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Does the search for a lineal sense of masculinity have any relevance to such thorny modern dilemmas as how to balance work and family or how to talk to women? Perhaps. Men have to feel comfortable with themselves before they can successfully confront such issues. This grounding is also critical for riding out the changes in pop culture and ideals. John Wayne and Alan Alda, like violence and passivity, reflect holes in a core that needs fixing. But men can get grounded in many ways, and male retreats provide just one stylized option, though not one necessarily destined to attract most American men.
What do men really want? To define themselves on their own terms, just as women began to do a couple of decades ago. "Would a women's group ask men if it was O.K. to feel a certain way?" asks Jerry Johnson, host of the San Francisco-based KCBS radio talk show Man to Man. "No way. We're still looking for approval from women for changes, and we need to get it from the male camp."
That's the point. And it does not have to come at women's expense. "It is stupid to conclude that the empowerment of women means the disempowerment of men," says Robert Moore, a psychoanalyst at the C.G. Jung Institute in Chicago. "Men must also feel good about being male." Men would do well, in fact, to invite women into their lives to participate in these changes. It's no fun to face them alone. But if women can't or won't, men must act on their own and damn the torpedoes. No pain, no gain.