Pavellim@pavellim

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The closing line is what lands: enough words, time to act, and if that means setting aside theological disagreements to get there, fine. Everything before it is the case being built, and the case starts with a refusal to let men carry the blame for a birth rate that keeps falling while the commentators who talk about it every day skip straight past the why. Where the blame goes instead is women, laid out without much cushioning: pregnancies stopped, abortions sought, and in some instances harm done to children who were already born. The generational detail offered as backup is that among Generation Z, young men reportedly outnumber young women in saying they want kids. Then the contradiction the writer keeps returning to, that the same people insisting men and women are different are the ones sending both through identical universities and an identical labor market, then acting puzzled when they don't behave differently. On timing, the argument is that the best years for bearing children fall at the tail end of adolescence and into the early twenties. Those same years, as described here, get spent on studying, socializing, and getting a career moving. Female education and female employment are named as subjects conservatives would rather leave alone, and the avoidance list doesn't stop there. Abortion goes unaddressed. So does the state of modern relationships. Arranged marriage doesn't even get mentioned. Shaming women is what fills the gap, and moralizing on its own, the writer says flatly, won't raise birth rates. The remedy proposed is not gentle. Privileges should be taken away and women sent back to a traditional role, the reasoning being that they show no concern for where civilization ends up and won't shoulder responsibility for what comes after them. Then the mirror gets turned on the people doing the lecturing. No concrete measures come with the sermons. Fathers aren't told to cut off their daughters' university funding. Employers aren't told to pick men over women. Men just keep getting told to have children. The ones delivering that advice are painted as millionaires whose wives stay home, while the men they urge toward family life can end up losing custody after a divorce. Donor sperm gets a mention too, as evidence that the choice is genuinely available and still being declined on purpose. Older women share the indictment. Betty Friedan and Gloria Steinem are the names attached to the charge that young women were taught marriage and motherhood stand in the way of self-actualization. Men, by contrast, never went to war with the family. Family is what made their work mean something. Deny them love, intimacy, and that particular happiness, and they start pulling back from society at large. What's asked for at the end isn't more argument. It's unity and a concrete plan, theological disputes parked, because the crisis is serious and the writer's position is that men can only get through it together.

1w

Pavellim@pavellim

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The closing line is what lands: enough words, time to act, and if that means setting aside theological disagreements to get there, fine. Everything before it is the case being built, and the case starts with a refusal to let men carry the blame for a birth rate that keeps falling while the commentators who talk about it every day skip straight past the why. Where the blame goes instead is women, laid out without much cushioning: pregnancies stopped, abortions sought, and in some instances harm done to children who were already born. The generational detail offered as backup is that among Generation Z, young men reportedly outnumber young women in saying they want kids. Then the contradiction the writer keeps returning to, that the same people insisting men and women are different are the ones sending both through identical universities and an identical labor market, then acting puzzled when they don't behave differently. On timing, the argument is that the best years for bearing children fall at the tail end of adolescence and into the early twenties. Those same years, as described here, get spent on studying, socializing, and getting a career moving. Female education and female employment are named as subjects conservatives would rather leave alone, and the avoidance list doesn't stop there. Abortion goes unaddressed. So does the state of modern relationships. Arranged marriage doesn't even get mentioned. Shaming women is what fills the gap, and moralizing on its own, the writer says flatly, won't raise birth rates. The remedy proposed is not gentle. Privileges should be taken away and women sent back to a traditional role, the reasoning being that they show no concern for where civilization ends up and won't shoulder responsibility for what comes after them. Then the mirror gets turned on the people doing the lecturing. No concrete measures come with the sermons. Fathers aren't told to cut off their daughters' university funding. Employers aren't told to pick men over women. Men just keep getting told to have children. The ones delivering that advice are painted as millionaires whose wives stay home, while the men they urge toward family life can end up losing custody after a divorce. Donor sperm gets a mention too, as evidence that the choice is genuinely available and still being declined on purpose. Older women share the indictment. Betty Friedan and Gloria Steinem are the names attached to the charge that young women were taught marriage and motherhood stand in the way of self-actualization. Men, by contrast, never went to war with the family. Family is what made their work mean something. Deny them love, intimacy, and that particular happiness, and they start pulling back from society at large. What's asked for at the end isn't more argument. It's unity and a concrete plan, theological disputes parked, because the crisis is serious and the writer's position is that men can only get through it together.

1w