We Still Need Gentlemen

We all saw the pictures of men who stood by and watched while 23-year-old Iryna Zarutska was stabbed to death on a bus. We saw those photos and wondered how we’ve come to this place in history, a time when men have lost their protective instinct. According to scripture, men were created to protect and treasure those more vulnerable than themselves. God calls men to be strong, to be heroes, to be courageous and caring. Sometimes when we turn on the news, we begin to realize that many men have lost their sense of purpose in favor of apathy or self-preservation.

I saw a video that was meant to be funny. Jack and Rose of Titanic fame were in the ocean after the unsinkable ship went down. Jack was floating on the infamous door, and Rose was in the water. Rose told Jack that she was cold, and asked if he would let her climb up onto the door. But Jack instantly started naming reasons why that would be a bad idea, and all of them pointed to the fact that he had no intention of risking losing his own life so that the young girl could be saved. The caption? “If Titanic happened in 2025.”

It was supposed to be funny, but it bites as all satire does, because while I watched I couldn’t help but think of young Iryna, brutally killed while men who should have been her protectors watched. We have fallen far as a nation, and I know that we could point to so many different factors that have led us here, but that’s not really what this post is about. I’m writing to say something much simpler instead: we still need gentlemen.

We need men who are alert to the needs of those around them, who consider themselves a lookout and safe place for the vulnerable in their presence. We need men who consider every woman they encounter to be their sister, mother, friend, or child. We need heroes who not only give a woman their seat on the bus, but then will see it as their duty to watch over that woman until she steps off of the bus and out of their view.

In a recent study a little over one-third of men surveyed said they struggle to understand their place in their community or the broader world. Could it be that one piece of the puzzle is that many men have lost their protective instincts, and therefore, their sense of belonging and purpose? When this happens, the world shifts, and suddenly the physically strong become the psychologically weak. Men grow self-absorbed, helpless consumers, and women come to trust them less and less, until one day we realize that most women would rather see a bear in the woods than a man. It’s a cycle that is doomed to unravel the fabric of our world, and suddenly we see why God designed our roles as he did. We need trustworthy, strong, reliable, godly men.

Those men know better who they are and what they are meant to do. Those men are servants, helpers, guides, and friends to the women in their circles. They are the men who look for ways to help, to lead, to support, and they take their role as protector seriously. Always alert, always watching, always ready to stand between a vulnerable person and whatever or whoever may do her harm. I know this is a hard calling, but when men are operating in full understanding of their role as protector, I believe they have a greater sense of how they fit into this world and who God created them to be.

Women don’t just need a man’s physical strength, either. We need the everyday example of men who nobly elevate the needs of others above their own, in small ways: recognizing when women are uncomfortable, paying attention when women are looking for reassurance, seeking to make life easier for the women in the world around them.

Many men reading this right now are probably frowning, thinking, you women got exactly what you asked for. Women needed to stand up for their rights. Good and just things were accomplished. But as it almost always happens where humans are concerned, sin blurred the target. That’s the hard thing about wanting things that are outside the purview of God’s good design: sometimes you get what you ask for, and then your children and your children’s children pay the consequences.

But it isn’t too late for us to reject the things we see in our society today that harm both men and women. We can do this together: raising boys who understand their place in this world, teaching girls what real heroes look like, and each of us praying that we will become more like Jesus every day. We need men who are gentlemen--now, more than ever. If anyone told you different, they weren’t speaking for me.