When researching my recent posts I came across a 2013 blog post by “Word Warrior” Barry Jacobsen titled CHIVALRY IS DEAD, LADIES: AND IT’S (PARTIALLY) YOUR FAULT!
Jacobsen took the sinking of the Concordia as an opportunity to position himself as the only real man in the room (emphasis mine):
…I have led what most would consider an enviably active and adventurous life; leading some of my friends to call me the “REAL most interesting man in the world” (forget that aging Latin lothario!). So it is with some degree of authority and an even greater degree of disgust that I say: I am sickened by my fellow men today.
As a man raised by a WWII veteran with a strong sense of chivalry (particularly toward women), I am disgusted with what passes today for manhood. So many men are mere shadows of what their gender represented in generations past. Military service members excepted (which include an amazing collection of very fine young men) most men today aren’t fit to carry the water of the “Greatest Generation”, my father’s generation; much less the dauntless knights who originally defined “chivalry”.
Like Lowry, Jacobsen was deeply troubled that men evacuated alongside of women and children in Costa Concordia (emphasis mine):
But I was strongly reminded that by modern standards I am a veritable John Wayne compared to most men today; by what happen on 13 January 2012; when the cruise ship Costa Concordia ran aground off the coast of Tuscany.
When this occurred we were treated to the sickening sight of men elbowing women and children aside in their frantic, rat-like scurry for the life-rafts. When the first of these life boats arrived on shore, aid workers were expecting to see them filled with women and children. Right? Instead, they saw lots of burly Tony Soprano-wannabes accompanied by their well-dressed wives and “goomahs”!
After a few paragraphs explaining what a proper shipwreck should look like (the Titanic), Jacobsen gets back to how much better he is than other men:
When I look at today’s young men I see a bunch of pierced, tattooed, slovenly louts. These are not men: they are “manlings”. Boys that never grow beyond their toys.
A beautiful 29 year old acquaintance of mine complains that her husband spends much of his time at work (in his parents Real Estate business) playing online poker. He then comes home, eats the dinner she has prepared for him, and then flops down on his Lazy Boy and plays X-Box most of the night! Never mind that his very sexy wife has needs of her own. When he is too tired to continue playing, he goes to bed and passes out.
Not a man: a manling.
While Jacobsen desperately wants the ladies reading (including perhaps one very sexy married lady) to know that he is a real man unlike the man-lings they are wasting their time with, the point of the post is that women are partially to blame for the fact that other men aren’t as amazing as Jacobsen is:
But women must accept at least some of the blame for the current deplorable, degraded state of modern manhood.
Not to blame the victim here, but consider: Its women, after all, that raise men (all too often without a man in the house). It’s mostly young female teachers that teach our boys in their most formative years. And, ultimately, its women who accept and give themselves to “manlings”; rewarding thuggish, uncouth behavior by going out with and marrying such cretins.
Were women to choose wisely in their mates, picking the “nice guy” over the “bad boy”; then the old adage that “nice guys finish last” wouldn’t be so sadly true. Were women to demand that the men in their lives not treat them like slutty sex objects; but instead commit to them and family before mating, than many more boys would have involved fathers providing male role models in their lives.
Were mothers to raise boys to be gentleman with a sense of honor, they would grow up into men those mothers could be proud of.
Feminist politics, political correctness, and (most importantly) lack of male role models has left this generation of men with no clue how to behave as MEN!
The obvious part he leaves out is that women aren’t just making babies with sexy badboys who then don’t stick around. Very large numbers of women are marrying honest (but boring) men, having children with these men, and then kicking the men out of the home. How is it that Jacobsen hasn’t noticed this? Has he lived a sheltered life, away from the dysfunction of our modern family structure? How can he not see the anguish of good fathers having their children ripped away from them?
This brings me to Jacobsen’s bio page. According to his bio he is ex Special Forces, and likes to Live Action Role Play (LARP) as a medieval knight:
I’ve been a medieval combat reenactor for 35 years; and a Knight and Count within the Society for Creative Anachronisms since 1978 and 1980 respectively. It was within the Society that I formed the Spartan Warband in 2004, a national combat group that recreates the warrior culture of ancient Sparta.
While some men merely daydream about being a white knight, Jacobsen walks the walk and dresses up as one.
But this doesn’t explain how he hasn’t noticed that women are kicking good fathers out of the home. This is after all an epidemic. At the end of the bio we learn:
On a personal note, I have 3 amazing children (with two amazing ex-wives).
This of course leaves us with two options. Either Jacobsen is one of the man-lings who impregnate women and then either abandon them or are kicked out due to abuse, adultery, etc, or he has been cast out of his children’s lives for no good reason by not one but two “amazing” women.
My guess is the latter, since this would be most in line with his LARPing Sir Lancelot. Lancelot’s corrupted sense of honor lead him to cover for the crimes of an adulterous woman. The legacy of this corrupted sense of honor is all around us. Calling women to account is difficult, and feels terrible. While changing the focus to men allows a white knight to avoid what he fears while positioning himself as heroic. In this sense chivalry really is about protecting the weak, in the form of weak men protecting themselves. However, this self protection comes at the expense of both women (who are suffering due to a lack of moral leadership by men) and the truly weak and innocent, the children.
See Also:
When you use the word ‘Cartoonish’ to describe these men’s chivalrous expectations, you’re not joking. Wow!
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The humble-brag doesn’t even register for him.
When’s the last time you used the word “dauntless” in casual conversation?
He was just too manly for his two amazing ex-wives. Although they are both now enjoy watching Chad play X-box in his Lazy Boy.
I had to laugh at the line where he called his two ex wives “amazing” women. If they were decent women, and he a decent man, then he would still be married. His children would have had an intact family.
I also have to wonder about the “ex special forces” guy that dresses up for renaissance fairs. I’m not saying that they can’t both be true, but those do tend to be different categories of guys.
For some reason I think these men confuse gaming with real life. We don’t get a second life, once you’re killed, that’s it, game over.. why the need to tell men to sacrifice for the average day women whom he has zero connection with.
Equality, bitches. Deal with it!
What absolute drivel that fellow typed up. He makes one glad for the fact that “the knights are dust, their swords are rust, their souls are with the saints, we trust.” May their kind never be seen again upon this Earth. Clowns in armor…
“It was within the Society that I formed the Spartan Warband in 2004, a national combat group that recreates the warrior culture of ancient Sparta.”
I’ve got news: The Spartans weren’t about chivalry. They were religious zealots who were about stabbing you in the face and installing military juntas in your town. They enslaved the entire nation next door and made them serfs (the Helots). You could say they were about Women and Children First, but probably more relating to auction blocks than sinking ships.
It says he spent 8 years on an A-team, but doesn’t list the group or his MOS. Says he was a Medic, which in SF is 18D, but again, not listed. May be omitted as a lot of civvies wouldn’t know what it meant.
He nails it here:
“Feminist politics, political correctness, and (most importantly) lack of male role models has left this generation of men with no clue how to behave as MEN!”
And he’s not entirely wrong here:
“When I look at today’s young men I see a bunch of pierced, tattooed, slovenly louts. “
But then he repeatedly indicates that it’s up to women to teach boys and men how to behave. He’s noticed a problem, created by feminism, but seems to think that the solution is essentially more feminism.
“When the ship is sinking and no one taking charge, wouldn’t it be nice if men were made of the same stern stuff the men aboard the Titanic were…”
One of the things he misses is that in order for men to courageously take charge of a situation, they have to be in charge in the first place. But men are not; women wear the pants in relationships today. Men’s lack of self-sacrifice has nothing to do with them needing to respect women and everything to do with women needing to respect men. You can’t expect full responsibility from a subordinate position.
Bart: I had to laugh at the line where he called his two ex wives “amazing” women.
Perhaps he must grovel before his ex-wives in order to stay in his childrens’ lives? His ex-wives scream and whine and complain, but he defends himself, then no visitation.
“ex Special Forces”
Yeah… Like I wrote yesterday, there are a lot more Spec Ops soldiers in cyberspace than in meat space.
I’m guessing… I dunno’… 88M maybe? (If he served at all.)
Seriously, what kind of dweeb puts his SCA rank on his resume? A LARP’ing wanna’-be writing for other LARP’ing wanna-bes, that’s who. Would a real Green Beret do that? I don’t bloody-well think so. That would be like me insisting that people address me as “Shodan” (my karate “rank”). On the contrary, I keep trying to get the retired CSM I work with to stop calling me “Sir,” even thought I’m a retired LTC… which is real rank.
Methinks he’s another example of the anonymous NRO fat-ass we discussed yesterday who claimed to be 310 pounds and 6% body fat.
Oh… apparently he’s a trained actor, too. Golly gee-willikers, he was a even fight coordinator for an animated film! How much macho can a guy fit into one lifetime? He’s such a “real man” that he became “a paid-consultant on “masculinity” (yep, that’s right: hired by the Miller-Coors Brewing Company to help them reach-out to today’s masculine market).”
But of course.
The entire post from which Dalrock took those excerpts is a complete mess. He demands that men “respect women,” but gives no reason why that should be so. He insists that men must individually earn respect (by the extreme measure of being willing to die at the drop of a hat for any reason or no reason at all), but apparently believes that women are due respect by default. Not JUST by default, either… in his mind there is nothing a woman can due to forfeit her right to male respect and human sacrifice, including divorcing him and taking his kids.
Like of lot of LARP’ers, he seems so tied up in his fantasy world that he incorporates his romantic (and false) notions of his chosen fantasy realm into real life. It’s a fairly common affliction for hard-core fantasists… like a doughy, Cheetos-stained loser whose identity is wrapped up in the World of Warcraft character.
Sometimes the jokes just write themselves.
I have to pile on with Lyn here about the Green Beret angle. It is entirely possible that this is 100% legit, but all Dalrock readers should be aware that “special forces” has become quite the cottage industry in the last few years (or maybe many, many years). Anyone claiming it should stand by for a Freedom of Information Act inquiry into their actual service records, which are a matter of public record and can be requested by virtually anyone.
Websites such as “This Ain’t Hell” and “Military Phonies” regularly expose the pretenders to these things, and believe it or not they number in the hundreds. I scan through these with fascination. Green Beret pretenders have lately taken a back seat to imaginary SEALS, which seem to outnumber the actual number of serving naval personnel. The saddest part to me, is that many of these people have actual honorable military service but their occupational specialty was not sexy enough in their minds so they embellished it to include some kind of “SPECFOR”.
Anyway, I’m not calling out Mr. Jacobsen because it is more work than I’m willing to do to verify; but given the rest of his testimony I harbor some doubts. An A Team member for example, would have very little practical use for open circuit SCUBA in his normal routine; and would be unlikely to advertise it. These men operate in a different underwater realm. SCUBA is kindergarten for them. Later they almost exclusively use this type gear:
http://www.rebreathers.eu/cms_rebreathers/en/node/104
Just sayin’.
Rollo,
In defense of the word dauntless, it is a real nice Boston Whaler saltwater boat: https://www.bostonwhaler.com/family-overview/dauntless-boat-models/
I almost forgot. From the bio – Sten gun. Give me a break. This sounds like an affectation. US Army SpecFor personnel would be familiar with it, but even the lowly M3 “Grease Gun” found in every tank turret years ago is superior, humble as it is. I consider it another tell.
Three kids with two “amazing” ex-wives is the stuff of which satire is made. Does he go out drinking with the tone-deaf piano teacher? I won’t take relationship from him just as I wouldn’t music lessons from that teacher.
@Rollo
I believe the last time I talked about the HMS Dauntless, which was a ship of the line in the first Pirates of the Caribbean movie.
“Sten gun.”
Yeah… I thought that was odd, too: affectation. This guy is probably trying to enhance his LARP cred by touting a weapon nobody in his right mind would choose in a real fight. Frankly, I’m not much a fan of submachine guns at all. It’s nearly impossible to hit anything with them. A semi-auto carbine or even a large caliber pistol is almost always a superior choice.
A green beret would know that.
Then again, he probably thinks he would ace his way through the agoge, when in fact he’d probably be left in a puddle within three days.
But never fear… he was hired by Miller-Coors as a “masculinity consultant!”
Wanna’-bes / LARP’ers are some of the worst white knights. One wonders what all the compensation is about…
@Lost Patrol:
A bit of Google-fu it appears Census data says a whole lot more people claim to have served in Vietnam than actually did. We also went all around with the Stolen Valor issue. SpecOps seems to be the new “in” one to claim?
Didn’t someone used to say that manginas doubling down would enable us to predict when the breakage point in the whole thing was likely to be?
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It’s nearly impossible to hit anything with them.
And of course they are no longer issued. But – weapon of choice for a fight to the death in a closed elevator?
@Looking Glass:
Absolutely correct from all I’ve seen about the millions of Vietnam Vets. For the younger crowd, SpecOps is the poser destination of choice lately. Movies and first person shooter xbox games have sucked them in I suppose. It’s hard to establish actual street cred when you’re young. When I was a kid I made up ‘cool things I had done’ for the other guys. You always get found out though.
Kind of like Dalrock airing out Mr. Jacobsen’s claims, a man who evokes “The Greatest Generation”. You know – the generation that raised The Boomers – of which I am one. Awesome legacy.
On a personal note, I have 3 amazing children (with two amazing ex-wives).
We should have zero sympathy for a ‘man’ so logically and morally deficient that he failed to learn his lesson despite not one, but TWO hammerings through misandry court. He can only double down on his cartoonish squawking.
He deserves any and all misandry he continues to get. No sympathy from us should be forthcoming at all.
“On a personal note, I have 3 amazing children (with two amazing ex-wives).”
The jokes write themselves, it would seem.
Only a cuck refers to an ex as “amazing”. I also doubt that, like the children of lake Wobegone, that his offspring are “above average” and thus amazing as well.
I wonder if he’s a parishioner of Mark Driscoll.
May I as someone entirely without any military experience (save for being a Boy Scout – if that counts) chime in on stolen valour. I have often observed that if all those who claim to be SAS were really in that elite unit then there would be more people in the SAS than in the entire British Army – I know two people who drink in two of my locals who so claim the distinction, yet the lack of detail and willingness to advertise the fact of their valour do not to me ring true. I would suggest that boasting of military valour derives from the same motive as of those who claim (not entirely uncommon in the Manosphere I have to say) to be God’s gift to the fair sex. The purpose in both cases seems to be to impress other men and thus to be thought of more highly by other men (and perhaps thus further by women).
Sadly, even my late Father was claiming on-line to have been of the military rank of Major when (I have his military record) he was in fact de-mobbed as a Captain. One might have thought that for a conscript soldier that would satisfice especially when (as he did) he saw action at both Arnhem and then later (post D Day) in Normandy, but no.
Years ago my mother’s workplace was blown up by a terrorist bomb. The upper floor was destroyed but the lower floors were more or less intact. After the building was ‘cleared’, she and the other women who worked there were escorted by the police back to the basement to recover their coats from the cloakroom. As they got their coats, one of her workmates said – ‘what’s that?’ It was a box containing sticks of gelignite and a timer. The policeman accompanying them immediately bolted for the exit, knocking several of the women over in the confined space. I don’t know much about Lancelot or chivalry, but I know what cowardice and dereliction of duty is.
[D: Your trolling is boring. No more.]
He’s actually ashamed of his own weakness and helplessness with women. And instead of dealing with it, he retreats into a delusional bubble and projects his hatred on all the men around him.
@Opus
I know two people who were special forces, and neither of them advertise it. My cousin has a best friend who was in one of the elite units, and whenever that guy would get asked what part of the army he was in, he would shrug and say general infantry.
Maybe that’s not everyone, but I would be skeptical of someone who boasts about his service.
@Anon
He deserves any and all misandry he continues to get. No sympathy from us should be forthcoming at all.
Agreed. Men like that are dangerous to all their fellows, and even to the women themselves. Whether they are actively malicious or just mentally broken, they cannot be trusted and must even be guarded against.
“Real men” (TM) are like vegans. You never have to worry about how to identify one because they’ll proudly announce themselves within the first 30 seconds of meeting one.
Speaking of heros: Has the infamous Jenny Erikson “stuck the landing” or something even more impressive? I see that she’s expecting her third child (girl) very soon … but no mention of the father/husband?
@Ron
When I was young not only did ex-military fail to boast of their wartime deeds but they never even mentioned what my parents always referred to as just ‘The War’. There was a man at the end of the road – a newspaper man with the Express – who for odd reasons I knew on and off through my life. I attended his funeral where in the eulogy I learned that he had been a ‘conchie’ and had spent ‘The War’ on a farm in Lincolnshire. I cannot believe that Father and he would have been on good terms had my Father known of this. I might add that the only reason I know (see above) that my Father had been in Normandy in 1944 was because amongst his papers was a torn up letter from a former army colleague of his referring to an incident that occured as they were driving in a jeep up to a bridge; the letter hastily stuck together with selotape and preserved by reason of the untimely and unexpected recent death of its author.
I might also mention that one day talking to a client it transpired that he had served in Malaya [there was a civil war in Malaya in the 1950s but I don’t believe it being Empire that American troops were involved]. I have no recollection why this should have come to my notice and when I casually expressed interest, he promptly sealed his lips and was clearly even then, fifty years later, pained to human endurance by the memory. I promptly apologised and changed the subject.
“Has the infamous Jenny Erikson “stuck the landing” or something even more impressive? I see that she’s expecting her third child (girl) very soon … but no mention of the father/husband?”
My money’s on “Mr Unavailable”.
The end portion of the article:
“Feminist politics, political correctness, and (most importantly) lack of male role models has left this generation of men with no clue how to behave as MEN!
When the ship is sinking and no one taking charge, wouldn’t it be nice if men were made of the same stern stuff the men aboard the Titanic were; when women and children really did come first, and men went down with the ship?
I will leave you with the immortal words of Rudyard Kipling, poet laureate of the British Empire; someone who knew more than a few “real men” in his life:(insert Kipling’s epic poem)”
I’ve heard the above stated many many times in the sphere.
I’m assuming the intention of his article is to persuade women to make better life choices. The only way to do that is to get them to take this last bit to heart. There’s no persuading someone who already agrees with you…they already agree with you. However unlikely that is to happen, the piece seems intentionally set up to persuade. To persuade, you find common ground (he’s definitely speaking in herd language with the “amazing!” this and that, and all the romantic horseshit). Then he throws this in at the end. He might be attempting to bring the reader on to his team and then make her think about the last bit. I can easily see IB smiling and nodding her head reading his article, and passing it on.
Lancelot was the classic “bad boy”; fooling around with married women, cuckcolding his best friend and mentor.
I wonder how many guys here have interacted with hard-core LARPs before. Story time:
For starters: I picked up fencing in junior high school. Due to a stroke of supremely good luck, for the next five years I was under the tutelage of a guy who had previously coached Olympic athletes in Europe. I went on to compete in all three weapons (although I think of myself as having been primarily as an épée man) at the regional level, and became a “fencing master” in college (which is not as impressive as it sounds). Being both an American and a military officer, after college I quickly discovered that there was no way to continue fencing, and I haven’t bent a blade since then. Fast forward to Captain Lyn87 a few years later.
My wife and I were on our way to church one Sunday morning when I spied a bunch of people in a park-like area wearing home-made armor and whacking each other with big sticks. I immediately recognized them as SCA guys (the same organization “Count” Jacobsen is involved in). Seeing a chance to dust off my long-unused fencing skills I went to talk to them before continuing to church. It turned out that they met early Sunday mornings (and other times), and I would be able to meet up with them if I was willing to get up a little earlier. They were overjoyed at the prospect at having a formally-trained fencer join them, especially since there was a sub-group that specialized in renaissance combat rather than medieval combat, and having a former fencing master to teach them would have been a welcome addition.
I initially chose the bastard sword as my primary weapon, as that was the one where my former training gave me the greatest advantage. It was pretty fun, and I made my own armor (mostly) out of upholstery foam. It looked absurd, but it was light, flexible, and surprisingly effective. (If it’s stupid and it works, it’s not stupid.)
That’s when things started to go wonky. I looked at fencing / fighting as a sport… I had no interest in pretending to be a musketeer or knight errant. However, my new companions were really into it… especially the leaders of the group (guys like Jacobsen). Even the wives were involved, and they tried to snag my wife into their medieval craft projects (my wife was a reasonably competent basket-weaver… a welcome addition to the ladies-in-waiting auxiliary). We both thought it was more than a little weird and stopped going in short order.
The point of that story is that hard-core LARPs – the kind of guys who give their SCA rank but not their military rank even though they claim to have been Spec Ops soldiers – are a really odd bunch of people. Their behavior borders on being cultish and they sometimes have a hard time separating their fantasy world from the real one. (You sometimes see that in hard-core gamers, too.) Once they develop and internalize their mental and emotional picture of the “better” world in their heads, they want to carry that into their interactions with people in the here-and-now. So if their fantasy world demands cartoonish chivalry for all the m’ladies out there, they put real-life skanks, whores, babymommas, and even ex-wives on polished pedestals and bow before them. Then because they have a “duty” to come to m’ladys rescue, they insist other men treat the same women with the same deference they do.
“But I was strongly reminded that by modern standards I am a veritable John Wayne compared to most men today…” + “Not to blame the victim here…” + I’ve been a medieval combat reenactor for 35 years; and a Knight and Count within the Society for Creative Anachronisms since 1978 and 1980 respectively. It was within the Society that I formed the Spartan Warband in 2004, a national combat group that recreates the warrior culture of ancient Sparta…” + “…On a personal note, I have 3 amazing children (with two amazing ex-wives).”
lololol holy sh****t this guys a total fagg*t!!!!!!!?!
seriously lol, how cucked do you have to be to call youur ex-wives “amazing”?
Barry said:
“A beautiful 29 year old acquaintance of mine complains that her husband spends much of his time at work (in his parents Real Estate business) playing online poker. He then comes home, eats the dinner she has prepared for him, and then flops down on his Lazy Boy and plays X-Box most of the night! Never mind that his very sexy wife has needs of her own. When he is too tired to continue playing, he goes to bed and passes out.”
Why is this beautiful 29 year old acquaintance bitching to Barry about her husband? Says much more about her than it says about her husband.
Barry Jacobsen is like pastors claiming to be the most Alpha man in the room. One’s reminded of Mark Driscoll’s “HOW DARE YOU!” rant.
I was about to say: he being in the military should know first hand how screwed up marriages are. His bio beat me to it.
Eh….doesn’t matter. Women have watched ‘Titanic’ and enough TV to know that facts don’t count. Their feelings, what Hollywood heart-throbs and pop-culture think, and their victim-hood (women have it worse for everything evidently) only matter.
Agreed with everyone about the military credentials. I have never served in the armed forces. I am a person who gives a nod of respect to a person who did enlist, and serve…and to those who were drafted…….a handshake as well. A sincere “thank you”
With this said…..every veteran now seems to be in special ops, was in some sort of ranger school, was in airborne, was in the top 10%, 3%, or 1% of their respected branch and had some sort of big secret mission, was enrolled in all the special classes, or had some sort decoration that only 1% of those served actually got.
My father was USAF for four years in the 1950’s. He served, he did his time, he was honorably discharged. That was all I knew…….now he is in his eighties………and when I was going through photos, scrapbooks from his USAF years when he was preparing to sell the house and move down south I was surprised at what I found.
The old man was in Vietnam in 1959. Never knew this. Pictures of him helping the RVN forces cleaning up dead bodies in the streets of Saigon (yes, there was terrorism and a full scale civil war going on there before 1965). A few newspaper clippings from the newspaper in Saigon. Front page, there is my dad organizing in the street. A leader. Another photo of dad shaking hands with President Eisenhower at some military ceremonial function in 1958 in California. Certificates of completion for classes….all kinds of stuff…….him working on fuel systems on jets at the USAF base in Nah Trang, Vietnam in 1958.
I asked my dad about this, and said “Hey pop, how come you never told me about the cool stuff you did in the USAF?” He replied “I was just an Airman 1st class, I did my job and what I was told to do. Any man that has to brag about his military service….esp in my day when you had to serve…isn’t a man. I saw some gruesome stuff back then……it wasn’t worth bragging about, or talking about.”
I wish I had the frame of mind I have “now” back when I was 25….because as I get older, I admire my father a ton more for the things he did. He was a man who did a lot by saying only a little.
As for the other comments above…..yeah…it seems right now there are more ‘Navy Seals’ than regular personnel in the USN today…….and every Iraq Veteran has to tell me how many certified kills they have……..
Different times today. Everyone seems to be a hero……again, I am not putting veterans down but just because you served, doesn’t make you a “good” person. It doesn’t mean you are smarter than average. It doesn’t make you hero.
*correction in above. Not VC forces. the RVN forces. Apologies and no offense to Vietnam Veterans
[D: Fixed.]
“The point of that story is that hard-core LARPs – the kind of guys who give their SCA rank but not their military rank even though they claim to have been Spec Ops soldiers – are a really odd bunch of people.”
If I may make an observation from outside America – all Americans appear to be somewhat odd, and American warfighters often appear to be entirely irrational. They are downright spooky because they are so incomprehensible. One minute, they will run into a burning building, on the slim chance that they might get to play hero by rescuing somebody – and the next minute they will be choking people and demanding military extermination of whatever third-world country they currently blame for their problems. They seem to veer from ultra-altruistic to megalomaniacal without warning.
“When I look at today’s young men I see a bunch of pierced, tattooed, slovenly louts. These are not men: they are “manlings”. Boys that never grow beyond their toys.”
I don’t see this even in Commiefornia. The young men are lost and deliberately confused by elders and society, but writing off the lot of them because some go off Bruce Jenner’s deep end is exceedingly unfair. Perhaps fewer of them would play video games if there was a second male space for them somewhere in the world. Perhaps fewer would get tattoos if there was a healthier way to attract girls. Perhaps they fell because they were pushed.
He’s going to be bitterly disappointed in his own “amazing three kids” if he truly believes this.
…
Lyn87 @ 8:38 am:
“The point of that story is that hard-core LARPs … are a really odd bunch of people. Their behavior borders on being cultish and they sometimes have a hard time separating their fantasy world from the real one.”
Co-sign. You see this in pen&paper RPGs, too, people who use it as an escape from reality rather than a four-hour vacation with friends. (D&D is very popular in prisons, for example.) I have trouble imagining a Special Forces guy ending up that burned out. They screen pretty hard for recruits with thick skin.
But oddly, I have no trouble at all imagining a Special Forces guy who’s proud of his two ex-wives. Long deployments make easy frivorces and a “no excuses” attitude can easily be bent inward upon itself. Perhaps I should meet a few in real life but yeah, the real ones don’t seem to advertise.
When’s the last time you used the word “dauntless” in casual conversation?
Only when I’m casually mentioning dive bombers.
“I have to pile on with Lyn here about the Green Beret angle. It is entirely possible that this is 100% legit, but all Dalrock readers should be aware that “special forces” has become quite the cottage industry in the last few years (or maybe many, many years). Anyone claiming it should stand by for a Freedom of Information Act inquiry into their actual service records, which are a matter of public record and can be requested by virtually anyone.”
I have heard of this FOIA process. If it can be done within a reasonable time and at a reasonable cost, it would be a public service. If an imbalanced LARPer is dragging the reputation of the US military down to his level, it will only agitate both the American warfighters and their detractors.
For my part, I have met numerous US warfighters who have been awarded medals for loyalty, not for military skills, and who are avid Dungeons & Dragons players, so I believe this LARPer really is a legitimate veteran. He’s probably dancing within the boundaries of technical truth-telling, but exaggerating his accomplishments. Perhaps he really was a Green Beret for two weeks until he failed a physical training test or something. Or perhaps he was one of those warfighters who got a high rank for office work but never saw a combat zone.
Plenty of “Special Forces” bubbas aren’t “tabbed.” Is he tabbed?
@Jason
I used to do those things, but not anymore. I don’t shake the hands of Chevron employees either. “Thank you for your corn growing service, sir! We eat it every week and we couldn’t drive our cars without you!”
Military service has become a lazy and phony appeal to authority. The man in the OP is a stellar example of that, but you find some equally compelling ones in the Men’s Sphere, too.
@Fifty Seven – Remember what happened to the Spartans too:
The old mythologer would seem to have been right in uniting Ares and Aphrodite, for all warlike races are prone to the love either of men or of women. This was exemplified among the Spartans in the days of their greatness; many things were managed by their women. But what difference does it make whether women rule, or the rulers are ruled by women? The result is the same. Even in regard to courage, which is of no use in daily life, and is needed only in war, the influence of the Lacedaemonian women has been most mischievous. The evil showed itself in the Theban invasion, when, unlike the women other cities, they were utterly useless and caused more confusion than the enemy. This license of the Lacedaemonian women existed from the earliest times, and was only what might be expected. For, during the wars of the Lacedaemonians, first against the Argives, and afterwards against the Arcadians and Messenians, the men were long away from home, and, on the return of peace, they gave themselves into the legislator’s hand, already prepared by the discipline of a soldier’s life (in which there are many elements of virtue), to receive his enactments. But, when Lycurgus, as tradition says, wanted to bring the women under his laws, they resisted, and he gave up the attempt. These then are the causes of what then happened, and this defect in the constitution is clearly to be attributed to them.
Aristotle, The Politics of Aristotle,: Book 2, trans. Benjamin Jowett (London: Colonial Press, 1900)
” Never mind that his very sexy wife has needs of her own. When he is too tired to continue playing, he goes to bed and passes out”
I find this hard to believe. I can count with the fingers on one hand the number of times I have told my wife: “Sorry babe, not tonight, I’m too tired.”
If he isn’t “meeting her needs” there must be a very good reason and I suspect that it has to do with her. Yes, it helps to have a “sexy wife”, but that feature can easily be neutralized if she’s a bitch and you can’t stand being with her.
@Bart
A surprising number of Special Forces guys are deep into nerd hobbies. Being into SCA and related activities (which is different from LARPing, albeit marginally) is not uncommon.
Perhaps so many Millennial men put in no effort because Millennial women aren’t worth the trouble.
“When I look at today’s young men I see a bunch of pierced, tattooed, slovenly louts”
Gee, I never see women who fit that description.
gaikokumaniakku
gaikokumaniakku that’s a good observation about us Americans.
“When I look at today’s young men I see a bunch of pierced, tattooed, slovenly louts”
Actually, he is mistaking the typical (female) feminist for a man. What with the shaved sides of the head, but unshaved legs and armpits.
“For my part, I have met numerous US warfighters who have been awarded medals for loyalty, not for military skills”
We don’t fight actual wars anymore. Special forces are popular because on one hand, politicians can use them for personal/financial benefit without risking significant casualties, and on the other hand, soldiers go for SpecOps because that’s the only way to see action.
Restless soldiers and conniving leaders. A bad combination. We can solve this by dropping the 82nd Airborne on Hollywood, cleaning out the homo actors and then using real soldiers for all those movies of soldiers. Real soldiers can’t act? Neither can Shia Labeouf. And Posse Comitatus won’t be an issue if secession happens.
For the record (since we’re on the subject of who-did-what), and for the benefit of those who don’t have a lot of experience with what the terms mean:
I was a field-grade officer (retired now). I had a TS clearance for several years. I graduated from Airborne school and wore my wings thereafter. I have flown military aircraft solo. I have slept in mud. I went to Afghanistan during the shooting war. Not boasting here: other than the flying bit, none of that is exceptionally noteworthy for an officer of my generation.
What did not happen:
I have never fired a weapon at a human being (although I came very close to doing so once).
Other than mortar rounds lobbed into the general vicinity that impacted so far away I could barely hear them, nobody has ever fired a weapon at me.
I was never in any sort of “elite” unit.
Despite handling lots of classified stuff over the years, I never read anything classified that was particularly interesting… and nothing at all that made me think, “AHA!” (most classified material is either technical, boring, or both).
My only service-related injury was the result of being a passenger during a car crash coming home from a BBQ restaurant in Oklahoma, and my VA disability rating is 0%… so no cash for me.
Pretty normal / pedestrian stuff on the whole.
________________
Despite all that, having been in a bunch of different places and having done a bunch of different things (some of them boring – some of them interesting – some of them (arguably) important, only a few of them dangerous), my dress uniform has enough doo-dads to make me look like a 19th Century Bolivian Field Marshall.
Chicks dig that (for all the good it ever did me – I have also never been much of a “ladies man”).
When someone thanks me for my service I thank them for paying their taxes. It used to be a big part of “who I am” – now it’s mostly “what I used to do.”
@Lyn87, I was one and done as an aircraft mx officer between active hostilities in the desert. Had a clipboard to check incessantly on people who were actually working. Got to do some fun stuff. Made a fraction of what I would have had I followed all my friends straight into IT.
In all, I don’t regret it, but like you say, I don’t need anyone to thank me. I got paid for it.
….seriously lol, how cucked do you have to be to call your ex-wives “amazing”?…
Amazingly cucked, I guess 😉
@the other anon
Mohler makes the same feeble argument in the piece someone linked to the other day. “Please stop your feminist rebellion ladies, or the next time the Titanic sinks men won’t die so you can enjoy extra legroom and a warm feeling of romance”. At the same time, he is implicitly promising that he himself of course will gladly die to provide said legroom and romance should the opportunity arise, whether they stop the rebellion or not. It wasn’t a serious argument 100 years ago when Titanic sank, and it isn’t a serious argument today. Feminists know this in their guts.
It all comes down to a variant of “See what a good [big] boy I am Mommy! Can I have a cookie?” The ladies reading understand this and either ignore him for being so incredibly pathetic, or give him a pat on the head and tell him what a good boy he is. Meanwhile, other men who want mommy’s approval join in, hoping to bask in mommy’s approval as well.
Off topic:
Interesting bit from the RooshV forum. “Criminal Minds” is a CBS tv show about a team of FBI forensic detectives specializing in serial murder cases. A “ripped from the headlines” episode involving a criminal who murders attractive young women and blogs at a “manosphere” blog. The word “manosphere” is used repeatedly in the episode, as is “alpha”. “Incel” is used at least once. Reportedly inspired by the Elliot Rodger case. I have not watched the episode. I have only read summaries.
Interesting to me, at least, because this reflects the public perception of the manosphere. The clear message: “Men talking about relationship problems and seeking individual solutions is dangerous and leads to dysfunction, insanity, violence ,and criminal activity.”
Here’s the link
https://www.rooshvforum.com/thread-61512.html
“Mohler makes the same feeble argument in the piece someone linked to the other day.
(snip)”
Point taken. That is true, Dalrock.
“I have heard of this FOIA process. If it can be done within a reasonable time and at a reasonable cost, it would be a public service. If an imbalanced LARPer is dragging the reputation of the US military down to his level, it will only agitate both the American warfighters and their detractors.”
There aren’t enough resources, and it would be like combatting a hydra. There are about a thousand self-described Special Forces people from the 101st Fighting Keyboardist Regiment to every authentic Special Forces soldier.
http://www.wfmynews2.com/news/local/2-wants-to-know/military-impostors-reach-epidemic-level/426257018
@Other Anon
Just to clarify, I wasn’t saying your argument was feeble, but that Mohler and Jacobsen’s argument is.
Deti —
That’s ironic given that Rodgers hated the manosphere. Of course, that doesn’t matter to these people, because they’re quite happy to say the manosphere is Rodgers, just like they’re happy to say the entire “alt-right” is Richard Spencer. Conflations like that serve their purposes of marginalizing all dissent.
@Dave – “….seriously lol, how cucked do you have to be to call your ex-wives “amazing”?…
Amazingly cucked, I guess 😉”
Love it!
Deti:
Sounds like Criminal Mounds were trying to meld Son of Sam (a 1970’s bonkers-in-Yonkers psycho premeditated murderer) with Rodgers (an impulsive disturbed narcissist aspie who killed more men than women).
Do not lose all hope. I am hearing the terms “alpha male” and “beta male” more and more in standard issue comedy shows, used pretty accurately. Back in January, SNL did a super-cold sketch where Michael Che interviews a “refugee” cuck unable to escape from a country called the Friendzone, then games the Friendzone guy’s one-itis gal. More recently SNL took apart “male feminists” who try to pick up a chick in a bar by showing off their feminist bona fides like wearing pussy hats and sporting Hillary buttons, then going “bitch!” when the girl declines their overtures. (Ending with a lesbian who does the same approach and yells “bitch” when the chick turns her down too). Someone on that writers’ staff reads Rollo I think.
A John Wayne type fellow named Barry
WAC First card always ready to carry
Though ex-wives left him twice
Finds the LARPing quite nice
Seeking Love on Concordia Ferry
@thedeti:
The ability to use Cultural Propaganda cat-bird seats. Shape the narrative when no one is looking, so the word is associated with a murder that your grandparents might watch. Granted, if the topic comes up, just ask “like the hacker 4chan?”. 🙂
From Instapundit, a noteworthy case of cause and effect bewilderment from twats :
https://pjmedia.com/instapundit/261308/
When I got to the “On a personal note, I have 3 amazing children (with two amazing ex-wives)”, I burst out laughing. Bloody mangina!
About the Instapundit Link, a summary for those who need one :
“So you drastically expand the definition of “sexual harassment,” and then promote an ethic that says that all accusations must be believed, and then you’re shocked that workplace men don’t want to hang out with women? How stupid are you?”
@Anon:
As TFH loved to point out, Cause & Effect aren’t the strong suit for Women. And Writers. Especially writers that are Women.
Christie Blatchford: B.C. man pleads for family court reform in suicide note
http://news.nationalpost.com/full-comment/christie-blatchford-b-c-man-blamed-cruelty-of-family-court-battle-for-driving-him-to-suicide
Lyn87 says:
March 30, 2017 at 8:38 am
Can confirm.
It is the story of Don Quixote in a nut-shell.
” Never mind that his very sexy wife has needs of her own. When he is too tired to continue playing, he goes to bed and passes out”
At the same time…..”bold n’ biblical” pastors tell us Christian men that if we don’t go to bed exhausted “every night” somehow we’re not real men.
“Tendies Stories are green text stories featuring a twenty-something man who lives at his mother’s home and constantly demands “tendies” (chicken tenders) in exchange for “good boy points” he has earned by doing chores and taking care of himself.”
http://knowyourmeme.com/memes/tendies-stories
I realize the conversation has moved on from this thread, but I would like to encourage military veterans and other people with combat experience to deconstruct the myth of soldier as action hero. As Lyn wrote above, he served in combat and yet never actually shot a guy (as we expect to see from cowboy movies or war movies).
I can find few factual links:
https://www.gunowners.org/sk0802htm.htm
According to that link, many concealed carry gun owners shoot and neutralize various muggers every year. Conversely, it seems that few USA warfighters get into classic gunfights where the warfighter actually kills an enemy with small arms fire. It seems most casualties of war result from high-altitude bombing.
And I also found a left-wing rag bemoaning USA military violence in general, but they are so biased I don’t trust them as a source of info on the USA military.
“I have led what most would consider an enviably active and adventurous life; leading some of my friends to call me the ‘REAL most interesting man in the world’ … by modern standards I am a veritable John Wayne.”
To paraphrase Margaret Thatcher: If you have to tell people you’re a real man, you aren’t one.
Off-topic: the recent fuss over VP Mike Pence’s “no dining alone with other women” rule led me to this article, which I found refreshing. It’s about a young wife who got into a “flirtatious relationship” with a wealthy businessman, until her mother and another older woman/family friend sat her down and gave her some tough love: http://ijr.com/opinion/2017/03/264924-mike-pence-mocked-rules-dining-women-rules-saved-marriage/
I particularly liked this part:
A nice change from the “But I’m not happy!” excuse that our culture worships.
@gaikokumaniakku
Your point is absolutely correct from my perspective. Only a minuscule portion of military personnel are ever involved in the kind of close combat, movies and myths action hero events you are referring to. Millions have done some time in the military services. The vast majority had jobs one would find all throughout the corporate world, commercial aviation and trucking, supply warehouses, IT shops, power plants, administration, construction, etc. They are wearing uniforms, and some are working in austere environments, but the tasks are the same. These days quite a few are found in the same type cubicle farms as one would see in any big business. They themselves know this better than anybody, which is one reason why claims to heroic acts and “Special Forces” get out of hand. It’s also why the ones I know are embarrassed by people thanking them for serving and don’t really know how to respond.
There are in fact people who have done, and are doing the high action, high danger things we see in movies; but only a handful in the grand scheme.
I get myself into a Catch-22 type scenario because I’m guilty of making claims just like the ones I’m saying to be skeptical of. “I did this for decades, I know what I’m talking about, trust me.” I don’t know how to claim knowledge of the system without sounding like the guys I’m saying to be wary of.
“It’s also why the ones I know are embarrassed by people thanking them for serving and don’t really know how to respond.”
Thanking a person for their service isn’t the equivalent of, “hey, by the way, thanks for charging into gunfire last Saturday”.
It’s a thanks for agreeing to serve. Which means deploying into hostile and dangerous places (even if it’s just to fix third world plumbing) at the behest of the people they voted into government, moving a lot, and having their freedoms limited to do so. A thanks is the least they can do.
Also, it’s just a courtesy. Because it’s kind of awkward to be at an event, shake a person’s hand when he’s recently returned from some ShizaMcShitistan and has to go back in two weeks and make small talk.
@ Societal Decay says:
April 2, 2017 at 6:00 am
Note that the lady who wrote the article you shared married at 19. Today, most would say that is too young, and point to higher divorce rates among couples who marry young as evidence. But the problem isn’t marrying “too young”. The problem is that there is no longer a social stigma attached to a woman breaking her vows. From the article:
“… I watched the marriage of someone very close to me disintegrate before my eyes in a painful divorce. When the divorce papers were finalized and the woman’s last name changed back to her maiden name, there were cheers of, ‘You go, girl!’ on social media.”
Exactly. Mrs. Rieley’s mother and her friend (whether they knew it or not) obeyed Titus 2.
Titus 2:3 Likewise, teach the older women to be reverent in the way they live, not to be slanderers or addicted to much wine, but to teach what is good. 4 Then they can urge the younger women to love their husbands and children, 5 to be self-controlled and pure, to be busy at home, to be kind, and to be subject to their husbands, so that no one will malign the word of God.
Today, however, young women are more likely to hear “you go girl” from older women when they frivorce their husbands. As Dalrock has pointed out, it’s amazing that divorce rates in the US aren’t higher.
*This brings me to Jacobsen’s bio page. According to his bio he is ex Special Forces, and likes to Live Action Role Play (LARP) as a medieval knight*
Enough said right there. He’s no more of a “real man” than the “cubiclers” he disdains. He also clearly ignores the fact that these subsequent generations are direct products of his own generation’s inability to stifle rampant feminism.
@Looking Glass
Interesting that you bring TFH up around Anon.
https://kiwifarms.net/threads/freedom-from-the-gynocracy-the-black-pill-omega-virgin-revolt.20263/page-4#post-1434918
IMO that is just a situational alpha (aka 2 women/3 kids, short relationship) that lacks frame to be anything that white knight. I guess one of those people who got lucky genes that makes life for them easy – but also makes them not to think life over .. because to think you need incentive – those guys have none … unless frivorce raped or cheated heavy by woman.
But I also guess that everything is before him, while he fails his job of being a father for his 3 kids.
Oscar,
WRT women marrying “too young,” you’re certainly correct that it has more to do with their culture than their biology. My wife had just turned 20 when we met on a blind date, we got married less than five months later, and we’re coming up on 30 years. I have a niece who lives a few miles from us who married at 19… they just had their third child and they attend the same church as us. Her husband (my nephew-in-law?) was recently appointed to the deacon board (our church is very strict about the qualifications for deacons and elders as laid out in 1 Timothy 3 and Titus 1).
If my wife divorced me she would be shunned by nearly every person whose opinion she respects, as would I if I divorced her. Likewise, my niece would be similarly shunned if she bailed on her marriage, and all of us understand that God gets the final say in the matter. Not that either one of them has ever even seriously thought about it, but the knowledge that breaking their vows would result in their lives and reputations being ruined provides a buffer: if you know what happens if you jump/fall off the cliff you’re not likely to see how close to the edge you can get.
I realize that two data points don’t constitute unassailable proof, and both my wife and niece grew up in two-parent households and are exceptionally gifted women with regard to I.Q., but it’s worth noting that the general propensity for young women to initiate divorce (and/or misbehave in their marriages) directly correlates with the “guardrails” society puts around them. What’s more: both historical and cross-cultural data show that men generally require far less formal external control to stay on the straight-‘n-narrow than women do. Boys are expected to understand incentives as soon as they roll out of their cribs… so certainly women don’t need to be 30 to understand carrots-and-sticks, especially if they see the metaphorical sticks used a few times.
Lyn,
“… certainly women don’t need to be 30 to understand carrots-and-sticks, especially if they see the metaphorical sticks used a few times.”
Exactly. Marriage in ones late teens or early twenties was the norm within living memory, and divorce rates were much lower back then. The reasons for low divorce rates were…
1. The social stigma that against divorce and…
2. The law made divorce much more difficult
But reason 1 was also the reason for reason 2, so really it comes down to social stigma. Now that the social stigma no longer exists (except in a few subcultures, like your church, apparently), young attractive women who believe they can trade up with little risk see no reason not to.
Man, this is utter silliness – as countless other commenters here have already said. I don’t give a schiesse if you’re even freaking ex-John Rambo; talking this way is just ridiculous.
That kind of “support” is missing far too much today. My wife faced no stigma from nuking our marriage, in reality. No one in the church even told her it was wrong until the pastor called her weeks after it was too late. The pastor’s wife told her to “stay away” as I would “go back to the way I was” without a word on filing for divorce being bad.
She had indicated to the pastor’s wife she was unhappy for some time and then told her I had threatened murder-suicide. I was instantly the bad guy and the church’s stance of “no divorce” got quickly shown for the fraud it was.
I was asked to leave recently because I didn’t heal fast enough for them (on my own) and probably because I challenged the pastor’s wife’s improper response when I got my wife to call her when she came to pack up some things at the house.
My wife even admitted she moved to another state so she wouldn’t be too close to me because she knew I would talk her out of this foolishness.
I note all this detail to note the major failure of churches in this area. I have a few blog posts coming on the topic.
Maybe he’s telling the truth about Special Forces, but I doubt it. Unless, that is, he’s using special in its other outstanding sense XD. If I’m right, I pity the poor guy. Not fortunate enough to have learned young that lying to look cool can backfire when all of your friends and the men around you figure you out and never let you live it down. I’m still “the Russian” for a lie I told in grade school about growing up riding horses in the Russian Far East. Ugh!!!!!