Our Sons, Our Schools
by
Warren Farrell, Ph.D.
In the last third of the 20th century, feminism freed women and girls
from the straight-jacket of stereotyped sex roles. No one did the same for
men or boys. This is not women's fault. Women cannot hear what men don't
say. But it does have an impact.
Girls used to be minorities in college and graduate school. Now women
are almost 60% of full-time graduate students. They are also 54% of
full-time undergraduates and almost 70% of part-time undergraduates. In
high school, girls are more likely to be in clubs, in student government,
on school newspapers, to receive better grades, to be valedictorians and
salutatorians, to win scholarships, and to have higher professional
aspirations. In contrast, they have fewer discipline problems and drop out
less.
This change is occurring for many reasons. Our sons are often being
raised only by their mothers, then entering elementary schools with almost
all female teachers. Girls have role models. Boys have gangs. Yet our
daughters are still being treated like disadvantaged minorities with
federal programs like Girl Power focusing millions of dollars on our
daughters' special needs-while no program focuses on our sons' special
needs.
Nothing tells the story more dramatically than our sons' and daughters'
suicide rates. As feminism has helped our daughters get love and respect
for being whoever they want to be, our daughters' suicide rate has
declined. Meanwhile, our sons' suicide rate has soared. Why? Start with
the power of our children's first love. Fortunately, our daughters now
have the option to pursue boys and take sexual initiatives. But our sons
still have the expectation. If they do it too slowly, they are still
called a wimp; but now, if they do it too awkwardly, they are sued for
sexual harassment; and if they do it too fast, they are a date rapist.
As feminism has helped our daughters to have more ways to gain love and
respect, it has also encouraged sexual harassment and date rape
legislation that has given our sons more ways to lose love and respect.
And people who feel unloved and disrespected are most vulnerable to
suicide. So when our sons and daughters are nine their suicide rate is
identical, but by their early twenties, our sons' rate is six times as
high.
Feminism helped us become aware of the price of our daughters
becoming sex objects, but not the price of our sons becoming success
objects. ... our sons did not become successful by expressing who they
were, but by repressing who they were.
By focusing only on our daughters, we have identified only the ways our
daughters experience low self-esteem and depression. So we catch their
experience before it becomes suicide. Boys' experience of depression and
low self-esteem is hidden in the cracks. By calling it aggression or
delinquency or drinking or drugs, we miss the depression until we stand
before his coffin.
The reason boys' experience got hidden in the cracks evolved slowly
over the past third of a century. It started with the shadow side of feminism in the
belief that since our sons would grow up earning more money, they must
have more power, privilege, and attention to their needs. We lost sight of
the fact that men had been historically obligated to raise money just as
women had been obligated to raise children, and that obligations are not
power, but, well, obligations.
We failed to see that women's attention to men's needs was conditional.
Few women competed for the man reading I'm OK, You're OK in the
unemployment line. It was conditional on his willingness to earn money
that a woman would often spend while he died sooner. Therefore, homeless
men and gay men did not have women providing for their needs. It was
conditional upon men being willing to die in war. Few beautiful princesses
married conscientious objectors. Women fell in love with The Officer And
The Gentleman, not The Private And The Pacifist.
Feminism helped us become aware of the price of our daughters becoming
sex objects, but not the price of our sons becoming success objects. We
falsely assumed that our sons' greater preparation for success meant a
greater concern for who he was. We missed the fact that our sons did not
become successful by expressing who they were, but by repressing who they
were. Successful men did not express feelings, they repressed feelings.
This is still the norm in most North American high schools. The girls are
most likely to fall in love with our son if he is a football player. A
football players soon learns that being in touch with his feelings is
dysfunctional, that acknowledging his pain leads to him leaving the game.
And then the cheerleader would no longer cheer for him. She would cheer
for his replaceable part.
Our sons need love and approval too much to look underneath the cheering in that
her cheering is not for who he is, but for his willingness to deny his
feelings. Our sons are still being taught to receive love by sacrificing
their bodies. But instead of calling it child abuse or prostitution, they
call it "becoming a man" Or scholarship potential. Or identity. Few
parents protest. Most applaud.
Our daughters have entered the Era of the Multi-Option Woman, while our
sons are still in the Era of the No-Option Man. Our daughters now have the
option to perform, the option to pursue boys, and the option to pay; our
sons still have the expectation to perform, pursue, and pay.
Our daughters are still giving their love to men who perform, and
watching mothers do the same. Worldwide, two and a half billion of our
daughters-as-women are still enough into the fantasy of being swept away
that they were glued to Princess Diana's wedding. Few of our sons have
castles to offer.
When these fantasies of security become the trauma of divorce, our
daughters demonize the men who failed to save them. They join First Wives'
Clubs. Their fantasy of being swept away has been swept away. It is
difficult for a woman who is rejected to feel a man's feelings. It is
easier to label him a jerk. (It hurts less to be rejected by an object
than by a human being.) A success object who fails becomes an object of
contempt and the focus of the male-bashing that is ubiquitous today.
On a deeper level, our sons' depression and heartaches get lost in the
cracks because virtually every society has had an unconscious investment
in men protecting us. People who protect us have to be willing to die, not
encouraged to be in touch with their feelings. It was part of our genetic
heritage to select men who were killer-protectors.
Our genetic future, though, is dependent on selecting men who are
nurturer-connectors. This will evolve not from a women's movement blaming
men or a men's movement blaming women, but from a gender transition
movement helping both sexes to make a transition from following rigid
roles to negotiating trade-offs in a multi-option world. For the past
third of a century, we have introduced our daughters into a multi-option
world. Now it is time to introduce our sons.
© 2006, Warren Farrell
Dr. Warren Farrell
is the author of many books, including two award-winning
international best-sellers, Why Men Are The Way They Are plus
The Myth of Male Power. His most recent books are Women
Can’t Hear What Men Don’t Say, which was a selection of the
Book-of-the-Month Club, and Father and Child Reunion about
how fathers can be successful at both work and home. His latest
book, just published this year, Why Men Earn More: The Startling
Truth Behind the Pay Gap and What Women Can Do About It, helps
both employers and employees understand what makes a company want to
increase an employee’s pay. His books are published in over 50
countries, and in 10 languages.
Dr. Warren Farrell is available for expert
testimony to help fathers stay equally involved in their children's
lives after divorce.
CLICK HERE to contact Dr. Warren Farrell for information.
www.WarrenFarrell.net (Why Men Earn More)
www.WarrenFarrell.biz (Father and Child Reunion)
www.WarrenFarrell.org (The Myth of Male Power)
www.WarrenFarrell.info (Women Can’t Hear What Men Don’t Say)
www.WarrenFarrell.us (Why Men Are The Way They Are)
www.WarrenFarrell.ws (The Liberated Man)
Copyright 2004 Warren Farrell, Ph.D., all rights
reserved
