Stewie - oddly, i'm about 2 chapters in (invigilated 3 hour exam today, got bored of marking!) and have not yet thought "erugh" - which is saying something, since I think (I hope?) my 'sexist-twaddle-o'meter' is quite finely tuned. It is completely focussed on boys but oddly, that's quite refreshing - it's about boys because that's the point of the book, rather than being about boys/men because that's the whole scope of humanity. If you see what I mean.
I've never read so clear and well-argued a case of why the patriarchy creates a culture of toxic masculinity which creates boy-and-then-men who aren't fully people, boys and men who are entirely emotionally illiterate, boys and men who are encouraged not to empathise or to demonstrate the feelings they have, and which bubble up only as anger or self-hatred. I don't see any blaming of Those Pesky Feminists for this - quite the opposite, it seems to be a critique of our social (patriarchal) construct of masculinity.
The one place where I think, potentially, it could be mis-read or data-mined for misogynist twaddle spouting, is that the book is fairly clear on where boys fall down in primary school (developing impulse control and communication skills later than girls, etc) and how badly they fit there until they're older (by which it's sometimes too late, as they've decided they hate school and the teachers have decided they're 'naughty boys', or whatever.) They point out that girls are better socialised to cope with requirements like sit down, stop talking, share (not that this is a good thing, but that girls are told to do these things from a young age, and not just on entering school). They also deal pretty well (pretty non-sexistly) with the evo-psych nonsense, pointing out that ALL children have equal amounts of testosterone until age around 10 years, and so 5 or 6 year olds who are hitting, shouting, biting, etc, might, in fact, have not been socialised to use words for how they feel. They don't dismiss differences - pointing out, for example, that most 8 year old boys who are 'behind' are at the same level as most 6 year old girls, because some key skills seem to emerge later in boys as a rule - but they point out how things change past puberty. I imagine some sexist tosspot might see this as "OMG overly feminist/feminine schools are failing our boys!!11!! PANIC!!!" but actually it's a criticism of how we raise boys before we shove them into the school system, and an indication of the ways in which we prevent them from the emotional literacy needed to actually deal with their feelings. They identify the ways boys who enter puberty talk about alcohol, girls, and sex as indicative of whether they've been brought up knowing how to talk about how they feel (and thereby KNOW how they feel, and how others feel). Surprise surprise, the ones with no empathy were keen to brag about how much they could drink, or how they've taken part in "exploitative sex" (yes, weasel words for sexual assault and possibly rape, but in the context of not knowing any more, I'll quote them).
As I say, I'm only a few chapters in. But so far I'm finding it refreshingly feminist. yes, it's Patriarchy Hurts Men Too - but as it's ABOUT men and boys I don't mind. It's Why The Patriarchy is Hurting Your Son, as far as I can see - and why I blame the patriarchy even more today than I did yesterday.
oh god I just saw how long this post is. I'm going to hit 'post' before I wimp out and delete it!
I meant to say: I'd love to vote on what we want to read. We seem to be getting a good shortlist together.