A Tale of Two Men—And What It Means for You

Men feel like they are not “allowed” to be what all men feel called to be

And here’s the bottom line: as good men are attacked for wanting to help, as they hold themselves back, they begin to feel like they are not allowed to be what all men feel called to be. Even the science of how we are created differently as men and women points to this. For me as a person of faith, I also clearly see this in what the Bible describes about a few specific callings for men: to be those who step up, who protect others, who fight for those who can’t fight for themselves, who provide for their families. This doesn’t mean that women cannot also do all of those things, of course! But the guys who are growing up in and navigating this culture today are sometimes made to feel that the callings they feel deep inside are wrong. That lending women their strength (in all the ways that means) somehow tells women we aren’t strong.

I hear this especially from those in the millennial and early Gen Z generations. I think it is no coincidence that the men who offered to help me were all a bit older than me, and the men who stopped themselves were all younger.