Nonexistent rites of passage create world without men

For Spartan males, adolescence was a trying time. Ripped from the arms of their mothers at age seven, they would be enrolled in the agoge system, where for the next 10 years they would be trained in preparation for life in the Spartan military.

At 17, their training would be put to the test in what was known as Krypteia. The boy would be sent into the countryside with a knife and told to kill as many helots — Spartan slaves — as he could. If he returned to his school without detection, his training was finished, and the boy would become man.

For Spartan males, Krypteia was a rite of passage into manhood, a culminating moment in which he drew upon all the knowledge and training acquired during adolescence.

For males today, there is no such culminating experience. Asked what rites of passage exist today to help youngsters make the transition into manhood, one might respond with, “when he graduates from college,” “when he gets married,” “when he buys his first suit” or “when he gets his first real job.”

Unfortunately, however, these traditional modern rites of passage are being pushed further back as men are taking longer to graduate college (if at all), waiting until later in life to get married and have children and even postponing moving out of their parents’ houses until into their late 20s.

This leaves males in a metaphorical no-man’s-land between boyhood and manhood.
Young males are desperate for some type of culminating experience, that moment when they realize they have made that exciting transition away from boyhood and can now be dealt with and given the responsibilities of a man.

Instead, we have men who are adrift. Unsure of how to perceive themselves in the larger structure of society, they remain where they are comfortable and know how to operate. They avoid responsibility and prolong boyhood.

We see this evidenced in today’s jobless statistics. According to the U.S. Labor Department, the number of women in the workforce surpassed the number of men last year. And today, males with high-school diplomas between the ages of 20 and 24 have an unemployment rate of 15.6 percent, more than the 12.6 percent for women of the same age.

While these numbers can’t be attributed solely to the lack of rites of passage for males — the inadequate supply of proper male role models in our culture is also a contributing factor — I believe there certainly is a connection. One we see play out every day here in Bloomington.

Many young males in college refuse to accept the responsibilities that come along with manhood. They dress as if they are still 14, sit in front of the television and play “Call of Duty” all day, spend four nights a week out at the bars, get grades that are just good enough to get by and treat post-graduation as if it is never going to come.

Had these young males undergone a rite of passage that alerted them to their transition into manhood, perhaps the situation wouldn’t be as it is now. If nothing else, they would at least start thinking of themselves as men, and hopefully, as a result, start carrying themselves as men, too. This, in turn, would alert their communities and potential employers that they are ready to shoulder the responsibilities of men.

Harvard Professor Harvey Mansfield defined manliness this way: “Manliness seeks and welcomes drama and prefers times of war, conflict and risk,” he said. “Manliness brings change or restores order at moments when routine is not enough, when the plan fails, when the whole idea of rational control by modern science develops leaks.

Manliness is the next-to-last resort, before resignation and prayer.”
Sadly, this type of manliness is far too absent in “men” today, and inevitably, our society suffers because of it. Were there more legitimate rites of passage, this deficit, I’m certain, could come close to being overcome.

­— nperrino@indiana.edu