Nature and Its Lessons on Masculinity.

Nature and Its Lessons on Masculinity.

Watching wild animals can make one marvel a lot. For instance, I was studying about the behaviors of male Kangaroos and Chimpanzees and I was able to relate their behavior with that of human beings. The testosterone hormone in us men often make us to behave a bit aggressively when it comes to mating as does chimpanzees.

During mate selection, the alpha male in the animal kingdom tends to have more opportunities of mating with multiple females. And just like that, the alpha male will always have higher chances with females in the human kingdom as well.

Look keenly at male kangaroos for example. These creatures just like other males in the animal kingdom will tend to showcase their front muscles and demonstrate their prowess by winning over other males in fights of dominance in order to have mating rights.

For monkeys and Chimpanzees, the alpha male tends to depict their masculinity by exposing their toughened teeth and thumping their chests the most, respectively. They will then make the loudest noise also as a warning to other males not to trespass on their territories.

Back to the humans. Most of us men will spend a lot of time in the gym rooms to try and make our chests more muscular and our biceps more pronounced in a bid to showcase our masculinity. And we are sometimes tempted to go a notch higher and walk while naked on the upper parts in order to show the world what we got and gain space in the dominance realm.

But there is a catch here. Animals will always be animals. We never gauge them on any moral principle whatsoever. When it comes to us human beings, we have a moral gauge meter against which we are weighed beside the physical aspects.

For instance, I have a friend who believes that having those big muscles and not having money is akin to being a muscular chimpanzee that runs away when another faction attacks their troop. Another one believes that having big chests with empty brains is akin to being the most muscular kangaroo that doesn’t know how to throw the kick to win that coveted dominance.

In the end though, we sometimes can’t control what the homes do to us. No wonder in the animal kingdom, you see a small monkey wake up one day and decide to stage its revolt and want too to be crowned the alpha male without due consideration of the consequences.

This too happens in the human kingdom although it gets equated to foolishness and stupidity. Imagine waking up one day as a father and getting you standard eight boy questioning your authority as the father and even threatening to beat you up.

We now know that the testosterone hormone is to often to blame. A study among monkeys found out that the testosterone hormone was undeniably high in teenage monkeys. No wonder they are often active and seeking equal sexual rights among the group irrespective of what protocols dictate.

In humans too, the male testosterone levels tend to decrease by about 1% every year past the age of 40 for most men. We should not thus kill ourselves from the high energy we see dissipating from our young people if we see them being put into good use. It should only worry us if we see them putting those energies into wrong use like burning schools and wreaking havoc everywhere.

The day we said that disciplining our children even within acceptable limits was wrong is the day we lost it. We now have so many young people reeking of heightened aggression hormones such as testosterone and have nowhere to put them into good use and just want to show their masculinity by reeking violence so to say.

And because there are no measures to curtain them like through acceptable discipline, there is nothing else but to turn into destruction. Let us borrow a leaf from the animal kingdom. When you are the least in the hierarchy, you better have that in your head and know it. The psychological understanding keeps even the high hormone levels at bay.

That is what discipline did back in the days. Making the young people understand that they are young. No suppression but simply being aware of who they were and where they ranked in the chain. This false feeling of larger than life that makes young people behave like the monkeys in the forest should be tamed by all means especially in schools.

There is nothing wrong with masculinity. In fact, it is the best gift we have as men when used within the confines of acceptable moral levels. When it spews out of control and gets misused it breeds problems from murders, to increasing HIV/AIDS levels due to multiple sex partners to as far as school unrests.

Geoffrey Ndege

Geoffrey Ndege

Geoffrey Ndege is the Editor and topical contributor for the Daily Focus. He writes in the areas of Science, Manufacturing, Technology, Innovation, Governance, Management and International Emerging Issues. For featuring, promotions or support, reach out to us at info@dailyfocus.co.ke
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