The old saying “boys will be boys” has now become “boys will be boys, and we’ve got to do something about it.”
Unfortunately, that’s hurting our young men and boys, leaving them with negative experiences in school and inflicting lasting emotional and psychological harm.
“In the United States, researchers say several economic and social changes have combined to change boys’ and men’s trajectories,” The New York Times admits. “School has changed in ways that favor girls, and work has changed in ways that favor women. Boys are often seen as troublemakers, and men have heard that masculinity is ‘toxic.’” The Times adds, “Researchers say there is something about modern-day school that is not enabling boys to fulfill their potential.”
While researchers can’t seem to figure out what’s happening in schools that might be turning boys away, it’s pretty clear to everyone else. Schools have become hostile to boys, forcing them to act, think, and learn in ways that are antithetical to their nature.
For one, the nature of boys to be more fidgety and playful is now viewed as a disease requiring medication or at least some type of intervention to stop them from being who they are. The intervention often comes in some form of social engineering designed to force boys to be something they’re not, and medicating them is often the wrong approach.
“We have mistaken their natural impulses in many cases for unnatural impulsivity,” writes Erica Komisar at the Institute for Family Studies. “Boys are naturally impulsive, risk-taking, and physical in their behavior. Although it is a parent’s role to provide structure in the early years, play — and specifically physical play — is the natural way boys learn. The problem is that we have created a system that goes against the grain of boys’ instincts rather than going with the grain and providing some structure to their unique learning style, which is gender related.”
Komisar adds that when we demand that boys act against their nature, they often go into fight-or-flight mode. This leaves them feeling unsupported and alienated in the classroom, while also developing a negative attitude toward learning and school in general, which makes them less likely to succeed.
“By most measures, the well-being of boys has been declining for quite a while. Educational achievement has been going down, suicide is on the rise, and men are less likely to enter the workforce and rise up the ladder than in the past,” reports Hot Air’s David Strom. “Men are being beaten down by a dominant culture that keeps punishing them for being male. Is it any wonder that so many boys are ‘discovering’ that they are girls? By making that simple change, a toxic male can vault above a natal female in prestige. So much so that any girl who objects to a boy strolling into their locker room and using their male strength to outcompete them is attacked as a transphobic bigot.”
Elizabeth Heubeck of Education Week writes about the organization’s study looking further into the problem and concludes, “Teachers see boys, overall, as having more trouble sitting still, less focused and engaged in class, less willing to take on leadership roles, and generally less motivated to perform well academically. The survey results provide important clues about why boys are lagging behind their female counterparts throughout their K-12 education.” Heubeck noted that one teacher in the survey revealed a novel approach to engaging boys: “That style of instruction wasn’t working well for her or her young students — most notably some of the boys in her class. Informed by the latest research on early childhood development, Arrow now runs her classroom much differently than she used to, incorporating music, movement, guided play, and choice time into the curriculum — while still meeting state learning standards.”
At Boys’ Latin School in Baltimore, cellphones are banned, and middle and high schoolers have more hands-on activities. There’s a focus on social interaction, movement, and learning through active participation in lessons.
While these are good ideas, they don’t address the broader issue of the negative way boys are viewed by many in the fields of education and psychology, where there is a real movement to change boys instead of helping them grow into functional, productive, and thriving members of society.
Daniel Cox writes on the American Enterprise Institute’s Survey Center on American Life finding: “The rising rejection of feminism among young men is almost certainly linked to growing feelings that American society has become more hostile to men. In 2019, less than one-third of young men reported that men experienced some or a lot of discrimination in American society. Only four years later, close to half (45 percent) of young men now believe men are facing gender-based discrimination. For some young men, feminism has morphed from a commitment to gender equality to an ideology aimed at punishing men.”
We’re losing our young men and boys, and as they grow older, there’ll be serious consequences in society if we don’t start turning the tide.
Simply changing teaching methods and lessons that accommodate the unique learning style of boys, albeit needed, will not suffice to turn the trajectory of their lives. Pedagogy and politics aside, in order for boys to become men, having strong, positive, caring male role models is the best way for them to reach their full potential.
