His pattern is to lay a sloppy kiss on her, press his face into her neck, and then to prove that he really cares, he pounds her chest a couple of times with his little fists. The next moment, he’s off to tear through a book or throw his Elmo doll in the fireplace.
If my son were school-aged I’m sure some would suggest that I reach for the Ritalin and start shooting Junior up. But before any of us head to the pharmacy, a recently published book dealing with the male child should be mandatory reading.
In her book The War Against Boys, author Christina Hoff Sommers charges that the teaching establishment, indeed society as a whole, has been on a crusade since the early '90s to feminize male children.
According to Sommers the root of the problem was a 1991 report by the American Association of University Women which charged that young girls were being “short-changed” by schools. The solution: give the girls more self-esteem. Some educators and legislators decided the best way to do that was to demonize boys and alter their natural behavior.
Suddenly, rambunctious little guys were labeled “aggressive.” Sommers tells the tale of one kid getting punished for running around at recess. And what do you think of sexual harassment workshops given to three and four year-old boys? To eradicate the dark taint of masculinity certain schools now require boys to play with dolls.
Sommers rails mightily against these tactics. “Boys need discipline, respect and moral guidance,” she says. “They do not need to be pathologized”.
Ms. Sommers has indirectly identified the problem and the solution to this entire debate. Rather than allocate more real time to their sons, many parents prefer to buy into the “pathological argument.” To spare themselves the sometimes difficult effort of disciplining and redirecting their boys (who at times can be more trying than their female counterparts), these parents have turned to alternative solutions.
In the name of taming some beast within the male soul, Ritalin is now quickly becoming the most frequently administered prescription drug for boys in America. To justify its high usage, parents, teachers, psychologists and feminists suggest that the boys are “out of control,” “domineering,” “threatening,” etc.
A generation ago, it was called “being a boy.” Sommers believes boys “don’t need to be rescued from masculinity. Our boys are not racked by emotional turbulence,” she says. Sadly, boys and girls are now the guinea pigs of this massive gender-driven ideological struggle. Neither are faring very well.
The Christian Science Monitor reports that boys are behind girls in reading and writing. Boys make up the majority of dropouts, suspensions, and disabilities reported by schools at present. And suicide is up among both boys and girls.
In the face of such statistics, why can’t we dispense with politics and admit that the genders are different? Both males and females have been endowed with particular gifts necessary for the good of society. If we don’t begin to acknowledge the differences between the sexes and create curricula that reflect those differences, our children — male and female — will continue to suffer.
On a practical note, Sommers advocates single-sex classrooms to better facilitate adapted curricula. Moreover, she encourages parents to listen to and defend their sons with greater zeal. I could go on, but my son just threw a baseball at my keyboard. Time to practice what I preach, if you’ll excuse me.
