Can boys be civilised, as in, made civil?

[NineNine]

I have dds. For every mother I meet who has a ds who is a bit loud or physical or unruly, at some point we have a conversation where she implies or says outright that boys are so different and my girls are ‘easy’ more or less because they are girls.

It drives me crazy because I have put a lot of effort into teaching my dds to be empathetic and considerate but also not to accept bad behaviour from others. But time and again I see boys being aggressive and destructive and it’s just shrugged off because boys will be boys...

Obviously NABALT, but I wondered if anyone has had dss who they have struggled with but feel they have had a positive impact on their behaviour? Have the mothers of these disruptive boys tried their best, and know better than me what boys are really like? Or have they been shrugging their shoulders all along and not even attempted to avoid what they believe is typical male behaviour?

I totally agree missy. Isn't the point that normal childhood behaviours, even if we don't like them, don't lead to adult violence/ assault etc? And if we do see concerning behaviours it's probably because there is something else going on?

You've misunderstood her missy. She is complaining that parents of boys stereotype them and insist that their behaviour is innate when actually it arises from their low expectations. I am surrounded by parents like this myself and before I had my ds I started to doubt myself and think maybe they were right seein as I held a minority view with no personal experience. Then I had my ds and found I was spot on

Yes, I understood that perfectly. I thought that was what you meant. So my point stands but let me put it in a different way - does the stereotype of girls cause the kind of violence against boys and men that the stereotype of boys causes girls and women? Because violence against women and girls, predominantly at the hands of men, is a national and international issue. And those men were all once boys. So we as a society need to work out how boys become men who commit violence against women. But we can’t and never will be able to until ever time the question is asked you get a load of parents going NAMALT. And in the meantime a quarter of girls come out of school having experienced sexual harassment and violence, and a third of child sex abuse cases are peer-on-peer, predominantly boy-on-girl.

Sarah - I'm sorry a lot of the parents around you are like this, but the OP moved onto talking about the link to adult male violence which really feels like bashing of young children displaying normal behaviour. The OP isn't even clear about what age children she is talking about, so it's really hard to judge. Is she talking about 4 year olds or 11 year olds? Or 17 year olds?

We all have anecdotes of parents making poor choices - I can think of it for both girls and boys. Missy was right in saying it was a boring stereotype. Everyone agrees parents who excuse their children's bad behaviour are annoying - I haven't seen anyone say anything otherwise.

I asked my 15 year old to comment: "He says that they learn it from parents who buy into ridiculous stereotypes and don't treat people as individuals"

your title is so offensive that I was reluctant to open the thread. then I thought maybe it was tongue in cheek and you had a point to make, butno, it seems as if you and your friends are in some kind of parallel universe, where stereotyping half of the world as uncivil is normal.

I have a ds, and 2 dds. There are 3 very different personalities, they are all expected to behave and be polite.

Funnily enough my dh is also able to be civil, and my dad, and my brothers.......

RiverTam - I don't think NAMALT is the problem at all. In my experience violent men are HUGELY different to normal men like my husband. Violent men are not normal, something has gone very wrong along the way to turn them like that. The two violent men I've known both grew up in very violent households. I couldn't say why my dad is violent and his sisters aren't - but I can definitely say I don't think boys growing up in happy, normal, connected households have much likelihood of turning out like my dad.

I'm surprised at the level of defensiveness on this thread. The op seemed to me to be raising a valid and interesting point. Why is everyone so cross at the idea that some parents may be holding their sons to lower standards than their daughters?

So we as a society need to work out how boys become men who commit violence against women.

Yes! Great. Perhaps if the OP had phrased her OP like that, we might have had some sensible answers. As it was, it did somewhat come across as an attempt to blame mothers of sons for male violence. Not only is blaming women for the actions of men the worst kind of misogynistic shit, of course mothers of sons are going to react to poorly-worded generalisations because we see our children as complex and unique individuals, not as a societal problem waiting to happen.

Hi OP, I haven't read most of the thread, but I am a mother of boys, one of whom went to live with his violent father as a pre-teen and has gone on to repeat a lot of his father's behaviours having been a thoughtful and sensitive younger child and never having been allowed to hide behind the "boys will be boys" concept. Another son, is still a kind and thoughtful young man. I think a feminist analysis of male violence does help inform how we bring up boys, at least the feminist women I know who have sons, do in general, have sons who subscribe a lot less to some of the more toxic elements of masculinity.

Tallulah - because the title is pretty offensive, and her op basically says parents of boys are crap.

She must have a weird set of friends, because while I have often heard people say their boys are full of energy, I don't know parents who excuse their boys behaviour in the way the OPs friends do.

Completely agree mrsfrumble

Boys are both complex and unique individuals and, under patriarchy, a societal problem waiting to happen. Under patriarchy boys are systematically taught to devalue and exploit girls and women. As women, we have been taught to allow, justify, minimise this. How can we find ways of countering our own socialisation and protect our boys from the most damaging aspects of male socialisation if we can't acknowledge that it is happening?

great post, Tallulah.

While that is a great post, and I agree, that is not what the OP posted.

No, but her subtext was pretty onbvious, to me at any rate, and the responses are very predictable and refusing to look beyond the surface.

No and it’s pointless to try. Gas them at birth like male chickens

Such a goady thread title is bound to make people defensive surely.

Right, I get that Tallulah. As parents of boys, we can acknowledge it and deal with it on the level of our children being complex, unique individuals. Which I believe most of the “defensive” mothers on this thread are trying to do, seeing as no one has excused their son behaving with violence and aggression.

But in the level of “societal problem waiting to happen”, surely that’s a problem for, well, society, not just the mothers of sons, as we can only raise and influence our own children on an individual level. Does that make sense?

Like I’ve said, I think this thread has got the reaction it has because of how the OP worded their OP. It did come across as “these mothers of boys! Always shrugging and making excuses!”

RiverTam subtext can be drowned out if the OP is worded provocatively enough.

The OP is just so totally confused it’s nonsensical. Can boys be civilized? What do you mean by civil? Quiet, sedentary, compliant? That’s what I was as a child, and I’ve no real desire to bring up any child to be so, much as I’m sure it would be easier as a parent. But then after castigating boys for being a bit loud, physical and unruly, she moves on to aggression. That doesn’t follow. Aggressive men are maybe the product of poor male role models, hard childhoods, yes and probably toxic masculinity. teaching boys to be kind, respectful of women and others, building up their self-esteem, teaching them to express emotions and, importantly, there being good male role models - all very important but aiming for them to turn into compliant, sedentary individuals sitting with a colouring book - not so much.

To be honest, one of the scariest things about being a mother of boys is the thought that their father and their peers will have more of an outcome in how they turn out than I will.

I agree phuquoc am loud, and not compliant or sedentary at all. I am also civilized. The two are not the same thing.

I find this suggestion that boys are necessarily more aggressive and 'difficult' than girls to be offensive. That's not my experience at all - having had a daughter and two sons. My daughter, for example, was always far more unruly. And my two sons were generally very well behaved and accommodating as young children.

The way that the thread has evolved has created the discussion that has followed. It blamed parents (mainly mothers) for boys behaviour and male violence. The vast majority of these boys will mature out of it.

People have responded with their own experiences because the thread was very much at the individual/familial level.

But the problem is societal and much more is going on than parental influence - peers, schools... If the thread had started the discussion at the societal level (openly rather than sublimely), the thread would have gone a completely different way.