If young men want ‘traditional’ gender roles, we need to know why - Kathleen Stock

[IwantToRetire]

Gen Z women and men are growing further apart in their political outlook and aspirations. It is vital the root causes are understood so we can all find common ground

Afew months ago, alongside other proud parents, I sat watching my teenager’s GCSE drama class showcase: a dozen short plays, devised and performed with gusto by small groups of pupils. In terms of theme, there was a definite attraction to the darker side of life; indeed, in nearly every play there was a hair-raising death. Another repetitive strand — at least, in pieces written partly or wholly by the girls — was the shoddiness of men’s behaviour.

One character struggled to find the kettle after his wife had died, having never used it before; another was violent to his family; and what viewer could forget the fiendish theatre manager, forcing dancers to take stimulants so that they could work longer hours? Worst of all, though, was the policeman who was also a serial killer, dramatically strangling his detective wife on stage after she discovered he was the culprit. There were also quite a few impassioned speeches about the prevalence of patriarchy and misogyny in society.

At the final curtain, I looked around at the mild-mannered, supportive fathers in the audience, many of whom had cut work short to be there. What could these men have done to their children, I wondered. Or, more seriously: was it possible to give young women today some awareness of male violence without causing them to write all men off?

Full article at https://www.thetimes.co.uk/article/if-young-men-want-a-return-to-traditional-gender-roles-we-need-to-know-why-g3pnmfj56

I disagree with nearly everything she said, but agree this is something that more people need to be talking about.

Or I suspect, as it has always been, women will have to adjust their lives to accommodate intransigent men and boys.

Can be read at https://archive.ph/gGXMV

I think that conflict gives the DCs a better chance to show range of skill and thus get higher marks.

I think most drama courses do do that though.

They study plays that explore tough themes, and Shakespeare etc. and find themes in current affairs

That's rather sad. Personally, I think it's a challenge to show joy and delight without descending into the maudlin. But I don't think we are living in a world where you are socially allowed to feel joy or delight anymore. And I wonder how that affects young people if the only emotions you are allowed to display are depression, anger, or anxiety.

I think you pretty much summed it up. Many boys no longer see a role for themselves. That is difficult to reconcile.

Or is it that they see that the role they're expected to share now includes some pretty shit stuff that women aren't prepared to take all the responsibility for any more?

I think it's a little bit rich going after GCSE student's plays, when national TV and movies (and lets face it, the news) are full of blokes abusing and murdering women - it's a key plot point. Perhaps rather than bemoan it, they should look at why the kids feel this way, and is it a reflection of reality?

My kids (both sexes) seem to have had the message, especially in primary school, that boys are naughty and rowdy, but girls are good (or maybe that’s girls should be good?). Neither should be generalised by sex.

This is really important I think. DS1 is in Y6 and feels this keenly: the message is girls are well behaved and good and boys are naughty/bad. Alongside this, he lives in a family where both parents have professional jobs and share the household labour equally. He struggles to accept the idea that women and girls might be disadvantaged in the world because that is entirely removed from his experience- his experience/perception is that girls are praised/prized/favoured.

I can well imagine that for some boys and young men, the ideas of patriarchy and misogyny can easily feel like a fabrication.

Do they get to choose? We had a brief. When I did GCSE Drama our options were violent skinheads, date rape, Pinochet regime... I could go on. We wanted to write comedy!

I really struggled with the element of The Identity Trap by Yascha Mounk that suggested, essentially, forming sub categories of humans creates problems in diverse populations.

I kept thinking about the importance of equality and protection and the need to be able to highlight inequality in order to have a just and safe society.

However, since reading the book, I do have a new frame. I have interpreted some posts as being a bit 'team girl' or 'team boy', but until we are 'team human' we aren't likely to get anywhere.

It's important to understand what has happened in the past, and what is happening now in terms of outcomes for males and females, but to bring about positive change, we need to understand the whole picture.

This is FWR, so I can understand a desire to focus on the F and the W (and the G). Maybe this isn't the right space to try and fully understand the issues for M and B, but I don't think woman who want to do this, for the sake of men and boys as well as women, should be disparaged.

Men are told on the internet that women value them for their money, their car, their muscles, for treating women badly. They see in real life that rich successful men are with women who more attractive then the men. Men who are supportive of women are rarely portrayed favourably.

Teenage girls tend to be praised in school and neither boys or girls are educated in the disadvantages women experience when they have children. More women are opting out of having children and those that dont have them later in life.

"Half of women (50%) born in 1990 (the most recent cohort to reach age 30 years) remained childless by their 30th birthday; this is the first cohort where half remain childless by 30 years of age."

Women are opting out of traditional gender roles, men want them back.

Men have not been freed.

its gotten worse for them!

if one of them even looks at a women it’s somehow sexual harassment or misogyny.

its miserable for them. And as a survivor of sexual harassment assaulting to me and other women as well.

crazy

if one of them even looks at a women it’s somehow sexual harassment or misogyny.

Bollocks!

I can see how people banging onn about "the patriarchy" all the time can be very annoying indeed. I find it annoying, myself. When feminism becomes all about 'oppressors' and 'oppressed' and women as 'victims' then it is no better, in my mind, than any other form of intersectionalist identity politics.

Personally I think a lot of what people refer to as 'the patriarchy' are just those patterns that arise out of sex based differences. Certainly in the West, where we have established equalities legislation and women well established in all sorts of roles in society.

I do think a lot of the theatre stuff is very much repeating tropes, and there is a tendency for young people to want to wallow somewhat in the dystopian. Sometimes teachers almost encourage this. So it's very very possible that in many cases, the kids aren't really writing this stuff from their own experience. They want to be edgy and topical.

My main reason for thinking this is just watching kids develop these scenarios in theatre classes over the years. It's rare to see them really dig inside themselves and really writing from their own experiences. Which is why so much of what teen theatre groups produce can be so bad, tbh. I find they do better in many cases with comedy, it seems to be more authentically representing the world they see and experience.

I do think there is a lot of mixed messaging boys get about family life, how to treat girls, academics, and life in general. With family life in particular, they get sidelined and seen as non-essential, while at the same time, blasted if they don't provide financially and step up with helping with care. Mums are seen as really essential by many women, dads not so much. In some instances, particularly where the parents are young and not living together, it becomes quite toxic and there is really no positive parental role available for the dads.

I don't think a society as a whole can really maintain the idea that dads are unnecessary alongside the idea that they are necessary. One will lose out in the end.

Shooting arguments down in such a way achieves nothing.

I think it is true that many young men find it difficult to know how to deal with male - female relationships, when there is a generalised atmosphere in which men/boys are perceived always as potential oppressors or as sexist pigs. It's no different to telling that white children that they have 'privilege' and should mind what they say, how they behave, and always defer to a black child when talking about their experience.

I think part of it is due to economic changes- I grew up in boom times, people felt hopeful and the norm among young men was to embrace progressive causes (such as women's equality)- after all, there was plenty to go round so why not share? Perhaps harder times make young men perceive equality more as a threat than a blessing.

I also think it's part of the tendency of the internet to broaden any division.

Fee thoughts:

• perhaps a reaction (by kids) to selfishness of Gen X dads (first gen allowed to walk away during the first gen where single mums were seen as acceptable?)

• millenial dads (age late 20-40 now) are v different, hands on, 50/50, more stay at home dads, more only wanting 1 child to give good childhood. Interesting to see their kids GCSE performabce in 5 or so years!

• lack of acceptable comedy means focus on disaster/ violence in dramas now eg every play in the same space as less options

• young boys/ teens now have a wider range of transparency on rubbish/ average/ great dads now. Seems more of a range than when i was young. I know for a fact several of my DS age 12 friends are jealous of his v involved sporty dad (absent dads)

• girls/ young women expectation of boys/ men has risen (good). Now want a partner who is a decent dad, can controbute towards home, does 50/50 round house etc. when a partner fails, maybe he becomes violent? Maybe these kids see men as struggling more with these new demands.

I am not surprised that GCSE students went for dark themes. It’s an age where my kids enjoyed horror movies and have you seen how dark some of the GCSE English language texts are? My dd did GCSEs a few years ago and the text came from a book where a young girl is sexually assaulted. (The assault wasn’t in the exam extract)

I also think it's part of the tendency of the internet to broaden any division. Being more extreme than the content already out there is a good business tactic if making money and notoriety are the primary objectives.

I am not surprised that GCSE students went for dark themes. It’s an age where my kids enjoyed horror movies and have you seen how dark some of the GCSE English language texts are? My dd did GCSEs a few years ago and the text came from a book where a young girl is sexually assaulted. (The assault wasn’t in the exam extract)

I also think it's part of the tendency of the internet to broaden any division. Being more extreme than the content already out there is a good business tactic if making money and notoriety are the primary objectives.

I am not surprised that GCSE students went for dark themes. It’s an age where my kids enjoyed horror movies and have you seen how dark some of the GCSE English language texts are? My dd did GCSEs a few years ago and the text came from a book where a young girl is sexually assaulted. (The assault wasn’t in the exam extract)

I also think it's part of the tendency of the internet to broaden any division. Being more extreme than the content already out there is a good business tactic if making money and notoriety are the primary objectives.

Could it also be that a lot of “traditional female roles” aren’t appealing to men? They don’t want to clean and do childcare and would rather a wife or gf do those jobs for free. This is reflected in how it’s still acceptable for men to not see their child(ren) after a split and have new partners quickly step into mother role eg asking new partner to go part-time to accommodate their stepchildren.

If anyone has seen the documentary 'Cambridge Analytica' it's clear there is an industry which sows political discord using social media. This is a valuable product, one that certain politicians and even other countries find valuable.
You can now weaken a country without having to send troops or use weapons. Huge instability can be created just by pumping enough divisive ideas into the youth.

I truly think that is happening. Possibly Russia, possibly china, maybe both. I think many aspects of our society atrebeing completely undermined. One of those could well be the undermining of positive male and female roles.

Ultimately you can never know what messages any social media feed is pumping into another individual's brain - you don't see what they are scrolling through, and it will be entirely different from yours (this is the problem of non-shared realities)

What is Facebook/Instagram/tik tok telling these children?

I don't think it's positive, inspiring, hopeful or makes them want to contribute positively to society.

I think we need to get to grips with this pretty soon, or our society will collapse.

Well for sure... but cleaning and childcare (some aspects, anyway) aren't all that appealing to many women either.

Wasn't there once a study or something that said men who did more housework had better relations with women than those who did not?

Doing more housework could also be a way of providing as well. The provision of a clean household makes lots of people feel happier. Why can't men use their provider instincts to do that?

I thought this article about a French advertising campaign, targeting male drink drivers was really interesting: https://www.theguardian.com/world/2023/feb/08/toxic-masculinity-fuels-dangerous-driving-like-drink-french-advert-says

I think authorities need to work harder to present this alternative vision of what a man can be: kind, sensitive, self-sacrificing, involved in loving relationships with others. And that that is not a loss to him or anyone else, but a massive gain. We should have advertising campaigns speaking to men in this way and showing them an alternative to the toxic culture that pervades so many views of masculinity. Particularly if we want to address issues like the falling birthrate - yes, women are choosing to have fewer children, but - given more than 90% of single parent households are led by women - why should they be expected to shoulder that alone?