Not Enough Good Men

There is a crisis facing America’s men. They have fallen behind women in school, they are often overlooked in career opportunities, and they are scolded for their unique educational needs. No solutions have been found because our reigning civil rights regime prevents us from even acknowledging the problem or from coming to grips with it. Instead, our laws keep insisting on “gender neutral” remedies like improving test scores or graduation rates—ignoring the natural differences between the sexes. The assault on single-sex institutions—from military schools to the boy scouts—accelerated with the Supreme Court’s decision in United States v. Virginia (1996). In Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg majority opinion, she argued that natural differences between men and women were artifacts of prejudice and could not be used to justify single-sex education. She predicted that Virginia Military Institute (VMI) would not have to change much to admit women. Over twenty years later, evidence to the contrary is compounding. With new physical standards, alternative forms of discipline, new dress codes and grooming standards, and a new honor code which disregards the courage and sacrifice of men, one could only image what else could be changed.

To seriously consider the unique educational needs for men, we must be free to consider the unique natural differences between men and women. Therefore, the states should seek to overturn United States v. Virginia (1996) and be allowed to consider the unique needs of men once again in education and allow manly honor as a legitimate goal for public schools.