From “The meaning crisis, and how we rescue young men from reactionary politics” by Aaron Rabinowitz:

Everyone needs meaning in their lives. Society used to hand men a simple set of narratives for meaning-making: provider, protector, patriarch. Now some segments of the male population feel they are denied those paths, told that it is chauvinistic to see themselves that way, and that progress demands they sit down, shut up, and let others take the lead. While that is good and right for those who are finally being allowed to also participate in society, many men feel they are denied any appealing alternatives. If a large swathe of the population feels they are being denied avenues for meaning-making in their lives, it becomes everyone’s problem, because they will find a way to make their lives meaningful, and in the absence of water they will drink sand.

A correspondent comments:  “Creating spaces to explore models for living as cooperative partners rather than in a hierarchy of superior-inferior positions seems like a good idea.”