The concept of gender is a fundamental aspect of The Ghost Dogs. We are, after all, a men's group. Understanding the nature of gender is important to understanding the purpose of The Ghost Dogs, why our group was created, what our group does, and understanding how we're preparing forthe future we're likely facing.
The Gender Roles
Gender roles are, at the most basic level, innate, biologically-determined behaviors that reflect the realities of the human experience. Our environment plays a role, but we're born the way we're born.
Generally, there are two behaviors that exist on a spectrum, masculine and feminine, that interact in a complimentary way. The development of these two sets of behaviors came about as a survival mechanism for our ancestors. Being social animals who rely on each other for survival, humans have developed specialized social roles that optimize the unique biological characteristics that define the differences between men and women.
The biological realities of the differences between men and women is undeniable. Some of the major differences include:
- Body size and composition: Men tend to be larger and have more muscle mass than women, on average. Women generally have a higher body fat percentage than men.
- Reproductive system: Men have external genitalia, while women have internal reproductive organs. Men produce sperm, while women produce eggs.
- Hormones: Men and women have different hormone profiles, with men producing more testosterone and women producing more estrogen and progesterone.
- Voice pitch: Men's vocal cords tend to be longer and thicker than women's, resulting in a deeper voice pitch.
- Hair growth: Men tend to have more body hair than women, with hair growing on the chest, face, and other areas.
- Bone structure: Men typically have denser bones and a larger bone structure than women, making them generally stronger and less prone to osteoporosis.
- Strength and endurance: Men, on average, have greater upper body strength and physical endurance than women.
Every known society and culture throughout recorded human history has conformed to behaviors consistent with these gender roles. Generally speaking:
Men have traditionally been hunters, protectors, and providers, and have therefore evolved physical and behavioral traits that facilitate these roles. For example, men have greater upper body strength, higher levels of testosterone, and a greater capacity for spatial reasoning, which can be advantageous for hunting and defending territory. They also tend to be more aggressive and competitive, which can help them succeed in these roles.
Women, on the other hand, have traditionally been gatherers, caregivers, and reproducers, and have therefore evolved physical and behavioral traits that facilitate these roles. For example, women have a higher proportion of body fat, which can provide energy during pregnancy and lactation, and they have a greater capacity for social and emotional intelligence, which can facilitate nurturing and care giving. Women also have a stronger immune system, which can help protect them and their offspring from disease.
The Pervasiveness of the Idea of a Duality of Human Nature
This idea of two different-but-complimentary forces manifests in many different ways across cultures and throughout history. Each one of these explanations of this duality closely tracks to the idea of masculinity and femininity. Here's a sample:
- Yin and Yang: One of the more famous constructs, the Chinese defined femininity as the "Yin" and masculinity as "Yang." When balanced, these led to health, happiness, and harmony.
- Shiva and Shakti: This is the same general idea as used by Hinduism.
- Specific Family Roles and Grace and Justice: The Abrahamic religions (Christianity, Judaism, and Islam) all promote social roles that track along masculine and feminine roles. Further, the idea of grace and justice, which are important Biblical concepts, track along masculine and feminine lines.
- Animus and Anima: Carl Jung, the psychologist who gave us the concept of introverts and extroverts, defined masculine and feminine aspects of the human psyche with the constructs of animus and anima.
- Logos and Eros: The same idea, but from Greek philosophy.
- Liberal and Conservative: Conservatism is often associated with values such as tradition, hierarchy, and individualism, which could be seen as more "masculine" traits. Liberalism is often associated with values such as equality, cooperation, and empathy, which could be seen as more "feminine" traits. When assessing the current state of America, understanding the role of gender roles as political ideologies helps make sense of how and why we have deep social divisions.
In general terms, each of these roles plays a specific role in a society. Masculinity generally provides for and protects the society, whereas Femininity generally nurtures and expands the society. One cannot exist without the other, and each tends to ebb and flow in predictable ways. Sometimes masculinity plays a bigger role; sometimes femininity plays a bigger role. Culture after culture throughout history has relied the the constructs of masculinity and femininity, which is why it is featured so prominently.
Using the parable of "The Call of the Wild", Masculinity is necessary for exploring and eventually conquering The Northland. Strong, courageous, skilled, honorable men, working in conjunction with other men they trust and respect, operate under The Law of Club and Fang to tame wilderness and create civilization. This period usually involves a great deal of technological innovation. In essence, Masculinity tames The Northland and creates The Southland where The Law of Love and Fellowship can thrive.
Once The Southland is established, Femininity and The Law of Love and Fellowship allows the civilization to advance and expand. There's always a small number of Masculine men needed to maintain order and protect the perimeters of the civilization, but Femininity becomes the dominant role. The civilization will reach a peak of maturity where the people feel safe and the standard of living is maximized. The farther a civilization advances, the more Masculinity is perceived as a threat to the social order, which results in men being encouraged to be soft, submissive, and weak.
Interestingly, the members of a society at this point universally see their society as "too advanced to fail." This happens because humans tend to be overly optimistic ("We got it right this time!") and perceive human progress as linear, not cyclical, and we're terrible at paying attention in history class.
Without necessary Masculine men to maintain order, crime, corruption, decadence, distrust, sharp social divides, laziness, and moral bankruptcy begin to erode the civilization until one large event or a series of smaller events cause the civilization to collapse. Quite simply, there aren't enough good men skilled at violence to protect the innocent from bad men skilled at violence. People go through a dark period of suffering and hardship, knowledge and technologies are lost, law and order give way to lawlessness and anarchy, and the virtues of Masculinity suddenly become incredibly valuable.
So... Is Masculinity Bad?
In many circles in our modern, technologically-advanced civilization, "Masculinity" is a dirty word. This vilification of masculinity usually comes from one of two angles:
Masculinity is "toxic" because it reinforces unsavory, oppressive, dangerous traits.
The "Toxic Masculinity" crowd claim masculinity is narrowly defined and places great pressure on men to conform to rigid standards, including emotional repression, aggressiveness, dominance, and violence. Further, "Toxic Masculinity" restricts men's career and hobby choices, and rewards competition. "Toxic Masculinity" is claimed to create a fear of weakness and vulnerability, encourages risk-taking, and promotes the objectification of women.
The people who toss around the term "Toxic Masculinity" usually advocate redefining masculinity as a different form of femininity, and usually advocate men engage in silly behaviors like crying openly in public, constantly ask for permission to engage in behaviors, use closely-policed politically-correct language, make sacrifices for the sake of weak or lazy people, and replacing assertiveness with passivity and submissiveness.
Masculinity is bad because all gender roles prevent equality.
An equally goofy idea comes from the Marxist tradition of believing all social problems would be eliminated if we eradicate any and all inequality.
Historically, America was founded on the belief that the government wouldn't stand in the way of particular groups or individuals, therefore everyone had the equal opportunity to be successful. If you're willing to take a chance and willing to bust your ass, the sky is the limit. That's why America is "the land of opportunity."
This noble idea gets bastardized, though. The Marxist crowd believes equal opportunity is unfair, therefore we should have equal outcomes. That means no matter how hard you work, no matter how much you sacrifice and suffer, no matter how much risk you take, you deserve the exact same outcome as a lazy, unmotivated slob. Despite the fact that this dumb idea violates everything we know about human nature, it's still pretty popular in circles who are insulated from the realities of life.
These goofy Marxists believe gender roles, specifically masculinity, perpetuate inequality because some men are insanely successful. They see this success as unjust, and believe the government should take the spoils of these individuals' success and distribute it to the people who are not successful.
Their solution to this problem is to eliminate gender roles and make all humans sexless, androgynous blobs. Just as Marxism is wildly popular among people who are too lazy to be successful, this idea of eliminating gender roles tends to be wildly popular among men and women who are really unattractive. If they can't win the game, so they they demand the rules of the game be changed.
The modern Western world in general and the United States in particular are analogous to The Southland. Aside from a few "Manuels" (the character in "The Call of the Wild" who sold Buck to dog traders), we're living in the safest, most comfortable society in the history of humanity. Predictably, this has created a couple generations of the softest, weakest men, which is supported by research. Aside from being sperm donors, the vast majority of society believe they have no need for manly men. The dirty work conducted by rough men that's needed to maintain our technologically-advanced Western society is largely hidden from view. As such, masculinity is portrayed as something to be feared. Manly men are perceived as aggressive, violent, and oppressive.
Gender in America in 2023
I hypothesize America, right now, we're likely past the apex of our civilization. During the late 1990s and early 2000s, the United States experienced a period of sustained economic growth and prosperity, with low unemployment rates, high GDP growth, and a booming stock market. This period was characterized by technological innovation and advancements, as well as globalization and increased trade with other countries.
However, since the early 2000s, the United States has faced a number of challenges and setbacks that suggest a decline in prosperity. These include:
- Economic recession: The United States experienced a major economic recession in 2008, which led to widespread job losses, home foreclosures, and a significant decline in economic activity.
- Political polarization: The United States has become increasingly politically polarized in recent years, with growing divisions between the two major political parties and a lack of compromise and cooperation in government.
- Income inequality: Income inequality has increased in the United States in recent decades, with the wealthiest Americans accruing an increasing share of the country's wealth.
- Declining global influence: The United States' global influence has declined in recent years, with challenges to its leadership in areas such as trade, climate change, and international relations.
These factors are exasperated by some rather illogical policies that have led to the collapse becoming an inevitability. Globalization destroyed the manufacturing sector of our economy as factory after factory closed in favor of cheap labor in China and Mexico. Deregulation led to corruption and bad financial decisions that led to the housing collapse in 2008. A lax immigration policy has led to an influx of illegal aliens crossing the border. Opposition to a nationalized healthcare system has led to a serious erosion of our collective health and skyrocketing healthcare costs. Expansive welfare programs have eroded the motivation for many to work, instead preferring to sit at home and do nothing productive. "Defunding the police" gave criminals free reign to victimize the most vulnerable members of our society. Short-sighted environmental policies have polluted or nearly exhausted valuable resources like water, soil, air quality, grazing lands, and forests.
The real problem, though, is that we've passed an important threshold of cooperation. In a growing, stable civilization, Masculinity and Femininity work in conjunction to keep society safe, but also growing and advancing. If crime increases, the Feminine folks let the Masculine folks fix the problem. And when the society stagnates, the Masculine folks let the Feminine folks solve the problem. When these two dynamics stop cooperating, things go to shit quickly.
Today, we're faced with a situation where the Feminine folks believe the Masculine folks are the cause of the problems, so they double down on their Law of Love and Fellowship policies. And the Masculine folks believe the Feminine folks are the cause of the problems, so they double down on their Law of Club and Fang policies.
Either way, we're probably kinda screwed.
The COVID pandemic proved our society is hopelessly divided, and we have passed the point where we can cooperate to overcome social adversity. Even now, after 1, 100,000 Americans have died of the disease and cost us about $16 trillion, people still cling to their emotionally-charged position that points fingers at "the other side." If we can't come together to navigate this catastrophe, we're in deep trouble.
The only way we could prevent our civilization from collapsing is for both types to recognize they need each other and start cooperating. Unfortunately, human nature being what it is, that will not happen. The collapse of our civilization is inevitable.
Does this mean we're heading back to the Stone Age?
Probably not. But our civilization is likely going to face a prolonged, darker future. It's likely we will never again see the prosperity we enjoyed fifteen years ago. Our children and our children's children likely will, but not us. Our cushy, safe world is gone.
For men, specifically the type of men who are reading this blog, this is a good thing. That safe, prosperous, cushy world was a world that sort of hated Masculine men. We were treated like outcasts and punished for wanting to do "guy stuff." We were blamed for all of society's problems and taught we were expendable. All of this and more happened because prosperous societies forget they exist because Masculine men carved the society out of the wilderness, and prosperous societies don't have to come face-to-face with the violence that's necessary to protect that society from the bad people who threaten the prosperity.
When civilizations collapse, suddenly the Feminine folks come face-to-face with those bad people. Faced with the threat of imminent violence, Feminine folks need Masculine folks for protection. The virtues of Masculinity will be in high demand, and we'll see a Renaissance of manhood. Eventually men will tame this chaos, stability and prosperity will reemerge, and the cycle will begin anew.
So What Do We Do?
Since 2015, I've been interested in bringing people together. Specifically, I've been experimenting with connecting people who are more Masculine-minded and people who are more Feminine-minded. Those experiments have been an abysmal failure. The problem is people, accurately, see our society starting to fray around the edges. Anyone who remembers the late 90's to early 2000's understands we're in a much worse place today than we were then. Most of us understand our society is crumbling.
The problem is we blame "the other side", however we're defining it. Blame leads to resentment, which leads to hatred. When we treat our neighbors as enemies, our fate is sealed. The collapse becomes an inevitability.
Most people simply stick their heads in the sand and pretend everything is fine. If they ignore the problems, they might just go away. Sadly, the people who ignore reality are often the first people to fall victim to the changing world. In "The Call of the Wild", these people are represented by Curly, the dog that was ruthlessly killed by a hardened Husky minutes after arriving in the Yukon. They've always lived their life by The Law of Love and Fellowship, and they're incapable of perceiving any other reality.
Some people cling tightly to their ideological beliefs with the false hope THEIR side is the ideology that will save society if only they can win the ideological battle. They genuinely believe the collapse is being caused by the other side, and forcing that other side to accept their beliefs will save everyone. Today, these groups are represented by groups and movements like Black Lives Matter, Trumpism and MAGA, Feminism, The John Birch Society, Antifa, The Oath Keepers and The Proud Boys, and the Democratic Socialists of America... among others. These groups are like the Yin without the Yang. Their inability to work in harmony with the other, and their failure to understand the complimentary nature of Masculinity and Femininity, are what cause the collapse. Doubling down on their ideologies merely assures the collapse happens faster.
Some people see the world is changing, and attempt to prepare for social collapse by hoarding. But they fail to grasp the post-collapse world is fundamentally different than the cushy, comfortable world that ceases to exist. In modern American society, these people are usually Preppers. To be clear, prepping is not a bad thing; being prepared to weather adversities is something all of us should do. The problem is most Preppers are like Hal, Charles, and Mercedes. Their solution to surviving social collapse is to hoard all the materialistic shit they can so they can continue to live their Southland life in a Northland world. Eventually, their emotional attachment to The Southland will cause them to fall through the figurative ice.
The correct answer is found in historical accounts of the long list of civilizations that have experienced collapse. There are four characteristics of survivors:
- Adaptability: Those who are able to adapt to changing circumstances and find new ways to meet their basic needs may have a better chance of survival.
- Resourcefulness: Individuals or groups who have access to a diverse range of resources and can make the most of what they have may fare better than those who rely on a single source of support.
- Resilience: The life after a social collapse is brutal; suffering is widespread and inevitable. People who are able to bounce back from adversity and remain positive and proactive in the face of challenges may be more likely to survive and thrive.
- Cooperation: During times of crisis, cooperation and collaboration among individuals and groups may be essential for survival. Those who are able to build strong networks of support and work together towards common goals may have a better chance of weathering the storm.
"The Call of the Wild" is a useful parable because these are the four fundamental characteristics Buck had that allowed him to survive and thrive in The Northland, whereas others perished. This is why Buck's evolution is such a useful roadmap for men who are motivated to develop themselves and get better at being a man. The Ghost Dogs have three explicit goals:
- Improve ourselves as individuals
- Surround ourselves with like-minded men who we trust and respect
- Create useful social networks and mutually-beneficial win-win relationships with other individuals and group
In accomplishing these goals, we address and develop each of those four characteristics needed to survive social collapse. In essence, The Ghost Dogs are organized and structured in a way that assures we will survive and thrive as our society erodes.
Skeptics and critics may claim my outlook and predictions are wrong; our society might be perfectly fine and our future is filled with muffins wrapped in rainbows. Maybe they're right. Maybe this is just misplaced paranoia. Maybe us modern-day Americans really have figured out how to maintain peace and prosperity indefinitely and we've successfully escaped the cycle that doomed every other human civilization.
Maybe.
We all have a choice. We can sit back and do nothing and hope our safe, cushy, existence lasts until the end of time. We can choose to believe our kids will be fine, and their kids and their kids' kids will be fine. We can keep working jobs we hate to buy shit we don't need to impress people we don't like. We can stay in bad relationships with partners we resent because they do not appreciate our sacrifices to raise kids who hate us. We can treat the heath problems caused by our sedentary lifestyles and gross obesity with the latest, greatest pharmaceuticals. We can pass time sitting on the couch rooting for men who play games we wish we could play, or fight imaginary wars with our virtual friends to earn imaginary glory in the latest installment of Call of Duty. We can satisfy our primal sexual drive by jerking off to our favorite Pornhub channel. We can bury our loneliness and quiet desperation with drugs, alcohol, and weed.
Or we can do the hard work of getting better at being a man. We can create a life of real adventure where we take real risks and earn the honor and respect of real men who we trust and respect in tribes bonded by a strong sense of brotherhood. We can choose to become stronger, more courageous, and develop our skills in manly pursuits that will be required in the near future. We can become the kind of man that would make our grandfathers proud. We can become the kind of man who can survive and thrive the coming collapse. We can become the kind of man we are destined to become.
The choice is yours. If you're in that first group, I'm not interested in changing your mind. If you're not desperate to discover your innate, primal masculine self, you're not going to be motivated to do the hard work that discovery requires. You'd be wasting my time and you'd be wasting yours.
If you're in that second group, though, keep reading. You've found your tribe.
~Jason
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