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Manning Up: How the Rise of Women Has Turned Men into Boys, by Kay S. Hymowitz. New York, NY: Basic Books, 2011. 240pp. $25.99 cloth. ISBN: 9780465018420.
Adolescent male elephants run amok when there are no mature bulls in the herd to keep them in line. A similar problem has been said to afflict human societies. Without a firm male hand to guide them into clearly defined adult roles, lads become louts and boys remain guys long after they should have become men.
Robert BIy argued along these lines, invoking traditional cultures rather than elephants, in his book The Sibling Society (1997). If young men today are aimless, narcissistic, and unsure of their place in society, BIy said, it is because they are raising themselves, without benefit of adult male wisdom, in a culture rife with schlock and grift. Michael Kimmel's Guyland (2008) echoes Bly's theme, though Kimmel does not claim that the wisdom needed to rectify the situation is vested solely in men or to be found in ancient myths. Joining this genre of books on young men failing to grow up is Kay Hymowitz's Manning Up.
In Hymowitz's analysis, as in Kimmel's, young men today experience a period of extended adolescence. Whereas once upon a time young men settled down earlier and embraced constructive adult roles as husbands, providers, and fathers, today they remain self-indulgent "preadults" into their late 20s or early 30s. Although the title of Hymowitz's book refers to "men," as if extended adolescence is a universal phenomenon, she is...