Reading Susan Sorenson's statistics on sexual assault in universities was mind numbing. Unfortunately much of the problem is a reflection of the "Jock" culture which permeates High School life, often supported by the "cheerleading" culture. Young men learn early on that "real" men, with muscles and form accentuated by tight fitting trousers, padded crotch and shoulder pads, are "studs" capable of both explosive violence on the field and being sexually attractive. Boys on the football team are taught to see themselves as the Adonises, the alpha males of High School culture. Those leaning toward academics are nerds. This continues into adult life where the higher up the economic and financial ladder a male climbs, the more brazen and open can be his attempts to assault women and demonstrate his manliness. The Cuomos, Epsteins, Gaetzes, Weisteins and Trumps of this world lead the pack and collect women like hunters their stuffed trophies. This is not a new phenomenon. Ghengis Kahn's genes are present in about 16 million men alive today.

Sorenson makes a case for women being better educated which, given Republican sensitivities to any education about sex, is problematic in a society with Puritan roots, where sex has always been associated with sin. Women know the score and either latch on quickly and exploit the situation or, as Sorensen points out, have their trust and ignorance exploited and become unwilling victims. For a man sexual prowess is seen as male affirming, for a women, having multiple partners opens the door to accusations of immorality. The dichotomy remains central to our culture. Freud's madonna-whore complex is alive and flourishing.

When I taught at an American Catholic High School, I was forced to witness Spirit Line where well trained girls in skimpy costumes jumped and whirled around in complicated athletic routines with everyone shouting and screaming at the tops of their voices. One of the female teachers, a nun, reacting to my European sense of bewilderment that such behavior be allowed in school, replied caustically, "Bump and grind." and walked off to get a cup of coffee in the faculty lounge. Like attendant Vestal virgins, the Cheerleaders attended all the football and sporting activities paying homage to the physical prowess of the males and sometimes the females but the latter with never the same enthusiasm.

American males are part of a gun loving, truck loving, patriarchal, cowboy hat wearing culture, where men storm their way into women's hearts with their ruggedness and can-do attitudes. They are ready to build a house on the prairie at a moment's notice. It's all a bit sad actually. The result is that since this is the way men see themselves, as their sexuality and strength wane, so ED advertisements proliferate and worried older men scurry off to the doctor to be prescribed some blood flow enhancing pharmaceutical product which he prays will re-establish his manhood and give some delight to his wife, who by that time has long ago reached menopausal indifference to the whole male procreative thing.

The culture needs to change and is changing. After the "MeToo" movement, it surprises me that it has taken so long and so much heartache and suffering for women to tell men, over and over again, and in public, just because women are part of the workforce, they will not be treated as sex objects. Unfortunately many of the men controlling the system do not want to know. They feel their patriarchy is being threatened and their rights to control women under scrutiny. There needs to be a rewriting of the definition of what constitutes masculinity so that virtues such as gentleness, compassion and respect are given greater emphasis, more emphasis than just having your brains turned to jelly on the football team. In the Middle Ages the idea of Knighthood was mainly created to protect women and the poor and the downtrodden. We need more knights. Shining armor can be optional but virtue and respect for women necessities. As the great Chaucer pointed out nearly five hundred years ago, "When maestrie cometh, the God Love anon, Beteth his wings and farewell he is gone" which roughly translated means "There can never be love if either sex has power over the other." Love does matter.