Why Are Men and Women Divided?

SPEAKER_1 (0:00)

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Helen (0:12)

On Relevant Radio.

Tim Carney (0:16)

We're one of those guys who should have said, whoa, stop this, and said, no, guys, this is not how we behave. And the fraternities used to be places that tried to raise men to have more virtue. This is a job primarily of the parents, but also how we raise kids K-12. And sometimes, when I think this happened in an Ivy League school, I'm thinking, were the parents just thinking about achievement, about let's get to Ivy League, let's get to a good career, and some of them might have set aside, wait a second, I need to teach my son to be a man of virtue, a man who won't just not do the bad thing, but will intervene and try to be the hero in that situation.

SPEAKER_1 (0:54)

It's The Drew Mariani Show on Relevant Radio.

Drew Mariani (1:00)

Yeah, that was Tim Carney on Morning Joe talking about the Cornell case, and really the need for virtuous men. I want to talk about that today. I don't know how many of you followed it. I'll address some of this, but I really do want to zoom out and talk about something even larger. Young men having real kind of anger or disenchantment with women.

There's a disturbing case if you're not aware at Cornell University. It raised some troubling questions about the way young men view women, and seven fraternity members were accused of participating in a horrific sexual assault. And beyond the allegation, so I was thinking, again, there's alcohol or drugs, and there's a whole litany of things that happen in these frat houses. But there's something else going on right now, too.

And that's a change in the dynamic between these young men and women. That Cornell University case, these guys, by the way, have been accused in a civil lawsuit of participating in drugging and sexually assaulting a young woman. This happened back in 2024 The young woman was subjected to repeated sexual acts while she was incapacitated. And I won't go into details, but Cornell's investigation resulted in just some disciplinary sanctions, including expulsion and suspensions. No criminal connections were obtained. Some of the accused dispute the allegations. You are innocent until proven guilty.

New York authorities are now taking another look at the case. It's back in the news.

And I would just say, let's respect due process and take a look at the evidence. But it made me think, and Dr. John Grabowski is going to be stopping me, it made me think about what is happening to the relationship between young men and women in America. And I do want to hear from you, because you probably have a son or a daughter, maybe you yourself are going through this, and we'll open the phones in a minute, we'll engage in this, but why does there seem to be so much resentment, so much hostility, something even frightening in regard to the disregard for the dignity of one another, really, of our human sexuality?

This is a situation that, again, I have a friend, and maybe I'll start it this way and we can talk to Dr. Grabowski about it, who has somebody he's related to, and he was saying that his son's very disenchanted with women. And I said, well, why is that? He was in a relationship for a long time, and actually he's married. And his wife, I guess, does not treat him with respect. You know, and, you know, I don't want to give too much information away in case the person is listening here. But, you know, he actually came out to the point where he almost hates women, you know, and we're seeing this. So there was a Pew Research study. We found that 51% of men believe that they're doing worse today finding romantic partners than others did 20 years ago. There was another survey that was out that found that while men and women report similar levels of loneliness, men are less likely to turn to friends and family for support. So I was thinking, what's that mean? You know, you can have a generation of young men who desperately want companionship but they don't necessarily know how to build that relationship. And then there's the digital world where you've got dating apps that turn relationships into endless exercises and comparison and rejection. You have pornography that can encourage a view of intimacy, separate it from love, right? Or commitment and responsibility. And a lot of online communities out there where these men who are disappointed, you know, they feel rejected, they reinforce one another, and it becomes poisonous. So instead of helping a person become a better man, they tell them, hey, the woman is the enemy. You've been cheated. You're entitled to something, you know? And there's a lot of other things. And ladies on the other side of the table, are you seeing this in men? Is it hard to find a really good man? You're finding that men have a misogynistic type of perspective. I hate the broad brush, and I don't want to do that. But, you know, there are a number of factors here that could be driving why more men today seem to be angry at women. And I wanted to bring in Dr. John Grabowski. He's a professor of moral theology and ethics at the Catholic University of America. He served multiple times, I think three times as theological advisor to the USCCB in the area of marriage and family. He was a member of the Pontifical Council for Family. And it's great to have him with us. He's the author of a book called Unraveling Gender. His latest book, A Catholic Guide to Being Human. You can find all those at OSV. Doctor, welcome back. Good to have you with me.