Jack Donovan "The way of men" ideas about masculinity on Good Men Project

Emasculating them is another aspect of that—it adds insult to injury. Insulting a man’s honor—his masculine identity.

There’s a point where a man who wants to “feel useful” ends up “feeling used.” When the system no longer offers men what they want.

These “good man” codes tell men to be manly—but not too manly. 

 A man struggles to maintain his honor—his reputation as a man—because some part of him is struggling to earn and maintain a position of value, his status and his sense of belonging within the primal gang. Men want to be good men because good men are well regarded, but being a good man isn’t the same as being good at being a man.

There is a difference between being a good man and being good at being a man.

Being a good man has to do with ideas about morality, ethics, religion, and behaving productively within a given civilizational structure. Being a good man may or may not have anything at all to do with the natural role of men in a survival scenario. It is possible to be a good man without being particularly good at being a man. This is an area where men who were good at being men have sought counsel from priests, philosophers, shamans, writers, and historians. The productive synergy between these kinds of men is sadly lost when men of words and ideas pit themselves against men of action, or vice versa. Men of ideas and men of action have much to learn from each other, and the truly great are men of both action and abstraction.

Being good at being a man is about being willing and able to fulfill the natural role of men in a survival scenario. Being good at being a man is about showing other men that you are the kind of guy they’d want on their team if the shit hits the fan. Being good at being a man isn’t a quest for moral perfection, it’s about fighting to survive. Good men admire or respect bad men when they demonstrate strength, courage, mastery or a commitment to the men of their own renegade tribes. A concern with being good at being a man is what good guys and bad guys have in common.

To appeal to men, they speak of strength and courage.

A man who is more concerned with being a good man than being good at being a man makes a very well-behaved slave. (Framed by emasculating Matrix: feminization of society, corporate instinct on men emasculation, culture & social conditioning that dictates betaness kingdom)

There has always been a push and pull between civilized virtues and tactical gang virtues. However, the kind of masculinity acceptable to civilized societies is in many cases related to survival band masculinity. Civilized masculinity requires male gang dramas to become increasingly controlled, vicarious, and metaphorical. Human societies start with the gang, and then grow into nations with sports and a climate of political, artistic, and ideological competition. Eventually—as we see today—average men end up with economic competition and a handful of masturbatory outlets for their caged manhood. When a civilization fails, gangs of young men are there to scavenge its ruins, mark new perimeters, and restart the world.

The final sentence, “When a civilization fails, gangs of young men are there to scavenge its ruins, mark new perimeters, and restart the world” reminds us of a quote by Robert E. Howard in one of his Conan stories: “If that’s true, then answer this priest, why are we in these pits, hiding from some animal?” Conan asked “Someday, when all your civilization and science are likewise swept away, your kind will pray for a man with a sword.”

This book “The way of men“revives a call to reawake our true essence of being a real man, authentic masculinity, manliness.