Building Brotherhood Part One: The Trials and Tribulations of Forming a Gang

 

"This shit wold be way easier if the world would just hurry up and fall apart."

That was the thought that jumped into my thoughts as I was rummaging through hand-written scribbles from a few years back. ChatGPT wasn't being especially helpful in synthesizing the thirty-eight divergent ideas I fed it. The best idea my AI sidekick could generate was a hybrid between Jim Jones' People's Temple Agricultural Project (of "Drink the Kool-aid" fame) and Scientology. 

FML. 

You see, for the last fifteen years or so, I've been fascinated with the social dynamics of self-improvement. Specifically, how do groups positively influence people's journey to self-improvement. 

Part of the fascination has been fueled by evidence... I have a whole lotta anecdotal (and empirical) evidence that surrounding yourself with hard-working, motivated people super-charges your own self-improvement. The friendly competition and accountability is helpful, too.

Another part of the fascination is fueled by a strong desire for authentic connection with others, and the sense of belonging to a group of like-minded folks. Our modern world is a lonely, isolated place. Since the dawn of time (for humans, anyway), we've relied on a tribe of other people to survive. "Lone wolves" didn't last long in the harsh, unforgiving wilds of our primal past. Given each of us is the result of a long, unbroken chain of social animals, tribalism is etched into our DNA. Hell, the entire field of "social psychology" is dedicated to studying our innate social acumen. 

Anyway, this fascination with the social dynamics of self-improvement have led to the formation of a fairly long series of intentional and unintentional "tribes" I've either started or became a part of. Some have been centered around a particular activity, like the Runner's World Barefoot Running Forum, The Barefoot Runner's Society, BRU, The Hobby Joggas, BRUCrew, Fight Club, and El Diablo Combatives. Others have been centered around ideas, like Families on the Road and Cotton Underwear Nougat Troupe. Still others were specific to self-improvement, including Man Camp and The Lab. Some were really successful. Some weren't. 

 Each idea provided some insight on what works and what doesn't work; each idea has been a step towards solving a riddle... a riddle that would be wayyyy easier to solve if we had some external force that would force us to have to need each other. 

Like the apocalypse. 

But alas, we have to work with the world we have, not the world we want.

I. The Goal

The ultimate goal is to surround myself with a "gang" other men who have a strong desire to improve themselves in a variety of fun, exciting, and adventurous ways, have a strong sense of duty to provide and protect their families and communities, and also crave the camaraderie and brotherhood of other men who are striving for the same. Every member would bring their own contributions to the group by teaching what they know and learning what they don't. The men would set goals and hold each other accountable for accomplishing those goals. My specific contribution would be teaching a lot of the stuff that I've written about in this blog and others, like sleep and heath, physical fitness and diet, ethics and values, social skills, sex and romantic relationships, and personal growth. Basically, can teach men how to be better at being men. 

The most successful incarnation of this idea is the Man Camp, which this blog (and its grittier, more offensive predecessor), was really good. But it had two fatal flaws. First, it was mostly online. Second, it was designed to solve a specific problem (fixing "Nice Guys"), not to develop a particular type of man to be a better version of themselves. I'll elaborate on this point more, later.

It's worth noting, for readers who are unfamiliar with my ideas, that the idea of a men's only group is intentional and based on the science of gender in general and evolutionary psychology and biology in particular. The exact explanation of the rationale goes beyond the scope of this post, but if you really want to understand why we exclude women, you can read this post:

The Science and Logic Behind Our Philosophy: A Discussion on Feminism, Masculinity, and the Patriarchy

My hypothetical Gang of Men is still solving a problem, but it's a far more generalized problem than the Nice Guy issue.

II. The Problem We're Solving

Simply put, our modern society makes men soft, and modern society keeps us isolated. This isn't some conspiratorial plot hatched by evil masterminds in an underground lair; it's merely the natural cause and effect of progress and technology. We know this because we've seen this story before. Many, many times before.

Human history is cyclical. If we want to predict the future, all we have to do is look at the past. And any objective study of the past strongly suggests we're currently just creeping past the apex in our current cycle. It looks something like this:

Every society in recorded history prior to the modern day, and those before recorded history, have followed the same rise -> peak -> collapse pattern. EVERY one. And every one of those societies believed they would be the exception to that rule. They believed they would be too good to fail. And they were wrong. 

The cycle works like this: 

1. Motivated, hard-working people bust their asses to improve their society, usually through development and technological innovation. Early in our history, this involved inventions like the harnessing of fire, the smelting of bronze, and the wheel. In more modern times, this has included cell phones, traction control, and Door Dash. 

2. As the standard of living increases and life gets easier, more and more humans get lazy. And complacent. As the struggle to survive wanes, we start occupying our time with other pursuits and forget all the skills that we needed to survive before our society reached its apex. In other words, we get soft. We also start engaging in behaviors that sabotage our society by destroying the social fabric that holds the society together. Specifically, we see a precipitous decline in moral values, political corruption, automation of basic tasks, economic instability caused by greed, and a loss of a sense of identity. We tend to start believing in ideologies that divide us in ways that assure we start viewing our fellow community members as enemies, which threatens to tear our society apart.

3. An event or a confluence of events create a tipping point where the strained society snaps because the society has lost the ability to work together to overcome adversity. The society endures a rapid decline in the standard of living. This rapid decline occurs because too many people within the society have lost the skills and resiliency needed to survive real hardships. This is typically a time of great pain and suffering, death and destruction. Chaos and war are common. I like to call this process "The Voiding" because it's as if all of our progress is simply voided out. SOME people in the society do just fine; for various reasons they maintained the skills and resiliency needed to survive. These survivors either band together to form functional, successful communities OR become what amounts to despots and warlords. 

4. Over time, those who organized as successful communities overcome the terror of the despots and start building a new society. And the cycle begins anew.

I believe we're currently past the apex, which probably happened around the late 90's up to 9/11. Since that time, our society has been rapidly ripping itself apart. For me, the test to determine where we are in that cycle of human history was COVID. It was a major issue; to date about 7 million people have died from the disease. The economic impact has been calculated to about a 4% decrease in global GDP... which is about as bad as The Great Depression. The key, though, isn't the degree of the pandemic. It's our response to the pandemic. 

If we had a functional society, humanity would have come together to face the problem. That clearly did not happen. In fact, I'd bet a large sum of money that every person who reads this had a spike in their blood pressure as soon as I mentioned COVID because it triggered some emotional response that is caused by the divisions within our society. We're past the tipping point; we're in The Voiding.

The problem is the last few decades have made men weak and isolated, which has destroyed our ability to be resilient in the face of adversity. Take the average American man today and plop him out in the wilderness with nothing. He would be dead within three days, assuming it wasn't too cold or too hot.

I won't go into detail here about all of the qualities of modern American men that make them weak as fuck, because men who get it, get it. Men who don't, get pissy and defensive. I'm not interested in speaking to the "pissy and defensive" men; they're not the men who have that drive to provide, protect, and really put in the hard work to become the best version of themselves. They're not the men I want in my Gang.

Before I get into the specifics, I have to discuss what went wrong with the previous groups I've associated with over the years.

III. The Issues with the Previous Social Groups

Some of these groups were successful, especially for their intended purpose. Others were abysmal failures. But none really accomplished my overall goal of achieving my "Utopia" Gang. Here's a brief assessment of the groups, what went right, and what went wrong.

• The Barefoot Running-Related Groups: These groups were specific to the niche of barefoot running. They were great for learning and teaching about barefoot running, and even running in general. They were kinda good for learning about lifestyle stuff, like minimalist living. Ultimately, though, the limited topical specialization limited their usefulness for personal growth. And, quite honestly, I eventually got tired of the barefoot running fanatics and snake oil salespeople who preyed on the fanatics.
  
• The Hobby Joggas: This was my social running group from Michigan. They were (and still are) awesome, as a training group who pushed each other, as a collection of friends who helped each other run ultramarathons, and as a fun social group to hang out with wen we weren't running. The biggest problem? They were specific to West Michigan. Once I moved, I lost them.
  
• BRUCrew: This was a short-lived in-person and online group set up for functional fitness workouts and for "social challenges." The idea was to help members get fit and do social interactions that scared us, which would help us overcome social anxiety and introversion. It actually worked well (especially the online version), but lost steam as I got distracted with other projects.
  
• Fight Club: This was my mma gym in San Diego where I learned to fight. I was merely a student here, though I did progress into a bit of a leadership role eventually. I loved Fight Club; my coaches and teammates were awesome folks who, for the first time in my life, gave me a feeling like I wasn't an outsider. These were my people. Even though I've been gone for almost five years, I still train under my coaches. The problem with Fight Club is the same problem as The Hobby Joggas... once I moved, I lost them.
  
• Man Camp: Man Camp was the first real "Gang of Men" I intentionally started. Originally, it existed as a Facebook group and a blog. Eventually, I re-wrote the original blog (this blog you're reading right now) to make it a little less offense. Man Camp was based on the idea of fixing guys who fit the mold of Nice Guys, and was intended to fix bad, sexless relationships and teach men about the nature of women. One of my academic backgrounds was the psychology of sex and gender, so this is an area of relative expertise. For the right kinds of men, this group was extremely successful. It had two problems, though - it was online-only and it was pretty limited to fixing sex and relationship issues. Its mission limited its usefulness to help men get better at being men outside of that narrow focus. It did bring together a group of the kind of men I want in my corner. Several of this group's members will likely play a role in any new "Gang of Men' project that I develop.
  
• Cotton Underwear Nougat Troupe: This was another kinda goofy short-lived online project that was supposed to bring men and women together to talk about sex and relationship issues. It ultimately failed because too many of the women who participated were new age hippies who were really life coaching (which is a bullshit industry filled with amoral grifters) and a too many men who were the "Nice Guys" I had tried to fix with Man Camp... but were militantly opposed to changing. The lone bright spot from this group came from having the opportunity for me to convince a... more mature... female friend to take the advice I gave in this tuber-controversial blog post to find a genuinely good man, for whom she eventually married.
  
• El Diablo Combatives: This was my jiu jitsu and mma gym in Colorado. It was an attempt to re-create Fight Club. It ultimately failed because being a gym owner sucked. Aside from being bad at running the gym, I also wasn't willing to lower the standards of the students we would accept to pay the bills. It did, however, result in...
  
• The Lab: The Lab was a bit of a social engineering project that developed because I had some folks at my gym who are really awesome people who shared a lot of my goofy Utopia ideas. We had a Facebook group and a blog, but we also met a few times in-person. The general idea as the creation of a Tribe of like-minded people who would help each other grow and provide support for each other. The idea was best summarized in this blog post here on this blog. Ultimately, I made three mistakes. First, the Lab was part of my gym, which was in the process of failing. Don't build castles in swamps. Second, the project was really ambitious, and none of the key players had the time or resources to get the project off the ground. Making things overly complex is both a blessing and a curse... in this case it was more of the latter. Third, I experiment too much to lead a project that requires a lot of focus. I like continuously tweaking my ideas, which makes it really difficult to build big projects from start to finish. The confluence of those three factors spelled doom for the project, though I still dream of making it happen one of these days.
  

So that's a summary of the social groups I've been a part of over the years. I threw all of these ideas into a giant Vitamix, hit the puree button, and got...

IV. The New Gang 

Earlier, I stated my explicit goal:

The ultimate goal is to surround myself with a "gang" other men who have a strong desire to improve themselves in a variety of fun, exciting, adventurous ways, have a strong sense of duty to provide and protect their families and communities, and also crave the camaraderie and brotherhood of other men who are striving for the same.

Basically, I'm working to create an updated version of "Man Camp" with all the lessons from my other experiences AND with an explicit focus on doing cool shit. Our world isn't especially friendly to masculinity these days, and there's a better than average chance we're going to need masculine men if my predictions about The Voiding are in any way accurate. We have real need for men to have the opportunity to learn how to be better men, and have the opportunity to prove themselves to other men they respect. 

Like I stated in the original quote at the beginning of this post, this process would be A LOT easier if our world were clearly falling apart. If we were cold, starving, and living in constant fear, it would be wayyy easier to organize a gang. But we're not there. Yet. I might be totally wrong about my dire prediction about The Voiding. But I'd rather start building a gang today instead of waiting for the grocery shelves to empty and the lights go out. 

Anyway, for those of you who enjoy reading, this idea isn't mine. It's merely a synthesis of a lot of other ideas. The ideas that form the crux of my proposed Gang of Men come from these folks and their works:

• Jack Donovan ("The Way of Men" and "Becoming a Barbarian"), 
• Jocko Willinck ("Extreme Ownership"), 
• Sebastian Junger ("Tribe"), 
• Mark Manson ("The Subtle Art of Not Giving a F*ck"), 
• Rollo Tomassi ("The Rational Male"), 
• Leil Lowndes )"How to Talk to Anybody")
  
• Tucker Max and Jeffrey Miller ("What Women Want"), 
• Sam Sheridan ("The Fighter's Heart), 
• Dave Grossman ("On Killing" and "On Combat"), and 
• Gavin de Becker ("The Gift of Fear".)  

... among others. There are a lot of people smarter than me who have a lot of phenomenal ideas about the nature of masculinity, how society is vilifying those of us who crave what our grandfathers enjoyed, and long to  get back to our primal roots where men and brotherhood were one in the same.

For the last six months, I've been toiling away behind the scenes, playing with ideas and working out logistics. I've built a complex, intricate plan, then distilled it down to its simplest elements. Build more complexity, then do more distilling. Five or six such cycles later, I finally have a plan for the Gang of Men. 

To really be effective, I needed to add some elements. The most important aspect was defining the exact type of man the group is designed for, which are men who love doing "guy shit", long for brotherhood, have a strong desire to provide and protect for those they love, and have strong ethics. The type of men I'm looking for are the men who look around at other men today and feel a sense of disgust at their weakness. Or, as was the case for myself not too many years ago, you feel that disgust when you look in the mirror.

The group also needed an identity, which included a unique name. The group needed a clear focus. The group also needed a clearly defined set of values and an accompanying ethical code. The group also needed an aspect of gamification and other creative elements to leverage the psychology of motivation and play. There were other elements that had to be added, which I'll detail in future posts.

I also needed to eliminate some elements. Most importantly, I needed to be careful to exclude the kind of men we don't want. As I learned from the Man Camp experiment, not every man wants to improve, not every man wants to make a commitment to a group, and not every man understands the concept of honor. I also needed to eliminate the structural complexity, especially in the beginning. Finally, I needed to eliminate the hyper focus on relationships. While the new Gang of Men will feature a lot of my teaching on improving relationships, understanding women, becoming more attractive, and other such topics, the main focus is helping each other get better at being men.

I'll be sharing the details in future posts in the very near future, but here's a preview for The Valorians.

 

We are The Valorians, a brotherhood of modern men forged in the fires of adversity, bound together by a shared commitment to excellence, and driven by an unrelenting hunger for success. Our mission is simple yet profound: to elevate men to their highest potential, to imbue them with a sense of purpose and direction, and to equip them with the tools and skills necessary to overcome any obstacle and conquer any challenge.

We stand for strength, courage, honor, and mastery, and we believe that these virtues are the keys to unlocking the true potential of every man. We reject the notion that modern men are weak, passive, or unfulfilled, and we refuse to accept mediocrity as the status quo. Instead, we choose to embrace the challenges of life head-on, to push ourselves beyond our limits, and to forge a new path that leads to greatness.

We are the embodiment of the warrior spirit, the guardians of tradition, and the pioneers of a new era of excellence among men. We are The Valorians, and we are dedicated to empowering men to reach new heights of success, fulfillment, and happiness. Join us on this journey, and together we will transform yourself and you into the man you are destined to become.

 

"Valorians" was chosen because valor is the defining characteristic of the men of this new Gang. "Valor" means displaying courage in the face of danger. This is a literal virtue this new Gang will work to instill, but it's also something we will instill in a more figurative sense. Embarking on a journey of self-improvement AND doing so in the presence of other men is scary shit and requires valor. Ergo the name. 

Anyway, I'll be sharing more in the near future. If the idea resonates with you, stay tuned.

 

~Jason

 

***

Bullying: Why We Do It and How To Really Fix the Problem

Bullying has always been a topic that interests me. As a kid, I spent a few years being a bully, then a few more years being bullied. As a high school teacher, I witnessed countless incidents of bullying. As a person with a psychology background and a deep fascination of human behavior, I've always been curious about the exact motivations behind the behaviors.

Aside from my own personal interest, bullying exacts a huge social cost in human life. Approximately every 30 minutes, another person commits suicide due to being bullied. That alone should motivate us to take this problem seriously. Hopefully this post will serve as a spark to ignite a wider debate on bullying and maybe, just maybe, lead us to a future where so many people aren't dying.

A few months ago, I asked my Facebook friends why they thought bullies, well, bully. Their responses were about what I expected, and mostly attributed bully to either negative personality characteristics, insecurities and/or an inferiority complex, fear, hatred, unhappiness, mental disorders, emotional immaturity, or they're just perpetuating a bullying cycle (they were bullied, thus they become bullies.)

While I don't discount any of these explanations, none of them really seem to adequately explain the actual bully dynamics. That shouldn't come as a surprise, because science doesn't really understand bullying behavior. Or at least the published research seems to be missing the actual underlying causes of bullying. All of these explanations are based on logical or emotional inferences, not actual empirical data. When we DO look at the empirical data, we realize we, as a society, have no clue about bullying. 

Evidence: This study that shows anti-bullying programs actually INCREASE bullying. The authors hypothesize these programs don't stop bullying; they teach bullies to get better at not getting caught. It's the equivalent of showing bank robbers the blueprints for the bank's security systems. 

For some of you who may be familiar with anti-bullying programs, you're probably thinking "But wait! I know of programs that work! My school (or my kid's school or whatever) implemented it and it really works!"

Maybe, but odds are good it's a lot like Finland's "successful" program. This program effectively teaches bystanders to overcome the bystander effect and intervene on behalf of the victim. That's actually really effective... at eliminating bully behavior in school-related situations and pushing it to other off-site situations.

It's sort of like how we treat the homeless in California. They're a nuisance, so municipalities enact programs to force them to move to a neighboring municipality, then those municipalities do the same. It does nothing to solve the problem, it just pushes it around. But it makes people feel good that they "fixed" homelessness because they no longer see them begging on the street corner. Likewise, schools can feel good because they "solved" the bullying program by pushing the problem elsewhere.

I call bullshit. If I'm going to address a problem, I want to actually FIX it. If I'm in a sinking boat, I don't want to devise a better method of shoveling water out of the boat. I want to find the damn holes and plug them. That's the goal with bullying.

My Hypothesis

Currently, there are a slew of evolutionary psychologists that believe bullying behavior occurs as a function of... big surprise, evolution. They contend bullying behavior is really a social domination issue. In our evolutionary past, bullies would get more resources like food and shelter. Those who were the best at bullying would have access to the greatest quantity of resources, thus most likely to survive long enough to pass their genes to the next generation. As a result, bullying behavior is "hard-wired" into our genes. In the modern world where we really don't have to fight over resources, kids who grow up in a chaotic home environment may not learn the social skills to inhibit this "natural" tendency, so they engage in bullying behavior. 

That's problematic on several levels. Bullying occurs regardless of the stability of the home environment and is better predicted by the perceived safety of the environment. For example, bullying behaviors are positively correlated with violence. The more dangerous the environment, the more bullying we see. Interestingly, that only pertains to males (that's a big hint.) Furthermore, males tend to bully other males they don't know very well but also aren’t complete strangers (another hint.)

What about female bullying? This offers a tantalizing clue, too. Females engage in far different bullying behaviors than men. Men are direct. They physically and verbally bully each other face-to-face. Women? Not so much. They engage in relational bullying, or, as we like to say, they're catty bitches. They corrupt the relationships of their victims by spreading rumors, leaking secrets, back-stabbing, and using "excluding" behaviors. More significantly, bullying behavior increases as a function of social standing. The popular girls are most likely to bully. Weirdly (to me anyway), this fundamental difference in bullying methodology between the genders is often written off as a minor detail when it should be considered a major hint regarding the real cause of bullying.

So what is the real cause of bullying?

Gender roles and sexual selection. 

Ever watch later elementary and middle school-aged children flirt with each other? It's rough. They have the basics down, but the behaviors are WAYYYY over-exaggerated. They just haven't fine-tuned the skill set, and they'll slowly improve throughout high school and into college, with some never really improving on their early fumbling attempts. This flirting behavior serves a useful evolutionary purpose; it's the mechanism we use to attract and secure a mate and eventually pass our genes on to the next generation. All of us come from a long line of countless ancestors who successfully flirted… at least once. 

Bullying plays by that same rule. Bullying in children is rough around the edges. It never really stops over the course of our lifetime (yes, there are retirement community bullies.) And, like flirting, bullying serves an evolutionary purpose. Bullying differs in that males and females engage in bullying for very different reasons. 

Intermission: If you haven't read it, take a look at my Gender Role Protection Theory and the accompanying "why homophobia exists" post. They'll be referenced in the "male bullying" discussion. Also take a look at the Women, Explained article. It'll help explain female bullying.

Why Men Bully

When men bully, they're testing each other to test their ability to "protect the perimeter." In evolutionary terms, men, due to our larger physical size and greater upper body strength, are tasked with protecting the tribe. Part of that task relies on interdependent cooperation. Guys need to know the other guys protecting the perimeter with them are capable of protecting their back, both literally and figuratively. This is why men bully men they don't know well. This is also why standing up to male bullies is the only effective way to stop bullying. This is also why "telling the teacher" or "bystander intervention" just causes the bully to modify their bullying behaviors. This is also why men bully effeminate males (gay males, transgender folks, etc.) so often (read the homophobia post if you skipped it.) 

As I mentioned, if the victim fights back, even unsuccessfully, the bullying immediately stops. If they do not fight back, the bullying continues until they do. Sadly, our society has fallen into a trap of being rather militant on teaching boys NOT to fight back. That results in continual bullying until the victim simply snaps (hello, school shooters!) 

We can solve that problem by simply teaching boys to stand up to bullies. 

That’s it. That’s all we have to do. 

Before we move to women, there's one other interesting angle to this. I've had a hard time finding primary sources (unfortunately I was a history major in addition to psych), but there have been some cultures in human history that had a special rule of sorts for biological/genetic men that did not want to "protect the perimeter." They basically got a free pass to opt out of this male fitness testing. Instead of protecting the perimeter, they would do other tasks within the tribe/community. In other words, they weren't bullied because there was no reason to bully them. I have no idea how we could implement this in our modern American society, but it would be a great solution to those men that do not want to conform to the masculine gender role. In essence, if we can find that solution, we end homophobia.

Why Women Bully

This is a much more difficult problem to solve. Women essentially bully to maintain their status as the highest-valued females. Their motive is simple - the highest value females get access to the highest value males. Female bullying disqualifies other potential rival females for access to males. They begin these behaviors before they actually hit puberty for the same reason they start rudimentary flirting behaviors before puberty... complex social skills are hard to learn. 

These behaviors are fairly predictable, and include several behaviors that many feminists somehow manage to blame on men (or the "Patriarchy.) A few examples include:

• Slut-shaming
• Fat-shaming
• Style-shaming ("You're wearing THAT dress?")
• Public humiliation
• Excluding women from social circles or not inviting women to events
• Back-handed compliments
• The aforementioned leaking of secrets and spreading rumors

Honestly, I have no idea how to fix this problem because, at the most basic level, female bullying is one of the engines of evolution. It assures the best genes from the human gene pool are matched up, thus assuring our survival as a species. Short-circuiting that mechanism would doom us genetically. If we were Hell-bent on making it happen, we'd basically have to resort to radical social engineering where women would be forced to reproduce with completely random men. I have a hard time believing anyone (me included) would support that idea. 

A victim of female bullying could feasibly take the male approach and stand up to the bullies, but they'd probably have to resort to a scary level of violence to make the bullying stop. Unlike male bullying, female bullying isn't a test. It's the real deal. The females doing the bullying have no incentive to back down until the victim is effectively disqualified from attaining the high value males. To make it worse, female bullying occurs in packs against individuals, so the lone victim would essentially have to kick the asses of an entire group.

There may be some value in education, though. If a female victim of bullying understands exactly why she is being bullied, maybe she wouldn't take it as personally. That subtle shift in understanding might make the difference between her contemplating suicide and having the strength to persevere. Even if it saved a single life, it would be worthwhile.

 

Tribes deserve special attention here, though. In a tribal social organizational model, bullying between females can be greatly reduced or even eliminated if the higher ranking females in the Tribe militantly police bullying behaviors among the lower ranking females. A small coalition of the most powerful, influential females can effectively set the tone for the rest of the females in the Tribe, and focus that "catty bitchedness" to females outside the tribe.

Conclusion

Bullying is a serious behavior that harms countless people. Hell, it KILLS a lot of people. As a society, our previous and current attempts to curtail the behaviors have been fruitless. The best we can do now is suppress bullying in a specific environment. To me, that's completely unacceptable because bullying is still occurring. Is my hypothesis correct? Maybe. Maybe not. But what the Hell do we have to lose?

This post is kind of important. Even if you disagree, we need to start thinking outside the box on this issue. Please share this post far and wide. If you're a parent, grandparent, aunt, or uncle, this issue probably affects the kids you love. If you're a teacher or any other professional that works with children, this issue affects the children you care for so dearly. Hopefully it'll start a new, better dialogue. Post it on Facebook, Twitter, and even Google+. Email it to your coworkers and family members, or print it out and post it in the break room or on the fridge at home. If we spread the word, together we might be able to save some lives.

Why Do We Really Silence Women? A Discussion on the True Nature of Gender

I spend a lot of time writing about the effects of gender on our personal lives and on our relationships. I also spend a lot of time writing about tribalism through a lens of evolutionary psychology, and how this affects our modern beliefs and behaviors. Lately, thanks to some great conversations with my friend Kimberly, I've started to consider the intersection of these two realms - namely what effects gender has within tribes, especially in the realm of leadership. 

I'm still working on the nuances of the ideas and will write a full post on my hypothesis soon. In the interim, I'm going to address on very specific aspect of gender and leadership - the issue of women being silenced. 

Before you continue reading this post, read the article below. I'll be referencing it throughout the rest of the post.

When Women Don't Speak

In this article, the author discusses the persistent problem of women, in mixed groups of men and women, largely being ignored. The exact problem is summed up by this quote from political science professor Chris Karpowicz: 

“Women are systematically seen as less authoritative,” says Preece. “And their influence is systematically lower. And they’re speaking less. And when they’re speaking up, they’re not being listened to as much, and they are being interrupted more.”

Basically, in a group setting where decisions are being made, female participants do not share the same elevated platform as male participants. This observation is not surprising and entirely valid; we have a ton of data in the published literature that confirms this. My own observations across all kinds of circumstances also confirms this. 

The standard narrative permeating the social sciences has a fairly uniform explanation for this phenomenon, which was summed up nicely by political science professor Jessica Preece:

"Rather than outright misogyny, she says it’s usually cultural norms and gendered messages that subtly - and profoundly - shape the rules of engagement. Individuals who suppress female speech may do so unwittingly. “They may love women,” says Preece. “They may even be a woman!” But as a society we have been “slowly socialized over years to discount” female expertise and perspectives."

The professor continues with this explanation when she describes BYU's accounting program and the experiences of women placed in cohort groups:

“Women are systematically seen as less authoritative,” says Preece. “And their influence is systematically lower. And they’re speaking less. And when they’re speaking up, they’re not being listened to as much, and they are being interrupted more.”

When you unpack the nuances of this narrative, it's essentially based on the belief that men are perceived as inherently superior to women, and this is supported by the observation of group dynamics. Men dominate the discussions and decision-making process. 

The article goes on to discuss some experiments involving groups of five who were given a task of distributing money. When the group's decision is determined by majority rule, they found the total talking time and, ultimately, the decisions the groups reached, were dominated by males. Further, the vast majority of the interruptions made by males when women were speaking was negative. After the discussions, the participants rated who was the most influential group member, and it almost always fell to those who talked the most... which were always males. 

Their solution was to change the decision-making protocol from majority rule to unanimous. In that scenario, female influence (and talking time) increased substantially. 

The authors then go on to hypothesize about the problems with the current solutions to this problem.

"From pundits in politics, the business world, and the media, “the solution so often has been, ‘You’ve got to fix the women,’ or, ‘Well, women have just got to lean in,’” says Stoddard. But the experiences women have when they lean in can be very different than a man’s in the same position.

“Advice that works for men doesn’t always work for women, because people react differently,” adds Preece—and this is well supported in the literature. Behavior that seems strong and decisive when it comes from a man, she says, may be interpreted as abrasive and aggressive from a woman. There’s even a term coined for it—the double bind.

“The double bind is huge,” says Stoddard: exhibit traditional female characteristics, she says—warmth, caring, responsiveness to all ideas and assignments—and “you’re going to experience others seeing you as less competent.” But take on male characteristics—leading, disagreeing freely, being assertive, speaking out—and likability suffers. “The competency-likability tradeoff is a constant balancing act for women.”

They accurately point out that the problem isn't the women. But they make a fundamental error in assuming the problem is the environment. This conclusion makes complete sense if you frame gender as a social construct that was designed by men to oppress women (the "patriarchy" narrative), which has been a basic assumption of gender research dating back to the 1960's. If you've read ANY of my other writings on the topic, you'll know I bitterly disagree with this narrative. 

It's flat-out wrong. The authors are correct in that women are not to blame for this "not being heard" problem. However, they're wrong about the environment being the problem. It's understandable; given their incorrect assumptions about the social nature of gender, the environment is the only possible problem. It never occurs to the authors that their basic assumptions about the very nature of gender may be wrong, despite the fact that their narrative hasn't "fixed" this problem despite decades of effort. 

"Karpowitz, Preece, and Stoddard watched all of this unfold anew in the accounting-program study, where the women who were in the minority were routinely seen—by themselves and others—as the least competent, least influential members of their groups. And this is among 20-somethings raised in the era of #LeanIn and #MeToo—arguably a time in which women have been encouraged to be more ambitious and speak out."

Not only have these 20-somethings grown up in a pro-woman culture where gender equality is THE dominant narrative spread anywhere and everywhere, but their parents and even their grandparents have been exposed to the exact same message. Since the 60's, our society has been aggressively pushing this pro-woman narrative. Even in the most educated, liberal of circles where all participants have internalized the belief that men and women are truly equal in every way (sometimes to the point of absurdity), we still see this effect of women being silenced. 

After six decades of trying to fix a problem and having zero success, it's prudent to consider the possibility that we're somehow doing something wrong. I'm suggesting we (really, them) don't understand the actual nature of the problem. And that misunderstanding stems from the fundamental assumptions researchers make about gender. 

What if it's NOT a social construct? What if masculinity and femininity weren't fabricated by men to oppress women? What if we've been trying to solve a problem that isn't actually a problem at all? And perhaps worst of all, what if we've been hurting the very people we've been trying to help while solving this problem that doesn't really exist?

Enter My Hypothesis

I love science because it seeks "the truth", but openly acknowledges the pursuit of "the truth" is a true asymptote. Over time, we get progressively closer to "the truth", but we'll never fully arrive. That means good scientists aren't motivated by discovering that all-encompassing "truth", because they know they never will. Instead, good scientists HAVE to be intrinsically motivated by the process of trying to discover "the truth." So we use empiricism and the scientific method to slowly and systematically disprove various hypotheses. Rule out possibilities. Inch closer to that ever-elusive "truth." Good science forces us to see the world as it is, not the world we WANT to see. When applied correctly to this problem of women not being heard, good science reveals WHY we can't seem to fix this problem. 

The fundamental error the author and the researchers cited in this article make is the same error that's dominated gender research for decades - the assumption that gender is a social construct that was created for the nefarious goal of female oppression. Thanks to ideologies like modern feminism, this same error has been spread to popular culture and has given rise to the modern social justice movement (among others.) In short, this world view assumes something like this does or has actually occurred:

But what if gender isn't a social construct? What if gender is biologically-determined? What if it's innate? What if gender is more like sexual orientation and it's not a choice so much as a fundamental part of who you are? This is the foundation of most of the gender topics I write about, and is explained in greater detail in this post. Give it a read if you're unfamiliar with my arguments.

Back to this scenario. I would argue the group dynamics the researchers observe occurs as a function of our innate behaviors that have developed throughout the millennia, therefore serve an evolutionary purpose. Furthermore, if we embrace THIS narrative, we can easily develop a solution that fixes the "problem."

So What's the Solution?

After twenty years of working as a high school social studies teacher, I've observed countless groups of students. These groups sometimes consist of all males or all females, but mostly contain a mix. I may occasionally create groups just to test my hypotheses. But don't tell my students that. 

Anyway, I've come to realize group environments are not inherently collaborative in nature. They're competitive. Without excessive intervention, all groups always follow the same pattern all the time: Different people will have different ideas, which they share. The person who sells their idea the most effectively by gaining group consensus ultimately "wins", and the group comes up with a solution. 

When it comes to gender roles, masculinity is inherently competitive and hierarchical. In any given situation, the most competent male, as determined by the rest of the group, is deemed the "leader." This position isn't bestowed; this position is earned. In a group setting, the most competent person is assumed to be the leader, and their ideas are the ideas that the group supports. They reach that conclusion based on that masculine person's ability to sell the idea over the other ideas other individuals in the group try to sell. 

Quick sidebar - I'm using the term "masculinity" instead of "male" because it's entirely possible for a woman to exhibit the masculine traits needed to be deemed the most competent person in the group. In these group settings, the bias isn't against women; the bias is against femininity. Subtle but VERY important point.

So within groups, masculine people make the decisions. So where does feminine people fit into this? Are they truly voiceless?

Of course not. 

To understand the role femininity plays, let's go back in time. Imagine we're part of a tribe of hunter-gatherers roaming the plains of pre-colonial America 400 years ago. The tribe has to make an important decision about moving to follow a herd of animals or staying in one place and planting crops. The very survival of the tribe could be at stake. How would the tribe make this critically-important decision?

Ultimately, the decision is likely going to be made by a single person who is willing to assume the responsibility of the lives of the people they care about deeply. If this person makes the right choice, they survive. Wrong choice? People die. So this person is likely going to gather as much information as they can, including information from the tribe itself. Different people in the tribe are going to have different perspectives that will consider different variables. Some people will consider the food variable. Some people will consider other, potentially hostile tribes. Some people will consider access to water. Some people will consider access to fire wood. And shelter. And weather. And a myriad of other practical survival considerations. These people would likely have a more masculine outlook on the situation; they're going to consider how the tribe will get provisions for survival and how the tribe will protect itself from outside threats. 

Some people will also consider how each option would affect the people of the tribe. Will it affect relationships? How will it affect the children of the tribe? How will it affect relationships with the tribes they trade with? How will it affect their ability to recruit new tribe members? These relationship-related variables are more likely to have a more feminine outlook on the situation; they're going to consider how the tribe itself functions as a collection of different individuals. 

The leader of the tribe, the person who has accepted the responsibility for the tribe's very survival, absolutely needs both of these perspectives to make the right decision. Without the masculine perspective, the tribe might starve or be overrun by a more powerful neighboring tribe. Without the feminine perspective, the tribe may rot from within due to interpersonal conflict or be isolated from the outside world and die because the tribe failed to progress as much as competing tribes.

In summary, both the masculine and feminine perspectives very different, but both are absolutely necessary for survival. A good leader recognizes this and values each for what they are: complimentary, necessary perspectives.

When we look at the mechanics of how great leaders make decisions, we see a familiar pattern. They present the problem to a collection of advisors, the advisors mull possible solutions, the advisors report back to the leader, and the leader makes an informed decision. In some way, shape, or form, this is how organizational decisions are made. 

The advisors who will present ideas to the leader are essentially "selling" their ideas. This actual process, as such, is competitive in nature. The best ideas presented by the most persuasive advisors win. This is why these advisors tend to be masculine (again, not necessarily men.) Assertiveness, confidence, and logic are what will make their ideas winning ideas. That's the realm of masculinity, not femininity. 

So where does femininity come into play? 

Throughout this entire process of developing possible solutions, the leader and all the leader's advisors will consult with feminine individuals (who are usually women, but not always women), usually informally. They have conversations. They present the ideas, the feminine individuals consider how those ideas would affect the relationships within and between tribes, then share their thoughts. As I mentioned earlier, this input is absolutely critical to the tribe's survival. 

So why can't femininity be the decision-making gender? 

This is the million-dollar question. In the "gender is a social construct" narrative, femininity is capable of running the show but isn't given the opportunity because of oppression. This narrative probably developed, in part, because women were envious of men in power. Power itself is great, but it also comes with all kinds of nice perks. The person calling the shots makes the most money, attracts the hottest mates, gets the best access to the best food, clothes, private jets... whatever. Who wouldn't want that?!?

The problem with this is two-fold. First, this ignores the fact that the person at the top likely got there because they earned it by beating out all the other inferior people in the tribe. As a masculine male, I can confirm that clawing your way to the top of anything and remaining there is really fucking hard work. Because there's always people fighting for your position. You have constant pressure to be the best as long as you desire the power of being at the top.

Second, being at the top requires one to take on a shit-ton of responsibility for the welfare of the rest of the tribe. Normally this isn't a huge deal... until you have to make a decision that pits the welfare of the group against the welfare of one or a small number of your tribe members you're leading. 

Going back to the hypothetical tribe scenario - let's say the clear best solution is to follow the herd of animals. Maybe the land our tribe is currently occupying is ill-suited for agriculture and staying in one place will make the tribe targets of neighboring, aggressive tribes. Staying in one place exposes the tribe to likely starvation AND war, both of which could doom the entire tribe.

But let's say moving to follow the animal herd means two sick children in the tribe will likely die. Do you choose to endanger the whole tribe, including the two sick children, or do you save the tribe but endanger just those two children? Practically, it's an easy decision. Emotionally, though, that simple decision means your choice will likely kill two children in your tribe. 

That kind of decision requires the ability to dissociate from the emotion of those close relationships of the tribe in order to save the tribe, which is something feminine individuals simply cannot do. Nor SHOULD they do. Nor should we ASK them to do. 

So back to our BYU accounting groups from the posted article. Whenever we convene a group of students, whether it be in my high school psychology class or a group of BYU accounting students, and ask them to do a task, we're inserting them into what amounts to that final stage in my tribe example where a leader is determined and the other group members "sell" their ideas to the leader. This is a competitive environment. As such, masculinity takes center stage and femininity is marginalized. 

We CAN alter that dynamic, as the researchers did in the study described in the article, by requiring unanimous decisions, but this is a decidedly artificial solution to the problem. Forcing the feminine members of the group to participate in the competitive practice of sharing ideas does allow them to speak more, but their ideas are still left behind because they're not being sold with masculine gusto. So it makes us feel good that the feminine people are literally talking more, but the end result is the same - the ideas the feminine members have are largely ignored.

The worst part of this scenario is that the process of forcing the feminine members to compete with the masculine members, we may be robbing them of their opportunity to actually influence the decision-making process, which ultimately hurts the group because decisions lose that feminine perspective.

So what IS the solution?

Based off my hypothesis of how this shit works, the solution needs to be two-fold. First, the leader of the group absolutely has to recognize that any decision pertaining to the group/ organization/ tribe NEEDS both a masculine and feminine perspective. While I think this kind of leadership is rare today, it's not extinct. Truly good leaders intuitively realize decision-making requires both masculine and feminine input and guidance and will seek out both perspectives. But a lot of 'leaders' fail to recognize this, which results in a lot of bad decisions. 

Second, an environment has to be created where the feminine perspective can be shared in a noncompetitive environment. This means we can't just throw people together in a group and ask them to make decisions. That is ALWAYS going to result in masculine voices dominating at the expense of feminine voices, even if we radically alter the "rules" of how the group operates (by measures such as requiring unanimous votes for decisions.) No matter how much we tweak the dials and knobs of group dynamics, this is always going to be a problem. 

So, our solution to this problem is to choose better leaders who understand the value of both the masculine and feminine perspective, AND create a decision-making process that allows the feminine voice to be heard. The first is straight-forward. The second is a little tricky because it requires work outside a group setting where that competitiveness isn't stoked. 

Personally, I've found the easiest way to do this is to simply split groups up and let individuals have one-on-one conversations with each other. in these scenarios, the masculine members tend to share their ideas with the feminine members, and the feminine members share all the relational variables that would influence the masculine member's ideas. In this way, all the ideas that will eventually be proposed in the group setting are filtered through a feminine lens. This dramatically improves the quality of the ideas that are eventually proposed in the group setting. 

Interestingly, the BYU researchers acknowledge this:

"For starters, women are “likely to identify different things as problems in the first place,” says Preece. In politics women often think differently about issues than men do; the literature even shows they can have a cooperative, democratizing impact on deciding bodies. “Women are more likely to think about, What are the needs of families and children and how do we care for those who have the least in our society?” says Karpowitz. “Many men focus on different priorities, such as how to balance the budget or change the tax structure.”

The problem is they fail to understand the underlying dynamics of gender, which leads to misidentify the problem, which leads them to propose solutions that have failed, continue to fail, and will continue to fail into the future. The folks who buy into this narrative, in the process of trying to solve the wrong problem, are making the very problem they're desperate to solve much, much worse.

Like any good scientist, I openly acknowledge I might be totally wrong about all this stuff. But based off my own experimentation and observation, I'm likely a lot less wrong than the BYU researchers. If we can momentarily suppress our emotional reaction to the suggestion that gender roles are complimentary in nature and not oppressive, and that gender roles are innate and not imposed by a nefarious "patriarchy", we can begin to understand the real dynamics at play. That clarity allows us to develop actual solutions to the actual problems. 

For the folks who read through this entire post, give these ideas some thought. After you've pondered them for a bit, share your thoughts with me. 

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Reframing Gender: Masculinity and Femininity as a Personality Construct and the Gender Cup Model

In the In the years since I began writing and gender, sex, and relationships, my hypothesis on the true nature of gender has evolved. Originally, I explained "gender" as a spectrum with masculinity at one end and femininity at the other. Any given person, regardless of their biological (do they have a penis and testes, a vagina and ovaries, or any of the variations and combinations that can occur) or genetic sex (XX, XY, or any other variation that can occur), fell somewhere on the spectrum. It looks something like this:

I had liked this idea because it allowed for the wide variety of gender expression we see occurring throughout our populations. The problem, though, is the construct didn't allow for the combinations of masculinity and femininity we see. 

For example, it would be entirely possible for a biological and genetic male to exhibit very strong masculine traits, yet also exhibit very strong feminine traits situationally. Based off my hypothesis I explained in this post on my other man camp blog, this kind of man would commonly be called a "gentleman" and would be considered exceptionally high value to potential mates. In the realm of gender research, this man who displays both masculine and feminine traits would be considered "androgynous."

This man, however, can't really be described with the "spectrum" model above. If he's placed somewhere in the middle, we couldn't discern him from an "undifferentiated" person who exhibits few masculine OR feminine traits, which according to the hypothesis, would be low value to potential mates.

So I needed a new representation of my model, and this new model had to account for a few... issues. Including:

• The model has to represent combinations of masculinity and femininity as discrete constructs. This would alleviate the problem of the spectrum graphic representation above. 
• The model has to represent gender expression independent of biological and genetic sex. A major problem with the concept of "gender" is it's often conflated with sex. Part of this is simply an issue with the colloquial use of the the terms. In popular culture, we use sex and gender interchangeably. Our new model has to account for the fact that sex and gender, while often occurring together in most of the population, is not a perfect correlation. Most genetic and biological males are mostly masculine, but there are obvious exceptions.
• The model has to account for variability within the same individual over time and between different circumstances. A biological and genetic male may be masculine as fuck in one scenario (like confronting an aggressive homeless person), but may display strong feminine characteristics at other times (like when caring for a sick child.) 

Taking these into consideration, I developed a better model. Note this isn't actually MY original idea; the inclusion of masculine and feminine gender traits have been studied by personality psychologists for over a hundred years. My model is unique in that it's tailored to be used as a foundation for the rest of the ideas and concepts that make up the "man camp" world view.

Gender as a Personality Construct

My new model is quite simple. We have the two gender constructs: Masculinity and Femininity. Our personalities are made up of these two traits; all of us will possess SOME masculine and SOME feminine traits. The degree to which each of us possess masculine and feminine traits can be measured with a test such as this one designed off the work of Sandra Bem, or if you really want to dig into the nuances of your gender expression, take this test. Either one will give you a ballpark representation of the combination of masculine and feminine traits you possess. 

Your particular measure of masculinity and femininity will be represented with two cups:

As the measure of masculinity and femininity increases, the cups get progressively more full. Each of us will have a particular level in each cup that represents our distribution of masculine and feminine traits. 

One of the cups will be more dominant and more outwardly obvious more often. This is our primary gender. The other one will be our secondary gender. A strongly masculine man will behave in a masculine way most of the time, but may exhibit feminine characteristics in specific situations. Masculinity would be his primary gender; femininity would be his secondary gender. 

Likewise, a strongly feminine woman will behave in a feminine way most of the time, but may exhibit masculine characteristics in specific situations. Femininity would be her primary gender; masculinity would be her secondary gender. Here are my cups:

As you can see, I skew HEAVILY towards the masculine. Interestingly, back in my "Nice Guy" days, I would have scored FAR higher on the femininity cup and FAR lower on the masculinity cup. Not because I was a fundamentally different person, but rather because I thought that "Nice Guy" persona would get me what I desperately wanted - female attention. The cups above represent my authentic self. I'm pretty good at the feminine traits represented in the cups above because they're fundamentally part of who I am. But the feminine traits that I "faked" as part of my "Nice Guy" persona? Not so much. 

Anyway...

I'd expect the majority of the population to follow this particular pattern. HOWEVER, it's entirely possible for other combinations to exist. A biological and genetic male could express feminine characteristics as his primary gender. And vice versa. Or a genetic or biological male or female could have equal parts masculinity and femininity. AND those characteristics could be balanced in such a way that they're equally dominant (both "primary".) And so on.

The way to think of "gender", therefore, is that it exists independently of biological sex, genetic sex, sexual orientation, or any other such construct. 

Make sense?

The model itself isn't new or revolutionary; it merely gives us a useful framework to talk about the role of gender on how we perceive ourselves and the world around us, and helps explain, predict, and alter how we relate to other people. Especially in relationships. 

How We Can Use This Model

I make a lot of observations, give a lot of explanations, and make a lot of predictions across this blog and my other sex and relationship blogs. Pretty much all of these observations, explanations, and predictions can be explained using the Two Cup Gender Model. Here's a sampling:

• Gender expression is biological in nature and difficult to change without profound consequences. The idea that gender is hard-wired is one of the enduring, fundamental aspects of my hypothesis, which I detail in this post. However our cups are filled is largely innate and difficult to change. We can ACT in a way that violates our biological imperative, but that violation will come with significant struggles. It's essentially the same as if a gay man tries to be "straight." Possible, but extremely distressing personally. This deviates from the popular notion that gender is a social construct, which has virtually no scientific support. 
• All of us have an authentic "default" ideal combination of masculine and feminine traits. This is tied to the previous point. Each of us has a default combination of masculinity and femininity that feels authentic. When we're acting in that way, we're most likely to reach our full potential. 
• Masculinity and femininity are complimentary in nature. Great things happen when masculine and feminine people work together towards a common goal. Masculinity or femininity alone are both woefully inadequate at accomplishing greatness. Masculinity and femininity also falls flat if the constructs are competitive in nature. 
• Masculinity and femininity can both create and ease tension, which creates the foundation of the push/pull dynamic of flirting and seduction. When masculinity and femininity interact, there's an inherent tension based off the stark contrast between the two. This contrast is the fuel that supplies the fire of passion. This applies to relationships or, really, any situation. Bringing masculine and feminine individuals together makes life more interesting. 
• Relationship health increases as a function of the the disparity between masculinity and femininity in each partner. As I mention in the last point, the tension between masculinity and femininity fuels passion. The greater the discrepancy between the two, the more passion can build. The more passion builds, the more subjective enjoyment we get from relationships, the longer and more satisfying we'd expect the relationships to be.
• Most men are aroused by strongly feminine women; most women are aroused by strong masculine men. This is in no way a given, but generally speaking, this holds true. This is the reason a great deal of the man camp teachings involve learning to get better at being a man.
• Relationships are most successful when both partners score high on both masculine and feminine traits. The more of each trait a single individual possesses, the more capable they are at navigating life, empathizing with others (including their partner), and more dynamic and interesting their personalities become. A masculine male with strong feminine capabilities paired with a feminine female with strong masculine capabilities will create the best, most successful relationships. Basically, two androgynous partners are the pinnacle of relationship potential. 
• Relationships are least successful when both partners score low on both masculine and feminine traits. Basically the opposite of the last one. Two undifferentiated partners are going to have the least-successful relationships.
• Children thrive when they're exposed to both masculine and feminine influences. Role models are important for children. Having a strong masculine and a strong feminine role model will expose them to the full range of gender expression, which will help them learn the nuances of both. It's important to note the biological or genetic sex of the parents don't seem to matter. A gay couple with one masculine and one feminine partner has the same basic outcomes as a straight couple with the same gender expression variability. 
• The most successful tribes have roughly equal numbers of masculine and feminine members. If you follow this blog, you know tribalism is a major focus of my hypothesis. Generally, the more diverse the tribe, the more successful it will be... mostly because diversity gives the tribe a wider range of capabilities to solve interesting problems that arise within and outside the tribe. Gender is a MAJOR part of this. A tribe of mostly masculine members or mostly feminine members is not going to be nearly as successful as a tribe with equal numbers of each. 

These are just a few of the practical applications of the Gender Cup Model. Moving forward, this'll likely be the model I use for future posts. 

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