Christianity and "Manhood" Are Best Friends Forever



Sen. Josh Hawley, a Missouri Republican, was given an award by a right wing group from Florida. Hawley received the award because of his book, Manhood; The Masculine Virtues America Needs.

The group giving the award is call the Center for Christian Statesmanship. Hawley's award was for being a distinguished "Christian Statesman." Then in his remarks, Hawley riffed about how masculinity holds together the family and the liberal assault on masculinity is "destroying the family." Connecting all these dots, "statesmanship," "masculinity" and "family" is hard for me. They don't seem to have anything to do with each other. 

A book chest-beating about "masculinity" does not seem like what we mean generally when we think of the term "statesmanship." One nice definition of "statesmanship" is "evidence of wisdom and skill in conducting national and international affairs." We have now entered the new world where "statesmanship", at least Hawley's version, is talking against masturbation and video games and for driving monster trucks. Changing gender is against masculinity. the new "statesmanship" is hitting the marks of social conservative talking points.

Hawley's award gets more complicated when, in his remarks, he connected erosion of his version of masculinity with reductions of marriage and children in marriage. He lost me again. What is the connection?

Certainly the number of marriages is down and the number of children per 1,000 women has fallen. It seems to me some of this was caused by Hawley's Republican Party's reduction in funding of childhood education and day care services. Making marriage easier to finance surely would increase the attractiveness of both marriage and raising children.

I'm thinking President Trump will receive the same honor for his Christian Statesmanship of about illegal immigrants eating pet dogs and cats.

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