This was originally supposed to be a response to *this* – a synopsis by one Ms. Brigitte Dale regarding an article discussing the growing trend of guys taking ever longer to “grow up”
….Honestly though, this whole thing as a societal phenomenon is pretty interesting. It’s easy on the one hand to simply dismiss it as the inevitable negative outcome of widespread wealth and entitlement and a superficial media culture, and it’s entirely possible that that would make up the bulk of the correct analysis.
It is also possible, however that there is more to it than that. In the animal kingdom, generally the longer it takes for an animal to reach adulthood, often the more complicated the the requirements are of integrating into that species’ social structure. i.e. the longer one spends learning how to be part of the group before taking their ultimate place in the herd, the better one’s chances of success are. Acquiring “adult” status in human society is tad bit more complex than in a herd of elephants or a troop of monkeys but the benefits of spending more time in a formative state of flux are likely similar. In our parent’s time, and even more so their parent’s time, “Growing up” was a necessity. If you weren’t reasonably successful then you were either out on the streets or a step above that in some soul-crushing factory type job. There certainly weren’t student loans and forgiving parents and government assistance to make your twenties easy and fun. Pretty much finding a corporate ladder and climbing it as soon as possible was the only way to vastly improve your standard of living beyond a few steps away from poverty. Now though it’s easy to get away with not starting a career until late in your twenties, and maybe it’s even a good thing to do so. Presumably we all have inherent talents as well as inherent desires regarding what we would be satisfied having achieved with our lives. If you can spend ten years or so kicking the tires o’ life, maybe you end up with a much clearer picture of who you are and what you want than if you just dove in right away with whatever career and family were readily available and just buckled in for the long haul.
On second thought, maybe this whole thing is entirely women’s fault. (everything else is….amirite? anybody? high-five?anybody?) Before the pill, if people wanted to do what people always have done and always will do, which is engage in significant and insignificant sexual relationships, they would inevitably have to deal with what was always the outcome of such doings – babies. Once there was a baby involved, barring total assholery by the male (or occasionally the female), the outcome is pretty much instant adulthood. Job, wife and kids. As this was the norm, the culture grew up around it and shunned bachelors largely as aberrations. Now that people can have relationships without making lifelong commitments, once the exuberance of the initial discovery passed in the “hey let’s have sex with everybody” 60’s, a general pattern and culture of extended adolescence seemed to grow and solidify eventually building to what it is today. But who’s to say that that is necessarily a bad thing? In the absence of biological necessity, the late twenties might just be the more natural and appropriate time to stop gathering the pieces and to finally put yourself together in the role of an “adult”.
