Britain’s lost boys Sonia Sodha

This is true, and there are probably several factors.

One is that in early reading education, the trajectory for boys vs girls is a little later for boys. So they suffer the consequences of the push to have kids reading earlier - they can't keep up because they aren't developmentally ready and that just snowballs for some. More realization that reading readiness varies a lot in those early years would help a lot of kids, but especially boys.

Because the education system wants them reading early, they start to rely more on strategies that work for kids who aren't developmentally ready, like guessing based on cues like pictures. That can hide the fact that some kids aren't really reading up until about age 10, when they are expected to read for content. The, they can't keep up.

I also think it's notable that the computer and online stuff boys seem drawn to are largely images, like video games, whereas girls are more drawn to social media type things which include text. In my experience a lot of the girls aren't reading l either outside of school, but they are typically reading a little more than many boys.

The biggest problem facing boys is the amount of gaming they're allowed.
There's a denial about how serious this problem is with lots of people claiming that's how boys socialise these days, leave them to it. We really shouldn't be leaving them to it.
Get them off their consoles and phones and they may start to go out and socialise, do some sports or even read a book.
Get them to do chores from a young age and they'll grow up to be more competent, more confident and develop a more willing and able attitude.

Sorry, I just find your posts perplexing........

So, you now seem to be suggesting that the only reason they want to be with you and your friends is because they fancy you and want sex? Before, you made it sound as if they couldn't cope or function socially or form friendships without being a part of the girl gang; and that they would ditch their male friends as soon as they were given entry?

I get it - but honestly, it's just not been my experience at all - I've played in pubs (admittedly, a naice pub, not the one known for fights), a church hall, castles (that was LARP), obviously university as well as people's houses. My ex never played any of this stuff, but he's wandered around with the kids into board game shops and been invited to whatever they have that's child appropriate. Now he was a bit judgemental about the dressing up for LARP, but didn't care about the tabletop, and would have quite enjoyed Warhammer if you didn't have to paint the figures first (after all, kids have been playing with toy soldiers forever - it's just a riff on Risk if you think about it).

When I told my friends and colleagues that I was off for a weekend long game with my uni buddies they were all either amused (that a grown adult still did this) or interested - not one had any issue with it.

I've seen posts on the local facebook group asking for club ideas for more geeky children (where I live now most people are more involved with local sport clubs) - no Games Workshop here, but things like lego are suggested

I guess that's what makes life interesting and makes this all the more complicated - not only is everyone different, but the society around everyone is different.

We're 19, 20, 21. What do you think we have?
And, yes, we as young women obviously think similarly about them, but not to the extent of ditching our "galmates".
And I'm sure there lies the difference. We NEED other girls/women to help us cope with boys/men. They don't need friends to cope with us. We're not a threat!

Have to say I can't relate to your post at all.

What do you think you and your girl group have that the boys want so badly?

OK I'm generalising.
Yes most boys have male best friends but it was rare to find a boy at school or college who DIDN'T prefer to be around us.
The problem isn't so much "they want or need male friends" as "they will do anything to get RID of male friends and know me instead".
And I am NOT being pretentious - i could name 20 other young women who'd say the same.

It's not rubbish. Males and females are different in biological make-up and there are clearly some generalised differences which result from that. Of course individual personality often over-rides some of these factors, but at a deeper level there is a hard drive. Why would human beings be any different from other mammals and species which are divided into two sexes? Male bodies, even in childhood are programmed to be receptive to large surges of testosterone in puberty, in a way that girls bodies are not.....which is why women suffer negative health effects when they take artificial testosterone in quantities typical with males.

Testosterone, and oestrogen, both impact our mental state as well as our physical state. When you become pregnant your body is flooded with hormones which compel you to respond in certai ways; and after birth the same flood happens. Female brains are receptive to this in ways that male brains are not.Nobody is trying to put girls down. Girls ands women have absolute value and integrity as females, as well as through being individualised human beings.

Recognising that there are some generalised differences between boys and girls and between men and women is not to suggest that women are inferior. Part of the reason we are now beset by gender ideology is because of the crusade to suggest that there are no obvious differences: that being a woman or a man is just a matter of sociaisation, and that anyone, even the male of the species, can become a woman, for example, by performing gender.

Recognising that there are some differences between the sexes - in terms of trends and averages - is not to suggest that we must all be forced to perform gender roles whethere they suit us, or work for us, or not.

Girls have absolute equal opportunity when it comes to being unpleasant, mean, and so on.

I do see where you are coming from.
My point was that people believe in those stereotypes, and can be shocked and in some cases aggressive when they realise that the upstairs rooms of their local pub is booked out for RPGs/ board games/ table top battles.
Very few people will know that games workshop has open evenings/days where people can go and paint and play games all day. Even less know that sometimes the results from these games are recorded and have an influence on the direction that the global story goes.
My worry about this is that various games are now being changed to pacify those that claim (make big noises) that the games are not inclusive especially when these people are never (even after the changes) going to play.

I did use RPG as a generic term. but online to me would be mmorpg.

Sorry, I didn't realise you were an AD&D player/were into Warhammer - since you were saying things that seemed very stereotyped, and not my experience at all. Felt like someone who's only seen US TV shows ridiculing it all.

On various threads on MN where RPG players have been brought up as a better source of male partner, it has been shot down as those that play are seen as basement dwellers, socially award and still live with mum and dad.

This really - just saying 'RPG' - rather than tabletop RPG, or LARP generally suggests computer games to me - along with the idea that they're basement dwellers still living with mum or dad - that's more of an online gamer stereotype, since the other role-play games do involve getting out and meeting people, and as I say, I've been doing it for nearly 30 years, and the vast majority of people I've gamed with were utterly normal people, reflecting the wide range of society.

I absolutely agree with this - like in the NHS, league tables tend to lead to gaming the system, rather than analysing what's lead to a poor result and working to actually improve it.

In my kid's primary they did a thing where they raced through 2 years of a subject in 1 year, then did it again the following year. They felt that it let them stretch the kids that need stretching, and repeat stuff for the kids that needed the repetition - that it let them individualise better for the students. They're also willing to move kids up and down a year (not UK) - so my son, who couldn't read when he started, they moved down a year so he had time to catch up. My other son, they just abandoned the idea of teaching him cursive when it became clear that was causing more problems and stress than it would solve.

At primary especially, they need to balance academics with social development, and that is hard, but that is also very important.

I want to see girls catch up, of course I do, and as the discrepancy in maths (I don't know about science) appears to be down to 0.4%, that seems pretty achievable to me. That gap in English is over 11%.

so how do you feel as the mother of a son, that boys are still doing better in maths and science?

Are you aware there's a middle ground that lets people volunteer without heaps of unnecessary paperwork?

The discrepancy between girls and boys achieving Grade 4 and above in English (@noblegiraffe · Yesterday 10:43) is not a stereotype. It's a statistic that has implications for us all and, as a feminist and mother of a son, I welcome the chance to talk about it and exchange ideas and views, even if I don't agree with every post.

Boys have more T in utero.

Here's a fascinating (if tangential) article on male and female twins, and prenatal T transfer in utero, and effects in later life:

pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/30886089/

As Warrior says, it's always a mix of nature and nurture, and always will be.

(And I'm not someone who permits bullying or aggressive behaviour from boys.)

If nothing else your post shows that its not just men that mansplain things.

I have been in the community for years and am passing on what I and others have seen and lived through.

The most there is, is a lack of knowledge (which you are also displaying here, thinking these are online things)**

I'm not sure where you even get the idea that I think that these are online things.

https://www.mumsnet.com/talk/_chat/5287812-1-in-10-women-murdered-by-a-man-are-murdered-by-their-son-and-this-is-an-increasing-trendedone-in-en?page=6&reply=142720290

https://www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2025/mar/05/more-than-170-mothers-killed-by-sons-15-years-uk-report

I don't know what the cause is - and think research a bloody good idea - but some women are paying a high price being left picking up the peices when problems with their sons occur.

yep, i learned a lot of my feminism from my dad. A senior soldier who cooked and cleaned as much as my mum, and who never stopped us doing hobbies, having toys or decorating our rooms exactly as we wanted. As a result my brother can cook and clean and fix a motorbike, and i can cook and clean and shoot and do woodwork and sew.

The exceptions really make the non-exceptions stand out. I used to reinforce the partriarchy with my grandad: on a sunday when i was there for a visit, we'd go to the local working men's club while grandma magicked up Sunday lunch. He'd go to the bar and order a pint and a half of shandy. And the question always came back to him "is the half for a lady?" and thus my half of shandy would come in a half pint ladies (stemmed) glass. It tickled me pink. When i started drinking pints we got a few comments about it but no real pushback.

IIRC studies show that girls do better in single-sex education while boys do better in mixed? As to English - at my all-girls school we had to read Lord of the Flies. None of us complained that it wasn't all hearts, flowers and Mr Darcy.

Agree that working class boys are often neglected. Why is that? oh, i know. It is because women are in charge of absolutely everything everywhere and are intentionally cutting them out of everything.

Poverty and class are not always barriers - but if you remove free libraries then you limit social mobilty. I am from a working class family but one that believed in education as a route out of the pit or the factory and away from poverty. We had free libraries and grammar schools though.

It's not class, it's not poverty - unless you count poverty of expectation.

Exactly - it does happen in many families - yet read posts on here and you'd think men never did anything ever.

We shouldnt be normalising men doing nothing - we should be point out in can does and should be happening.