Rant of the Exiles

A single female friend in her early thirties asked me to blog about why people should get married. She's been dating men who seek marriage as if it's something to cross off their checklist - they want children before they get too old, they're lonely and desire companionship, etc.  If I had to guess at the thinking behind the question, she senses something off about the attitude and tone of these men's responses to her question. Or there might be something off about how she asks the question and her expectations concerning their responses. We'll address both possibilities. I'm also assuming she is the one posing this question to men. It's difficult for me to imagine guys offering canned reasons for pursuing marriage without first being put on the spot. If guys open with unsolicited sharing about loneliness and wanting children, that's really, really not good. First let me note, there is nothing wrong wanting children or addressing loneliness a...

How God invented the triad I hate leadership books. They remind me of everything I should be doing as a leader but not doing today. I feel guilty, insecure, and ashamed after reading them. So when a friend of mine recommended checking out  Tribal Leadership , I balked. But I finally got around to reading it and the book is awesome because it's completely about Jesus, though he's never mentioned by name. Language matters:  The premise of the book is that tribes are groups of about 20-150 people and each tribe has a culture that can be categorized in stages. The key insight to the three authors' research is each stage is defined by its culture and the culture is defined by language. That's the key to making the book work - listen to how people talk about their company, their group, their church and you can determine what type of culture they participate in and what stage of leadership they're at. Stage One: Life sucks  ==> "Everything th...

I love Milo Yiannopoulus's viral two-part series titled "Sexodus" . It is one of the few nuanced, well-researched articles that attacks feminism and defends men's rights without descending into vitriol and misogyny. My journey with the men's rights movement (aka " manosphere ") started with Wesley Yang's  Paper Tigers . The New York Magazine's feature article from May 2011 blew me way. He examined how internal and external cultural biases stunt the social and economic growth potential of Asian American men. It was a mainstream unveiling of a phenomenon almost every Asian American guy has personally experienced - the bamboo ceiling and discrimination. The 9,000 word essay wasn't just a rant. Yang provides a complex, well-researched portrait of both victims of the bamboo ceiling and positive examples of Asian American men who broke through. After reading it, I felt more hope than sadness because light was piercing an area that's ...