Men and Marriage [Hardcover]

George Gilder (Author)

Book Description

Release date: August 31, 1986

"Timely when originally published, Men and Marriage is essential now given the the warlike climate of male-female relationships, unfortunately fostered by radical feminism." Rush Limbaugh Men and Marriage is a critical commentary that asks the burning question, How can society survive the pervasive disintegration of the family? A profound crisis faces modern social order as traditional family relationships become almost unrecognizable. George Gilder's Men and Marriage is a revised and expanded edition of his 1973 landmark work, Sexual Suicide . He examines the deterioration of the family, the well-defined sex roles it offered, and how this change has shifted the focus of our society. Poverty, for instance, stems from the destruction of the family when unmarried parents are abandoned by their lovers or older women are divorced because society approves of their husbands' younger girlfriends. Gilder claims that men will only fulfill their paternal obligations when women lead them to do so, and that this civilizing influence, balanced with proper economic support, is the most important part of maintaining a productive, healthy, loving society. He offers a concrete plan for rebuilding the family in America. His solutions challenge readers to return to these roles and reestablish the family values that were once so crucial in staving off the ills that plague our country. Gilder insists that it is time to reexamine what "liberation" has wrought and at what cost. Only a return to traditional family values, he contends, can stem the tide of disaster. George Gilder is the author of Wealth and Poverty , the best-selling critique of Reaganomics, The Spirit of Enterprise , Visible Man , Naked Nomads , and The Party That Lost Its Head . He was a speechwriter for Ronald Reagan and now writes regularly for The Wall Street Journal and National Review about material advances and their effect on society. His most recent books include two other well-known social commentaries, Microcosm and Life After Television. Also available in paperback.

Editorial Reviews

From the Back Cover

"Men and Marriage . . . is an outstandingly important and well-argued book." National Review Drug Addiction, lack of education, welfare, children in poverty, violence, unemployment, single-parent homes-these critical problems facing our country today. Many ideas have been presented regarding the cause of these problems, but only George Gilder speaks directly and with authority about their one undeniable source: the disintegration of the American family. Men and Marriage examines the loss of the family and the well-defined sex roles it used to offer and how this loss has changed the focus of our society. Poverty, for instance, comes from the destruction of the family when single parents are abandoned by their lovers or older women are suddenly divorced because society approves of the husband's new, younger girlfriend. Gilder claims that men will only own up to their paternal obligations when the women lead them to do so and that this civilizing influence, balanced with, proper economic support, is the most important part of maintaining a productive, healthy, loving society. He offers a concrete plan of action for rebuilding the family in America. His solutions challenge readers to return to these roles and reestablish those family values which were once so crucial in staving off the ills that plague our country.

About the Author

George Gilder is author of several books on social and economic issues. He was a speech writer for President Reagan and now writes regularly for the Wall Street Journal and Harpers. --This text refers to the Paperback edition.

Product Details

• Hardcover: 240 pages
• Publisher: Pelican Publishing; Rep Sub edition (August 31, 1986)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0882894447
• ISBN-13: 978-0882894447
• Product Dimensions: 5.5 x 0.9 x 8.7 inches
• Shipping Weight: 1.2 pounds (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 4.3 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (30 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #595,133 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

More About the Author

Discover books, learn about writers, read author blogs, and more.

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

145 of 154 people found the following review helpful

5.0 out of 5 stars An Outstanding Work July 6, 2000

By Stephen N. Shields

Format:Paperback

Men and Marriage benefits the modern reader in a number of ways. Providing excellent data and analysis on males and females in modern society, the book enables its reader to better understand the modern controversy over men and women's respective roles in society. Gilder feels that one of modern society's key problems is its denials of the differences between the sexes and, as a logical corollary, its denial of appropriate roles. He writes, "Though rejecting feminist politics and lesbian posturing, American culture has absorbed the underlying ideology like a sponge. The principal tenets of sexual liberation or sexual liberalism--the obsolescence of masculinity and femininity, of sex roles, and of heterosexual monogamy as the moral norm--have diffused through the system and become part of America's conventional wisdom." Gilder has also performed an invaluable service by providing relevant material for couples and singles. Gilder wants the single woman to u! nderstand that if she decides to sacrifice her twenties on the altar of career, she could easily find herself a celibate priest serving that altar for the rest of her life. Gilder reports that Yale and Harvard sociologists, after analyzing census data, concluded that a woman who waits until her mid-thirties only has a 5% chance of getting married. The author also has much to say to the single man. Of the most unique and striking of Gilder's observations on the sexes is his contention that the average single man struggles with an inherent irresponsibility that only marriage can cure. While this assertion may have had a secure, albeit covert, place in yesterday's conventional wisdom, Gilder boldly presents the thesis with impressive statistical support.... Single men are 30% more likely than single women to be unemployed. If they get a job, the single man will make very little more than his single girlfriend, in striking contrast to the substantial earning power of the married! man who takes home 70% more income. Single college gradua! tes will normally earn about the same as married graduates of high school. Gilder suggests, "It could well be more important for an ambitious young man to get married than to go to college" (p. 63). Demographically, except possibly for the divorced, the single most disturbed group in the United States is single men. Between the ages of 25 and 65 the single man is 30% more likely than single women to be depressed. He is 30% more likely to exhibit a tendency toward phobias and passivity. The unmarried man is three times more likely to experience a nervous breakdown and 22 times more likely to be committed to an institution because of mental disease. And these statistics are not just cause for sympathy for the single man, but a cause for concern. For 90% of all violent crime is committed by single men even though above the age of 14 they only make up about 13% of the population. The statistics and analyses that Gilder provides on singleness leads to another vita! l area that he addresses. A theme that Gilder resounds with great force is the degree to which a healthy society is in fact dependent on the health of its families. He writes, "As a social institution, marriage transcends all individuals. The health of a society, its collective vitality, ultimately resides in its concern for the future, its sense of a connection with generations to come" (p. 16). While the first six chapters of the Gilder's tome, which focus on sexual roles, are easily worth price of the book; its remainder is a tour de force on the relationship of modern sexual thought and the ghetto, welfare, homosexuality, the workplace, education, politics, and biogenetic engineering. While many will view this work as an anachronistic throwback to the 50s, it's empirical support of its major theses gives the reader pause. Read more ›

43 of 44 people found the following review helpful

5.0 out of 5 stars Equality is Not 'Sameness' April 12, 2008

By Andrew Cort, author of THE DOOR IS OPEN

Format:Paperback

This book received a lot of flack when it first came out. The demand for equality among men and women was finally being accepted as a proper ideal for a civilized society, and anyone who disagreed was deservedly shouted down. But amidst the great din, it was presumed with terrible shallowness that any thoughtful challenge was traitorous activity (This, unfortunately, is often still the case.) George Gilder was one of the first to point out that 'equality' does not mean 'sameness', that acknowledging the equality of women does not mean that men and women think, feel, or ought to act, in the same ways, or that it is 'bad' to examine the question of whether there might be gender roles that are indeed sensible, virtuous, and possibly even wonderful. As we look back over the years since the feminist movement began, we cannot honestly say that the changes we have made have made everyone happy. It is worth going back and taking a calm, thoughtful, fresh look at the challenges that George Gilder raised in this book.

42 of 45 people found the following review helpful

5.0 out of 5 stars Both academic and entertaining... July 7, 2006

By Charles Bevel

Format:Hardcover

I agree with a lot of what previous posters have said but would like to add that Mr. Gilder is indeed a gifted writer. The book is replete with "laugh-out-loud" witicism interspersed between salient point after salient point. I loved it.

As an African American who grew up in a working class neighborhood which, over the 20 years since my departure, has deteriorated almost to the point of "ghetto", I can say unequivocally that whatever Gilder points out concerning the general population indeed goes triple for the African American community. If America has drunken the feminist "kool-aid" and relegated husbandhood and fatherhood to the trash heap of obselescence, the black community has taken said "kool-aid" intravenously...and it shows!

Thanks Mr. Gilder for you engaging contribution to sanity.

26 of 29 people found the following review helpful

5.0 out of 5 stars This book changed my attitude toward marriage. March 31, 2006

By lighten_up_already2 VINE™ VOICE

Format:Hardcover|Amazon Verified Purchase

I grew up in a disfunctional family situation and I thought all through my twenties that I never ever wanted to get married. Marriage is where the misery starts, so I thought. The funny things though is I could never say I was happy, and I got less and less happy every years. I was in a downward spiral psychologically.

When I read this book, so many obvious things became clear. Things so obvious and common-sense that you might never think of it yourself and you certainly won't hear on the "news for entertainment" media or from Hollywood. Singleness is a problem, especially for men.

So, I had a change of heart toward marriage and was eventually blessed with a wonderful wife and now I can say, even with all the extra responsibility of a wife and kids, that I'm genually happy with my life. I owe a lot of it to this book.

17 of 18 people found the following review helpful

5.0 out of 5 stars Men and Marriage April 2, 2009

By Gerard Reed

Format:Paperback

Years ago George Gilder published Sexual Suicide, then revised and expanded and renamed it Men and Marriage (Gretna, LA: Pelican Publishing Company, c. 1986). Gilder is better known for his work on economics, Wealth and Poverty, a supply-side manifesto widely discussed in the 1980's, but as a professional writer he has addressed a wide variety of social issues, including sexuality. And though his presentation has religious overtones, his argument is mainly philosophical and pragmatic.
First he focuses on "the facts of life." No issue needs more attention, Gilder argues, than that of men and marriage, for our hedonistic culture encourages men to behave irresponsibly. The oft-touted sexual revolution, praised in some circles for liberating women, has fundamentally freed men from family ties and obligations. Unattached, predatory males endanger our civilization--as do vandals and gang members on urban streets. Historians and anthropologists assure us that men, in every culture, have found their identity in providing for women and children. Women conceive and bear and nurture children as an inescapable biological reality. Their role is fixed. Men, however, need marriage to find their role. "The crucial process of civilization is the subordination of male sexual impulses and biology to the long-term horizons of female sexuality" (p. 5). Thus the health of any society depends upon the health and durability of its marriages.
Resisting those who willfully blur sexual distinctions, who naively assert (in highly utopian ways) that sexual differences are cultural rather than biological, Gilder insists there are indeed ineradicable differences which must be recognized and respected.... Citing an "authoritative text on the subject, The Psychology of Sex Differences by Carol Jacklin and Eleanor Maccoby (who chaired the department of psychology at Stanford), Gilder contends: males' sexual hormones make them innately more aggressive; sex differences appear quite early in life and resemble those found in non-human primates; men crave leadership positions in groups. Men, for example, bond together in hierarchical structures, finding fulfillment in athletic teams, military units, street gangs, or revolutionary movements.
Divorced from women, men turn barbarians--"they rape and pillage, debauch and despoil the settlements of society" (p. 39). Only when their sexual drive is restrained by the structures of marriage, only when their bounty-hunting tendencies are overcome by the responsibilities of fatherhood, only when women say "no" to footloose males, can a men be "tamed."
That's not happening in our society. Consequently monogamy is crumbling. Couples "live together" rather than marry. Those who marry frequently divorce--the men moving on to other mates, enjoying a socially-approved "system of polygyny" (p. 76). Gilder notes that young women have no difficulty attracting males, but 15 or 20 years later they discover themselves abandoned or ignored. Shiftless males forever focus on "sexual princesses" who are most physically attractive. So, sadly enough, single women over 35 have only a five percent chance of marrying.
The collapse of monogamy most strikingly appears in America's inner-city ghettoes and--surprisingly enough--Scandinavian welfare states. Race is irrelevant. So is income. What is relevant is a welfare system which incubates fatherless families. Unneeded as a provider, the man seeks identity in a series of sexual conquests and violent adventures. "All civilized societies train their men to protect and defend women." When they abandon their post, when male aggressions turn against women, "the group tends to disintegrate completely and even to become extinct" (p. 136).
Like Weldon Hardenbrook, Gilder unapologetically calls for patriarchal families and societies. Alleged "matriarchies" have simply never existed; they never can exist. It's either patriarchy or anarchy. Experimental androgynous communities, such as the Communist communes and Israel kibbutzim, slowly and surely swing back to patriarchal structures. Certain segments of modern America, following utopian advocates of androgyny, illustrate what Michael Levin described as "'the feminist road to socialism'" (p. 150). The quest for "egalitarian marriages" in places such as Sweden, for example, has led to "the obsolescence of marriage itself" (p. 152). Tragically, "The United States is enacting many of the policies that brought sexual suicide to Sweden" (p. 153).
Nothing is more important than restoring the health and integrity of the family! Such wisdom typified ancient China, as is evident in this statement in I Ching: "The family . . . is the native soil on which performance of moral duty is made easy through natural affection so that within a small circle a basis of moral practice is created, and then is widened to include human relationships in general . . . ." (p. 165). In Men and Marriage, Gilder simply seeks to recover that ancient Chinese wisdom, declaring: "Most achievement in the world, I believe, reflects the force of family, first the patience and patrimony of parents and relatives, then the inspiration and support of husband or wife, finally the challenge and responsibility of the next generation. Some children can thrive in the absence of all this; but the society as a whole depends on family connections to succeed" (p. 193).
Gilder's message finds few adherents on soap operas or among the elite intelligentsia. But it certainly squares with the portrait presented us in Scripture and traditional cultures. Whether our nation can survive while ignoring it is a question only future historians will decide. This book's readable, challenging, irritating, fascinating in part because Gilder dares to take a strong, "reactionary" stance. Read more ›