Men and Fear

Fear is a tempting force for men

Control

I saw an interview with a gangster who was asked if it was better to be loved or feared.

A lot of men might try to say something clever like "if you're smart, you can have both." That’s what I would have said when I was 17 years old.

But you can't. And that's why the Mafia fell apart. You can’t have both love and fear, because one drives out the other.

It should come as no surprise that the gangster’s answer was: both… but if I had to choose one, I’d choose fear. He said he’d keep his men in line by making them afraid of him. He’d strategically give them advantages and rewards for loyalty, but he’d never give them enough that they no longer needed him.

In other words, pure manipulation. He held his “family” together by making himself necessary. If someone started to doubt whether they needed him, he’d just eliminate them. There is no room for doubt in a fear-based system.

A fear-based system only survives as long as you can hold it together by force. Which, as history is quite fond of showing us, is not forever. Fear-based systems come with expiration dates — whether they are families, social groups, or nations.

Like one of those tensegrity tables. The system is held together by the tension of cords, ropes, or chains. By a magic trick of physics.

Source: Amazon.com

And on the other hand you have a Classical Table that's held together simply because the pieces fit. The table stays together not by some trick, but by virtue of being properly built. Because it wants to stay together.

Sex and young men

The reason people like Andrew Tate get popular on social media is because men are curious about fear. Especially young men. They’re curious about what it’s like to use fear. To wield it. To be in control by virtue of being stronger than someone else, or having a more important position than them.

A lot of men, maybe even most men, aren’t interested in using fear to control others. Or, at the very least, they know morally that they shouldn’t.

But that doesn’t mean they’re not curious about it. About what it would be like to just take what you want, to have aggression-based sex, and to have women be timid in your presence. It’s a fantasy.

It plays into an animal-kingdom set of instincts that we still haven’t evolved our way out of (and probably never will). It’s what men like Genghis Khan are remembered for. Impregnating half the world and not taking no for an answer. Men want to know what that’s like, even if they’re not comfortable enough with you to admit it.

Men are filthy, vile creatures. A lot of us just do a decent job of controlling or hiding it. If a man trusts you enough to admit what actually goes on in his head, you'd better have an open mind and a strong stomach.

And many women are the same way. Sex and romance can be incredibly exciting things. And you can play games with power and aggression in the bedroom. If you want to. If it's done as cooperative play, it can even bring you closer as a couple.

But wise men who actually have what they want in life would never tell you to behave like Andrew Tate. Or like a gangster, or Genghis Khan. Even if it’s not for a moral reason, it could just be for the most basic selfish reason: it’s just not a good strategy across time. It only works until it stops working. And it always stops working.

Love never stops working. It just works more slowly. And it requires patience and self-control, which are a lot less shiny and sexy than aggression.

It's so easy for men, growing up and grappling with what masculinity means, to look to fear as a way of getting. Or to raw strength as a way of being. Young men can easily be drawn to characters like Tate — men who appear to be getting all the nice things men want, by employing the most base and thoughtless strategies available. By acting like chest-pounding gorillas and using strength as the one single resource that buys them everything else.

To some extent, it’s natural for young men to go through this phase. The only way they stay there is if they have no good role models in their lives to lead them back out. Which, unfortunately, many young men don’t anymore.

There are some people (both men and women) who are aroused and invigorated by being afraid of the other.

A lot of young men take this as a cue that they need to be “dominant” in order to truly excite a woman. (“Dominant” is a huge buzz word for the Millennials and Gen Z.) They believe that power should be at the center of romance, because it makes for amazing sex (and is the only way to have amazing sex).

Not only is that not true, it’s a trap.

It puts you in relationships where you are forced to be a certain kind of man just to keep the relationship alive. You are forced to be emotionally unhealthy to keep your partner. A partner, by the way, who is probably also emotionally unhealthy. Otherwise she wouldn’t want that all the time.

In that case, you just shouldn’t be with that person. Two wrongs don’t make a right. And great sex can’t last forever if it’s based on something as dumb as aggression. There comes a day when you have to make love. Because there comes a day when you have to feel loved. And be loved. Not feared.

It's no surprise that Andrew Tate is also an alleged sex trafficker. And that he'll never have a woman in his life who truly gives a shit about him. I’m no predictor of futures, but that’s usually how this goes.

You might say history is going to remember Andrew Tate as a creep and a 4-year old. But that’s wrong. History is not going to remember Andrew Tate at all.

Family and authority

Any reasonable father wants to feel loved and valued — but at the same time knows that he needs to be feared to run his household properly. In order to wield authority properly, in order to raise children properly.

But that’s not true. At least, not in the way we often think it is.

Let me paint a picture of a man — a type of man I have seen over and over in my life.

This man, a husband and father, trusts himself as head of household. As the leader of the pack and the decision maker. He knows that in order to have an ordered, organized house you must wield some type of authority — and that includes drawing boundaries for the children. So far, so good.

But this man tricks himself, or rather his ego tricks him, into thinking that “boundaries” means “either obedience or disobedience to Dad.” That his job as head of household is to give orders and commands, and to punish those who do not follow them. Whether he’s right or wrong. His duty, he thinks, is to gather obedience like one gathers berries from a bush.

And he’ll often respond with either violence or aggression when his own authority is not respected.

All the while, he’ll let the children do things that are terrible for them. Like be narcissists or eat way too many cookies. Or, worst of all, he’ll let the children talk back to their mother but not him. He’ll let them call their mother nasty words and give her platters of attitude, because her authority does not need to be protected. His does.

He has that backwards. Absolutely backwards.

A father should be feared only if he’s standing up for something. Something other than naked obedience; something other than his own sense of authority. A father should not be feared just because it’s more fun for him than not being feared, or some simple-minded dumb-ass reason like “that’s how you raise good kids.”

But now picture a happy, generous man who’s always smiling. Always encouraging his kids and his wife. A man who doesn’t want to be feared.

When a happy, generous man stops smiling, you can bet your summer ass that you just crossed a boundary. And that boundary is probably something more important than his own ego. It’s probably something like… a value he holds dear, or the dignity and safety of his wife or children.

In that case, you probably should be afraid.

A father should draw boundaries not to make himself feel important, but for the direct betterment of those he's responsible for. I don’t admire a man who defends himself. I admire a man who defends his wife.

And the better he gets at drawing and protecting these boundaries, the less he will be feared across time. That’s ultimately the goal, isn’t it? The less he will need to be feared across time. Because his children will become better people and they won’t cross good, useful boundaries as much.

A father should be feared only when it’s morally useful.

Fear is tempting

Men often use strength to keep each other in line. The threat of violence is what keeps men in check a lot of the time. Keeps men (or women) from mistreating each other or each other’s groups or families or friends.

And that’s fine. That’s healthy. Despite our over-civilized modern world where you’re not even allowed to hit a man in the face for swearing at your wife. In my opinion, that should be not only allowed but actively encouraged. Because you shouldn’t be allowed to swear at someone’s wife. Or hit on someone’s teenage daughter, or bully someone’s young son. Those are useful boundaries, and you should be punished for crossing them.

Fear is a tempting force for men. We grow up and we want to wield it. Out of curiosity, or lust, or simply because it’s easier than learning how to be a good man. We see things like the Mafia or Andrew Tate, and we see a toy that we want to play with or a tool that is useful. We wonder and fantasize, like we do about anything.

Again, this is animal-kingdom stuff and it’s probably not going anywhere. But as we get older and see the consequences of fear, we often grow out of it. Especially if we have other good men (and women) around who can lead us a better direction.

If you want to have aggression-and-power-based sex, go for it. Have your fun. But make sure you have a loving relationship first.

And if you need to be feared as a man, that’s fine. But make sure it’s about something more important than your own self-esteem.

Drink some water and control yourself.

JDR

“The true index of a man's character is the health of his wife.” - Cyril Connolly