To wonder why working class white boys do worse than any other ethnic group, and how we can change this?

[Carla786]

A lot of stuff I've read recently has argued the way school is set up disadvantages boys compared to girls. But this doesn't explain why white working class boys would perform worse than wc boys of other ethnicities.
Asian wc boys are more likely to have present fathers,,but black wc boys less likely than white boys (I think). So absent fathers I'm sure are part of the problem, but then maybe also black boys then have a protective factor that still boosts performance which white boys don't have? What could this be?

And how can white wc boys be helped? The question also remains why white wc girls are apparently less affected too : maybe I suppose tying in to school methods being more suited to the average girl?

https://www.spiked-online.com/2026/03/24/the-betrayal-of-white-working-class-boys/

Part of it must be the flip side of social mobility. Education is a big driver of upward mobility. So those who remain working class are descendants of those who haven't made the transition now over repeated generations. It's a different stock. Not the same for non-white people in the UK, who may have fewer generations of genuine social mobility to filter through, plus the benefit of the selection effect of who choses to back themselves to emigrate.

Also 'working class' is often used (unfairly) as the catch-all description for the 'bottom' socioeconomic group, many of whom are not in fact very economically active and who would struggle to be able to immigrate if they weren't from here. So again, selection effects.

I often wonder if this is due to occupational segregation. Men and women still tend to do different jobs.
A man can be “uneducated” (in terms of academic education) and still make a lot of money in a “male” job. The equivalent “female” jobs tend to be much lower paid so women assume, unless they can be models or successful in the sex industry, to earn money requires formal education.

Really? What do you think went on in all those workers institutes and libraries that were built in every industrial town?

There’s an issue in this country of doing well at school not being cool. Some parents agree with it. Education for any working class kids is very variable.

Lack of engagement affects academic outcomes for both but girls “benefit” from generally being raised to be more compliant - more homework done, lower exclusions for behaviour etc.

Wages tend to follow sex rather than the other way around. Female dominated jobs are lower paid even where skill levels needed are matched for male dominated jobs. That is partly historic and partly the high degree of protectionism of historic differences. I remember the first time I came across stats about salaries in a number of STEM jobs, including medicine and being surprised/not surprised that countries with higher proportions of women in a job tended to pay that job less. It was especially marked in medicine where women have dominated the profession in some countries and it had less pay and status compared to the local male dominated professions.

Right?

”Awash with scholarships” - LOL!

Digital Blackface really is something.

There is no “White History Month” because that’s every month. And there absolutely are diversity policies that would incorporate white people such as things aimed at women, working class people and LGBT people.

As for “white men having the shit kicked out of them” that is something you completely made up.

@CinnamonJellyBeans is looking for a commission from Spiked. She has Brendan O'Neil's style down to a pat.

What?

Education has not been a driver of social mobility since wages and house prices were deliberately disconnected at the turn of the millennium. Selina Todd’s ‘Snakes and Ladders’ is available for those who want links to research.

I also take issue with your idea that there has been loads of time to be mobile and tough to those who haven’t managed it: firstly because there really has not been much time, I am only second generation following the world wars, born in late 70s to boomer parents; and secondly because there should never be a time when those unlucky enough to be born to poor parents should not be given opportunity.

There is an anti-intellectualism in Britain that is very depressing. You find it at all levels of society (I doubt Prince Harry has ever read a serious book), but it's especially strong among the working-class.

I know a French girl with an English husband. She once said to me "oh, he's SO English." As time went by I realised that by "so English" she meant an ignorant, beer-swigging, football-obsessed oaf who would no more go to an art gallery than jump off a cliff. Years ago I remember going in a French supermarket and wandering around the book section. I was amazed to see Voltaire and Flaubert and so on. In an English supermarket you'd never see Jane Austen or Virginia Woolf, just the latest piece of drivel from Jordan.

White working class here - well, I have a working class background. My parents were worried (mainly about the debt) when I said I wanted to go to university. I was the first in my family on both sides and my parents were clueless about how it’s not traditional debt. If I was a boy, I’d have been encouraged to do a trade like the more successful men in my family.

There's some really interesting responses on this thread. There's also a fair bit of snobbery and smug "we do it so why can't they, oh, must be because they're morally and intellectually inferior." This is so narrow minded and plain wrong. There are nuanced and complicated reasons for these outcomes. For the snobs, I hope one day you are on the receiving end of someone else's judgement and maybe you'll acquire some humility.

MN does express itself strongly about the poor behaviour of men. A good thing in my view.

But the wider world still loves men. Gives them all the power, jobs and everything.

Right. I think that’s one for: “As a black man” subreddit.

When the tri-partite system was introduced just after WW2 the third element was Technical schools for those with practical skills but this never really took off which left the Grammar schools for the most academic and the Secondary Modern schools for the not so academic. Of these the Grammar schools succeeded in raising the standards for working class children, like me, they were so successful that they had to go on the altar of 'equality'. We're now left with a system that is offering a curriculum that is not fit for purpose for a large majority of children, offering things which are totally unsuited to ability.

Just to give another point of view. I am Asian and was raised by parents who valued education over everything. Luckily, I was academic and did very well, as did my siblings. But there was a heck of a lot of pressure. We were basically told that we had to be doctors, lawyers, or engineers. The next rank down was Dentists and pharmacists. If we did badly, we might end up as teachers. And that was it.

I have an English husband and been much less ‘Asian’ in the raising of my kids. I don’t want them to kill themselves working and they have been free to choose their degrees themselves with no pressure for me. Of course I wanted them to do well in education, and they had all our love and support but I didn’t want to repeat the very limited educational world view of my parents. They have flourished by themselves. Too much academic pressure is definitely not a good thing. Growing up we were always compared to our peers and it felt like one lifelong competition.

anyway, things are changing. I work in London with deprived communities. There are many Asian kids, boys and girls who are not performing well. Especially the boys. There are Asian teenagers taking drugs, getting involved in gangs and violence and not studying hard. Asian youths with misogynistic views. Of course, the stats say what they say. But I do think the next generations of Asian kids here will not all be following the same patterns of educational success as their ancestors.

Yes that post seemed a bit odd. Even the original article was clear that was only one part.

I do think some of this is part of it : how can this be improved?

Yes, grammars were good imo. But technical skills never really got the same good treatment. I've read some Euro countries do this better, want to read up

Are you a journalist or researcher? Your questioning style is a bit like one.

This too! Interesting you mention Prince Harry, I was thinking he's the flip side of this. A bit like Mark Twain's Prince & the Pauper story: but for the accident of his birth, Harry could be one of the struggling boys we're talking about.
Anti intellectualism wasn't always such a thing among working class men. The 1800s had working class men and also women attending classes via friendly societies in classic lit & other subjects. Deindustrialisation seems to have made this kind of atmosphere vanish. There is also the difficult part of the selection effect : as the more aspiring leave, the least are left behind. And the jobs are not there.

there are no diversity programmes for white wc boys, but there are for poc. i think thats part of a much larger issue. there must be a guardian article on this..

No- I'm a history student, I think essay writing is making me get into the habit of being formal when I write 🤣 even when it's not needed

Ah ok.