"What Do You Want to Be When You Grow Up?"

The question that is the title of this post may seem an innocent one.  To some extent it is, and some hostile reflections on it which occurred to me today may seem, may be, eccentric and exaggerated.  And yet I think the question expresses a way that our culture indoctrinates youth, which is false, and has a high cost.  In Plato's Republic, he proposes that the citizens of his ideal state be taught to believe a "noble lie."  Is our society based on a "noble lie," too?  The lie I have in mind is difficult to express, but the words you can be anything you want to be might capture it.

"What do you want to be when you grow up?"  The question implies (a) that a kid should have some idea, at an age of ten or eleven, of his future career, and (b) that his future career can and/or should depend on his wishes, his inclinations, his daydreams ("want").  The trouble with (a) is that the economy is so complex that a kid won't know a hundredth part of the careers that exist, and to encourage such early planning might lead to a surplus of aspirants to a handful of careers that kids know about, e.g., teachers, movie stars, soldiers, president of the United States.  But of course, kids aren't making any hard-and-fast commitments when they respond to grown-ups' small talk, and some careers do require long advance planning.  So (a) is all right.

No, my problem is with (b).  Suppose grown-ups asked a different question: "What do you think you might be useful for, when you're grown up?"  This is a more wholesome question because it doesn't invite a kid to project his self-indulgent wishes and daydreams onto his plans for the future, but, instead, invites him to think of others, of service, of how he can help.  It doesn't suggest that the world owes him an interesting, exciting, or entertaining job, but that he'll owe the world valuable services in return for his room and board.  It encourages him to appraise, not his desires, but his capacities.

"What do you want to be when you grow up?"  The question suggests that it matters what one wants to be, that one can choose, that you can be anything you want to be.  The truth is that the career paths that will open up to a person are a tiny fraction of those he can imagine.  It depends partly on aptitude: that is relatively easy to understand.  A tone-deaf person can't be a musician; a stupid person can't be an MIT professor.  More subtly, it depends on a thousand accidents of social connections and circumstances and which resume strikes whose fancy and whether one happened to have a good day on this or that test or interview.  Try your utmost to realize your childhood dreams, and you'll probably fail; you may waste much effort and sacrifice personal ties and innocent pleasures in the process; and, worse, you may be corrupted.  There are a thousand subtle moral compromises to which the path to success may tempt you.

And yet, for all that, for boys, it might still be right to encourage the pursuit of dreams.  It's in men's nature to take risks.  Courage is stereotypically a masculine virtue, and while the stereotype is partly false-- marriage and childbirth may require as much courage from women as battle does from men-- the occasions that call for courage in women tend to be more a matter of accepting one's lot and less a matter of going out to seek adventure.  Risk-taking has a basis in masculine biology-- in nature, males are more expendable than females-- and this biological factor is etherealized in men into cultural manifestations of honor and bravado.  And from a rational point of view, too, men can better afford to take risks, for the simple reason that a man has more time: men usually marry younger women, and they can beget children for much longer than women can bear them.  A man can pursue his dreams and fail and pick himself up and be richer for the experience.

It is in girls that I think the attitude you can be what you want to be causes the greatest unhappiness.  Our society seems to be engaged in a conspiracy not to tell girls when they are young that they may have to choose between marriage and career, or if not that, at least between the dream career that strikes their fancy, with all the complex and urgent demands it will make on them, and the settled life and strong responsibilities of motherhood.  Political correctness can prevent grown-ups from talking to kids about this but it can't change the stubborn facts that female desirability as a marriage partner tends to peak in the 20s, well before investments in high-powered careers have had time to pay off, and that there aren't enough hours in the day to spend 50 hours a week in the office and pick one's kids up after school.

All in all, though, I think we would do better not to encourage self-indulgent personal ambition in men or women.  America is indeed a land of opportunity, but the best opportunities usually come as surprises.  We should be alert for opportunities to be of use, and able to appreciate the chances that time tosses in our path.  Meanwhile, the question we should focus on is not what we want to be, but what we ought to be.

Comments

[ms]

What you say is not exactly politically correct, but I do think you're right that young women are not adequately warned that starting 10 years after the onset of menses, fertility decreases year by year. Women tend to think they are fully fertile until age 35, which is not how it works. Not that women can't choose not to have children, but they should know the realities they are working with so they can make good choices. I wish women thought more in terms of having children in their early 20's and pursuing other things later when their kids are in school.
As for your other arguments--I'm not sure what to think. I generally think it is good if people think about serving humanity in making career choices, but a little dreaming is part of being young, isn't it?

[Nathan Smith]

To think of "serving humanity" might be an invitation to vainglory.

A little dreaming is not only a part of youth; I think all healthy people will have a little dreaming in them. That said, some dreams are bad, and others, good in themselves, might be a distraction from real duties or opportunities. And to turn a dream into a program and pursue it relentlessly leads, I think, to more evil than good.

"Not that women can't choose not to have children..." Should that be women's choice alone, or their jointly with their husbands?-- though that creates problems of course, since that makes it one vote against one vote. Or, alternatively, should it be the choice neither of the husband nor the wife, but obligatory for them both, which has the merit, at any rate, of avoiding the difficult question of which of them gets to decide? Can a husband whose wife refuses to bear him children regard himself as wronged by her? A woman can decline to marry of course, but are there obligations to her family that might affect the rightness of that choice, if made gratuitously?

[Joyless Moralist]

Personally I don't think it's all right for a married woman to refuse to bear children for her career's sake, nor do I think it right for a couple to jointly agree to remain childless. Children are the natural fruit of marriage, and the permanently childless marriage is defective. Sometimes the couple doesn't *choose* this defect, and merely has to accept what nature (or possibly some other *very* difficult circumstances) has dealt them; in such cases, they may perhaps find that life eventually yields them other compensations and rewards. But the couple that chooses this for themselves, just as a lifestyle choice, has failed to embrace the true nature of marriage. I at least would suggest that such a couple will in the long run find their lives and relationships impoverished as a result.

As for choosing not to marry... there the circumstances and motivations will make a tremendous difference. People who devote great energy to running from any serious burden or responsibility will certainly not live happy or fulfilling lives, and I think there could be cases in which a woman is obliged to marry, but there are also other kinds of obligations, including some that would preclude marriage, that women might legitimately choose. And of course, some people want to marry but never find an appropriate mate.

I guess the thing I'd want to say about your reflection, though, is that the divide between women and men might not be so large as you seem to suggest, or even if it is large, I don't know that you've captured its character terribly well. Because, after all, the responsibilities of a husband and father are also quite great. Again, I'm not going to argue that the situation is perfectly reciprocal, because I don't think it is, and men do indeed enjoy *some* advantages when it comes to "pursuing their dreams" while still having a fulfilling domestic life. But they also suffer some disadvantages. They can afford to marry later (though I'm not sure it's optimal, in terms of marital happiness, for them to be *dramatically* older than their wives). They don't have to worry about the physical inconveniences of pregnancy/childbirth/nursing, all of which make it difficult for young mothers to pursue careers that are quite physically strenuous, or that require them to be away from home for long periods. And traditionally, one of the husband/father's primary contributions to the family is to provide financial stability, which is compatible with the pursuit of a wide variety of careers.

However, a father needs to be much more to a family than just a paycheck. Just like mothers, fathers often have to subordinate their own interests to the good of the whole family. Among other things, kids need to have their fathers at home frequently and involved in their lives, and they need to live in a place that's healthy for children (which might involve many calculations, but certainly money isn't the only factor.) And the need for financial stability also places restrictions on what careers a father can legitimately consider. Often, the most glamorous or interesting careers are also the most risky, and the hardest in which to succeed. Being a good father might mean giving up your ambitions to be a writer/musician/actor/academic and selling insurance instead if that's what your family needs. For some of these ambitions, it might really be more acceptable for women to pursue them, since "desirable but not so secure" career paths often have more of the flexibility that is so badly needed by young mothers, and if their husbands have planned on a more steady and reliable career, the consequences of the wife not making it (or struggling for years before making it) won't be so dire. A girl who dreams of being a successful novelist, for example, might find that this ambition fits reasonably well with the demands of motherhood, whereas a man will need to achieve considerable success at a fairly young age if novel-writing is to be an adequate source of support for his family.

Also, keep in mind that it isn't terribly wise to encourage young girls to assume that they won't ever need to bring in a paycheck. Sometimes things work out so as to make this unnecessary, but many, many times they do not.

I think the bottom line is that girls and boys both should be encouraged to dream a little, but also to be prepared to take what life offers, and to make the necessary sacrifices for their families. The contours of those dreams should, I agree, be shaped in part by realistic expectations of the demands that family life is likely to place on them, and this will be a bit different for boys and girls, but I think both should have some non-domestic dreams and ambitions. A woman who has never been interested in anything *except* motherhood probably just isn't a terribly interesting person, which will hurt her husband and children more than anyone. Such women are likely to be overbearing, hovering mothers, and when their children eventually grow up they have no idea what to do with themselves.

[Nathan Smith]

re: "I guess the thing I'd want to say about your reflection, though, is that the divide between women and men might not be so large as you seem to suggest, or even if it is large, I don't know that you've captured its character terribly well."

Probably not, but I don't think the ideas I had in mind are at odds with what JM writes. I don't want to forbid dreaming-- on the contrary! though dreaming and ambition are different and can even perhaps be opposed-- or to say that girls shouldn't plan to be able to make money... As for marital age gaps and marital happiness, I really don't know, but even three or four years makes a difference. Three years of law school, or seven years of med school, won't compromise a man's marriage prospects. They might compromise a woman's. It's certainly true that (married) men also need to sacrifice personal dreams to family responsibilities, but the pursuit of a dream, even a crazy, unrealistic dream as one realizes *ex post,* can accelerate one's dash through the labyrinth of life and lead, via some disappointments and setbacks and turnings, to a fruitful specialization which one could never have imagined *ex ante.* Men have a bit more time for that process to unfold, and also, the payoffs to an interesting specialization may be higher, because women's tastes in men are perhaps more diversified than vice versa, and because a man who is a breadwinner, though he has to make an adequate living, has a good deal of freedom about how he does it.

It's not that I resent women having ambitious dreams. It's just that I think sometimes they invest a lot in them and then have to abandon them, and that, the human life-cycle and the logic of family formation being what it is, they have actually made greater sacrifices for those dreams than men who do the same things, and they are more likely to be under pressure to give them up later, and that if they understood all that beforehand, they might not have done it, might have lived more simply. A few years back I had a good friend, a woman, a professional, who worked very hard at her job, whose life was, I suppose, superficially enviable-- she had some money and a lot of friends-- but I got to know her well enough to hear a good deal of her thoughts of feelings... she was haunted by a sort of depression... I remember one evening in particular, a Sunday I think it was, but she was in the office, and I met her down there and walked her home, she had to keep me waiting for a while and apologized, I can't remember all the details, but she'd hit a sort of breaking-point and had to talk about it, and I remember how hopeless and trapped she felt, and one of the things she said was: "I just want to be a wife." Since she was quite liberal and presumptively feminist, it was an especially striking confession, like a sort of apostasy. I wonder how many superficially self-confident professional women have those moments when they just want to be wives, but they don't know how to get back to that, to meet the right kind of men, to be attractive in a way that makes men think of marriage and to signal that intention, to *let go* of the careers to which they've come to feel entitled but that may be a practical obstacle to marriage (for example, to marriage with a man whose career might require moving around). And they may have sexual histories that get in the way.

Maybe I'm just wrong about all this, I don't know. But I have a feeling that a lot of women are ill served by the way political correctness constrains the way we talk to kids about their futures.

[Joyless Moralist]

No, you're right, this is a real phenomenon. In academia I certainly meet women like this. I remember one particularly sad conversation with a woman in academia, again as in your example fairly successful and in many respects enviable and living her feminist dream, and actually a very nice person too, but in many ways seemed insecure and sad about her life. Anyway, in this conversation she was telling me, "I've been thinking more and more lately, what about a husband and kids? When am I going to do that?" She was 38.

Young women need to be made aware that they don't have all the time in the world to find a husband and start a family; young men are a bit less pressed on that front, as you suggest, but do need to be aware that if they don't win themselves some earning power they'll likely regret it when children start arriving. And all young people, I think, need to realize that youth is precious – they aren't going to have *that* many years to be young and single and exploring options. Or if they *do* take too many years to do that, they'll pay another kind of price. So make the most of the time you have. It won't last forever... hopefully.

But I don't know quite what you mean about young women living more "simply." I do think that they should be mindful of the passage of time, and should not take the relationships of their 20's too lightly. Adolescent flirtation is all right for adolescents, but by the time a woman is advancing into her 20's she should think of romance as a prelude to finding a husband, not merely as entertainment. Also, women should be wary of committing themselves to long-term career tracks that are obviously not family-friendly; a job that requires you to work hundred-hour weeks in the office, or to be out of town for multiple weeks out of the year, will quickly become intolerable with young children at home. On the other hand, I think it's a shame when women feel that they shouldn't do interesting things with their lives just because those things aren't directly related to starting a family. You're not necessarily more likely to meet a suitable mate by staying at home and working an office job rather than traveling the world or getting a good education. Indeed, is person is often more likely to meet someone she would want to marry when pursuing things that are interesting or intriguing to her. And, while you didn't specify what qualities exactly you think most men want in a wife, I *do* think there are are substantial numbers of men who are turned off by women who seem like too much of a blank. At least, so they have told me, in situations in which they have no particular motivation to flatter or impress. Women, just like men, can make themselves more attractive by making themselves more educated or generally interesting.

For me as a single woman, a good way of thinking about it was: if the thing you're currently doing didn't end up leading to a specific career, would you feel bitter about it? Would you feel that it had all just been a huge waste of time? Of all my major activities since college (well, and including college) I think I could fairly say that the answer is "no." (And of course, I didn't have to accumulate debt in any of them, which was also key. The major pluses to starting a PhD program were that it was interesting and could possibly lead to a desirable career, but didn't require me to take on any debt.) Not everyone has the luxury of thinking that way, but I think it's a good guiding principle insofar as you can follow it.

[nato]

I had originally thought "I'd best not try to engage this particular thread, since I think we're too far apart in our starting positions for it to be productive." It's maybe still true, but I thought I might offer something and see where it goes.

I don't know Nathan's friend, of course, but I do know a fair number of professional women in their early 30s, several of whom are starting to feel a bit pressured to find a partner. They definitely do want to be wives, though this doesn't mean they want that to be their defining characteristic. Essentially, they believe that marriage to the right man (in time to have a family!) is their proximal major goal. They haven't been unserious in their relationships; in many cases they remain single because they tried to make it work with someone through much of their 20s and it became clear that those relationships weren't going to go the distance for some reason or another. Where others might have married and divorced, they didn't get married in the first place, but nonetheless they maintained long term monogamous relationships.

I don't think any of that has much to do with them being professional or career-focused, but I think one additional item might be: the men with whom they come into contact (circulating, as they do, in professional circles) also tend to be career focused, and frequently averse to giving up anything in order to have a family. In this analysis, men don't have to plan for biological limits until much later, so they don't. Women in their cohort aren't as free, so they frequently find themselves impacted by life scheduling conflicts, and must make sacrifices one way or another.

Personally, I think men generally underestimate the advantages of settling down and starting a family earlier, but I don't think society sends that message very often. Instead, we spend a lot of time warning women about their biological clock/the difficulty of finding a man once they're older, which reinforces the idea that men lose nothing from waiting, which encourages the idea that men *don't make family-related sacrifices, so women must make the sacrifices, which proves that women had better prepare themselves to make sacrifices, which shows that women had better settle for whatever they can get before it's too late, which proves the warnings about their biological clock/the difficulty of finding a man once they're older.

[Nathan Smith]

As far as men are concerned, I think men usually have a very strong sex drive in their late teens and early 20s, so if their sexual opportunities outside marriage were curtailed by social norms, they would want to get married younger. And I agree with Joyless Moralist that it would be good-- although, again, politically incorrect!-- to give them the (realistic) idea that opportunities for marriage are and ought to be associated to some extent with earning power, at least in the sense that very low earning power is a perfectly legitimate and likely reason why many girls (and their parents!) might reject him as a candidate.

I don't think it would be particularly a good thing for society specifically to "send a message" about "the advantages of settling down and starting a family earlier" for men (though as I say, restricting the sexual opportunities of single men through changes in social norms would have that effect on many men). We need risk-takers after all: soldiers, entrepreneurs, scientists, poets, rocks stars, agitators and idealists; and though of course women can do those things, young men, *unattached* young men whose vision isn't blinkered or burdened by the obligations of family, are and have always been-- and this I think is indelible and inevitable-- the key demographic to supply those classes of people. Moreover I think this indoctrination would not take: it is manly to be ready to die chivalrously for one's lady, to defend and protect one's family with one's whole strength, but to be worried at a young age about settling down and starting a family is a bit unmanly and suggests a sort of emotional dependency. On the other hand, the men Nato mentions who carry on "monogamous" but unmarried relationships with women for years without intending to "go the distance" ought to bear a strong stigma, and women should be warned against them, lest they end up in their 30s and alone, with time running out.

[ms]

I don't think young men are hampered by marrying young. It used to be the norm for people to marry in their early 20's and spend 5-10 years being poor while supporting one another through educations and early careers. Many people started their families during that time and managed with garage sale stuff for a long time. My husband still thinks most fondly of this time in our lives(though I think less fondly of it--I like to have the money to buy what we need when we need it!) We all used to joke when we finally got some real furniture that it was time to get rid of our "early marriage" decor. Nato's summation of the vicious circle of expectations is spot on IMO. Societal messages do not in general encourage men and women alike to value the importance of timely marriage for both of them. There's too much encouragement for men to play around for a long time and women to suffer from increasing angst as the men who should be their husbands "find themselves." I've never been in favor of macho talk, but maybe we need more of it. Maybe we need to get the message out that being a man is not about sexual exploits but about stepping up to take on the responsibility and joys of marriage and family before age 50. One of my husband's collegues who is very successful and close to 50 only recently married a much younger woman and is now the father of two. He is so gaga over those kids and frequently wonders why he didn't have kids much sooner. Duh. When they are in college, he will be approaching 70. It doesn't make sense, though I am glad he finally saw the light.

[Nathan Smith]

re: "I don't think young men are hampered by marrying young."

Well, hampered from doing what? Some things you wouldn't be hampered from doing, but the need to get a certain income, the need to explain everything and win the consent of another person for your plans, the complexities of having mutual friends with a wife, and so on, definitely limit your options a lot. I'm not advocating that people "find themselves," which sounds like a way of saying, "practice narcissism"; rather, they should find things outside themselves to admire, to serve, to believe in. Let's call it "seek adventure."

[nato]

"to be worried at a young age about settling down and starting a family is a bit unmanly and suggests a sort of emotional dependency."

Well, young men are as emotionally dependent as anyone else*, though this tend to manifest in different ways. In fact, my anecdotal experience is that the reason so many men - young men especially - are so unhappy and destructive is because they believe they should have no emotional dependencies. This means they suppress or misdescribe (especially to themselves) their emotional needs rather than managing them. Many turn their anxieties to inspiration and motivation, of course, but frequently it turns to drug addiction, suicide, abusive relationships, crime, and so on.

One can be brave and afraid at the same time, be strong while feeling strongly, and decisive while aware of uncertainty. In fact, that's how humans are at their best moments. That young men think they should show no fear and admit no needs is a weakness and a cultural disease**.

As for seeking adventure or serving something greater, I totally agree. In fact, I would sort of recommend it to everyone as a critical part of their spiritual*** diet. Having a life partner certainly does complicate matters and limits some options, but it also expands others. Certainly my wife and I have been able to tackle more from our expanded resources together than we could have severally.

Finally, when I spoke of social messages, I didn't intend to imply some organized campaign of indoctrination. Society sends messages all the time as part of its operation as a society, and those messages currently tell men (on balance) that they should be showboating stars of their own lives, at least until they're entering middle age. There may be something intrinsically male about that approach to life, of course, but we certainly don't try very hard to temper it. If we want our sons (and daughters!) to be happy, perhaps we should take more time to explain more wholesome alternatives.

*Unless they are/have made themselves into sociopaths

**I'm aware of the common tactic to duck responsibility using a sort of perverted version of this realization, in which a young man, when confronted by misdeeds, makes self-exculpatory appeals to fear, emotional needs and so on. There might be an increase of this, though I think it's been around forever and only the language has changed to fit modern sociological tropes.

***Define that as you like; I think it applies to most peoples' definitions.

[Joyless Moralist]

How odd to find myself agreeing with Nato on so many points, in a discussion of domestic issues! :)

But yes. As Nathan says, marriage can hamper a person from pursuing some courses in life, but it can also open opportunities. In general I think married men tend to be both happier and healthier, and certainly more stable, than their unmarried peers. Now, it's worth noting that marriage isn't the *only* possible way to meet a person's emotional needs. It's a good one, but some of the careers Nathan mentions -- the military, for example -- have traditionally built strong "brotherly" ties among the men who pursue them, and sometimes that might be a good source of social and emotional support. Religious orders are another obvious example. But these kinds of organizations require a firmly established authority (or hierarchy.) The solution to years of restless, lonely, selfish male "self-exploration" is either marriage, or possibly submission to some higher authority as in the military or a seminary. But I wouldn't like to encourage Nathan's suggestion that it's "unmanly" to be interested (even at a young age) in settling down and starting a family! Quite the contrary, being a good husband and father is an excellent expression of manhood.

[Nathan Smith]

re: "One can be brave and afraid at the same time, be strong while feeling strongly, and decisive while aware of uncertainty. In fact, that's how humans are at their best moments. That young men think they should show no fear and admit no needs is a weakness and a cultural disease**."

No, I disagree. Yes, one can be brave and afraid at the same time, but to be brave is not to *act* on one's fear, and it can be helpful not to show one's fears. To talk about one's fears can strengthen them. It's the same with needs. There are people who are always complaining, saying "I need this" and "I need that." If, whatever one's motive, including possibly a sense of one's masculine dignity, one refuses to "admit" needs, one often finds that they weren't really needs after all, that one is stronger than one thought. Of course one oughtn't to go extremes, but a reluctance to talk about one's fears and needs, especially in men (whose duty it will be, in due course, to subordinate their fears and needs to the well-being and safety of their families), is good training in courage, fortitude, strength and self-reliance.

re: "Many turn their anxieties to inspiration and motivation, of course, but frequently it turns to drug addiction, suicide, abusive relationships, crime, and so on."

This is a strange argument. It's as if one were to say, "Brave men are sometimes cruel, therefore be a coward!" Drug addictions, suicide, crime, etc. are evils, so just don't do them. One can't attempt to psychoanalyze the roots of them and modify ethics on that basis, it's too speculative.

re: "In general I think married men tend to be both happier and healthier, and certainly more stable, than their unmarried peers."

More stable, yes. That comes close to being simply a way of saying that it restricts one's opportunities, while giving that good connotations. A seeker of adventure might, in some ways, be stable-- he might reliably brave or honest, for example-- but he will not have a settled, stable life, and in that sense will be unstable. And I think the world is better with some seekers of adventure in it! Much of the exploration and discovery, much of the enterprise and industry, much of the statecraft, much of the science, much of the poetry for which we are all grateful-- most of it the work of men-- has its roots in the love of adventure. Very often the inventors, poets, explorers, military heroes, etc. would have made, would inevitably have made, bad husbands, particularly in their youngest and most energetic phase. (Some of them were husbands, and bad ones.) JM notes "submission to a higher authority" as a solution to restless, lonely selfishness, but I don't think it has to be a formal organization; I think the mere love of life, the pursuit of a worthy idea, the desire to see places where great deeds have been done, can have the same salutary impact.

Being a good husband and father is an excellent expression of manhood, to be sure; but longing to be a husband and father when it hasn't happened yet is, I think, a bit unmanly. In general, it's not good to spend a lot of effort longing for things you don't have.

[Joyless Moralist]

"Being a good husband and father is an excellent expression of manhood, to be sure; but longing to be a husband and father when it hasn't happened yet is, I think, a bit unmanly. In general, it's not good to spend a lot of effort longing for things you don't have."

That really depends on what you're longing for, and why you don't have it. Longing for union with God is a good thing, even though you don't have it yet, because it's a fulfillment of your nature. Wishing for family life is similar. It's the fulfillment of our natural good, so wanting (in an active, seeking sort of way) a spouse and children is not really the same as wanting a sports car or a fancy job for which you may not be qualified. It's really just wanting to live a healthy, mature adult life, which really a person ought to want.

Does this mean that nobody can be a healthy, mature adult without a family? No, but there is a sense in which the single/childless person is fulfilled (if they are) in spite of that lack. They're missing something important, in a way that the non-sports car owner isn't. That's why it's regarded as a sacrifice when the vowed religious "give up" that natural course in life. So no, I don't think it's a bad thing for boys to have a strong, active desire to be husbands and fathers, any more than it is for girls to have a strong, active desire to be wives and mothers.

Now, of course, it's another question deciding how a person should *act* on those desires. Being single and childless (once maturity is reached) might reasonably be seen as a lack, but that certainly doesn't mean that such a person is incapable of living a good life or doing anything worthwhile. To be incapacitated by self-pity is obviously contemptible; to be actively seeking a spouse and hoping to settle down is not. Likewise, there are more and less appropriate ways/times to express needs. To be constantly sniveling about one's needs and problems to anyone who will listen is cowardly, but that doesn't mean that the "real man" should pretend not to have any.

[ms]

Did I suggest an "organized campaign of indoctrination?" Don't recall doing that. I am well aware that social expectations don't work that way.

[nato]

ms, I think you may have gotten Nathan and myself swapped.

I said: "...men generally underestimate the advantages of settling down and starting a family earlier, but I don't think society sends that message very often"

To which Nathan responded: "I don't think it would be particularly a good thing for society specifically to "send a message" about "the advantages of settling down and starting a family earlier" for men ... Moreover I think this indoctrination would not take..."

Leading to my clarification: "[W]hen I spoke of social messages, I didn't intend to imply some organized campaign of indoctrination. Society sends messages all the time as part of its operation as a society, and those messages currently tell men (on balance) that they should be showboating stars of their own lives, at least until they're entering middle age."