Ladies and Gentlemen, I ask you: Is it the end of men? That was the premise of an Atlantic cover story from July, in an in-depth look at this alleged decline--or rise, depending on your perspective. Now the BBC reports today on an article in the British Journal of Psychiatry that suggests that changes in the economic and social sphere in the 21st century could potentially lead to increased incidences of depression for men. As traditionally "male" jobs disappear in manufacturing and physical labor and women, due to higher college enrollment rates, increasingly become the "breadwinners," men will become depressed louts, so the thinking goes. (For the record, there is a Simpson's episode that explores this phenomenon extensively--Homer loses his job and eventually attempts to commit suicide. It aired in 1990.)

So men are on the way out, apparently, if they were any real ones left in the first place. (Kay S. Hymowitz offers in a Wall Street Journal piece entitled "Where Have The Good Men Gone? that "guys" have become the term for "males who are not boys or men but something in between.") Women now hold the majority of both jobs and managerial positions in the United States, as well as outnumbering men three to two as campus undergrads. But thank heavens we still have Wikipedia, which, it's worth noting, you can edit from the couch.

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Eli Rosenberg