Men of Honour: A Young Man's Guide to Sex, Pornography and Masturbation

By Glen A. Gerreyn

Male by Birth Man by Choice
You may have been born a male but to become a man is a choice – your choice. This Young Man’s Guide to Exercise, Nutrition, Money, Drugs and Alcohol, Sex, Pornography and Masturbation will equip you to make right decisions and powerfully aid your transition from boy to man.

While some make informed decisions regarding some of these areas, other topics remain undiscussed. Often they are only joked about among young men. But poor decisions can bring the life of any young man unstuck. It can take years to recover ground and leave you burdened with lifelong consequences.

Men of Honour, encourages and inspires young men to take up the challenge to be honourable. Whether at school, in sport, at work or in relationships, we must develop our character to achieve success and experience the thrills life has on offer.

• Language: English
• Publisher: BookBaby
• Release date: Oct 1, 2011
• ISBN: 9781626758940

Book preview

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PRE

FACE

The entire premise of this book is based upon the concept ‘Male By Birth. Man By Choice’ – a phrase attributed to the late, great Edwin Lewis Cole. To become a man is your choice. The better the decisions you make the easier the transition from boyhood to manhood.

I have aimed this work to reach teenage boys and their fathers. My primary intention is to help young men discover their masculinity. I see masculinity as the positive traits that are typical of honourable men. Those traits include, but are not limited to; manliness, self-sacrifice, respect, conscientiousness, bravery, honesty, healthy habits and humility. This book’s secondary purpose is to guide fathers to help their sons navigate the stormy and turbulent emotions generated by adolescent hormones.

I also want to focus my efforts on raising a generation of honourable men. The task is huge. I hope this book serves as a manifesto to begin a movement for real social change. The women of this world deserve that and not one iota less.

As a warning I want to make mention that this book is written with the male psyche in mind. In other words it is not for women. I realise that by saying this many women will want to read it. This truly is ‘secret men’s business’. I know most guys are happy to stay out of women’s gatherings, so I ask you pay us the same respect.

I should mention that the manner in which I have chosen to write is very candid. It may even seem a little crass. The humour I use is designed to help guys relax before I hit them with a metaphorical piece of ‘two by four’ and ask them to rise to the challenge. I would not normally speak like this in mixed company. In fact when I run the Men of Honour seminar I ask that there be no females present. There are some things men just need to do by themselves.

In fact, I would ask the boys to not even discuss this book with their mothers. Most mums don’t really want to know what their sons are doing with socks in their bedrooms. Most mums would probably agree that that is already far too much information.

I recently heard a story of a mum who caught her son masturbating in his bedroom. Not knowing what to do, she called out: ‘If you keep doing that you will go blind.’ After a moment’s pause the boy yelled back from behind the closed bedroom door: ‘Could I at least keep going till I need glasses?’

So can I say emphatically and unreservedly to all the mothers, girlfriends and sisters – please go and read something else?

I have attempted to make this book short and concise. I have given each chapter what it deserves without overstating the case, so you will find some chapters short and aimed straight at the jugular, while others are more extensive and rich with analogies. I want this work to serve as a statement of purpose for every male who reads it. I would recommend it be read again and again – at least annually. Firstly, because some of the material is written with certain stages of manhood in mind, so on your first reading some of the messages might seem irrelevant or difficult to fathom but the hidden mystery will gradually reveal itself over time and become crystal clear. Secondly, I ask that you reread it in order to fortify the decisions made and underpin your resolve.

At the back of this book is an oath that I would ask every young man to take the time to read and sign in the presence of a significant life mentor. Once you have read the contents of this publication, please take the time to consider respectfully whether you have what it takes to be a real man and take the oath with pride.

Fathers: this book should not only be used to open discussion about sensitive topics with your sons, I suggest you might also find it useful in relation to possible suitors for your daughters. Insist they read and complete a 500 word report on the book and sign the oath, before they are allowed to date your daughter. This ought to sort the wheat from the chaff!

Finally to every young man who reads these pages, do so with an open mind. May your journey to manhood be swift, unwavering and filled with copious thrills and opportunities.

Glen Gerreyn

Sydney October 2011

WHAT DOES IT MEAN TO BE A

REAL MAN?

Mine honour is my life; both grow in one; Take honour from me, and my life is done. - William Shakespeare

Sir Ernest Shackleton was a British Explorer. During an era called the Heroic Age of Antarctic Exploration he became the first man to lead a team in an attempt to cross the harsh Antarctic continent from sea to sea. It is rumoured that in 1901 he placed a classified ad in The Times of London stating:

People say that 5,000 men applied for the three positions on this journey. Whether fact or myth this story is compelling. Every young male has felt the call to adventure — the maddening desire to be something more. It is portrayed in great literature such as the Adventures of Huckleberry Finn or the quest that Frodo Baggins undertook to destroy Sauron’s Ring in the fires of Mount Doom. There is within every male an inherent need to prove their manliness by slaying a dragon or rescuing a damsel in distress. They want to unwrap the core of their maleness and discover who they really are.

But today we are living in a time when many males feel like they have to apologise for their masculinity. In some circles, manhood is so ridiculed that many young boys feel intimidated. Males are often asked to get in touch with their feminine side. Personally I cannot identify with that task. In fact, if I want to get in touch with my feminine side, I touch my wife!

I want young men today to embrace their masculine side, because that is who they are at their core. It is their true identity. When was the last time you heard someone tell a boy to get in touch with his masculine side?

In Western society it is almost like we are trying to eliminate all traces of masculinity. In mainstream advertising, whether in print, radio or television, we are inundated with images of the end of masculinity. Advertisers like to promote the ‘stupid male’ syndrome to connect with its audience. Television, whether being streamed through the internet or on your smart phone, does exactly that – it ‘tells a vision’. It paints a vision of what it predicts for the future or what it claims is already happening. There is an abundance of images that either depict masculinity as dumb and evil or try to trivialise the role of men in society.

Here is a small sampling of commercials that perpetuate the ‘stupid male’ syndrome. The RACQ insurance company ran a television commercial that depicts a man, clearly portrayed as a moron, running into a charter boat, while his wife, in the background, mocks him by saying: ‘How could you not see a charter boat?’ and walks around with a blanket over her head.

Or the Telstra BigPond commercial where the boy asks his father: ‘Why did they build the Great Wall of China?’ His father’s response is: ‘To keep the rabbits out.’ This let the whole of Australia in on a supposed secret – if fathers don’t know the answer they usually just make it up. This was a very successful and much copied theme for advertisements. Mock the father and everyone will have a good laugh.

Then there is the KFC ad where two young men are playing ping pong with night vision goggles on when the girlfriend of one of the guy’s walks in on them and smugly says: ‘I’m home’ as if to say you can stop acting like an idiot with your friend.

Even women’s sanitary products do not exempt men from being portrayed as fools. The Libra Invisible Pads commercials depict a male playing an assortment of games with his girlfriend’s pads, using them as shields and force fields to deflect enemy fire from his face and body. Seems like harmless fun, until the girlfriend walks in with her parents giving him a degrading and disparaging look.

Or there are the Supercheap auto commercials, where the bloke fills his garage to overflowing. His wife, acting like his mother, asks the man: ‘Where have you been?’ She treats him like an imbecile or small child who has ‘no idea’ and is hiding things from his wife like a kid. Commercials like this feed the myth that men never grow up and remain boys for a lifetime. This prolonged adolescence means men never assume responsibility. Therefore, all genuine leadership is a feminine characteristic not a male one. Is there a conspiracy to keep males subservient?

We also have numerous films that depict men as chumps or a halfwits. These films include Dumb and Dumber, Get Smart, Thelma & Louise, The First Wives Club, You and Your Stupid Mate, Dude Where’s My Car, Wayne’s World, Hangover, Bill & Ted’s Bogus Journey, Failure to Launch and How to Lose a Guy in Ten Days, to name but a few.

Television sitcoms, like Two and Half Men or The Office, portray men as chauvinistic and dishonourable. In his book Media and Male Identity, Professor Jim Macnamara from the University of Technology in Sydney, Australia, outlined the results of a landmark study he conducted. After researching 650 newspapers, more than 100 magazines and more than 330 hours of television he concluded that portrayals of men were overwhelming negative and that men today are extensively demonised, marginalised and trivialised in the mass media.¹

The fear abounds that if males are not castrated into civility, all hell will break loose. We need our boys to be boys and they need positive role models to help them understand what real manhood is about.

A society that pathologises the behaviour of its most energetic and exuberant boys and drugs them into docile submission, is enfeebling itself by rendering their vitality redundant.² In essence, the masculine honourable male is facing extinction. There are forces trying to render the male obsolete by expecting boys to act like girls. This is particularly evident in the classroom. If a young male can’t sit and listen attentively they are medicated into submission, even though it is clear that boys and girls learn differently. A new phenomenon is also emerging where kindergartens in Sweden attempt to be gender neutral to make sure the children don’t fall into gender stereotypes. As if being purely a boy or a girl is somehow not good enough. I believe we must do all we can to help raise a generation of honourable men who understand their purpose, have a clear sense of their identity and see a vibrant vision for the future of mankind.

Some young men think that being a real man is ‘being able to do whatever the hell they like and not having to answer to anyone’. With that attitude being bandied around, is it any wonder why so many young men today are coming unstuck? Doing whatever you like with total disregard for those around you is a recipe for disaster. Here is a definition of manhood offered by Ted Roberts: ‘A boy wants things his way now. A man puts others’ needs above his own.’ A boy may be self-centred, narcissistic and self-absorbed. A man on the other hand, is self-sacrificing and thinks of others first. A man is a giver rather than a taker.

Woodrow Wilson, the 28th President of the United States, said, ‘No man has ever risen to the real stature of spiritual manhood until he has found that it is finer to serve somebody else than it is to serve himself.’

At some point in your life you have to decide you are going to ‘put away childish things’³ and act, behave and think like real men. The problem is that many men today seem to have prolonged or extended their adolescence and never made the switch to real manhood. This, combined with the media’s focus on all things young, has led to throngs of immature and insecure men. The chief reason for this is that boys have been discouraged from growing up and have refused to do so. When natural growth is retarded, more men fail to thrive and their potential is