On Dec. 18, 2025, British comedian and actor Russell Brand walked onto the stage of AmericaFest, the Turning Point USA summit. He talked about his faith in Jesus, speculated that Hunter Biden used Joe Biden’s autopen to smoke crack and delivered a screed against the COVID-19 vaccine.
On Thursday, a London court found him guilty of one count of rape and three counts of sexual assault.
Sexual assault allegations against Brand first surfaced in September 2023, after a joint investigation by The Sunday Times, The Times of London and Channel 4 Dispatches, a British current affairs program.
In other news, men age 18-44 shifted 32 points to the left in the U.S. House of Representatives vote. Nonwhite men age 18-29 shifted 40 points to the left, according to The New York Times’ voter trends analysis.
This was not supposed to happen. The Republican Party was supposed to be the party of men, especially young men. That’s where the manosphere lives and breathes. That’s the party that hosts UFC fights on the South Lawn of the White House.
The Democrats? They’re nothing but a bunch of man-hating feminists and soy boys who think driving pickup trucks and eating red meat is proof of toxic masculinity.
Think back to the Republican National Convention in 2024. The final night was a veritable celebration of Republican manhood. Dana White, president and CEO of the UFC (and apparently Trump’s dream press secretary), spoke. So did legendary professional wrestler Hulk Hogan. Kid Rock performed.
The capstone of the night was the avatar of Republican masculinity himself, Donald Trump.
And it worked, at least for a while. Trump won in part on the strength of a multiracial surge in male support. He won 63% of the white male vote, 50% of the Hispanic male vote, and a surprising 19% of Black men.
There was a lot of loose talk about a Republican realignment. It was never going to last.
Look back again at the list of headliners at the Republican National Convention. As I wrote at the time, White was once caught on video slapping his wife. Hogan had a sexual relationship with the wife of one of his best friends, a radio host I mention because he went by the name Bubba the Love Sponge. And Kid Rock? He had his own sex tape scandal and once faced an assault charge related to a fight in a Nashville, Tennessee, strip club.
And we can’t forget Trump’s own terrible character and horrific treatment of women.
How many fathers actually want their sons to grow up to be like Kid Rock or Donald Trump? Some men might admire their fame or their wealth, but how many want to imitate their character?
Let’s look at more of Turning Point’s lineup at last year’s AmericaFest. In addition to Brand, it included Tucker Carlson, a man who never met a conspiracy theory he didn’t like.
It included Jack Posobiec, a man who came to fame while spreading the lunatic “Pizzagate” conspiracy theory, which, you will recall, claimed that senior officials of the Democratic Party were engaged in a child trafficking ring centered around the Comet Ping Pong pizzeria.
In December 2016, an armed man attacked the pizzeria, firing several rounds with an AR-15 in an attempt to open a locked door. Fortunately, he didn’t harm anyone, but his purpose (at least in part) was to investigate the conspiracy for himself.
Posobiec, a naval officer, was stripped of his security clearance.
And who headlined Turning Point’s alternative to the Super Bowl halftime show? Kid Rock, of course.
Far-right men flocked to figures like Andrew Tate, a pornographer, former kickboxer and manosphere influencer who is now facing his own criminal charges, including for rape and sex trafficking.
Others flocked to Nick Fuentes, a grotesque antisemite who once kicked off a speech by telling his supporters, “I love you, and I love Hitler.”
Collectively, the new right created a masculine culture that felt almost like a parody of a far-left toxic masculinity fever dream. It was a culture that celebrated raw physical aggression, sexual dominance and exploitation and the naked pursuit of wealth and power.
When anyone raised an objection, he or she was immediately mocked, bullied and lectured. Trump, the manosphere, and groups like Turning Point were reaching Generation Z, we were told. Get out of the way, boomers, they said. They’re building a youth movement.
Indeed they did — on the left. Even before the backlash showed up in the polls, I could see it on the ground. The vast majority of young men looked at the masculinity of the new right and reacted with revulsion and horror.
I teach at a Christian college, and I speak at colleges across the country. Despite the crowds at TPUSA events, there was no groundswell of support for bullying, for conspiracies or for the kind of performative peacocking that was on display from men like Pete Hegseth.
It’s as if an entire political movement watched a movie like “Back to the Future” and decided that Biff Tannen was the hero. Or they watched a holiday classic like “A Christmas Story” and cheered for Scut Farkus, the kid who terrorized Ralphie on his way to school.
Since I became a journalist, I’ve been writing about the challenges facing young men. One of the first columns I wrote at the Times was about that very topic — that men were falling behind women in school and that they were dying deaths of despair. The antidote wasn’t for young men to demand respect or assert their power but for them to find a purpose, a virtuous purpose in loving and serving others, that would provide deep meaning to their lives.
And no, I don’t think that the left has always approached young men with an open heart and an open mind. I appreciate what my friend Richard Reeves wrote in his invaluable book, “Of Boys and Men: Why the Modern Male Is Struggling, Why It Matters, and What to Do About It.” Phrases like toxic masculinity wrongly taught young men that there was “something toxic inside them that needs to be exorcised.”
As the MAGA right knows, it’s possible to motivate young men through rage and fear. In fact, it’s possible to motivate anyone through rage and fear, at least for a while. But if you really want to reach a young man’s heart, you need to inspire him, not enrage him. Give him an ideal to aspire to, not a person or group to hate.
At least once a year, I feel compelled to mention Jeffrey Rosen’s book, “The Pursuit of Happiness.” That phrase, taken from the Declaration of Independence, is often misunderstood. It didn’t mean the pursuit of joy or success so much as it meant “the pursuit of virtue — being good rather than feeling good.”
As Rosen wrote, “The classical definition of the pursuit of happiness meant being a lifelong learner, with a commitment to practicing the daily habits that lead to character improvement, self-mastery, flourishing and growth.”
Does anyone on the right want to call the founders “soy boys”? Actually, don’t answer that question.
What it comes down to is that the MAGA right forgot who a young man truly wants to be.
In my experience (with precious few exceptions), young men want to be good men. They want to be people who grow to be successful, yes. But more than that they want not just to be admired, but to be admirable — to be worthy of any honor or praise they receive.
You can hear it when they talk about the most positive influences in their lives. They’ll refer to a football coach who taught them to be honest, respectful and brave. They’ll remember the sergeant who showed them what professional excellence looked like. And they’ll talk about the father or uncle or Sunday school teacher who showed them what it meant to be a good husband and a loving father.
And then, when they have children of their own, they won’t brag about their wealth, or glory in their physical strength, or mock the weak. Instead, with their words and deeds they’ll remind young men of Rudyard Kipling’s poem “If—”:
If you can talk with crowds and keep your virtue,
Or walk with Kings — nor lose the common touch,
If neither foes nor loving friends can hurt you,
If all men count with you, but none too much;
If you can fill the unforgiving minute
With sixty seconds’ worth of distance run,
Yours is the Earth and everything that’s in it,
And — which is more — you’ll be a Man, my son!
This article originally appeared in The New York Times.