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In Defense of Men (and Women)

John J. Musewicz, JD, MS, LMFT
November 27, 2006

Western civilization is at war with marriage in particular and intimate relationships in general. It has become trite to note how the demands of the workplace run counter to a couple’s need for more time together to take care of each other and their families. In fact, the problem is much more fundamental. The lot of most men is made clear by the advent of the industrial revolution when men were ripped from farms and shops where they worked with their families and condemned to factories, coal mines and the like. Ever since, despite lip service to the contrary, western society has existed in conflict with hearth and home. And men have been most crippled by that conflict.

Men and women are different, and those differences should be celebrated. Like women, men have souls, and those souls, like all souls, need nurturing. When I work with men (and teenage males) in individual and couple therapy, I often find myself confronted by souls seemingly stifled by a soul-crippling society. I am often saddened by an apparent and immense need for growth. To simply say that men are often not as emotional as women, not as able to discuss feelings or not as able to commit as women is to trivialize the problem. Yes, male testosterone is a hormone of aggressiveness, sexual pursuit, competition and domination, but that is not at the heart of the problem. What is missing is a cultural nurturance of maleness so that boys can develop into princes and princes into kings instead of robotic, dominating competitors doomed to a life lived at the surface of reality and denied the satisfactions and joy of breadth and depth shared with romantic partners, families and friends.

Fortunately, it is never too late for a man to become a king (and a woman a queen), but it does often demand the initiating pain of rebirth and growth. I am often asked if therapy is supposed to make you happy? Not necessarily, and certainly not before suffering the painful labor that goes with rebirth and growth. Unfortunately, it is hard to turn our backs on the familiar, and so it is hard for men to surrender the cultural messages they bear and turn toward an unknown existence that they can not yet fathom as immensely richer and rewarding.

Man as Warrior: Western civilization has turned its back on the need for male initiation fearing, I believe, the collective power of real men. Men are by nature warriors. And that is good! But being a warrior has a dark side, and if warriors are not initiated into the good, I’m afraid the dark side will win out. Warriorship must be tamed in service to the good or it will be confined to the petty and the violent. For example, male anger in relationships often provides a view into the dark side of the warrior not taught discipline, respect, loyalty, self-denial and service. While anger can be a creative force, untrained anger serves only the dark side and can and will destroy relationships and families.

The Wise Man: Wisdom is not the accumulation of facts. It is not being a highly regarded academician, scientific technician or successful administrator. It is certainly not being a politician who uses his office to reward his friends and punish his enemies. The wise man is able to integrate his accumulation of facts with his emotions, feelings and soulfulness into the often nonrational world of wisdom. In relationships, facts and the logic of the mind can win arguments but lose loving and caring. True wisdom embraces the humility of knowing that we do not know, that loving and caring require being comfortable with the bewildering. In therapy, I have seen too many men adept at winning arguments at the price of destroying relationships. They lack wisdom, and usually they lack wisdom because of a lack of initiation to the realm of wisdom by a society that seemingly fears the power of wise men. And families and communities pay the price.

Man as Lover: It is not religion but economic and cultural regimentation that is at war with emotional and sexual intimacy. Did David ever stop singing the psalms? Did the biblical Jesus ever stop dining with friends and changing water into wine? Did the prophets ever stop being erotic men and women? Do saints lack for joy? Did anyone ever have a more genuine and loving smile than Mother Theresa?

While creature comforts can give some amount of pleasure (while fueling the economic engine), they can become the dark side of joy and pleasure. SUVs and plasma televisions can become as addictive as any street drug. But we have no controlling drug for the man who really knows how to love, who can combine eroticism, passion, responsibility, self-denial, focus and discipline. There are no limits to such a man’s love. In therapy, I see too many men who have been taught to compartmentalize their lives paying homage to work, sports, television and sex to name a few. They may even be sexual mastodons, but they are not lovers.

The Man Who is King and Father: Kingship and Fatherhood are the integration of the good warrior, the wise man and the lover. A true king may or may not be a president or a prime minister. He may not command armies, but he embodies leadership. This man does not win arguments; he uses arguments to move relationships onto higher ground. This king is at one with the universe. He does not have children; they have him. He loves and is loved. In his presence, all know that ultimately the world is good and they are blessed. He is larger than life; he is truly a grand father. I would hope both for men and women that such growth and development stands as an ultimate goal of individual and couple therapy. We can be better than we are.

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John J. Musewicz, JD, MS, LMFT is a Senior Staff Therapist in CFR’s Wynnewood, PA and Voorhees, NJ offices. He can be reached at 856-783-4200 ext. 5.

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