Josh Benner

Tag: manhood

  • Memorial Day, and the Saving Private Ryan character we struggle to not become

    I hope that you’re all having a meaningful Memorial Day. As we observe holidays throughout the year there are movies that become associated with them. For Christmas, there’s an entire season of Christmas movies.At Thanksgiving, It’s a Wonderful Life is associated with the season. At Easter, it’s resurrection movies like Ten Commandments and the Passion of the Christ.

    One of the great movies that I’ve come to associate with Memorial Day weekend is Saving Private Ryan. As a fan of the military film genre, Saving Private Ryan is my favorite. I love the characters, the performances, the story, the themes.

    For men especially, I think that war movies speak to something inside of us. There’s a warrior spirit. There’s the desire to want to be the hero, to want to have valor. But in some ways, the character in the movie who men struggle against becoming is Timothy Upham (played by Jeremy Davies).

    When Captain Miller is putting a team together to go and search for the missing Private Ryan, he needs someone with them who can translate. Upham speaks both German and French. In this regard, he’s helpful, though he offers little aid for his military skills. In one of the most dramatic scenes of the movie, Mellish, one of Upham’s comrades, is in a fierce hand to hand combat situation against a German soldier. Upham is standing in a stairwell, paralyzed with fear. He does nothing to intervene when he could have saved Mellish in that situation. Ultimately Mellish is killed in the struggle. When the German soldier who has just killed Mellish leaves the building, he sees Upham cowering fear and crying. The soldier walks right past him.

    Warning: Content may be disturbing.

    It’s easy to think that we’d be the hero, to think we wouldn’t be the man standing frozen in the stairwell. I think of the various domains of our lives. Being men, being husbands, going to work, growing in faith, leading families.

    It’s easy to be the hero in our own mind. It’s easy to be a hero, philosophically. In that, I mean that it’s easy to have the ideas and knowledge of what’s heroic, noble, and valorous. But actually executing on those fronts is the challenge. It’s what separates the common people from the uncommon. It’s what separates the everyman from the superman. We don’t effortlessly become great. If we did, everyone would be great and do great things. It takes real sacrifice, humility, and character. I know these are things that I fail to live up to all too often.

    It’s easy to recognize greatness and know what it takes. It’s a lot harder to pursue greatness which requires actually doing what it takes. It’s easy to be a bystander, it’s easy to be afraid.

    In the movie, Upham isn’t portrayed as a bad man. But he’s also not a great man. There is a scene later in the film where he shoots a German soldier. But in the moment that really counts, he’s standing frozen in a stairwell when he’s needed most.

    Remembering those who made the ultimate sacrifice

    On Memorial Day, we do honor hundreds of thousands of brave men and women who made the ultimate sacrifice for our nation. A series called “Medal of Honor” was released on Netflix in 2018. Each episode features the story of another recipient of the Medal of Honor. Incredible stories of heroism and sacrifice.

    American Revolution – 25,000
    War of 1812 – 15,000
    Civil War – 364,511
    World War I – 116,516
    World War II – 405,399
    Korean War – 36,516
    Vietnam – 58,209
    Afghanistan and Iraq – 6,713

    To the hundreds of thousands of men and women who gave their lives in the service and defense of America, thank you.

    Thanks for reading! I’d love to hear what you think, and don’t forget to subscribe! 

  • Best of 2018. #5 Parents allowing children to decide their gender: why?

    child-childrens-baby-children-s.jpg

    As 2018 comes to a close, I am sharing some of my top posts from this year. 

    A recent article from NBC talks about a Massachusetts family who are raising their twin boys without a gender. The idea behind this parenting philosophy is to allow the twins to decide for themselves when they’re older.

    In the story, the mother made the fair point about how we do have ways how we stereotype little boys and little girls that aren’t always helpful. Many raise girls to be prissy and “girlie,” while boys are raised to be tough and to not cry. These aren’t necessary aspects of masculinity and femininity, on that point, I agree. However to combat those stereotypes, we don’t need to raise children without gender. There are other, healthier approaches. (more…)

  • Parents allowing children to decide their gender: why?

    child-childrens-baby-children-s.jpg
    A recent article from NBC talks about a Massachusetts family who are raising their twin boys without a gender. The idea behind this parenting philosophy is to allow the twins to decide for themselves when they’re older.

    In the story, the mother made the fair point about how we do have ways how we stereotype little boys and little girls that aren’t always helpful. Many raise girls to be prissy and “girlie,” while boys are raised to be tough and to not cry. These aren’t necessary aspects of masculinity and femininity, on that point, I agree. However to combat those stereotypes, we don’t need to raise children without gender. There are other, healthier approaches.

    It’s absolutely unnecessary for a person to take an otherwise normal, healthy baby and to then introduce confusion into their child’s life. Is letting a person “decide” their gender so important?

    I hear people talk about how complicated gender is.

    For the vast majority of people, it’s pretty simple. And so I return to my question, why introduce confusion? Why introduce additional complexity?

    I know to some this seems progressive and enlightened.

    It’s unwise.

    I saw a video a few years ago of a British woman who was doing this with her son. It’s heartbreaking.

    If your approach to parenting is doing something that society has historically not done and which contradicts the wisdom of human experience: it’s wrong. Raising a child is not the time to try new experiments.

    The idea that you can raise a kid without gender and then let them decide their gender is self-defeating.

    The idea that you can take a baby boy or girl and raise this child neutral of gender, and later let them decide their gender, it’ll be in the context of them having been raised as unaware to their gender. When they decide which gender they want to be, it’ll be from a context of not having been raised according to a particular gender. It’s not like you’ll decide you want to be a boy and instantly know how to do it. You weren’t shown! You weren’t taught! You were intentionally kept in the dark.

    Part of the justification that I’ve seen is that this helps a child to embrace their identity. I would argue that it actually raises a child ignorant of an important aspect of their identity. This style of parenting takes away the foundation of manhood and womanhood.

    And for what purpose?

    According to a 2016 study by the Williams Institute, transgendered people make up just over one half of one percent of the American population. And the transgender life is not an easy one. Tragically, the rate of attempted suicides within that community is 40% according to The Report of the 2015 U.S. Transgender Survey.

    With the Massachusetts family, the mother is an engineer and talks of the gender stereotypes in her field, how it is often male-dominated. That’s probably true. But how does it help that to raise boys as if they’re not?

    Gender comes from God. It’s fundamental to his creation of humanity. God made men and women and we are both created in his image. We should celebrate masculinity and femininity. Men and women compliment each other.

    Josh Benner is the associate pastor at Cornerstone Evangelical Free Church in Fergus Falls, Minnesota and has a Master of Divinity from Trinity Evangelical Divinity School. He enjoys writing about faith and culture. He lives with his wife Kari in Minnesota.

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