"Boys' poor mental health stems from feminism."

[Whattheduckery]

Just been in a training session at my school and this is what the trainer has said. She followed with "because they don't have a club to be part of..."

It's made me so mad.

In my opinion girls and boys are socialised differently. I've always noticed that all children loved being active. Boys are encouraged to be boisterous, run around and expend energy, whereas girls are encouraged to be quiet, kind, play nicely and be more sedate.

I've also noticed a decline in standards when it comes to children's, particularly boys, behaviour. They are more aggressive, there are reports of boys calling their female teachers misogynist names for example. There are more reports of sexual assault due to porn and the average age of a perpetrator is 15.

It's entirely wrong, how she worded it, as per the OPs post. It is not the fault of feminism that boys' mental health is or may be being neglected. It is not the fault of girls and women who now have a more equal access to facilities and activities that were previously not accessible to them.

Society has always had an issue with boys and men being prone to emotional illiteracy and violence. Feminism has not made that more prevalent. Feminism isn't incompatible with wanting that to be improved.

I don't think it's due to being socialised differently. I used to think boys' behaviour was due to that. Then I had kids.

Boys just ARE more active, on average. Girls just are more likely to be able to sit quietly. This often works against boys.

I'm worried by all the posters encouraging OP to complain. When did we stop being able to just have a conversation?

It wasn't a conversation, it was workplace training and it was an unevidenced opinion that could be potentially damaging to accept as fact. It needs to be challenged. It was challenged on the day, but no response was given. It's entirely reasonable to give objections to the statement that was made and ask for clarification, explanation and for future training to be based in evidenced fact rather than opinion.

Feminism?
BS.
Nowadays, both boys and girls (more boys)
are "softies".

These sex differences in offspring behaviour show in every mammal species.

The reason why in the past boys were encouraged to be more physically active was because it was recognised they needed to channel the surplus energy and learn to control their aggression. Testosterone makes people aggressive and boys have a lot more of it than girls. It’s that simple. We talk a lot about PMS and how difficult it is for girls and women but not at all about how difficult it is for young men to deal with testosterone surges.

To say socialisation makes boys more active is to confuse the cause with the outcome.

Now boys are basically expected to be like girls. They have to sit still at school, very often have no positive male role models to show them how to ‘let steam off’ safely after school and the consequence is a lot of angry, frustrated and directionless young men either doing stupid things or completely checking out of the society.

It wasn't a conversation, it was someone doing training and their training sounds like a load of tosh. People who train others should know what they're talking about. You're entitled to make a complaint against a service.

There is evidence to demonstrate that boys and girls are socialised differently from when they are babies. There's a lot of research and literature on the subject.

When I was at school, boys and girls were expected to sit still at school and boys managed without a problem.

I wouldn't say it's unevidenced. There's a lot of solid research out there about the changes in community spaces for boys and young men since services became more inclusive of girls and young women. In one sense, it is due to feminism because girls and young women needed to be afforded more access to community services and opportunities so spaces changed to be more accommodating of females wanting to join and that was the absolute right thing to do at the time. However it naturally has had a knock on impact on male based youth provision which has lessened as a result. To me it's again the problem of more funding being provided to 'treat the symptom not the cause' essentially. We had entire modules based around this when studying the history and context of youth work provision. There's plenty of well received research and academic journals out there on this topic if you go looking for it.

And what did they do during PE lessons, breaks and after school? Did most have fathers at home?

@Lavender14 by "unevidenced" I meant the claim that the trainer made. If she had clarified what she meant and referred to the kind of research that you suggest exists then there would have been something to discuss and think about. Although what relevance that would have in a school context for individual teachers I don't know.

I agree that boys and men may need different outlets than girls and women, for various social reasons. The lack of funding or lack of interest from men in setting these up is nothing to do with feminism.

Even if there is a difference, socialisation has a big impact. Girls are still expected to be quieter and put next to the disruptive bits to calm them.

What makes me cross about this is that men still retain most of the control. Why aren't they setting up these additional clubs? Frankly I see plenty of clubs that, whilst girls teams have increased, are still predominantly male - rugby, football, boxing etc. Men on the whole have more time than women due hobbies as women are still taking the mental and housework load.

The problem is not that women and girls being elevated at boys expense rather men and boys haven't kept up as women have grown, developed and become more independent. Men still seem to expect women to sort their issues, many men are still very self centred. Women just get on with it and do things due themselves as they're used to working like that.

There's nothing stopping men entering teaching. My understanding is that actually they tend to climb the ladder quicker. Who'd have thought it 🤔. Also perhaps schools should introduce more sport if it's an issue?

And yes I have a son.

Same as the girls, played games. We had an adventure playground at my school which both boys and girls played on at primary school. At secondary, some boys would play football others did the same as girls.

Divorce was not common when I was at school so I imagine fathers were more prevelent but parenting was less lax. There were consequences for bad behaviour and parents tended to support teachers.

First rule of misogyny, women are responsible for anything men do.

Of course there are issues with boys that need to be addressed and supported. Were they caused by some pesky wimmin daring to speak out? Were they buggery.

Yes please complain.

I guess it's relevant for teachers because we all know that what happens outside school impacts what happens in school. If young men have no outlet or space to learn what actually makes a "good" man they will naturally take those issues into school. See aforementioned misogynistic or overly sexualised behaviour towards teachers or female students/ physical fights with peers/ impact of excessive porn use/difficulties using technology appropriately/ problems understanding the importance and nuances of consent/poor school attendance/ higher rates of leaving school early/violence in the classroom etc etc etc... it all works together and I guess I'd say its relevant because this is the context that teachers today are teaching in with less internal resources to support them in dealing with the and now with less community based external input thanks to years of austerity.

I do also think that there's reasons why the community sector is primarily female based. Females are also more likely to engage with services offered whereas males struggle to get over the door, making it even harder for the services for them that do exist to retain funding so even where men do step up, they've a real uphill battle to get a group off the ground now. Young men's work is now seen as a specialism because of how complex it is. Again not the fault of feminism - that's the impact of many, many years of a patriarchal society and all that goes with it. I guess the problem is that what the trainer has said is double pronged. The advancement of the feminist movement has eroded to an extent the service provision solely for males. That's a fact. However its also correct that as you say additional provision hasn't been offered which is not the fault of feminism. I think both things can be true at once.

The advancement of the feminist movement has eroded to an extent the service provision solely for males.

Can you explain this for the hard if thinking as I don't understand.

There has been a huge reduction in cheap/free services and activities available for children and young people (thanks austeritu). That has had an effect on girls and boys, but I think because boys tend to externalise their issues it is more obvious (it becomes more of an issue for everyone else a lot sooner).

I don't agree that the reduction in those activities is down to "feminism" or women invading their spaces though. There are a lot of martial art clubs etc available. If anything they are more popular now. They might be out of somebody's reach however due to geography, cost etc. (again, thanks austerity). Anything involving physical contact costs a lot more to insure.

@pigletinthewoods ”As someone said, if we had more boys boxing clubs in London, we’d have fewer stabbings”

there’s been a huge expansion of these in London in and Essex. I actually wondered the other way round - if it was linked to the increase in violence. For myself in my 20s, I had so much physical aggression that I needed to channel, I looked at boxing myself.

It wasn’t easy to find a club so I didn’t go for it because there was nowhere nearby but also I was actually worried it would make me more aggressive!

Bear in mind a lot of these clubs won’t have much supervision.

I remember at the time finding studies showing that that was quite possible. If you have a lot of pent-up aggression, there are other ways to learn to control it.

I’m not against boxing clubs by the way.

I’m just really surprised that somebody might think it would reduce aggression.

I actually do a "women's only" kickboxing class. I asked the guys running it if they did mens only (just curious). He said that they would if there was demand, but as it is the MRAtrainign classes are functionally men only anyway. The whole place is mostly run by men, mostly men are using it. The idea that women are chasing men out of those spaces doesn't meet reality. In fact, a lot of women are taking their sons to classes that run concurrently to the women only class. So women going increases men's participation. I think a lot of the dissatisfied boys aren't going out to these places though. They are watching MRAvidoes online and consuming content that tells them there is nothing out there for them. They aren't going out and seeing for themselves if that's true (it takes a certain amount of confidence to go to a boxing club etc if you are a teenage boy who spends most of his time indoors. Even though in reality those places are usually very welcoming). But it's easier to tell themselves that the men only spaces have been infested with feminists than risk rejection from other men.

If you have a set of 6 services solely serving young men in a community. Then through the push for greater access to services and opportunities for young women all 6 of those services change their policies and ways of working then you have 6 services serving mixed sex groups of young people and none solely serving young men. The need for spaces for solely young men is still there so unless additional funding is sought and new services created then yes there has been an erosure of services that provide male only spaces and do male focused intervention work. Obviously there is also the option of creating brand new separate services however, most funding providers look for inclusivity now meaning its much harder to find funding bodies who will fund single sec groups for male service users even if male professionals are there to do the work (never mind the discrepancy between male v female professionals in the community sector). Men need to step up and develop these funding opportunities and create better resources for young men that actually work. Ergo my point of two things being true at once. Feminism has eroded single sex male only youth work provision as the majority of services became mixed sex (not a criticism this was needed), and men failed to develop new services, train new male workers and create funding pots.

Boxing has been used for decades in the East End to reduce youth violence. It's a sport that requires intense training and discipline and has a sense of community. It engages young men and boys and keeps them off the streets. It helps them expend a lot of energy and aggression.

Well, perhaps it’s surprising to you but not to those actually doing the work on the ground:

https://open.substack.com/pub/boxingfanatics/p/amateur-boxing-is-the-perfect-sport?utmcampaign=post&utmmedium=web

Males at the higher end of testosterone levels are likely to gravitate towards contact sports, so one could assume that conflict-seekers will be overrepresented in boxing. But the ones with antisocial tendencies will either learn to adapt and become less antisocial or drop out, meaning at least some will be ‘saved’, so to speak.

If we say that high testosterone in males is a ‘problem’, then we should say the same about hormone-related emotional instability many women experience during PMS. My preference would be to see both a a natural consequence of the material reality of sex and develop services and society accordingly- to help both boys and girls.

The problem is with men. They caused the problem. They can deal with the problem.

Men need to start taking responsibility for their actions and their offspring.

Hmmm poor choice of wording. I think potentially what she means is the crisis of masculinity. Boys or men are not sure what they should be doing whereas historically it was pretty much set in stone. Are they the breadwinner? The caregiver? Both? How are they meant to behave without being too boisterous or imposing? How do they treat women - are they meant to be the “bad boy” like lots of women claim to love or are they meant to be kind and compassionate? The guidelines on what it is to be a boy or a man have shifted dramatically in 20 years leading to this “crisis” which ultimately could lead to mental health issues.

Yes feminism has contributed towards this, rightly so. She kind of has a point but potentially couldn’t explain it.

If we say that males and their hormone-mediated behaviour is a ‘problem’, then we should say the same about hormone-related emotional instability many women experience during PMS or menopause. Yet menopause/PMS are seen as mitigating circumstances for committing crime but male hormonal fluctuations are not.

My preference would be to see both a a natural consequence of the material reality of sex and develop services and society accordingly- to help both boys and girls navigate life and relationships with the wider society.