“Mother love has been much maligned. An over mothered boy may go through life expecting each new woman to love him the way his mother did. Her love may make any other love seem inadequate. But an unloved boy would be even more likely to idealize love. I don't think it's possible for a mother or father to love a child too much.” ThinkingWayMayChildrenHas BeensSeemsWould BeMotherFatherFamilyBoysToo MuchExpectingInadequateMother LoveUnloved Author:Frank Pittman
“When the masculine mystique is pulling boys and men out into the world to growl manly noises at one another, the only power with astronger pull on the male psyche is maternally induced guilt. The guilt is quite necessary for our moral development, but it is often uncomfortable.” MenWorldMoralBoysDevelopmentGuiltMalesNoiseUncomfortablePullingMasculineManlyMystiqueMoral Development Author:Frank Pittman
“Every boy was supposed to come into the world equipped with a father whose prime function was to be our father and show us how tobe men. He can escape us, but we can never escape him. Present or absent, dead or alive, real or imagined, our father is the main man in our masculinity.” MenWorldRealShowsFatherBoysAliveFunctionPrimeMasculinityAbsentOur Father Author:Frank Pittman
“The mother must teach her son how to respect and follow the rules. She must teach him how to compete successfully with the other boys. And she must teach him how to find a woman to take care of him and finish the job she began of training him how to live in a family. But no matter how good a job a woman does in teaching a boy how to be a man, he knows that she is not the real thing, and so he tends to exaggerate the differences between men and women that she embodies.” KnowsMenDoeRealMatterCareJobsMotherDifferencesBoysTeachTeachingSonTrainingMen And WomenTake CareBe A ManReal ThingsDifferences Between Man And Woman Author:Frank Pittman
“All those tough guys who want to scare the world into seeing them as men . . . who don't know how to be a man with a woman, only abrute or a boy, who fill up the divorce courts; all those corporate raiders and rain-forest burners and war starters who want more in hopes that will make them feel better; . . . are suffering from Father Hunger. They go through their puberty rituals day after day for a lifetime, waiting for a father to anoint them and say "Attaboy," to treat them as good enough to be considered a man.” KnowsMenWorldWantFeelsWarEnoughGuySufferingFatherWaitingBoysKnow HowSeeingToughRainTreatsCourtLifetimeHungerDivorceForestsCorporateGood EnoughRitualScareFeel BetterFatherhoodBe A ManPubertyStartersTough GuyRaiders Author:Frank Pittman
“Masculinity varies from time to time and place to place. But it doesn't exist just in the mind of a single guy: it is shared withthe other guys. It is a code of conduct that requires men to maintain masculine postures and attitudes (however they are defined) at all times and in all places. Masculinity includes the symbols, uniforms, chants, and plays that make this the boys' team rather than the girls' team.” MenMindPlayGuyGirlAttitudeBoysTeamAll TimeSymbolsDefinedCodeUniformsMasculinityMasculineVaryOther GuysPostureSingle Guy Author:Frank Pittman
“In time, after a dozen years of centering their lives around the games boys play with one another, the boys' bodies change and that changes everything else. But the memories are not erased of that safest time in the lives of men, when their prime concern was playing games with guys who just wanted to be their friendly competitors. Life never again gets so simple.” MenYearsPlayBodyWantedGuyGamesMemoriesSimpleBoysConcernFriendlyPrimeDozenCompetitorsPlaying GamesCenteringBody Change Author:Frank Pittman
“The great passion in a man's life may not be for women or men or wealth or toys or fame, or even for his children, but for his masculinity, and at any point in his life he may be tempted to throw over the things for which he regularly lays down his life for the sake of that masculinity. He may keep this passion secret from women, and he may even deny it to himself, but the other boys know it about themselves and the wiser ones know it about the rest of us as well.” KnowsMenWellsMayChildrenPassionWealthSecretBoysFameLaysSakeDenyToysWiserMasculinityTemptedGreat Passion Author:Frank Pittman
“At the heart of male bonding is this experience of boys in early puberty: they know they must break free from their mothers and the civilized world of women, but they are not ready yet for the world of men, so they are only at home with other boys, equally outcast, equally frightened, and equally involved in posturing what they believe to be manhood.” KnowsMenWorldBelieveHeartHomeMotherBoysBreakReadyInvolvedMalesCivilizedFrightenedManhoodNot ReadyOutcastBondingPuberty Author:Frank Pittman
“I'm not suggesting that all men are beautiful, vulnerable boys, but we all started out that way. What happened to us? How did we become monsters of feminist nightmares? The answer, of course, is that we underwent a careful and deliberate process of gender training, sometimes brutal, always dehumanizing, cutting away large chunks of ourselves. Little girls went through something similarly crippling. If the gender training was successful, we each ended up being half a person.” IfsMenWayLittlesPersonsSometimesBeautifulGirlCoursesProcessAnswersHalfBoysSuccessfulCuttingHappenedTrainingFeministCarefulGenderMonstersVulnerableNightmareBrutalDeliberateSuggestingChunks Author:Frank Pittman
“Early on, girls begin to menstruate, which is dramatic but not obvious to their playmates. They grow taller and rounder, but underneath their makeup they are still recognizably themselves. For boys it is far more disorienting. Puberty comes later, sometimes much later, and its delay is humiliating. While the tall round girls are getting themselves up like grown women, the prepubertal boys, with their featureless, hairless bodies, are just dirty little kids who could pass for the children of the hypermature girls.” ChildrenLittlesStillsSometimesBodyKidsGirlGrowsBoysRoundsObviousDirtyDramaticMakeupTallDelayLittle KidHumiliatingPubertyGrown Women Author:Frank Pittman
“A boy is not free to find a partner of his own as long as he must be the partner to his mother.” LongMotherBoysPartners Author:Frank Pittman
“As boys without bonds to their fathers grow older and more desperate about their masculinity, they are in danger of forming gangs in which they strut their masculinity for one another, often overdo it, and sometimes turn to displays of fierce, macho bravado and even violence.” SometimesTurnsFatherGrowsBoysViolenceDangerDesperateDisplayFierceMasculinityGangMachoBravado Author:Frank Pittman
