The "Manosphere" | Ep.21

We break down what the “manosphere” label is becoming and why a messy mix of backlash, online incentives, and bad role models keeps shaping how men view masculinity. We argue that healthy masculinity needs a moral measuring stick, not just viral confidence, and we point to Christ as the clearest standard.
• reacting to the manosphere documentary and the kind of influencers it spotlights 
• tracking the shift from mainstream male voices to more extreme online gurus 
• explaining the pendulum swing and why backlash follows cultural overreach 
• weighing “some good points” against the danger of absorbing the whole package 
• arguing why the “toxic masculinity” label tries to name real patterns 
• defining masculinity as virtues like responsibility courage honour duty sacrifice 
• calling out performative masculinity and the difference between image and character 
• unpacking dating fear harassment claims and how online outrage skews reality 
• sharing a Love Island story about chasing a confrontational “moment” 
• presenting Christian masculinity as strength under authority and strength used for good 

Jesus loves you, Christ is King and He's coming back soon. Get to know him. Stop wasting time.

Transcript

Intro And A Comedic Rant

SPEAKER_01 0:00

Welcome to episode 21 of the Ministry A Man podcast. Of the Ministry of a Man podcast. I'm your host, Isaac Anthony Turner. And guys, I don't know if you remember this. But I said in a previous episode, and I believe this is true, only 1% of all podcasts ever made make it past episode 7. And of that 1%, only 1% of those make it to episode 21, or past episode 21. Which means I'm in the top 0.1% of podcasts ever made of all time. Round of applause for me. Thank you so much. And um actually hold your applause because hold your applause because of this. We already have established I'm a top five, subjectively a top five podcasts in the world, according to opinion. There's there's better ones, but I mean I'm up there, in my own opinion. And so the issue is that the numbers aren't showing. The numbers aren't showing it, alright? And so there needs to be a solution. Now, my memory is a little bit sketchy from my adolescence. But if I do recall correctly, I believe the term was uh what is it? It's like uh the solution it's about solutions a problem. So uh violence is always the answer. I think that's what it is. Violence is always the answer. I'm pretty sure that's what they said. It was something about violence and answer. And so I might have to resort to violence. No, I'm serious. I might have to resort to violence if the numbers don't reflect a 0.1% podcast and a subjective top five podcasts. Okay? Now I don't know where this violence gets directed to, but it'll be somewhere and that that might that's the only answer I've got, okay? So um so I don't know what you want to do with that information. I don't even know why I'm telling you that. I think I'm just venting. Um, but no, I've loved every previous episode. Now, without further ado, I watched a doco this week. A doco called the manosphere or the manosphere. The manosphere sounds better than the manosphere, but I want to talk a little bit about it because when I first heard of the term the manosphere or the manosphere, it was being directed at people like Joe Rogan and Chris Williamson. And from what I seen on this documentary, that wasn't the demographic that they were showing. They were showing a very different type of person in the manosphere. And so I want to talk a little bit about it. So obviously, there did seem to be a bit of a rise in men recapturing their masculinity. There's been a long time of the phrase toxic masculinity been thrown around. And everyone's had their two cents and everyone's had an opinion on what that is, what that means, what that looks like, what's toxic and what's healthy. And there's definitely been a resurgence in certain stereotypical masculine ideas, like provider, protector. But then on the other side, I guess in the more toxic areas is like womanizer or maybe uh some sort of power status through having a high financial success or something. So there's kind of things just happening everywhere. It's it's just a mess. Like the whole masculine world is a mess. The whole world's a mess, but specifically today we're looking at the the mess that is masculinity and how the world is seeing it. And I just want to sink my teeth into it a little bit. Because what initially did start with these other more prominent male voices, a lot of men really resonated with Joe Rogan because he was this kind of Jim, you know, jujitsu guy, the the UFC commentator, the hunter, you know, thought provoker, was very articulate and well spoken. So he was quite kind of a well-rounded guy, seemed to be quite reasonably minded, and a lot of men really liked that. Then you had your Jordan Peterson's come along, and he was speaking specifically into the disenfranch, disenfranchised adolescent uh males. And so he was a big voice for a little while, and then all of a sudden the Tate brothers sort of pop up, specifically Andrew Tate, and he's got a thing to say, and a lot of young guys are looking to him for advice and thinking that he's the uh the top G, the top guy to look to for as a role model. And then you've got, I don't know, all these guys on this manosphere thing was like streamers that get a lot of girls and make a lot of money. And so it kind of just seems like what the manosphere is now, if this documentary is anything to go off, is that it's just men that got successful that don't have good morals. It's kind of that was kind of the theme of it, is like, yeah, these guys have got a big following and they're probably successful in whatever venture that they've decided to go into, but they just seem to be not good guys. Like there was this Justin Waller or Wallen guy who's a multimillionaire and he has a wife and kids, but he sleeps around with other people and she just doesn't, she doesn't care. So I don't want to know about it. He goes and does his thing, it's a don't ask, don't tell sort of situation, but he wouldn't let her do the same thing. So it's obviously this, it's a double standard. He's obviously an unfaithful man, and just I don't know, it's just like a bad role model, bad morals, and uh definitely not like some young guys will probably look at that and be like, yeah, that's awesome. But you can see why it's a problem. I mean, anyone that has some sort of like conscience, I guess, or some any kind of moral compass would probably agree that that's not a good role model. But nevertheless, I mean, yeah, I mean, most of the dudes, it was that they showed in the in the documentary, it was just making money in unethical ways, or it was just like double standards with women, speaking poorly uh against women, cheating on women. It was basically just men overall just don't not valuing or mistreating women seemed to be the most common threat. I mean, uh, you couldn't have picked a worse group of guys to look at. Um, I think Sneeko was the only one on there that didn't really come across bad. He he just doesn't like the Jews, and so I think that's but he wasn't like he was a bit of an odd one out because everyone else seemed to be super, super misogynistic in their own right, except Sneeko. So I don't know why he was even in it, but what I what I fear will happen is this term manosphere is gonna go really mainstream, and what's gonna happen is it's gonna be thrown around at pretty much everyone, every guy for anything, if they just don't like the guy, or if he's just an opinionated guy, or if he's just a guy that disagrees with women on something. So if there's a typical maybe feminine stance to take, let's say, as a as opposed to might what might be a more male-dominated idea or ideology, the man expressing that will be accused of being in the manosphere. It'll become exactly like uh terms that just lose their meaning over time, like when someone says you're a fascist or a Nazi or racist, whatever it is, anti-semi. They're just saying it like they just throw it on everyone, and then it kind of loses its meaning because initially it did start as Joe Rogan and Chris Williamson. Like those even a guy named Mackin Murphy, I think, was in it, and he's just like an evolutionary psychologist. Pretty sure he was associated with the the manosphere a few years ago. It's like I don't even like that dude's like super, I'm pretty sure he's liberal, pretty sure he's he's quite left-leaning. Um, I mean, I could be wrong, but but he appeared on Chris Williamson's podcast, and so he's probably part of the manosphere due to the proxy there. But because it's already shifted so much over the over some years, like that the term doesn't really have a definition. And so it's just gonna be labeled as whatever. People are gonna throw us, it's gonna lose all its meaning, but that's uh that's a prophecy that I'm foretelling. So we'll see what happens there. Um, but I do want to talk about why I think this happened and how it kind of was birthed, because from my observations, what seemed to be the trending ideology was feminism and more left-leaning or liberal ideologies that tried to go a little bit too far. They pushed a little bit too much, and there's been a snapback. The pendulum uh reached its pinnacle and it started to fall back the other way. For a long time, this this particular feminist ideology or left-leaning ideology, at least in the beginning stages, most men were okay with it. Pretty much all men were like, yeah, look, you okay, sure. Like you wanna vote, vote. Like you wanna uh work, drive, do all the things? Like, sure. I mean, especially when it comes to like being in the workforce, was like like I can just imagine guys being like, what you wanna work? Okay, all right, like like we don't we don't want to be doing this, okay. But if you want to do it, like sure. Like the like the idea of of uh women being like we want like it's I'm not like disagreeing with it. You anyone if they want to work, they should be able to work. But the but it seemed like they were kind of trading privileges for rights, like in order to to get their rights, you had to forego certain privileges. Like, imagine not having to work. Like the men had to work. Like they we we die if we don't. If the men don't work, everyone dies. Like, there was like you if you want to have a family, there has to be a provider, that's be someone to go out and do the dirty work and get some income, get some capital, get something, something of value, in order to survive. And that was happening, and they were doing it specifically to uh look after a family. But I mean, obviously, there's there was always the cases you you understand why, uh because the worst of the cases were the women are trapped now. So like that was the I guess the behind the movement was, or at least the I don't know how how often and frequent it happened, but it it definitely happened where there would be times where uh let's say that the man was abusive or something, and what's the woman to do? She can't just leave because she's relying on him for life, basically, for to make money. So it's a very difficult thing, and um, so I'm not opposed to it in any way. But it was almost like, yeah, okay, like you want to work, work, sure. Like uh go for it. And so they do they do that. So that that gets through and they get the rights and all this sort of stuff, and um but but what proceeds after that, this is what happens when you make your entire personality uh uh an ideology, is you can't then stop because once you get what you want, well then who are you? Like if your identity is wrapped up in this movement of like this is my purpose, this is my the the reason that I'm alive is to fight for this cause, well then what happens when you win and you get the thing? You have to make up different things, you have to make up different fights, and so what they end up doing is they they create this uh this idea of toxic masculinity just kind of being masculinity, and so men were kind of just seen as bad in general, as just being just being men. There was this this quote of little boys in school were being seen as defective girls because they're more boisterous and they're more rowdy or they they couldn't sit still. And so it's like, oh, why can't you just be more like the girls? Well, because they're not girls, but they're being treated like, well, there must be something wrong with you because the girls don't seem to have a problem with doing this. Rather than the environment you've put them in isn't suited to the masculine energy. They're like, no, let's put everyone in the same environment and expect everyone to act exactly the same, even though you're biologically and psychologically different in so many different ways. So they push a little bit too far, and what ends up happening is you know, then they've they villainize all the boys. They say, you know, you're defective or masculinity's toxic, all masculinity. They push a little bit too far, and then all of a sudden the boys get sick of being disrespected and villainized just on behalf of a few bad eggs. Because obviously there are gender-specific problems, the male gender-specific problems are very overt, they're they're very uh forthcoming, and so they're easy to identify. And they're bad, and they're bad. And so, but the issue is you don't blame an entire gender for the minority doing something wrong or being their the masculine idea being expressed in a very unhealthy way or toxic way. So then Jordan Peterson was probably the first to come along, and then he starts actually speaking into the disenfranchised male adolescent, speaking into the importance of masculinity and why we need it in society. And then they cancel him every which way till Sunday, and he ends up getting sick, and then, you know, I mean, he does a lot for men. He he paves the way, he was the trailblazer, so to speak. And unfortunately, the first person through the brick wall was always the bloodiest, and so he had a lot of opposition coming against him. Well, when he got sort of, you know, attacked over and over and over again, he got sick and he went a bit quieter. Then all of a sudden, Andrew Tate rises up, and you've got the guys like Myron, Myron from um Fresh and Fit. They start to rise up and they do not hold back. They they feed off of the uh the hatred that is flown at them, and they build platforms off that hatred and they get more exposure off that hatred, and then they start speaking uh things with completely unfiltered, and they get to the position that they're in because there was no one else that was doing it. And then a lot of young men look to them because they're like, Well, yeah, I am sick of being spoken down to, I am sick of being disrespected, even though I'm not part of the group that you're blaming all of the men for. And so they they do look to these guys, and and now rather than being villainized and ridiculed or not even ridiculed, just villainized. Rather than being villainized and being called toxic for just being who they are and not even like largely supporting a lot of the the early feminist stuff, they end up being like, well, no, well, screw this. If you're gonna villainize me anyway, even though I'm trying to support and do whatever, and you're just telling me that I'm born bad. Well, no, I'm not gonna do that. Maybe there's another option. Maybe I'll listen to this other guy who's saying that I'm not those things and saying that no, I actually do need to work hard, and that is a value, and I'm not gonna be spoken down to and treated like I'm less than women just for being alive. No, maybe I do have some value, and then they start listening to these guys, and so um obviously that's like who who is not gonna do that? Like that they're the only options that they had. They're backed into a corner with nowhere else to go. And so someone's come along, given them a way out, given them an idea that sounds good. And you know what? He's making a lot of money and he gets a lot of girls, and a young adolescent boy probably doesn't have a really strong moral compass, and so he probably does look that as being like the ideal and being the the archetype of the hyper masculine man. Yeah, this is what I need to do. And so they they resonate with it, and then though the the the men, there were never gonna be pushovers forever. There was always gonna be something that pushed back, they were never gonna be spoken to. Like they thought that they were gonna be able to just dismantle masculinity in men, and men will just roll over and die and just take it. But that was never gonna happen. It was always gonna be a pushback, and unfortunately, the good one, Jordan Peterson, got attacked so much he stopped really speaking about men. And he speaks about other things, and he's he's even sick at the moment, unfortunately. But but look at what we're we're left with. You're seeing it now, you're seeing what the fallout from what happens when you try to attack masculinity so much, even the healthy stuff. And so this is what you get. This is what we got. We got the manosphere. It's um yeah. And so I want to talk a little bit about the good and the bad, or taking maybe the good with the bad and the dangers that there is with that, because you'll often hear this when men speak about Andrew Tate. They'll say something along the lines of, I don't like this guy, but he did say this one good thing, or I'm I'm I'm largely not a fan of his, but I liked this. This is good. He had some some of his ideas were okay. So, like, obviously, there's that it's taboo to say that you like Andrew Tate anyway. Even if you really do like a lot of his stuff, it's kind of like a social, you'll become a bit of an outcast. Like, it's not really socially acceptable to say that you like Andrew Tate. Uh and so like a lot of guys know that. And they go, I like some of the ideas. And it's like it's it's fine. Like people kind of know the vibe, whatever. The issue is he is right about a bunch of things, a bunch of things that men should do, let's say working hard and taking responsibility and accountability and not being a coward and not being a pushover, not being weak, like all the all these stuff. Largely the concepts that he's presenting are good concepts to understand. I mean, he says them quite abruptly in ways, but a lot of men like being spoken to like that. A lot of men don't want to be spoken to like children. They want, they don't want you to sugarcoat it and bubble wrap it. They want you to speak directly. Exactly what is the exact things that I need to do to not hate my life or to not feel like I'm just this weak little coward that can't do anything in his life. Tell me exactly what I need to do, tell me straight, and tell me harshly so I so I can act upon it and I know the seriousness of it. It's not bad, it's not a bad way to speak to men. I mean, it happens all the time. Like I've the there's a lot of uh church sermons you'll hear the pastor will speak very directly to men. They'll say the men need to step it up and they need to, you know, like you you will never ever hear, and I agree with this, you'll never hear them say that about women. And I and I don't think that they should. I don't think that the women respond very well to stern direct confrontation uh in in group settings. The women, you need to step it up, you need to stop doing this and start doing this. Like, I just can't see that really resonating that well. Um I mean, maybe maybe if it's coming from another woman, they might that that they respect, but uh we'll see, yeah, who knows. Anyway, the reason that Tate got popular is largely uh for controversial reasons, but a big part of it was because he was telling there was a lot of truth under what the things that he was saying. So he's obviously had a lot of misogynistic stuff. I don't I don't know about there's so many different allegations against him that you don't even know what's true because he were he beat allegations and he was in jail but then got set free because apparently it was bogus, whatever the thing. So you just don't know. I but I mean I don't think he's a good guy, like blatantly, in my opinion, but just from what I've seen online and seen the way he speaks about things. But here's the here's the where the problem lies is that a little bit of poison in the yeast will. Poison the whole loaf of bread, even if it's just a tiny bit. If you have a glass of water and it's a clean, fresh glass of water, and you drop two little drops of toilet water into that glass, are you still going to drink the glass? Probably not. You would say that the that pure glass of water has now been tainted. You can't really separate out the toilet water drops from the rest of the water that's in the glass. And so the idea of looking to someone like Andrew Tate as being a role model or being someone to get their source of ideology or masculinity or him to just be someone that you look to to emulate as a life, uh, you know, emulate your life after, you're you can't really separate out the good from the bad unless you're mature enough to do it, or you have something beyond him to recognize what is good and what is bad, right? So I use Christ as my example for life. And so when I look at someone, I can I can use Christ as the measuring stick to see whether I can listen to this person or not, and if I'm able to extrapolate out the good things. If you don't have something else, well, how are you going to be able to extrapolate? How are you gonna know what's good and bad? You can might you might go off a vibe or a feeling, but why are you getting that vibe and why are you getting that feeling? What is giving you that? Is it just the way you were brought up, or is it some other external thing? If you don't have those things, if you weren't brought up with a moral compass and you don't have any other role models or examples to live by, you're going to look at someone like Tate and then you're going to be like, yeah, sure. Or not just him, anyone in this manosphere thing. So your HS Tiki Toki or your, I don't know, Ed Matthews, whatever whatever their names are, you're going to look at these people and be like, well, this is the role model that I've I've got. And so I'm telling I I can't help but to take the whole package. And so this is the um the danger, I suppose. If you do have something like I know the things that I've seen of Andrew Tate, I have been able to say, that's good, that's bad. And I don't really need to listen to him because I have other things that I can listen to. I've got a Bible, I've got, you know, a whole doctrine of Christian ideology that I follow and support. Uh, but I can always relay everything or filter through all the information through the word of God, and so I can come out with the good stuff if I need to. And so there's this idea of, you know, eat the meat and spit out the bones, kind of kind of way of looking at it. Now, most of the time you're going to find the younger minds probably haven't developed that faculty, the ability to be able to extrapolate the good uh out of a sentiment or just out of a complete ideology. And what they might end up doing is that they'll end up taking on, okay, the hard work, taking accountability, but also pride and disrespectful attitude and misogyny. Like they're gonna take it all in one package. That's the that's the concern with listening to to bad role models. And it's also it should encourage more people to maybe be a bit more vocal in what is good, maybe be a bit louder. I mean, it's not always as marketable to be, you know, healthy masculinity. It's probably not gonna be as viral as you tate's, but it doesn't really matter. I mean, whatever is uh is good should be enough to to promote. There's also this framing that I've noticed change, or at least people have tried to change this framing, which isn't as helpful as they think that it is. There's this idea that toxic masculinity doesn't exist. Now I understand what they're saying by that. Because when they say that, they say toxic masculine toxic masculinity doesn't exist because masculinity is in itself a good thing. And so if someone's misusing or perverting these aspects of masculinity, it isn't toxic masculinity, it's just not masculinity at all. That's what they're trying to say. So if someone's being like, let's say overly domineering, or they're doing things that are, you know, the stereotypical thing that you would you might align with being, you know, some of these guys on this manosphere documentary, some of the behaviors they're doing, and they go, it's not that's just not masculinity at all. Masculinity is this stuff, it's all the good stuff. And it's like, I understand the sentiment behind it all, but it's they're avoiding the issue because all the phrase of toxic masculinity is a word or a descriptor of the certain male exclusive behaviors that are not seen in women or uh but but are predominantly male issues. And so that's why they're saying it. So it's like in the same way, you could refer to something as being like toxic femininity as like maybe invoking on purpose tears or crying in an attempt to manipulate the situation or look like the victim or something. You're not gonna ever see men do that. Um, and I know girls that can are really good at harnessing that and are really good at crying on demand, and it's scary, to be honest. But knowing that crying will invoke more protective reactions and they can kind of gain control of a situation doing it if you if if uh if they're doing it for bad reasons. So you could say, like they could turn around and say, Oh, that's not toxic femininity, that's just not femininity at all. That's just a bad person. It's like we're just labeling things here. When people say toxic masculinity, all they're doing is that they're referring to a specific set of more predominant male behaviors, and they're just putting a label on them. That's what that's what they're saying when they're saying toxic masculinity. So it does exist. I mean, you can try and say, no, it's just not toxic, but it's like it's a purposeless claim. It doesn't really help in any situation because they're trying to address, when they're saying toxic masculinity, they're trying to address this issue and just putting a name to the to the issue. That's all they're doing. And so I I want to explain a couple of things. First of all, what masculinity actually is, because it's um it's good to know because there's certain ideas of masculinity. There's so many different things that people think masculinity is. People think masculinity is like growing a beard and chopping wood and getting really into loud engines and motorbikes and cars. And it's like all that is is performative. That's just performative masculinity. Masculinity isn't uh, you know, there might be that might be a consequence of a man that just happens, like men happen to like certain things, but you can just like you can be not a real man or a masculine man. You can still be a child on the inside, I'm trying to say, and still do all those behaviors. You can still be weak and and be into cars, for example, or whatever. So my idea of masculinity, at least from what I've read and in the research I've done, is that masculinity is is very forthcoming. It's very direct. It's things like leadership, responsibility, or taking responsibility, it's it's attitudes and archetypes of these uh these direct uh motives. So courage, strength, accountability, competency, uh, capabilities, skills, honor, duty, sacrifice. There's many different virtues that you could say uh are lumped in. And and the uh maybe the the opposite to that, the the feminine uh traits or femininity is probably more something like piety and gracefulness and beauty, um, peace, nurturing, gentleness, kindness, charity, many of these types of things. So you'll see that there's kind of like this positive and negative aspect, and not positive and negative in the form of like positive being good and negative being bad in the moral sense. I'm talking about like a battery, you would see. The positive end is the protruding end and the negative end is the receiving end. And so you would say even the biological makeup of men is is masculine symbolically as well as literally, and the and the the female anatomy is symbolically feminine as well as literally feminine. Like a man, you know, is the the provider, and then the woman is the nurturer. And so the men would give, the women would receive. That's the idea of the masculine and the feminine. Is these uh it's a compatibility thing. It's it's why we're we work well together when we're both working together. I believe that men and women work best together when they're functioning in unity together. They bring the best out of each other, they have the the things that the others don't have. They bring different things to the table and they work well together. If they're you know, if they're healthy, I guess. There's always toxic versions of it all. But largely that is what the the male or the masculine feminine kind of dichotomy is is the man will give something and the woman will take it and and produce something different. It's the you know, the whole thing of give a woman a house, she'll make it a home. Give a woman, you know, a sperm and she'll make it a baby. Whatever the thing is, I don't know. You give them, you give them something, you I mean, they make things beautiful, you know? So what toxic masculinity would look like, or the things they're talking about when they say toxic masculinity, is being like um controlling, dominating, unrestrained anger, hostility, and oppressing the weak rather than using your strength to uphold the weak or to protect the weak. So misusing their power, let's say, that that's probably a good, maybe a good uh way to see it. And so the biggest issue that came from the the movement that tried to attack the toxic masculinity stuff, because let's be honest, that is all of those behaviors are toxic behaviors. And so what ended up happening, the biggest issue as to why the manosphere, I think, has risen up, is because they tried to to overstep. And they instead of just saying, yeah, these ideas um uh toxic, this uh these controlling, domineering stuff, what they tried to do is they tried to say, well, no, all of the male exclusive uh ideas are toxic in general. So all of the things about you know their strength and their courage and all of this stuff, like um even the chivalry stuff, what you think that a woman can't protect herself? Like, what's this man think? Well, you think that I'm just constantly in danger, and oh, I need this man to come and help me. And it's like, whoa, whoa, whoa, like how is that toxic? And they go, no, because anything that was uh that was associated with any form of masculinity got deemed as toxic for a period of time there. And so that's where the the the biggest issue, that's what birthed, I believe, the manosphere is because they're like, well, we we can do nothing right now, because all of a sudden, because it's it's who you are. If you try to imagine trying to tell a woman not to be a nurturer or not to do some of the the more feminine things that they do, the caregivers, the the emotional uh aspect of the woman that allows them to heal people. No, you're not allowed to do that. Oh, crying is is toxic. Imagine saying that. It's crazy. And then for a while as well, any attempt that males seem to make in, you know, in in dating dynamics and in masculinity, you're always the initiator. The man is the direct, he he begins the sequence as the the positive out uh or or the protruding element of masculinity is you go, the woman receives. And so what ended up happening was there was a lot of these movements of everything got deemed as some sort of harassment. If a if a man approached just to have a conversation or to maybe just ask for a girl's number or ask her out on a date, it was seen as harassment. And there seemed to be a little bit of a trend of people wanting to jump on board with that too. And it was almost like trending amongst women to be like, yeah, this guy harassed me. They jump on board and be like, yeah, me too, me too, me too. And a lot of it wasn't even me too. It was just like, yeah, that no, that seemed like that dude was just paid you a relatively nice compliment. And it was, I don't know what the harm was there. And that all got seen, uh, got seen as being harassment. Uh, and and then uh men were getting accused of just making women feel uncomfortable just because they try to talk to them. And look what's happened now. Now men don't want to approach women anymore, and now the women are complaining that men never approach them. So it's like you can pat yourself on the back for that one. Like the fruit of your labor was, yeah, now a lot of men don't want to approach, or you what you are gonna get is you're gonna get a lot of like narcissistic guys doing the approaching. The guys that don't care about, you know, being called creeps or being labeled as harass, uh harassing kind of guys, they're the ones that you're left with. And all the genuine dudes that were like, yeah, oh, the last thing I would want to do is is, you know, be labeled as harassing a girl. Like, yeah, far be it from me. I just won't, okay, I don't know what to do here. I just asked for you know her number, and yeah, I got accused, so I'm not I'm not doing that anymore. Uh and so all of these women that wanted to be in the victim club so so badly ended up, unfortunately. Not all of them, obviously. There's so there's a lot of beautiful, uh loving women out there, but it's it's always the loudest voices that get the most attention. And so all or the articles that are the most egregious that go viral. You're not gonna have an article written about the time where the guy walked up to a girl and and uh and she politely declined and said, Well, I'm actually really grateful and appreciate that that was really flattering. They're not gonna write a news article about that, and no one's gonna hear about that, even though that was happening and still does happen. Um, you know, I'm not trying to say that you know, I'm sure it was a minority of of women that were doing that kind of me too stuff, but unfortunately, in the the society that we live in, it's based on attention and clicks. And so you're gonna hear the the story, even if a a guy, you know, sends a screenshot of like, man, I was really nice to this girl, and she sparked off at me and like the screenshot of the messages, that's gonna go viral. But the nice, pleasant, you know, interaction that all went perfectly fine. Like, no one's gonna see that. And so we're we're actually getting quite a skewed idea of reality based on what we're being fed. You know, you're always gonna see the most hyper-extreme examples when you're looking online. It's it's why being online is so dangerous and so like not real life, like the real world just isn't as anywhere near as bad as people make it out to be. Or like, I mean, I I fall for it too, and I have to keep checking myself. It's like, no, look in reality. Look like reality's great. I actually quite like reality, it's a lot better than the online place. The online's danger. Anyway, but actually, you know what? I did experience this once, so oh okay. I used to be uh before I was a Christian, I used to love watching Love Island. I was obsessed. I watched like nearly every season, Australia and UK. I was I watched like a bunch of seasons. Anyway, I remember specifically this one season, and I remember I was chatting to this girl, and she was relaying a situation that had happened on one of the seasons where a guy and this girl were going to they were getting together or something and they were talking, and she she walked off, and then he turned around to the group of guys, and he said something really rude, really like like misogynistic kind of thing. And it was just like a smart comment to try to impress the boys, whatever. And it wasn't nice. Well, the girl heard and she turned around and straight up confronted him, just saying, What did you just say? And he panicked. He was like, Oh, nothing. And she goes, No, say it again. What did you just say? And then he was like, Oh, no, I was just saying something, no, you said this, and she called him out, and it was this real like girl boss moment, and all these other girls were there watching, and all the guys were like, Oh, and um, and she ended up just like breaking it off with him there, and then pretty much was just like, No, get out of here, like F off and Baba. And um, the girl that I was chatting to was saying how much she loved that scene. She was like, she was like, that was so cool. That girl, like, you know, she um she stood up for herself and she didn't take, you know, she was, I was like, yeah, that was pretty baller. Like that was I was like rating it. I was like, yeah, that dude was a clown. Like, why would you do that? Like, um, anyway, a little bit later, I I end up making a a kind of a flirty, cheeky comment to this girl, which it which was in, in my opinion, in in quite good taste. I don't think it was disrespectful at all. I think it was it's something that I've said to a few different people over the years, and it normally gets you the reaction that kind of you'd kind of be like a one of those smiles that's kind of like oh you, you know, you cheeky kind of thing, and they kind of give you a little hit, and you it's like one of those like flirty banter things. So I said this thing, and I kid you not. It was like she was quoting this girl off Love Island verbatim. She was like, What did you just say? And I was like, Well, I I repeated it because I was like, thought it was funny. And then she goes, I I can't believe you just said that. And like had tried to simulate the reaction that we'd just been talking about like an hour earlier, and saying how much she loved and was obsessed with this girl and how boss girl she was. And she tried to simulate the same thing for like something that wasn't even even remotely close to what that was, but that's what I feel like is a sentiment that a lot of girls have had that that were being very vocal online and and all the you know the the more viral stuff. So and after that, I was like, all right, like, well, you're unchill. So like we didn't, I didn't want to talk to her after that. I mean, like, we ended up enjoying the rest of our night and it was fine, and but like I I went home thinking, man, she quoted a thing from Love Island, like straight in my head. I'm like, immediately was like, okay, I can see what's what's happening. Like, you I don't believe that you care at all. I think that you want to care because I think you want to have a moment. I think you want to have a moment that's like this other girl that you like. And um unfortunately, there's consequences for that because she tried, she wanted to keep talking, and I was like, Well, I'm not interested in you anymore because this is that was weird. That was really weird. You like you're wanting to use me in this weird moment. Like, so and she was probably confused as to why I wasn't interested in talking to her anymore. Because I like I'm not gonna say, Well, I feel like you did a you were trying to repeat the Love Island thing. I'm not gonna bring that up, like it just sounds it would probably make me sound crazy, but I kid you not. I've seen the episode, and so I knew that she was doing the bit, and um, and yeah, so it was to her own detriment. But you got your moment, I suppose. So you can tell your friends about how you said to me, uh whatever. Anyway, uh here's the thing here's the solution to all of this stuff. It's very simple and it's it's Christ, it's Christ Jesus, is the ultimate epitome of masculinity and in a lot of respects femininity in it as well without being necessarily feminine. Christ is the perfect example as a human being, let's say. In addition to following Christ, men can't allow the culture or feminism or fear to stop them being masculine in a healthy way. In spite of the the fear of you know being labeled as a creep or whatever it is. You have to be courageous in these attempts, right? In in living out just being a masculine man. In fact, you have to, you can't actually be courageous unless there's fear. So it's not even in spite of fear, it's in the face of fear. And not even just approaching women. I'm talking about just in life in general, as being the type of person or being a man that embodies masculinity in a healthy way. You can't allow these sort of things, you can't allow yourself to be stepped on. You have to be true to who you are in the most in the healthiest way, regardless of what uh the world or the culture is trying to pit against you. You resent yourself and you will resent everyone else, and that's how you become an incel as a man, or that's how you become part of the manosphere, or just the red pill or the black pill, or whatever pill they're taking these days. You have to take responsibility. And by that I mean your response ability, your ability to respond. You have to take control of that. You have to be strong, you have to be honorable, you have to be noble. These things, you have to be all of those things in the face of it all. And um, and the difference between the manosphere and Christian men is the health and the direction that masculinity is pointed towards. Because as a man of God, you're always submitted under the Lord, you're always submitted under Christ. You're never at the top of the hierarchy in Christianity because there's always going to be God above you. So you're never going to be like the top dog, so to speak. You're, which is a good thing. There's a there's a man named JC Ryle who says, few men are able to carry a full cup with a steady hand. And obviously what that means is when you're at the top, you're it's a lot harder to maintain your convictions and your integrity. It's very, very difficult. There's a lot of responsibility, there's a lot of people looking at you. Um, and especially in the in the Christian world, you want to be, you want to, you need to be, in fact, a man of great humility if you're going to have any sort of influence and recognition or notoriety in the Christian world. It's not for the faint of heart. And so it's a good thing that you're under the headship of Jesus. In in uh C. S. Lewis wrote a book called uh The Screwtape Letters. And the book is basically about the perspective of a demon speaking to a lower-level demon regarding how to treat the Christians and their plan to derail them, basically. And one of the things he says is to let them be pushed either to extreme pacifism or extreme patriotism, in the sense that uh Christians shouldn't be either of those things. And the extremes of those things is actually detrimental to Christianity. We aren't pacifists, but we aren't warmongers either. There's there is there is a middle ground in between those things that the Christian must walk. But we we live out our duties for a greater good, something greater than ourselves. The strength that we have is not meant for us. You can't hoard strength. James Isaac Vance says in his book Royal Manhood that you cannot hoard strength. It must be used. You can hoard many things. Strength cannot be hoarded. It's uh it's it's either wasted away or it's or it's given and used for something else. We aren't selfish, we're we're selfless. That is the the mark of a masculine man is to be selfless, the uh the sacrifice for something greater. So that is what I think about the manosphere. I think Christ is the answer. I think if you're a man and you want a role model that is healthy and good and proper, and still live a life that's not boring by any stretch of the imagination. Jesus says that there's gonna be trials, there's gonna be tribulations. Jesus says, Guess what? They hated me, so they're gonna hate you too. That's what he says. So following Christ is going against the grain. The Bible says that the spirit and the and the flesh are at enmity with one another, they're enemies. The the spirit of the world and the spirit of Christ are completely opposite and they they're going in completely opposite directions. So if you decide to follow Christ, don't think that it's gonna be this nice little play date with Jesus where everything's gonna be great and you're gonna be this happy little camper because I've got Jesus next to me, and he's gonna help me through all the hard times. He's gonna help you through the hard times because there's gonna be hard times. Like, that's the thing. So yeah, Christ is it's the best thing, man. Like living for Christ is the best thing you you'll ever do. There isn't it, there isn't a thing that I could recommend more. Like, out of all the things that I've done, there isn't a better thing, a more consistently good thing than Christianity, as far as the the the actual outworking of that. Not to mention the promise of eternal life. I mean, come on, guys, eternal life. Let's go, let's go, baby. Eternal life. What a flex, man. Christianity is like, you know, because like there's different ideologies or whatever. Like reincarnation is like, yeah, you could be reincarnated as a pig or a gnat. You could be reincarnated as a shrimp in the ocean, brother. Or you could just be you could be reincarnated as just like a poor person. He's like living in the slums. And Christianity is like, bro, you get eternal life in heaven. Jesus, man. That's awesome.

SPEAKER_00 50:16

I mean, that's not why I'm Christian, by the way. But between you and me, it's a pretty good perk. I'll just say that. Um, you shouldn't be Christian for what you can get. But it's a pretty good perk, if you know what I mean. No, no, no, no, no, no, no. No, no, no, no, no. But seriously, but seriously. No, no, no, no. Like, no, no, no, no. It's good, like it's fine.

SPEAKER_01 50:44

Like, you're Christian because you it's self-sacrifice, you want to sacrifice your life, you want to sacrifice, you want to help other people sacrifice your life. Yeah, but eternal life as well.

SPEAKER_00 50:52

Hey, no, no, no, no, no. He's joking, he's joking. Guys, come on, guys. Alright, alright, alright. In the bo I'm pretty sure in the Bible it says that you get mansions.

SPEAKER_02 51:09

Let me see this.

SPEAKER_00 51:14

Do you get man a mansion in heaven? Do you this is the first thing that pops up? Do you get a mansion in heaven? Yeah, yeah, dude.

SPEAKER_01 51:27

John 14, it says, in my father's house are many mansions.

SPEAKER_00 51:32

Bro, we get a mansion. Come on now.

SPEAKER_02 51:35

Get a mansion. I'm gonna heaven, I get a mansion, and I'm gonna live there for all eternity. Come on now. Sign up, sign up, do it, bro. Oh, okay.

SPEAKER_01 51:57

Let's go. Let's oge. Alright, thanks for listening. Look, Jesus loves you. Christ is king. He's coming back soon. Get to know him. Stop wasting time. We're running out of time, all right? Your days are numbered. All our days are numbered. We're here for a minute, then we're gone. Not to be morbid. Not to be morbid. All right. So there you go. That's my thoughts on the uh the manosphere. Thanks again for listening to the Ministry of Man podcast. I love you. You're awesome. God bless.