This article highlights a concerning trend that affects the military: men ‘dropping out’.
By Geoffrey Ingersoll | State of the Day by the Daily Caller
Women in Spartan culture were revered because becoming a Spartan warrior literally started from birth. Only a fine woman could possibly give birth to a Spartan, the thinking went.
Mothers were the first “drill masters,” who spent at least the first five years of their sons’ lives teaching courage, discipline, duty. The phrase that’s echoed throughout history since is “return with your shield, or on it,” a feminine decree that succinctly laid out male expectations.
Our boys have recently fallen by the wayside. If you’ve been paying much attention, this isn’t news to you.
Professor Brad Wilcox at UVA posted a startling, enlightening, and finally hopeful tweet yesterday.
“My female students at the University of Virginia are worried about the state of the opposite sex. The women who take my “sociology of family” class tell of brothers living in their parents’ basements, boyfriends hooked on pornography and male peers who don’t pull their weight in… https://t.co/SRpido0n1q pic.twitter.com/zGuQoH8xnF
— Brad Wilcox (@BradWilcoxIFS) December 10, 2025
“My female students at the University of Virginia are worried about the state of the opposite sex.
The women who take my “sociology of family” class tell of brothers living in their parents’ basements, boyfriends hooked on pornography and male peers who don’t pull their weight in group projects.
Most troublingly, many of these women say they have never been asked on a date.
Their voices are part of a rising chorus expressing concern about the falling fortunes of our boys and men.”
[STARRS NOTE: Read the comments to the professor’s tweet]
Much has been said about the deteriorating state of men. Again, none of this should be new to you.
In previous editions of SOTD, I laid out how over-feminization of our culture contributed in some ways to this rapid decline in male outcomes and male development. Specifically, “toxic” or “suicidal” empathy.
You’ve heard it before: There’s been a ruthless attack on maleness, masculinity, and so on. HR departments run amok. Demands that men ask permission for every little thing, from holding a hand to opening a door, have reduced masculine agency to a bureaucratic, ever-penalizing obstacle course.
The beautiful mystery of spontaneity, that leap of faith, the risk and reward, the lesson of many failures that pave the way to the success that actually counts; there is no room for any of it.
It’s no wonder they’ve retreated from public spaces to basements and porn.
Inside Wilcox’s statement is a seed of hope, however, in the phrase “my female students.”
As much as I believe that we are free individuals ultimately responsible for our own outcomes, when it comes to relations between the sexes, toxicity in one leads to toxicity in the other. Failure in one, failure in the other.
I don’t look, for example, at the growing participation rate of young women on OnlyFans as solely their moral failure. Truth is, I don’t even look at it as a majority of their failure.
Where are your fathers? Brothers? Where are your husbands? When women en masse fall into such basic moral depravity, it isn’t the women I turn to, it’s the men. Strong, competent, cognizant men would never allow for it.
He started off, “My female students … are worried.”
This to me represents a bit of a turning point. When women close to these men stand up and say, enough is enough, perhaps it’s actually going to be enough. Nothing rouses the men in the room like the exhortation of a matriarch. When mothers, sisters, potential brides start making basic demands again, my guess is men would be apt to listen.
“Return with your shield, or on it.”
Nobody wants to fall short of such a simple bar.
–
I started off in a basement, actually, 20 years ago.
When my mother finally grew weary of it, she marched me into the recruiters’ office herself. My two brothers followed. She’s now looking down on the three of us, a writer, an engineer, and an active-duty Marine.
A mother of men.
We need more of them. So here’s my challenge to you, Dear Reader.
If you are a woman in a man’s life and he’s not doing what he should be doing, get after his ass.
First published on State of the Day by the Daily Caller
Some of the comments on the professor’s tweet:
“A big part of this isn’t that men suddenly “fell apart.” It’s that we spent 20 years building a culture that told boys they were optional, defective, or dangerous unless tightly supervised. We removed every clear expectation for how to become a man. We mocked masculinity, pathologized male desire, erased male-only spaces, medicated restless boys, and told them the future belonged to empowered girls. Now everyone is shocked that many young men have no direction, no confidence, and no hope.”
“it’s crazy that a multi-decade multifaceted demoralization campaign against white males demoralized white males.”
“These young men, eeffectively since birth, have been feminized. Trained by women that masculinity is “toxic”, medicated bc they can’t sit in a chair and listen to women teachers drone on for 7 hrs a day, and poisoned by chemicals which jack up their endocrine system. They watch females be coddled and not held accountable at every level, and their fear/pain doesn’t matter. What did you expect to happen?”
“Name a TV show or movie where they have the man as the strong one or even right some of the time – everything is based on them being dumb and worthless. Both men and women are wonderful, different and necessary. No reason to tear one down.”
“For decades we told boys that being a strong, responsible man was basically toxic. The nuclear family? A tool of the patriarchy. Whiteness? Some kind of contagious disease we needed to cure. And the white dad on TV, the one every kid grew up watching? He was the loveable idiot who couldn’t find his own shoes without his wife or teenage daughter saving the day. Homer Simpson, Al Bundy, Ray Barone, Phil Dunphy… the message was the same every night at 7:30: men in charge of families are a punchline. We spent thirty years laughing at that guy, then acted shocked when real boys decided maybe growing up to be him wasn’t worth the trouble.”
“Meanwhile, these same female students spend the rest of their time talking about patriarchy, male privilege, the male gaze, toxic masculinity, and sexual harassment. If you want to show them why this is happening among men, bring a mirror to class for them.”
“In a sort of ghastly simplicity we remove the organ and demand the function. We make men without chests and expect of them virtue and enterprise. We laugh at honour and are shocked to find traitors in our midst. We castrate and bid the geldings be fruitful.–C.S. Lewis”
“Perhaps you should go review the Study “Universe 25”. Remember the ladies and professors like yourself have labeled Men, actual Men as Toxic Masculinity. These same women are now angry that they have to sift through Feminized Men.”
Leave a Comment