it.
You are free to listen to whatever it is you want, and the quality or message of the music you listen to doesn't make you a good or bad person, but it will impact you and shouldn't be mindlessly absorbed. There is also plenty of music out there with great messages and very high quality to them that you could potentially listen to and it might be worth asking yourself why you would listen to something that seems to be supporting or advocating immoral and wrong behavior when you could be listening to something else?
Again, why am I saying this?
I am writing this because I love music. I love to listen to it and I would really love it if I was better at creating it. I've made the poor choice to listen to music with some pretty questionable messages in the past and I did so without consciously realizing or processing what it was I was listening to. There was a stretch of several months a while back where I was in a pretty big funk for a while and was dwelling overly much on kind of depressing things. At the same time I was listening to a lot of pretty pessimistic and depressing music and that music, far from helping my mood, was actually kind of reenforcing the self pitying and bummed out thoughts I was having. At several points during this span of time a very dear friend of mine pointed out that the messages being conveyed in the music I was listening to were perhaps not the best for me to be surrounding myself with, but it was quite a while before I took my friend's advice seriously.
Eventually I actually thought about what they had said at some length and that's when I realized how much the music I had been listening to had been affecting my already pretty black mood. That fact wasn't really what ultimately helped me to get out of my funk, but realizing that I was allowing my musical tastes to actually influence and control my emotions was one of the first steps to getting over what I was spending too much time dwelling on.
I still listen to some music that could be classified as being pretty depressing but I'm able to listen to it more objectively at this point and because I am able to better understand the overall message of the music I am listening to I can hear it without it controlling my thoughts and emotions for me.
I could have written a very similar post about the influence of books or movies or any other message conveying media but I think that music is probably the most powerful of any of those. Mainly I would like to see people being more consciously aware of what they taking in and guarding themselves from allowing the less than virtuous messages within a lot of popular culture to influence their decisions and thinking. After all, we are to live in the world but not of it.
Live in the freedom of the Gospel and listen to the music you enjoy, but understand what you are listening to and be the master of your own emotions and decisions.
Anyhow, I have once again failed to express what I hoped to say as clearly and coherently as I had hoped but that's a glimpse at some of my thoughts and musing for today. Now I'm gonna go listen to some more Mumford & Sons and Imagine Dragons.
Pax
Monday, September 2, 2013
Man Up
There is a running joke within my circle of good friends about one of my pals losing his man card to a lady, also a good friend. We tease him because something he told her caused her to do something for him that he probably should have done himself. As a result we say that he lost his man card to his knight in shining petticoats riding side saddle to his rescue.
Besides being totally brilliant and a tad sexist, the whole thing got me thinking a little bit more on what exactly being a manly means and what our "man card" actually signifies.
Earlier this year I read a book titled "The Men's Code of Honor: 66 Principles that Make a Man" by Dan Stanford, and as the title would suggest, the author went through a list of 66 principles, standards, or codes that he believed every true man should follow. They included everything from being honest, ethical, and dependable to standing up for women and children. More subtle, or perhaps less obvious, things like having a firm handshake and being a good steward of our planet were also included in this list.
Last year for my English class in the fall semester I also read an article titled ""Bros Before Hos": The Guy Code" by Michael Kimmel that was all about a study Kimmel conducted to try and determine what young men and women in our culture thought it meant to be manly. Among other things, the list he came up with included: Never cries, gets angry instead of getting sad, gets even, and doesn't show emotion. It was also included in this article that being "gay" was generally considered to be the opposite of being manly (I'm not going to go into my own views on Homosexuality within this particular article even if it kind of relevant.). I was really quite shocked and upset, not only by the first list of things that supposedly made someone manly, but then by the list of things that apparently indicate that someone is "gay". Kimmel created a list of responses he got from the young women he asked "What is an indication a guy is gay?" and their answers included "He is interested in what I have to say," "He has an interest in art or music," and "He looks at my face and not my chest." In other words, these women are, or at least were, under the impression that men who treat them with respect and had more than an animalistic personality are all homosexual and that real men don't care about what they have to say and are only interested in their physical appearance. I was pretty disgusted with what Kimmel's article revealed to be honest.
So, if you compare "The Guy Code" and "The Men's Code of Honor" you end up with two completely different perspectives on what it means to be manly. True, both indicate that showing strength and bravery are part of being manly, but even there there are discrepancies because what the people in Kimmel's article and what Stanford says are strength and bravery are two very different things.
If we can use the Michael Kimmel article as a decent portrayal of the popular, modern culture view of masculinity (and that is what it is meant to be) then I think it can fairly safely sum up the cultural view is this.
1. Masculinity is, at its heart, based on one's ability to dominate another.
2. Strength is determined by physical prowess and one's ability to control others.
3. Emotions and interests in art, music, or beauty in general are considered weaknesses and feminine.
4. Real men see women's bodies, and not their personalities or identities, as being the important thing about them.
Granted, some of those might be some gross generalizations and I know full well that not every young guy and gal in the modern U.S. world believes this, but I have seen much of this first hand and while Kimmel's article kind of forced me to look it in the face, I was semi-aware of a lot of these views already.
The thing is, real masculinity is pretty much the opposite of the four points I just mentioned above.
While there is nothing wrong with physical might, one of the thing that Stanford kinda address in his book (and I quite agree) is that a man's real strength is not in his ability to out lift another person but in his strength of character, and integrity. Then, a man's chief duty is not to dominate or control others, and especially not women, but to defend, protect, and care for them. A man's physical strength is meant to be used as a way to provide for and protect those with lesser strength, not as a means to bend them to his will.
Additionally, emotion, far from being a weakness, can be a great strength as well. Love and sorrow are two incredibly important emotions for a man and without them it is actually pretty hard for him to carry out his duties. Anger, which is the only emotion really supported in popular male culture, is actually kind of anti masculine emotion. Anger, violence, and hatred are like the exact opposite of what a real man is supposed to feel toward others. When those emotions end up governing a man's actions and thoughts that man has truly lost his man card and broken the Men's Code of Honor.
I also have a hard time understanding when exactly art and music supposedly became feminine pursuits. Someone apparently failed to get the message across to Leonardo Di Vinci, Bach, Mozart, and all them other famous artists and musicians. Sure, they may not be specifically masculine pursuits, but that doesn't mean that art and music are the opposite of being masculine. To suggest as much is just plain stupid.
Now, it is the fourth point that I wanted to address most out of the four I listed above because it really seems to be the most dangerous and damaging of the four supposed rules for being "manly" in today's society and because it does, in many ways, reflect back to the first two.
Call me sexist but when it comes to women, a man's duty is first and foremost to defend them, honor them, and treat them with the utmost respect. To treat a woman as a thing, or nothing more than a body to be used, is to fall as far from manhood as one possibly can. Rape, in my opinion, is the most disgusting and degrading act that a man can commit, but by abusing or disrespecting a woman in any way a man shreds his man card to pieces.
In today's culture, where the Feminist movement runs rampant, there is this ridiculous idea that men and women are equal. Now, I'm not about to suggest that men are better than women or that women are better than men because neither of those things is true, but they most certainly are not equal in the sense that they are exactly the same. The two sexes are incredibly different in any number of ways and it is foolish to try and suggest otherwise. We think differently, we feel differently, we act differently, and we are capable of different things. In the same way that an apple does not equal and orange, or that wood doesn't equal metal men and women are not equal. Neither one is superior or inferior, but they are not the same.
Women are capable of a lot of truly remarkable things that men really stink at. The fact that they have the ability to sustain and provide life far beyond what a guy could ever accomplish is just one of many talents the females have. They tend to be a lot better at showing compassion and sympathy toward other people. They're really good at being supportive of their friends and family. They know how to sacrifice their own interests for the sake of others in a way that should put all of us men to shame, and the energy and enthusiasm with which they strive to accomplish their goals is truly astounding.
However, none of this changes the Biblical truth that it is the job of men to defend and lead. We may not be very good at it, but that is our duty and our place. Protecting women and children is among the chief responsibilities of manhood. Men are the be the heads of their household, and they are to provide and care for the women in their lives before they provide for themselves.
The problem is that most people take issue with this idea because, I think, they don't understand what it means for a man to be the head and leader. It does not by any means mean that men have the right to dominate women or to reign as tyrants over them. It doesn't mean that women should have their rights stripped away from them and only serve as obedient slaves.
What being the head and leader chiefly means is sacrifice.
Really, sacrifice is what being a man is all about.
It means working night and day to make sure your wife and children have a roof over their heads. It means shedding blood, sweat, and tears to defend your country, family and friends. It means laying down your life for the sake of another. It means giving up everything you have so that another may go on. It is the exact opposite of domination, control, and using others (especially women) as tools for your enjoyment. Being a real man is the most selfless act that we, as men, can commit.
The ultimate display of masculinity and real manhood was demonstrated when Christ gave himself up to death upon the cross for the sake of the whole world and all the filthy sinners that have ever, and ever will, dwell upon it. As Christ has cared for his church, despite her rebelliousness and thanklessness, real men should care for those around them regardless of how they are treated. No man ever hope to be as truly manly as that perfect man, Christ, but it is in him that we see a perfect example of what we should strive for.
The man who leads a woman does so, not by enslaving her to his will, but by allowing her to live free of life's concerns to the extent he can possibly manage to do so. Father's strive to provide for their daughters and husbands strive to provide for their wives so that they need not worry about the needs of their body, heart, and mind. A woman's head should not be a tyrannical ruler who forces her to do her bidding, but he should be her guide, her protector, her provider, and the first to lay down his life for her benefit.
All four of the "rules of masculinity" in modern culture that I mentioned above stand in direct opposition to this! A man who strives to prove his strength through dominance cannot, at the same time, be fulfilling his duty by lifting another above himself. A man fighting to protect the honor and life of another cannot, at the same time, be fighting to prove his own prowess and might through the subjection of another. A man without emotion, love, compassion and the ability to feel sorrow cannot properly address the needs and emotions of those who depend upon him. Likewise, a man fueled by anger and a need to get even with those who slight him is putting his own self and desires above those of the people he is supposed to care for. Finally, no boy who basis a woman's worth on her physical appearance can ever claim to really claim to be a man. The man who values a woman only for her body is no more than animal.
Again I say, being a man is all about sacrifice. Your man card is not something you can win through feats of extraordinary strength or prowess, nor is it something you can gain through building yourself up by pulling others down. Rather the true measures of a man's worth lies in the number of people he has lifted above himself.
Christ shone in all his radiant glory and splendor as he hung, dying from the cross in order to save those who had scorned and rejected him. When faced with death he did not fight or display some feat of great strength, even though he certainly could have, but he gave himself up for the sake of us all. By taking upon his own shoulders all of our sins, faults, and failings he demonstrated to us all just what true masculinity really is.
On that note, I hope and pray that each and every one of you have been blessed to know a real man. Every boy needs one to look up too and every girl needs one to treat her right.
Pax
(P.S. I apologize for my random and winding thought process. I wanted to get this posted tonight before my Labor Day holiday is finished and I jump back into school so I didn't have take the time to organize my thoughts as much as I would have liked to.
Additionally, I'm posting a list of the 66 principles listed in "A Men's Code of Honor" by Dan Stanford. It is an excellent book that I found very interesting and would encourage all of you to read because he goes into a lot more detail about each of these principles and just listing them doesn't really get the real worth of the book itself.)
Besides being totally brilliant and a tad sexist, the whole thing got me thinking a little bit more on what exactly being a manly means and what our "man card" actually signifies.
Earlier this year I read a book titled "The Men's Code of Honor: 66 Principles that Make a Man" by Dan Stanford, and as the title would suggest, the author went through a list of 66 principles, standards, or codes that he believed every true man should follow. They included everything from being honest, ethical, and dependable to standing up for women and children. More subtle, or perhaps less obvious, things like having a firm handshake and being a good steward of our planet were also included in this list.
Last year for my English class in the fall semester I also read an article titled ""Bros Before Hos": The Guy Code" by Michael Kimmel that was all about a study Kimmel conducted to try and determine what young men and women in our culture thought it meant to be manly. Among other things, the list he came up with included: Never cries, gets angry instead of getting sad, gets even, and doesn't show emotion. It was also included in this article that being "gay" was generally considered to be the opposite of being manly (I'm not going to go into my own views on Homosexuality within this particular article even if it kind of relevant.). I was really quite shocked and upset, not only by the first list of things that supposedly made someone manly, but then by the list of things that apparently indicate that someone is "gay". Kimmel created a list of responses he got from the young women he asked "What is an indication a guy is gay?" and their answers included "He is interested in what I have to say," "He has an interest in art or music," and "He looks at my face and not my chest." In other words, these women are, or at least were, under the impression that men who treat them with respect and had more than an animalistic personality are all homosexual and that real men don't care about what they have to say and are only interested in their physical appearance. I was pretty disgusted with what Kimmel's article revealed to be honest.
So, if you compare "The Guy Code" and "The Men's Code of Honor" you end up with two completely different perspectives on what it means to be manly. True, both indicate that showing strength and bravery are part of being manly, but even there there are discrepancies because what the people in Kimmel's article and what Stanford says are strength and bravery are two very different things.
If we can use the Michael Kimmel article as a decent portrayal of the popular, modern culture view of masculinity (and that is what it is meant to be) then I think it can fairly safely sum up the cultural view is this.
1. Masculinity is, at its heart, based on one's ability to dominate another.
2. Strength is determined by physical prowess and one's ability to control others.
3. Emotions and interests in art, music, or beauty in general are considered weaknesses and feminine.
4. Real men see women's bodies, and not their personalities or identities, as being the important thing about them.
Granted, some of those might be some gross generalizations and I know full well that not every young guy and gal in the modern U.S. world believes this, but I have seen much of this first hand and while Kimmel's article kind of forced me to look it in the face, I was semi-aware of a lot of these views already.
The thing is, real masculinity is pretty much the opposite of the four points I just mentioned above.
While there is nothing wrong with physical might, one of the thing that Stanford kinda address in his book (and I quite agree) is that a man's real strength is not in his ability to out lift another person but in his strength of character, and integrity. Then, a man's chief duty is not to dominate or control others, and especially not women, but to defend, protect, and care for them. A man's physical strength is meant to be used as a way to provide for and protect those with lesser strength, not as a means to bend them to his will.
Additionally, emotion, far from being a weakness, can be a great strength as well. Love and sorrow are two incredibly important emotions for a man and without them it is actually pretty hard for him to carry out his duties. Anger, which is the only emotion really supported in popular male culture, is actually kind of anti masculine emotion. Anger, violence, and hatred are like the exact opposite of what a real man is supposed to feel toward others. When those emotions end up governing a man's actions and thoughts that man has truly lost his man card and broken the Men's Code of Honor.
I also have a hard time understanding when exactly art and music supposedly became feminine pursuits. Someone apparently failed to get the message across to Leonardo Di Vinci, Bach, Mozart, and all them other famous artists and musicians. Sure, they may not be specifically masculine pursuits, but that doesn't mean that art and music are the opposite of being masculine. To suggest as much is just plain stupid.
Now, it is the fourth point that I wanted to address most out of the four I listed above because it really seems to be the most dangerous and damaging of the four supposed rules for being "manly" in today's society and because it does, in many ways, reflect back to the first two.
Call me sexist but when it comes to women, a man's duty is first and foremost to defend them, honor them, and treat them with the utmost respect. To treat a woman as a thing, or nothing more than a body to be used, is to fall as far from manhood as one possibly can. Rape, in my opinion, is the most disgusting and degrading act that a man can commit, but by abusing or disrespecting a woman in any way a man shreds his man card to pieces.
In today's culture, where the Feminist movement runs rampant, there is this ridiculous idea that men and women are equal. Now, I'm not about to suggest that men are better than women or that women are better than men because neither of those things is true, but they most certainly are not equal in the sense that they are exactly the same. The two sexes are incredibly different in any number of ways and it is foolish to try and suggest otherwise. We think differently, we feel differently, we act differently, and we are capable of different things. In the same way that an apple does not equal and orange, or that wood doesn't equal metal men and women are not equal. Neither one is superior or inferior, but they are not the same.
Women are capable of a lot of truly remarkable things that men really stink at. The fact that they have the ability to sustain and provide life far beyond what a guy could ever accomplish is just one of many talents the females have. They tend to be a lot better at showing compassion and sympathy toward other people. They're really good at being supportive of their friends and family. They know how to sacrifice their own interests for the sake of others in a way that should put all of us men to shame, and the energy and enthusiasm with which they strive to accomplish their goals is truly astounding.
However, none of this changes the Biblical truth that it is the job of men to defend and lead. We may not be very good at it, but that is our duty and our place. Protecting women and children is among the chief responsibilities of manhood. Men are the be the heads of their household, and they are to provide and care for the women in their lives before they provide for themselves.
The problem is that most people take issue with this idea because, I think, they don't understand what it means for a man to be the head and leader. It does not by any means mean that men have the right to dominate women or to reign as tyrants over them. It doesn't mean that women should have their rights stripped away from them and only serve as obedient slaves.
What being the head and leader chiefly means is sacrifice.
Really, sacrifice is what being a man is all about.
It means working night and day to make sure your wife and children have a roof over their heads. It means shedding blood, sweat, and tears to defend your country, family and friends. It means laying down your life for the sake of another. It means giving up everything you have so that another may go on. It is the exact opposite of domination, control, and using others (especially women) as tools for your enjoyment. Being a real man is the most selfless act that we, as men, can commit.
The ultimate display of masculinity and real manhood was demonstrated when Christ gave himself up to death upon the cross for the sake of the whole world and all the filthy sinners that have ever, and ever will, dwell upon it. As Christ has cared for his church, despite her rebelliousness and thanklessness, real men should care for those around them regardless of how they are treated. No man ever hope to be as truly manly as that perfect man, Christ, but it is in him that we see a perfect example of what we should strive for.
The man who leads a woman does so, not by enslaving her to his will, but by allowing her to live free of life's concerns to the extent he can possibly manage to do so. Father's strive to provide for their daughters and husbands strive to provide for their wives so that they need not worry about the needs of their body, heart, and mind. A woman's head should not be a tyrannical ruler who forces her to do her bidding, but he should be her guide, her protector, her provider, and the first to lay down his life for her benefit.
All four of the "rules of masculinity" in modern culture that I mentioned above stand in direct opposition to this! A man who strives to prove his strength through dominance cannot, at the same time, be fulfilling his duty by lifting another above himself. A man fighting to protect the honor and life of another cannot, at the same time, be fighting to prove his own prowess and might through the subjection of another. A man without emotion, love, compassion and the ability to feel sorrow cannot properly address the needs and emotions of those who depend upon him. Likewise, a man fueled by anger and a need to get even with those who slight him is putting his own self and desires above those of the people he is supposed to care for. Finally, no boy who basis a woman's worth on her physical appearance can ever claim to really claim to be a man. The man who values a woman only for her body is no more than animal.
Again I say, being a man is all about sacrifice. Your man card is not something you can win through feats of extraordinary strength or prowess, nor is it something you can gain through building yourself up by pulling others down. Rather the true measures of a man's worth lies in the number of people he has lifted above himself.
Christ shone in all his radiant glory and splendor as he hung, dying from the cross in order to save those who had scorned and rejected him. When faced with death he did not fight or display some feat of great strength, even though he certainly could have, but he gave himself up for the sake of us all. By taking upon his own shoulders all of our sins, faults, and failings he demonstrated to us all just what true masculinity really is.
On that note, I hope and pray that each and every one of you have been blessed to know a real man. Every boy needs one to look up too and every girl needs one to treat her right.
Pax
(P.S. I apologize for my random and winding thought process. I wanted to get this posted tonight before my Labor Day holiday is finished and I jump back into school so I didn't have take the time to organize my thoughts as much as I would have liked to.
Additionally, I'm posting a list of the 66 principles listed in "A Men's Code of Honor" by Dan Stanford. It is an excellent book that I found very interesting and would encourage all of you to read because he goes into a lot more detail about each of these principles and just listing them doesn't really get the real worth of the book itself.)
The Men’s Code of Honor
1. Tell the Truth
2. Keep Your Word
3. Mean What You Say, and Say What You Mean
4. Don't Make Excuses
5. Admit Your Mistakes
6. Take Responsibility for Your Actions
7.
Fulfill Your
Obligations and Duties
8.
Finish What You
Start
9.
Respect and
Believe in Yourself
10. Don’t Compromise with Your Principles
11. Respect the Law
12. Play by the Rules
13. Don’t Take Unfair Advantage
14. Don’t Whine
15. Respect the Property of Others
16. Carry Your Share of the Load
17. Be Fair and Just
18. Don’t Gossip
19. Don’t Bully
20. Don’t Be a Braggart
21. Don’t Pry Into Other People’s Business Unnecessarily
22. Harm No One Without Good Cause
23. Use a Firm Handshake
24. Look a Person in the Eye When You Greet Him
25. Do Not Let Anger Rule Your Conduct
26. Do Not let Your Appetites Rule You
27. Stand Tall in the Face of Adversity
28. Do What Needs to be Done
29. Defend Yourself and Your Interests
30. Use Force as a Last Resort, Then Use it Well
31. Be Prepared to Risk Your Life or Safety for a
Greater Good
32. Face Death With Courage
33. Always Stand Guard
34. Honor Women and Their Feminine Nature
35. Never use Force Against a Woman, Except in
Self-Defense
36. Never Force Sex on Anyone
37. Protect Women and Children
38. Do Not Use Crude Language in the Presence of
Children
39. Do Not Use Crude Language in the Presence of Women
Without Their Approval
40. Always Be Faithful to your Romantic Partner
41. Never Steal Another Man’s Romantic Partner
42. Meet the Romantic Needs of your Partner
43. Love and Support Children
44. Provide for Your Family
45. Serve You’re your Children’s needs Before your Own
46. Marry the Mother of Your Children
47. Make Your Home a Sanctuary of Security for Your
Family
48. Do Not Unnecessarily Burden Your Family
49. Don’t Make Your Mother Cry
50. Plan and Prepare for Your Family’s Future
51. Support Actions that Make a Better World for Our
Children
52. Take Pride in Your Work
53. Don’t Be Lazy
54. Treat Your Superiors and Elders with Respect
55. Do the Hard Work, the Dirty Work, the Mechanical
Work, the Dangerous Work, and the Heavy Lifting
56. Always Give and Honest Day’s Labor
57. Defend Your Nation
58. If Call Upon to Lead, Lead with Clarity and Set
Standards of Discipline and Keep Them
59. Be Loyal to Your Family, Group, Nation, and Friends
60. Do Not Desert a Friend or Ally
61. Show Compassion and Mercy for the Weak, the
Dependent, and the Helpless
62. Champion What is Right and Good
63. Confront and Fight Evil
64. Respect the Earth and Her Life Forms
65. Set a Good Example
66. Uphold the Tradition of Men’s Honor by Expecting
Other Men to be Honorable
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