The crisis in boyhood and the plight of boys paints a bleak picture

by Robyn Wolfson Vorster | Aug 5, 2024 | Child Abuse, Child Protection Legislation & Child Rights, Children’s Online World

The labelling, identification with a maligned gender and the influence of and schooling in violence, misogyny and sex, both on and offline, could be fuelling what we fear most – the rise of another generation of violent men.

A recent headline in the New York Times read, “Boys get everything except the thing that’s most worth having.” Author Ruth Whippman, referring to boys, writes that “modern childhood presents a perfect storm for loneliness…”.

Whippman describes the dilemma boys face. They continue to have their feelings, vulnerabilities and even victimhood negated because of patriarchy where “all the old deficiencies and blind spots of male socialisation are still in circulation – the same failure to teach boys relational skills and emotional intelligence, the same rigid masculinity norms and social prohibitions that push them away from intimacy and emotionality.”

And they’ve grown up under the shadow of “toxic masculinity” where those on the opposite end of the spectrum think that boys have had too much attention in the past.

“For every right-wing tough guy urging his crying son to ‘man up’,” Whippman writes, “there is a voice from the left telling him that to express his concerns is to take airtime away from a woman or someone more marginalised… In many cases, the same people who are urging men and boys to become more emotionally expressive are also taking a moral stand against hearing how they actually feel. For many boys, it can seem as though their emotions get dismissed by both sides.”

According to Whippman, #metoo “should have been an opportunity to challenge patriarchy and the old power structures along with the old pressures and norms of manhood and helped boys to be more emotionally open and engaged. But instead, it has had the opposite effect, shutting them down even further.”

This challenge is even more acute in South Africa where major studies have revealed that boys are revered for their future role as protector and provider, yet unsupervised, unprotected and vilified for their current or perceived future wrongdoing.

They are frequently unfathered, schooled about sexuality by peers and pornography, four times as likely to commit suicide as girls, and given to urges deemed beyond their control.

Sexual violence

For many, childhood is characterised by violence, and although they were as likely to be subject to sexual assault as girls, its impact is trivialised and weaponised against them.

One of these reports, from a 2023 study on boyhood by global advocacy group Equimundo: Center for Masculinities and Social Justice, focuses on navigating boyhood in sub-Saharan Africa, specifically for 8-13 year olds. It was released on 16 April 2024, Blue Umbrella Day, an initiative driven by Family for Every Child, which is dedicated to caring for boys affected by sexual violence.

The Equimundo report formed the basis of discussions by experts at its launch along with two other reports, a 2018 global report on caring for boys affected by sexual violence compiled by Family for Every Child, and another 2021 report on the same topic researched by the Child in Distress Network (CINDI) and Childline which focuses specifically on South African boys.

Together, the picture they painted of the state of boyhood and the plight of boys affected by sexual violence was a particularly bleak one.

During the conference, experts began by answering the question, “why focus on boys”, explaining that the emphasis on boy children should never be to the exclusion of girls and the difficulties girl children continue to face. However, they stressed, boy children have a specific set of challenges that often go unacknowledged by families, communities, schools and policymakers, and therefore go unmanaged.

Most significantly, the studies show that patriarchy disadvantages boy children as much as girl children and women, but in a different way.

Equimundo’s Gary Barker, speaking about reframing masculinity, explained that surveys conducted by the organisations found that 40-50% of men believed that real men outperform others at all costs, shouldn’t ask for help or show that they are vulnerable, see sex as conquest rather than intimacy or connection, have to show that they are tough, and see violence as an acceptable way to get what you want.

He explained that those subscribing to these norms were multiple times more likely to binge drink, to have considered suicide, to bully, to be depressed, to have traffic accidents and to sexually harass a woman.

By contrast, the studies showed a chasm between how boys were viewed and therefore raised, and how they viewed themselves. When asked to describe themselves, boys used words like kind, helpful, nice, courteous, hardworking, and courageous.

This differed vastly from how they were described by their communities who used words like wrongdoers, troublemakers, drunkards, and drug abusers.

Suzanne Clulow, who was involved with all three research studies, explained how one of the girls she interviewed even described boys as being “like dogs”: “They say that boys are dogs, they are not loved, you will see them getting blamed in most cases for rape, transmitting diseases and they say all this is done by men.”

The studies, which included content from practitioners, families and, in the case of the South African study, children themselves, show how the social scripts which dictate what is acceptable behaviour for boys conflate financial provision with masculinity. This pressure to provide, especially in an economic climate where jobs are scarce, has led even young boys to feel hopeless.

Further, the belief that boys must be independent means that they are sent outside of home earlier, and are less supervised and less cared for than girls. Interviews with caregivers revealed a belief that boys could defend themselves and didn’t want to express their emotions or be nurtured and protected.  

Rejection, lack of love

While parents and girl children perceive this lack of supervision as freedom, independence and responsibility, boys view it as rejection and a lack of love.

Boys repeatedly referred to being unwanted and “pushed out of home” earlier. To quote one of the boys, “parents only want girls”. Another reported envying girls for their emotional connection with parents. Many boys expressed how lonely this lack of relationship left them feeling.

Troublingly, stereotypes are even stronger and more policed in boys’ peer groups. Many boys reported fearing being excluded from the group (especially those boys who were perceived as less manly, softer, thinner, smaller or more effeminate).

But despite this, boys did not perceive their peer groups to be a safe space, instead characterising them as a place of competition, banter that can easily morph into bullying, and aggression. This was confirmed by boys studied by Whippman who described even long-term friendship groups as “unsupportive” and reported that they did not feel comfortable being emotionally open or vulnerable in front of them.

Whippman found that almost without exception boys, “craved closer, more emotionally open relationships, but had neither the skills nor the social permission to change the story.”

Barker confirms that little boys come into the world ready to be loved and to learn how to love others, but their need for nurturing and attachment can easily be crushed. Along with their lack of skill to form connections, this leads to many boys feeling lonely and that “no one really knows me”, which in turn results in boys closing off their emotions and the human connections they want most, and instead professing that they don’t care.

In the book Raising Cain, Dan Kindlon and Michael Thompson describe how boys are taught that they mustn’t be feminine. The result is that they attack the “feminine” side of themselves: compassion, nurturing, caring and emotional connection.

Mothers, especially those whose male partners are absent, are often more openly critical of men. Boys grow up with the dichotomy of seeking to be loved by women who are overtly negative about masculinity. While women often de-individualise boys and men when they malign them and label them “trash”, their own sons are unable to separate themselves from the evils of the group.

Unresolved trauma, unsupportive schools

The early lack of supervision and connection has another unintended consequence, creating the propensity towards violence. Experts at the Blue Umbrella event noted that unresolved trauma can promote and lead to violence, and that the biggest risk factor for violence perpetration is experiencing or witnessing violence. Early independence in boys means that they are far more likely to witness violence at a young age.

Many boys also experience school as an unsafe and unsupportive place.  Global studies highlight boys’ educational underachievement. In a World Bank study of 100 countries, boys consistently fell behind girls on literacy, numeracy and standardised tests. Boys particularly struggled with primary school because of the gendered nature of teaching.

Although corporal punishment is banned in South African schools, the South African study revealed that boys were routinely subjected to harsh punishments, bullying, and physical and sexual violence from peers and teachers. Schools are not welcoming for boys, so they disengage from school. Boys also externalise trauma which can result in negative behaviours, including greater truancy or drop-out rates.

The upshot was that schools, like many homes, weren’t able to provide a place of meaningful connection for boys.

Life online, pornography

With home, peers and school often proving fraught, boys are increasingly finding their safe space online. Half of the boys polled in a study done in the US said that their online world was more interesting than their offline world.

And while there are positives about being online, and for many boys it is an important source of connection, what they are increasingly finding there are sexist, misogynist, angry and racist influencers – who they nonetheless trust – violent gaming, bullying and trash talk.

Boys are also reporting that online is where they are learning about sex and sexuality through exposure to pornography. The CINDI study confirmed that in South Africa many boys were learning about sex through pornography viewing, which typically normalises violence, harmful and risky sexual behaviours and minimises the need for consent. Boys who participated in the research reported that for many, it was their first exposure to sex, and they were aware of how it was changing their perceptions and feelings.

According to reports completed by Sonke Gender Justice in 2018 and 2021 on the “State of South Africa’s fathers”, 64% of households do not have a biological father present. The CINDI study further found that many mothers did not believe that they were equipped to teach their sons about sex and sexuality because of gender norms, and because, in many cases, they were unschooled about sexuality themselves.

Another violent generation

Tragically, the lack of supervision, communication, direction, affection and connection, the labelling, identification with a maligned gender and the influence and schooling in violence, misogyny and sex both on and offline could therefore be fuelling what we fear most – the rise of another generation of violent men.

Equally though, the perception that boys are violent and the instigators of violence also stops them from being acknowledged as victims. Although the Optimus study found that boys are slightly more likely to be sexually abused than girls (36.8% for boys and 33.9% for girls), the reports note that the sexual abuse of boys is “massively denied, misunderstood and even trivialised”.

Boys are under-represented as victims of sexual violence and disincentivised from reporting abuse. Many don’t disclose because of the shame of being seen as “less male”, fear of being labelled weak or homosexual (especially in countries where homosexuality is still illegal) or told that they should have fought back or run away. Some express confusion about how to get help, others guilt, especially if they were groomed by their perpetrator.

Boys who report sexual abuse also risk being blamed, and even seen as the aggressor (especially if the perpetrator is female). Families, communities and even abuse support services, child protection services and the courts, which are tailored towards girls, do not believe that boys can be victims. Some boys report being turned away from support services if they do disclose.

Exclusion and bias

The experience of young male victims reflects misperceptions about boys that extend as far as treaty bodies tasked with keeping children safe. Veteran child protection activist Dr Joan van Niekerk reported at the Blue Umbrella Day launch that even the World Health Organization policy on reducing domestic violence excludes boys.

When activists criticised the draft policy endorsed globally by health ministers and entitled “prevention of violence against women and girls” because it ignored boy children, the WHO’s response was to change the name to “prevention of violence against women and girls and children.”

This bias is carried through into the UN’s Sustainable Development Goals which focus on “achieving gender equality for all and empowering women and girls”. While the goal is essential, Van Niekerk stresses that empowering boys is equally important to prevent boys from feeling the need to establish power through violence.

This bias against boys is also evident in South African policy. There are few boy-focused initiatives that address the challenges that boys face. Instead, programmes focused on boys tend to be about toxic masculinity. Boys are poorly understood and supported in the child protection system and courts, and although restorative justice and diversion programmes for child offenders are an underpinning principle of the Child Justice Act, girls are far more likely to be supported through these programmes than boys.

Equally, the bias has led to a lack of donor funding for programmes assisting boys, including boy victims of violence. This is despite boys being statistically more likely to experience both physical and sexual violence than girls.

Meaningful interventions

While the picture of boyhood painted by the experts is not positive, they stressed that interventions are possible at every level of society which could make a meaningful impact on boys.

Speakers emphasised that while many boys grew up without a father in their household, that did not mean that they lacked access to male role models – 80% of boys have a male in their household such as a step-father, uncle, grandfather or even an older sibling who can provide them with fathering.

Others, with the support of female gatekeepers, can have access to their biological fathers (often withheld because of estrangement between parents, or because the father did not pay inhlawulo, the damages owing to the family following a pregnancy out of wedlock).

In the absence of a biological father, social fathering can provide boys with a positive masculine role model.

In addition, since the poor quality of a child’s relationship with his female caregiver as well as a poorer knowledge by the caregiver of the child’s whereabouts, friends and activities are all risk factors for violence, mothers have an important role to play in providing boys with opportunities for meaningful connection and communication.

Mothers and social fathers can also help boys to learn about sex and sexuality in healthy, age-appropriate ways, and counteract the negative messaging about sex and intimacy that boys are learning from pornography.

Experts underlined the importance of interrogating rigid gender roles, specifically the burden of financial provision, and stereotypes about boys being emotionally distant, unwilling to show emotion and not in need of nurturing or guidance.

Delaying independence, promoting accountability and assisting boys to navigate their relationships and online world are all essential to counteract feelings of isolation, loneliness and hopelessness and prevent early and sustained exposure to violence.

Delegates stressed that being male has an associated trauma where boys are not allowed to express who they are, to love or to show love, seek the help they need, or remain connected in a way they need. Given that childhood experience and trauma shape violent behaviour later in life, and many parents believe that their son “does not know how to show love”, it is critical to go upstream to prevent trauma both from specific experiences, but also the normative trauma of boyhood.

Breaking the cycle of violence

In the Family for Every Child report, researchers identified the need for primary, secondary and tertiary interventions to address gendered social norms, raise awareness about sexual violence against boys, and develop protective mechanisms by strengthening families, dealing with dysfunction, as well as teaching families to provide relationship and sex education.

They also underlined the need to deal with trauma and other adverse childhood experiences to protect children from harmful sexual behaviours and vulnerability to abuse; for the training of practitioners; and critically, for policy amendments.

Coupled with these legislative and policy changes, there’s a need for increased funding for programmes associated with boyhood, including through utilising social fathering and those providing positive rites of passage, along with interventions focused specifically on boys who are victims of physical and sexual violence.

Addressing the crisis in boyhood is going to take connection, communication, a safe space for boys to express emotion, a reworking of the social script and rigid stereotypes around manhood and a process of unlearning.

Crucially, dismantling patriarchy will no longer suffice to make these changes, the pendulum needs to swing away from the “men are trash” extreme too.

Combating despair and breaking the cycle of violence is at stake – we can’t afford to fail. 

First published in the Daily Maverick 5th August 2024