Why Men Don't Mature Until They're Forty.

“Maturity is a bitter disappointment…” Kurt Vonnegut

Men don’t mature as fast as women. This doesn’t surprise women at all, but it really freaks men out. Imagine learning you’re going to be a goofball until you’re practically middle-aged, meaning you’re grossly ill-prepared for things you’re doing now. You marry, have families, take out the garbage a few times, pay the mortgage, go to kid’s softball games, and supposedly you’re — we’re — not mature enough to do any of these things. We shouldn’t even be allowed to drive. We should still be on bikes — or scooters at best.

So why aren’t women running things? Why leave the country in the hands of goofballs? Politicians obviously aren’t mature. President Trump may have the smallest vocabulary of any American President. He still calls Kim Jong-un a “friend” which is worrisome since Dennis Rodman can’t do that and keep a straight face.

And why do we keep rewarding male immaturity when there are intelligent, mature women waiting to take over?

How did this happen? And why do we keep rewarding male immaturity when there are intelligent, mature women waiting to take over?

To start with, maturity didn’t mean anything for most of our history. Wars were fought, governments came and went, religion festered creating no end of conflict and strife. Essentially it was just a bunch of nasty goofballs making everyone else miserable. The Seven Years War, for instance, lasted, well, seven years. It involved five nations, with Great Britain gaining huge tracts of North American territories, only to lose the largest to American Independence.

As wars go, it was a wash. The French cried “Viva la Révolution,” royal heads rolled, then other countries did the same inciting more wars, more nonsense over land disputes, until the 20th century when there were two major world wars. Other than stopping some seriously twisted dictators, both wars did little more than move some borders, creating national, religious and tribal differences that still exist today.

Supposedly, being old and wise doesn’t necessarily make you mature.

It’s surprising we allowed this, but that’s men for you. We look for competence (not often), popularity (too often) and overall sneakiness (bingo). Winston Churchill was sneaky. So was Ronald Regan. Supposedly, being old and wise doesn’t necessarily make you mature. Churchill was eventually dumped as Prime Minister because he was big baby. Regan took so many naps, even Nancy thought he was a baby. How these men didn’t end up wandering around with pacifiers in their mouths is beyond me.

We know now there’s a reason for all this. Men don’t mature until they’re forty because, simply put, we can’t. According to a study done at the University of Oxford, men may have larger brains than women, but women’s brains develop earlier and are way more efficient. The researchers determined this based on functional and structural networks of the brain that extend into adulthood.

By tracking the brains of 121 participants, aged 4 to 40 years, they found a delay in long-term development of males, possibly due to sports and hanging around with each other. By the time men mature, usually during the summer when they have to watch tennis, males start to feel responsible. Unfortunately, this lapses once the Western finales start, when beer and Fritos return men to adolescence and general overall stupidity.

Gaining equality is a strange business, and nasty habits get passed around like guacamole dip.

Why haven’t women taken over at this point? Because they’re watching sports, too. Gaining equality is a strange business, and nasty habits get passed around like guacamole dip. To achieve anything, women have to pass on the guacamole, and realize extra innings are the best time to win ridings where men are on the sofas farting and burping.

Toledo could be won in a heartbeat, same with Cincinatti and St. Louis. These are heavy sports cities with tons of farting and burping. All a female candidate has to do is base her campaign on Pepto Bismol. In some states this has worked already, mostly where President Trump has caused more heartburn and indigestion than Richard Nixon or James Garfield.

What remains a sticking point is how women view male immaturity. Sure, some guys turn out like Homer Simpson, but kids love clowns (unless they’re Stephen King’s clowns), and fighting with you’re your dad over a bag of Fritos seems harmless, although still stupid.

A quick scan of Reddit showed some explanation for this, starting in university where women typically stayed in and chatted, while men went out drinking and came back with traffic cones on their heads.

It isn’t until you realize your kids are growing up dumber than Bart Simpson, that women realize they’ve got a problem on their hands. And it ain’t just genetics. Social factors like seeing your dad singing Bob Seger songs in his underwear could damage just about anyone.

A quick scan of Reddit showed some explanation for this, starting in university where women typically stayed in and chatted, while men went out drinking and came back with traffic cones on their heads.

“Knowing what some men did back then,” AlphaBluePill surmised, “I’m surprised they made it to adulthood.”

Maybe they didn’t — or that’s the consensus on AskWomen. In listing what they found immature about men, many found ultra-competiveness to be stupid, unless it’s a game you’re both playing, and you’re winning, and then it’s not stupid, you’re hubby’s just pathetic at games.

If it’s giving your kids a thrill though, that’s fine, but the minute hubby crawls into bed with his conductor’s hat, he needs help.

Same goes for men who have childish hobbies like model trains, which no sane woman would ever find fun. If it’s giving your kids a thrill though, that’s fine, but the minute hubby crawls into bed with his conductor’s hat, he needs help.

As a woman on Quora explained, “If the man you love is smart, but not smart enough, you can’t teach them to be smarter.”

Some women accept this as a challenge, but not the majority. Ask anyone in the #MeToo Movement and they’ll tell you immature men usually end up being perverts, pedophiles or Monster Truck fanatics. Better they’re found out early (possibly in kindergarten) and put in special schools where they can at least learn to fry and egg without exposing themselves.

Ann Coulter doesn’t mind immature men as long as they’re Republican, Christian and like really skinny women. “I love to engage in repartee with people who are stupider than I am,” she admitted, then went on to say some really stupid things. She was rumored to be dating Jimmy Walker, Mr. Dyno-nite from Good Times, but she denies it, probably because he isn’t stupid enough, or not into skinny women who irritate entire countries.

Many women on AskWomen, confess to being “motherly” when they should kick their boyfriend’s ass to the curb.

If men aren’t in a hurry to mature, maybe it’s conditioning. Many women on AskWomen, confess to being “motherly” when they should kick their boyfriend’s ass to the curb. “They always give you that shy look off the top,” one woman said, “until they want you washing their socks.”

There’s a limit, and women realize there’s a limit. Maybe equality is opening their eyes to immature men. At least mature men accept women in executive positions, whereas immature men are seriously pissed. “They’re taking jobs away from us men,” they say, forgetting they’ve never actually held an executive job, or anything even resembling an executive job.

It would be nice if more women were like Ann Coulter, enjoying stupid conversations while displaying so much racial bigotry, it’s hard to imagine what she classifies as stupid or immature.

Mason Cooley once summarized it by saying “For many, immaturity is an ideal, not a defect.”

At least she’s giving immature and stupid men a chance. Most women won’t, making it hard for men to enjoy their immaturity. They don’t see the need to grow up. They’re proud of who they are. Mason Cooley once summarized it by saying “For many, immaturity is an ideal, not a defect.”

Well, not even Ann Coulter is buying that. Men are just being men, and if immaturity makes them stupid, at least she has a dinner companion. She might even accept immaturity, much like she accepts her own bigotry. It’s not stupid if you wear it proudly as columnist Dave Barry did when he was asked about retirement. “What I look forward to,” he said, “is continued immaturity followed by death.”

Immature men last longer than mature ones. They’re less prone to ulcers, heart attacks and depression. Bigots, on the other hand, die like unloved dogs.

Ann Coulter knows Dave Barry. As far as she’s concerned, if he’s half as funny in death as he is in living, she’s looking forward to meeting him in the after life. Not that Dave’s leaving us any time soon. Immature men last longer than mature ones. They’re less prone to ulcers, heart attacks and depression. Bigots, on the other hand, die like unloved dogs.

So you can’t really blame men for not maturing until we’re practically seniors. We prefer staying healthy. If that’s considered dumb, we don’t mind. There’s always the Western Finales, and beer and Fritos and, of course, Ann Coulter. She always needs a dinner companion.

Robert Cormack is a novelist, journalist and blogger. His first novel “You Can Lead a Horse to Water (But You Can’t Make It Scuba Dive)” is available online and at most major bookstores. Check out Skyhorse Press or Simon and Schuster for more details.