Wednesday, January 13, 2016

How to Really Screw Up Boys

"More boys than girls are involved in crime, alcohol, and drugs." - Christina Hoff Summers.

I come from the wrong side of the tracks. I'm amazed how I turned out 80% normal, but I suspect a lot of that has to do with something lucky, genetically. In some ways I was just born with a leg up compared to lot of guys. I'm not criminal-minded, have no drug and alcohol problems, and have a job. That used to be the norm. Not so much anymore.

I know a lot of guys dead from alcohol and drugs (these men rarely make it past 50, although the first one I knew died at 15), and those things run in families. You ever hear the old saying, "What's bred in the bone will come out in the flesh"? It's true. Criminal activity runs in families, too. I know guys who've been in prison two and three times, and oddly enough, they're not bad guys at all (being all sleeved out is a good clue - it's like they're telling the cops, "Look at me! I've got drugs and a pistol in my car!").

I also know boys are a lot easier to damage than girls. Societies in the past understood this, so it favored boys, since they the ones as adults to create and maintain societies. Everyone has something wrong with them - "Original Sin" bred in the bone - but it's a lot easier for boys to go bad than girls. How many people understand that these days? (Not that many, apparently - and, by the way, the belief in "toxic masculinity" and "patriarchy" and "oppressive patriarchial capitialism" is part of the problem, and is the exact opposite of being the cure).

If you really want to screw up boys do two things.

Have them come from broken families. A lot of times these days that means a cruel and domineering mother and a weak or absent father. Does that sound familiar? It sure does, doesn't it, with all the divorce we have today.

Second, don't let the boys play. Torment them in school, try to turn them into girls with Ritalin, forbid competitive games, and you'll end up with unsuccessful boys - what I wrote about as "failure to launch." Even in their 30s all the want to do is play. I've seen them and their friends spend all day in front of the TV playing video games.

There are men who devote their lives to studying play, such as Stuart Brown. I understand why, once I realized years ago when I started seeing grown men who did nothing but play all day, to the point they didn't have real jobs. I can only conclude they weren't allowed that kind of unstructured play, the kind my friends and I did all the time.

What do these two problems have in common? Government interference. Interference in marriage - no fault divorce, usually giving the children to the mothers, cutting the fathers out of their kids lives.

And as for school, there are way too many women in them. The things I've seen female teachers do! And they didn't even know they were doing anything wrong.

I graduated from what was originally a teacher's college - and it still produces an enormous number of teachers, all of whom were girls (and I met a lot) and all of whom were stupid. What ever happened to male teachers? There were lots when I was growing up - and a lot of them graduated from the same university I did, 25 years before I got there.

There were people who predicted these problems 40 and 50 years ago, before they even started. But, as usually, those knew what the problem was had no power to fix them.

"Despite the difficulty of proving causation in the social sciences, the weight of evidence increasingly supports the conclusion that fatherlessness is a primary generator of violence among young men." - David Blankenhorn

4 comments:

Rusty Shackleford said...

"What ever happened to male teachers? "

I see a lot of comments on the internet labeling male teachers as being "creepy" if not outright pedophiles and molesters. It's part of the general trend to discredit and demonize men. It was never something I thought about when I was in school, but it's maybe discouraging men from considering the profession. Also, think about how many credits you have to have in women/queer/etc. studies to get a teaching degree. Who wants to pay to endure that? Hundreds of hours of calculus and physics seems easy by comparison.

Anonymous said...


Western civilization will pay dearly for the scourge that is feminism. Men are the thinkers, teachers, inventors, creators, and builders, not women.

Glen Filthie said...

"I also know boys are a lot easier to damage than girls...."
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LOL. I take it you aren't a parent, Bob? Oh yeah, you can mess daughters up pretty easy too! And, the same culprits are responsible: our public educators. Anything you do to hurt one gender ultimately hurts them both.

If you raise girls to think they can do anything a man can, if you tell them that they can re-invent society without regard to their own biology, common sense or 250,000 years of human evolution - they are going to grow up twisted, bitter and disappointed. Our girls are as messed up as the boys - possibly worse.

Anonymous said...

When you deny boys and men opportunities for ordinary development and growth, creative and/or productive work you had better neuter them psychologically or kill them outright because there will be hell to pay if you don't. Don't for a second think that's hyperbole.