Our Young Men Are Failing. Here’s How to
America is in epidemic overload. After COVID-19 and our opioid nightmare, most of us are weary of talking about the “crisis of the day,” especially when ludicrous ideas like gas stoves harming our health are foisted on us by our leaders and media.
Despite all this noise, there is a crisis worthy of every American’s attention—an epidemic of failure afflicting our young men. On the bright side, there are serious thinkers speaking out about this issue. Unfortunately, they insist on secular answers for a spiritual problem. We believe the answer may be found in Christian fellowship between small groups of men who help each other overcome those obstacles life puts before them. More on this soon.
For now, one prominent person exposing young men’s struggles is Richard Reeves, senior fellow at the Brookings Institution. He directs the Future of the Middle-Class Initiative and co-directs the Center on Children and Families. Reeves recently published Of Boys and Men: Why the Modern Male Is Struggling, Why It Matters, and What to Do about It.
The book does a good job diagnosing how boys and young men are set up for failure. But it falls short in its suggestions to truly help them. This is due to Reeves trying his best to make his book politically neutral—while also pretending not to see the elephant in the room—a lack of Christian faith.
Reeves does make pointed criticisms of our educational system. Specifically, he focuses on how it fails boys as early as pre-K, a trend which continues through college. A massive gender gap exists in higher education favoring women. Reeves explains it away as the net result of 12+ years of misguided education policies. One root cause? According to Reeves, education is overwhelmingly a female occupation. He writes, “Male teachers are especially scarce in elementary schools, accounting for just one in ten. Early years education is close to being an all-female environment.”
Though accurate in addressing the problem, his answer falls short. Reeves believes one vital solution is to increase the number of men teaching. “We need an all-out national effort, including scholarships and subsidies to get more men into our schools,” he writes. “Let’s start with a target of reaching 30 percent male representation in K–12 teaching.”
But a problem remains. A big one. Those male teachers will undoubtedly come from the same ultra-progressive colleges churning out today’s educators. Inevitably, they’ll preach the identical woke gospel. Why would they be any different from their female peers? Don’t believe me? It’s naïve to think any male teacher who recently graduated from an American university won’t accuse his pupils of toxic masculinity.
But do not fear. There is a solution. One based on faith and fellowship. Men’s groups, aka Power of 4 brotherhoods, unite small groups of men with diverse life experiences to help each other overcome life’s challenges. At the heart of these gatherings is our Christian faith. (I’ve been attending mine for about twenty years. Some of my brothers have been in theirs even longer.)
Now, what if similar-minded groups formed to help boys and teens collaborate to improve their education/career prospects? Such a brotherhood could bring in recent college grads to speak to whether to attend college or not. The same group could also hear from tradesmen. After all, college isn’t right for every young man. And yet, the social stigma associated with pursuing a career in skilled trades is overpowering.
The desperate need for this fellowship isn’t limited to just young men facing troubles with education. It extends to the economy. A whopping 47 million Americans quit their jobs in 2021 as part of the Great Resignation. Certainly, women exited their jobs, but an overwhelming male element persists.
This is easy to observe in your own life. Just ask someone trying to get their patio built or their car fixed. Delays abound, especially since it isn’t typically women hammering nails or restoring engines. Reeves opines that a big driver of men failing at work is the drop in real wages for the working class. “In 1979, the weekly earnings of the typical American man who completed his education with a high school diploma was, in today’s dollars, $1,017. Today it is 14 percent lower, at $881. Men at the top are still flourishing, but men in general are not.”
As in education, the answer again lies in Christian fellowship. I’m not advocating for men to gather to pray to the Lord for better financial outcomes. But that would probably work better than waiting for employers or (worse yet) the government to address what makes the rich richer and the poor poorer.
Instead, young men would benefit from working through their problems with brothers focused on lifting each other up and living how Christ taught. Men fear judgement from their peers and a society obsessed with wealth. Removing such concerns allows us to help each other achieve a better life.
Certainly, financial concerns are regular topics at Power of 4. Imagine what young men who believe they’re trapped in dead-end jobs can do with fresh perspectives? Find the courage to make the career jump they’ve dreamed about. Uncover a side hustle easing their financial strain. They might even learn how to network, creating opportunities where they once only saw drudge.
Ultimately, Reeves documents well the extent of problems young males face in Of Boys and Men, and we’ve only scratched the surface. As Christians, we don’t believe the situation facing younger generations is all doom and gloom. Young men can better fulfill their responsibilities as stewards of the Earth and of their own families when empowered by faith and brotherhood. We’ve created the blueprint for forming your own group. Start by reading Power of 4: How Christian Men Create Purposeful Lives By Not Going It Alone. Through supporting each other in the spirit of the Lord, our boys can again flourish.