WP: The Myth of 'The Boy Crisis'

[Rose Siding]

....The media have been hyping America's new "boy crisis" in magazine cover stories, a PBS documentary and countless newspaper articles. Boys, these reports lament, are falling behind in academic achievement, graduating from high school at lower rates than girls, occupying fewer seats in college classrooms, displaying poorer verbal skills.
....
The boy crisis we're hearing about is largely a manufactured one, the product of both a backlash against the women's movement and the media's penchant for continuously churning out news about the latest dire threat to the nation. The subject got a big boost last year when first lady Laura Bush announced that she was going to turn her attention to the problems of boys.

But those problems are hardly so widespread. The alarming statistics on which the notion of a crisis is based are rarely broken out by race or class. When they are, the whole picture changes. It becomes clear that if there is a crisis, it's among inner-city and rural boys. White suburban boys aren't significantly touched by it. On average, they are not dropping out of school, avoiding college or lacking in verbal skills. Although we have been hearing that boys are virtually disappearing from college classrooms, the truth is that among whites, the gender composition of colleges is pretty balanced: 51 percent female and 49 percent male, according to the National Education Association. In Ivy League colleges, men still outnumber women.
....
When it comes to academic achievement, race and class completely swamp gender. The Urban Institute reports that 76 percent of students who live in middle- to higher-income areas are likely to graduate from high school, while only 56 percent of students who live in lower-income areas are likely to do so. Among whites in Boston public schools, for every 100 males who graduate, 104 females do. A tiny gap.

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2006/04/07/AR2006040702025.html

[AngryAmish]

1. OK, but why the gap in disadvantaged areas?

It seems the writer says since rich white boys are doing ok there should be nothing done to help disadvantaged lads. It is that sort of "screw 'em, they're black" attitude this administration seems to always push.

[michaelwb]

8. Not only there.

Yup, and not only there but in this thread too.

When white girls were disadvantaged it was a crisis. And since we can now say that white boys aren't - it's not a crisis.

Sucks to be a minority male, but we knew that didn't we?

[madame defarge]

2. Thank you!

My school district - in a predominently white suburban neighborhood -- is all up in arms about the book "Raising Cain" and its findings, which this article seems to refute. When I first heard about all this hub-bub about how boys are falling behind and how we need to change the subtle messages that are being sent to them (i.e., "Girls Rule!" t-shirts are apparently offending them), I immediately thought that it was crap and they were trying to undue everything we've fought for in the past 30 years. Being the mother of a daughter, I refuse to fall trap to this crap.

I'm definitely passing this article on to everyone who attended the meeting, including the superintendent who was all over the need to help the boys.

[Warpy]

3. THANK YOU and thanks to the Boston Globe

for exposing yet another silly, manufatured crisis. Since journalists have been prevented from reporting the news every American needs to know, they've been reduced to filling their work hours generating twaddle about things like "the boy crisis."

Yes, males generally aren't as verbal and females aren't as good with visual spatial skills, but there are enough exceptions of both sexes outside this "norm" as to make it largely meaningless.

There is no boy crisis. The only jobs males are unsuited to are surrogate mother and wet nurse. The only job females are exempted from is sperm donor.

[AX10]

4. Thank You for this article. "The Boy Crisis" is a myth manufactured...

by the right wing to supress opportunities and equality among genders.

The author of the book is a shameless POS for writing this crap!

Read this part of the article:

"Nonetheless, some are advocating boys-only classrooms in which boys would be taught in boot-camp fashion. In a recent Newsweek cover story, Houston neurologist Bruce Perry described today's co-ed classes as a "biologically disrespectful model of education." In the New Republic, Richard Whitmire wrote of a "verbally drenched curriculum" that is "leaving boys in the dust." New York Times columnist David Brooks suggested that boys ought to be given books about combat, to hold their interest. (Forget Julius Caesar, give them GI Joe?)

There's actually not much evidence that most boys lack verbal skills. In 2005, University of Wisconsin psychologist Janet Hyde synthesized data from 165 studies on verbal ability and gender. They revealed a female superiority so slight as to be meaningless. And psychologist Diane Halpern of Claremont McKenna College looked at many studies of verbal and math abilities and found that, overall, the gender differences were remarkably small."

[BrklynLiberal]

5. Hey! What ever happened to Pickle's big "anti-Gang" Movement?

[AX10]

6. Do they want to prepare young men for war?

"Nonetheless, some are advocating boys-only classrooms in which boys would be taught in boot-camp fashion. In a recent Newsweek cover story, Houston neurologist Bruce Perry described today's co-ed classes as a biologically disrespectful model of education. In the New Republic, Richard Whitmire wrote of a verbally drenched curriculum that is "leaving boys in the dust. New York Times columnist David Brooks suggested that boys ought to be given books about combat, to hold their interest. (Forget Julius Caesar, give them GI Joe?)"

There's actually not much evidence that most boys lack verbal skills. In 2005, University of Wisconsin psychologist Janet Hyde synthesized data from 165 studies on verbal ability and gender. They revealed a female superiority so slight as to be meaningless. And psychologist Diane Halpern of Claremont McKenna College looked at many studies of verbal and math abilities and found that, overall, the gender differences were remarkably small.

[The Traveler]

7. There is a "boy crisis" and feminism is not to blame

Male empowerment does not require disempowerment of the female, or vice versa.

Sure, there is a boy crisis ... to be male is to be aggressive. Aggression is not necessarily bad. One can aggressively attack, for example, the problems of homelessness or social injustice. Or one can become a school yard bully. With shallow, vain men like Bush visibly in control, how can we expect young men to dedicate themselves to excellence? What is the point? Young men have sensitive bullshit detectors ... and our leaders teach them that corruption, vanity, dishonesty, and viciousness are the way to success ... not excellence, kindness, or creativity.

Young men are in crisis because older men are of low quality. It really is that simple. And while the Promise Keeper types sense the problem correctly, their approach to a solution (disempowerment of the female) merely provides evidence of their own inadequacy as men.

Here's a hint. Strong men do not fear strong women. They desire them.