Charlie Kirk and the lost men of America

September 30, 2025

OPINION by ANDY CALDWELL

So, exactly how why did Charlie Kirk become so important to a generation of young men whose future is dim because they have been marginalized and forgotten by society?

It is because he pushed back against the radical feminist’s decades-long war against so-called toxic masculinity. Of course, things become progressively worse over time, especially for those young men who are white, heterosexual, and patriotic.

The ones who go to college are told they must apologize for their white privilege and their gender. They have a target on their back by way of critical race theory and the diversity, equity and inclusion bias that insisted on marginalizing them.

Moreover, too many young women have been seduced to believe they don’t need a man nor marriage because they can find fulfillment in pursuing their career rather than forming a family.

All these things have left a significant majority of young men with no compass in life, no sense of value, and no obvious destiny. Charlie Kirk gave these young men hope by pointing them away from the ideology challenging their self-worth, while turning them to God, who has a plan and a fulfilling purpose for their lives, as he does for all of us.

The war that engulfs America is not best defined as a war between the left and the right. Instead, it all has to do with the conflict between those who want our nation to turn back towards God and his gifts such as marriage and family versus those who want us to keep turning away towards secular humanism, atheism, nihilism, and socialism/communism (where government is god-little “g”).

In that regard, perhaps the death of Charlie Kirk will prove to be the turning point for America’s third great awakening? For as the saying goes, “the blood of martyrs is the seed of the church.”

For a further examination of these themes, back in 2022, I wrote a column “The Fall of Man in American Culture.” It is worth reconsidering considering Charlie Kirk’s mission:

I have been tracing America’s transition from a world of faithful pilgrims to nihilistic pirates, that is, discussing that which has caused cultures and civilizations to either flourish or meet their demise. It was British Anthropologist J.D. Unwin who studied the fall of some 86 cultures and civilizations throughout history, only to find that the longevity, health, and well-being of culture was largely determined by their attitudes, customs, and mores having to do with sexuality, faith, and marriage.

Another brilliant scholar, Carle Zimmerman, a Harvard sociologist, studied the role of family in the rise and fall of civilization, determining that the one thing that advanced civilizations had in common was the nuclear family construct. That is, tribal and clan-type family constructs never amounted to much and, on the opposite end, when men and women became so narcissistic and hedonistic that nuclear marriages fell by the wayside, the culture soon met its demise.

Here are some of the issues affecting men:

1.  The feminist movement was a two-edged sword. As it sought to liberate women, it did so at the expense of men as it attacked so-called toxic masculinity. Along the way, it eviscerated the vital role of men as fathers, heads of households, providers, and protectors.

Specifically, society at large encouraged men to get in touch with their “feminine side” as they abandoned their traditional roles in family and society in deference to the ability of women to supplant them as equals.

2.  The attack on men, became a war on boys. Even though nearly all scientific literature indicates that boys and girls mature at different rates and are stimulated by different things, mothers in the home and teachers in schools began to push back against the things that little boys are made of, including boundless rambunctious energy.

In the 1960’s, with the dispensing of drugs like Ritalin, hyperactive young boys were diagnosed as having attention deficit disorders at twice the rate of girls and were deleteriously drugged accordingly.

3.  Traditionally, one key God-given role of women in society was to domesticate men by way of withholding sex apart from marriage, and sometimes, in marriage.  The free sex movement and the commensurate loss of the fear of God, made possible by way of the pill and abortion, served to throw chastity out the window, and men became somewhat free to roam before, during, and after marriage, sans any personal moral constraints.

Now at full throttle, the hook-up culture has replaced courtship, and porn addiction among men is epidemic.

4.  Subsequent to number 3, no-fault divorce facilitated awarding primary custody to mothers which means the fathers ended up spending more time with their subsequent family rather than their first. The destructive and disruptive impact of this resulted in successive generations of boys who were raised without their natural fathers in the home to guide, mentor, and discipline them, that is, if a man was present at all.

This has proved a disaster for society as nearly every social ill including drug and alcohol abuse, criminality, homelessness, and the like can be traced to boys who were essentially abandoned by their fathers.

5.  There has been a massive loss of 7.5 million jobs among men, such as those found in manufacturing, logging, mining, and the steel industry. These sectors virtually vanished, including by way of environmental regulations, thereby destroying head of household jobs for men without a college education.

The resultant wage loss put pressure on spouses to find work at the expense of family life.

Jordan Peterson said it best, “If you think tough men are dangerous, wait until you see what weak men are capable of!”

Andy Caldwell is the executive director of COLAB in Santa Barbara County and host of The Andy Caldwell Radio Show, weekdays from 3-5 p.m. on  FM 98.5, FM 99.5, AM 1240, AM 1290 and FM 96.9.