Byline: LEO MCKINSTRY
SITTING outside a cafe in the centre of Colchester yesterday, my wife and I planned to have a relaxing drink in the balmy afternoon sun. But any pleasure in our surroundings was soon obliterated by the terrifying vision of the Essex male in summer garb.
Wave upon wave of these fashion victims waddled past us, their plastic sandals triumphantly displaying bulbous toes, their baggy shorts proudly revealing pale grey legs, their T- shirts carrying puerile slogans about sex or sport, and their shaven heads glinting in the sunlight.
And though most of the men I saw yesterday must have been over the age of 30, they resembled nothing so much as an army of giant, overgrown toddlers - a new, horrific breed of babymen.
Of course, the chief babyman and role model for all intellectually stunted males is none other than David Beckham.
For although in his 30th year and now the father of two, Beckham wields a curious influence over men not only younger, but also those substantially older than himself.
Not that his followers are confined to Essex. Every place in Britain now seems to be filled with these babymen, dressing and acting like snarling infants.
A study due out this week from the British Economic and Social Research Council will reveal the extent of this refusal to grow up. Only a small minority of those aged 30 can be classified as adults on criteria such as financial independence or having left home, so childhood and youth now take up half the average lifetime.
Over the past few months, I have spent a great deal of time in France, writing a book.
One of the joys of staying there was to be among men who had embraced adulthood, who thought politeness and chivalry were still virtues, who knew a good time did not require drunkenness and violence, and who believed flesh-baring was for the beach rather than the High Street.
Unlike the British, most French fathers feel it is their duty to look after their children, not look like them. So it was a shock to return home and see the British male in all his furious, teenage glory.
ON ONE of the first nights after my return, I made the mistake of switching on Big Brother, to be greeted by the sight of some scrawny male contestant wearing just a pair of shorts and blubbing his eyes out to the camera.
In both his lachrymose selfpity and his uncovered state, he had captured the essence of modern babyman.
I switched channels and found an interview with two D-Day veterans, resplendent in their blazers and selfdeprecating heroism. It was impossible not to be struck by the contrast between the two generations of Britons.
Like toddlers, babymen seem constantly to be on the verge of a tantrum, unable to control themselves if their will is thwarted. They are like children with Attention Deficit Disorder, in permanent rebellion against authority.
That is why aggression and rudeness now permeate our society, reflected in phenomena such as road rage and violence against hospital staff.
'The gentleness of English civilisation is its most marked characteristic,' wrote George Orwell in 1941. How absurd that remark seems today, when we have to tolerate levels of petty crime unthinkable only four decades ago.
Again like toddlers, babymen live only in the moment.
Seeking instant gratification, they lack all sense of perspective and patience.
Household debt is shooting up because babyman gives no thought to the morrow. If he wants something, he just puts it on plastic.
Sexually incontinent and self-centred, babyman does not have the word fidelity in his vocabulary. Rod Liddle, the dishevelled, puffy-faced, serial philanderer and writer, who was conducting an affair even while on his honeymoon, is a classic of the type.
As is Lee Chapman, he of the 'energetic lovemaking session', whose now notorious libido resulted in the hospitalisation of his actress wife Leslie Ash.
Chapman, a former footballer and nightclub owner, refuses to let his age, 44, inhibit his preferred mode of dress: ripped jeans with a tight-fitting T-shirt and necklace.
Nor does he let it hinder his relaxation. Currently in Ibiza with his recuperating wife, Chapman was seen this weekend leaving one of the island's nightclubs shortly before dawn.
And it is no surprise that binge-drinking is also one of the hallmarks of this new breed.
Indeed, as Friday night arrives, the babyman can perform a frightening imitation of a helpless child, first losing control of his speech, then sliding into incoherent rage, before falling over and emptying the contents of his stomach over his shirt.
Because he never grows up, babyman clings to the pursuitsof his childhood, like pop music.
So we now have 40-year-olds who take more interest in their CD collections than in their wives, while rock festivals from Glastonbury to Reading are dominated by middle-aged men who should be looking after their garden or washing the car.
It is perhaps telling that modern Britain is governed by a Prime Minister who once led a rock group and still boasts of his fondness for playing the electric guitar.
Like a child, babyman loves computer games and if he can be bothered to read, he will probably turn to Harry Potter rather than something intended for grownups. Indeed, the awesome success of Harry Potter among adults is an indicator of how childish our society has become.
In the same way, babyman's favourite film is The Lord Of The Rings, the kind of fairy tale that used to be aimed at children, though he will also get the new Spider-Man movie when it comes out on DVD.
Like a toddler, babyman's humour is essentially scatalogical and slapstick.
So he adores the Graham Norton show, especially when members of the audience talk about their embarrassing toilet or bedroom moments.
AND BABYMAN often uses the giggling babytalk of the kindergarten when referring to personal matters.
There was a cringe-making moment last week when the new EU Commissioner, Peter Mandelson, referred publicly to his pet dog's problems in taking a 'wee-wee', the sort of baby language which would have been unthinkable in political discourse only ten years ago.
Today's neurotic, all-pervasive obsession with football is another sign of the rise of babyman. Soccer has, of course, always had a huge following in this country, but the childish hysteria that it now attracts is a modern development.
In the past, the game was seen in its proper context; on the day of the 1966 World Cup Final between England and West Germany, for instance, Britain's best-selling tabloid paper, the Daily Mirror, ran a front page story about the economy, rather than the match.
Babyman would never tolerate that. Soccer is often the driving force of his life, a substitute for patriotism, religion, family and community.
Yet is there a more undignified sight than a grown man, tanked up with beer and clad in an England shirt, bellowing abusive slogans and then descending into noisy tears when his country is defeated?
Once more, they are the tears of the toddler denied his wishes.
During the recent Euro 2004 championships, I was interested to see that in France there was far less frenzied flag-waving and face-painting than in Britain. But then the French seem to have retained a deeper, more genuine love of country than our fake, soccerfixated version of patriotism.
In the world of babyman, there are no stirring heroes, no inspiring role models.
Instead, there are pantomime celebrities - usually from the worlds of sport or pop music - whose antics mirror babyman's own outlook: laughable figures like Sven Goran Eriksson.
Despite fighting three wars over the past 25 years, the British public has not embraced a single military hero whose fame could rival that of a workaday Premiership footballer.
But it is not entirely babyman's fault. The phenomenon has arisen largely because the British male has lost his role in a feminised society.
In both the workplace and the family, men have found themselves marginalised, while in so many areas the state has taken over the role of breadwinner and father.
But instead of being content to live in a cocoon of childish irresponsibility, men should reassert themselves by displaying the virtues of traditional manliness.
Babyman might think he's cool, with his smutty T-shirt and his fancy iPod, but in truth he's an embarrassment to his gender.
