@Iwpoe,

Thanks for the response. Didn't see it last night when replying to Brian.

A preliminary question: how large a group of people would you advice? I ask both because some of my negative criticisms would be neutralised in sufficently small groups, and because what I'm most concerned about is the collective negative influence of large groups of youths on one another. 

iwpoe wrote:

That said, training in the so-called martial virtues: courage, honor, physical prowess, and focused expertiese are at least more likely to be compatible with the soul of men and boys, though I wouldn't avoid teaching them to girls for whom nature has made it possible. Also there are still feminine virtues having to do with sexual selection and motherhood more generally, which men should be aware of, even taught if they can manage it, but which are something more necessary and natural to women on the whole. It is conceivable that this part of education begin pre-puberty, if only just.

Is it a good idea to specifically encourage these virtues as masculine though? Virtue comes from the habit of performing the correct action in a given situation, and in most cases the gender of the agent doesn't effect the scenario (practically there may of course be good reasons why, should the option be there, one sends a man rather than a woman, but this doesn't mean that the obligation would not fall equally on the woman if the situation arises).You're right (of course! about there being demographic preferences to certain activities, though I wouldn't say X activities are representative of different virtues as much as different way of displaying the same set of virtues.

Practically it's also a bad idea to give adolescent males even more platform to display their competitive streaks. A problem with US culture in particular is this implicit idea that wining is in and of itself virtues (acting in accord with in the right goals is conducive of virtue, yes, so wining at somethings might be virtues). This is not to say competitive activities are necessarily but at this point in the life the issue is like to be too much rather than too little.

Could you elaborate on what you mean about motherhood? There are certain sets of responsibilities towards infants but I don't think it's feasible to go into these until one has a mature grasp of one's responsibilities towards other adults.

iwpoe wrote:

2. Post-puberty sexual difference turns education time towards a sexual dynamic. It is important for children to become acquainted with this, but unnecessary that they be occupied by it with it present at all times. The scene of flirting in the classroom is ubiquitious in teen media because it is unbiquitious in life. Sexual desire, as long recognized, is also the strongest occasion for confusion about virtues.

Historically same-sex bordering schools were et hem rather infamous for cultivating other vices. Even aside from that I don't think the issue of sexual confusion is actually mitigated by gender separation, in as much as young men have a tendency to go on about it a great deal amongst themselves, often in an unrealistic and irresponsible way (which is fine for fun of course but shouldn't be allowed to inform too deeply their actual view on sexual relations - I'd rather have them familiar with the opposite sex from an early age to counter this).

Whatever way it's done it's important to get away fom the notion that adolescent relationships, even those from a little later on which include sexual activity, are in someway 'play' relationships. That idea (which of course many people never grow out of) has had a more damaging effect on the collective psyche than the sexual revolution itself.

iwpoe wrote:

A woman must especially learn how to choose men well and not based on the arbitray advice of friends and society, and in a way very different from how a man must, since she will generally be the object of constant even deceptive attention, and a man chosen "for his hair" or some other merely airy criteria- even apart from pregnancy -can easily damage her soul for years.

Yes, but again I'm not sure if this isn't merely supervenient on general moral grounds as to what makes a person good. Yes, there are going to be other factors in sexual preference, some of which are natural if not demographically universal, and others of which are relatively arbitrary e.g. preference in hairstyles, but these are by their very nature not something that is learnt (in fact what is being encouraged here is rational prioritization of these things, something men need just as much). 

iwpoe wrote:

Also, strengthening of sexual selection criteria generally makes men fall in line. If women want a clear set of things, men generally fall in line, and we want them to want a set of virtues, not something else, nor even mere occasional signs of them.

Hmm I'd worry that might be borderline immoral in other ways. Accounts like NL already do too much for my liking to encourage gold-digging and nest-feathering.

Last edited by DanielCC (4/29/2016 6:04 am)