July 31, 2007
The United States of Boys-In-Crisis (And, Again, The Church Is Asleep At The Switch)
Time Magazine ran another story attempting to address the claim, contrary to LOTS and LOTS of researchers from several sectors, that American boys are in crisis. The author notes that after 10 years of panic about boys that boys are doing better. I totally disagree. Some boys are doing better but the youth ministries and activities I continue to be involved around the country paint a dire portrait: feminized, emasculated and they don't even know it. Sad.
"The culture" has been talking about boy crisis for a decade. John Eldredge talked about the effects of father wounds but many conservative nut-jobs rejected him because doesn't use the phrases they love to hear. So churches haven't listened still.
The Reformed world continues to be asleep at the switch while the divorce rates get worse and worse (daaaahh, people there's a connection here!!) and men are more and more impotent for anything kingdom-oriented and missional. Useless, passive men. Other conservative Christians don't think there's a problem or, oddly, think that masculine training is getting guys better at doing church stuff and evangelism, and liberal Christians are too busy swimming in androgyny to notice.
And then you get this empty rhetoric, "we just need to preach the gospel more." Ahhh, what makes people think that preaching "ALONE" makes everything else just fall nicely into place? Where did that come from? I've only done youth ministry in "gospel preaching churches" and they are full of emasculated, passive, men and really, really jacked-up kids.
There must not be a church in America then that preaches the gospel if that's "the" problem.
I think we may have made preaching an idol and/or made an idol out of "getting the gospel right."
Here's the Time Magazine story The Myth About Boys.
Posted by anthony at July 31, 2007 09:12 AM | TrackBackThat is nuts. The Today show this morning just did a peice about this as well. Some of the facts and statistics they reported are:
- Public schools across America are cutting recess time where boys can "blow off steam" in an effort to meat the standards of the "No Child Left Behind Act." Ironically, Private schools have something like double the recess time as public schools.
- 1 in 3 suburban kids are on ritalin, or some other ADD or hyperactive medication. (I used to be one of them)
- Most boys would rather stay home and play video games than hang out with friends, meet girls, or otherwise have quality social interaction. (I used to be one of them, too)
To paraphrase a psychiatrist on the show, boys are being medicated and forced out of their boyhood. More boys are growing up with psychoses than ever before. 40% of boys will never graduate college.
I practically mourned when I saw it this morning, yet I do not know what the solution is.
Brad, what's even more nuts is that you'll be hard pressed to find a church that's aware of the crisis and is actually doing something about it.
How is a problem this big going undetected and un-addressed in conservative evangelicalism?
I don't get it!! The church can do it's job with weak men. It's impossible!
When you visit a church here's a question you need to ask to see what century they're in: what is this church doing specifically to build up men?
If they don't have an answer for you that may not be a good sign. You may have some work to do there for sure.
Posted by: Anthony at July 31, 2007 02:00 PMWhat do you mean, specifically, by kingdom-oriented? Missional? Feminized? Emasculated?
It's tempting for someone who comes from a non-evangelical background simply to ascribe these sorts of claims to a "traditional" Christian mindset. That is, one that says "boys are like this; girls are like that; never the twain shall meet." And in that sense, they just don't make sense to many other folks without some greater definition, which I would appreciate.
I gladly accept that the sexes, in a general sense, have some natural differences. And I don't disagree with much of what you say - especially the parts about overmedication, the lack of recess and physical activity, etc. But what is wrong with the idea that the male part of society just inevitably will take a few knocks (in comparison to itself a couple of generations ago) now that women are achieving their proper equal status in society? Are churches failing to build up men, or are men just not the sole focus of public life anymore?
For instance (just as a hypothetical), if the total number of seats at higher educational institutions hasn't changed that much, but the proportion of female students in them has increased a great deal, then does that really say something bad about society's treatment of boys?
Posted by: Jack at July 31, 2007 03:39 PM"But what is wrong with the idea that the male part of society just inevitably will take a few knocks... now that women are achieving their proper equal status in society?"
Since when did equality require shortchanging another demographic? The point is exactly that it is not an "equal status" in society. Neither I nor Anthony would complain if it were equal, or the statistics illustrated as such.
"For instance (just as a hypothetical), if the total number of seats at higher educational institutions hasn't changed that much, but the proportion of female students in them has increased a great deal, then does that really say something bad about society's treatment of boys?"
Absolutely not, but the statistics point to a far more holistic and far reaching problem than just that. There is not a limit on seats in tertiary education as a whole, and that is just not an argument. With 40% of boys not graduating college, it is MUCH bigger problem than just a few more seats being taken up by girls.
Posted by: Brad at July 31, 2007 05:46 PMI'm still not convinced that boys as a whole are shortchanged. Some boys get "short-changed" in a way - i.e. the ones who aren't as smart or motivated as some girls but who would have gotten better jobs or spots in higher education had those girls not been competing with them. But that doesn't mean that all boys get shortchanged. I don't think, anywhere in history, that total growth has been so great that noone had to compete. The people at the bottom of an aptitude curve - or the people who are repressed by a dominant class (historically, females, racial and religious minorities, etc.) - always get short changed in a way. If that happens to describe some boys, it sucks for them, but again, that doesn't mean all boys get screwed over.
Nor is 40% of boys not graduating college a necessary evil. MOST Americans do not graduate from college - only about 30% finish a college degree at all. Many, many Americans do not even need to go to college for the kinds of jobs that they will have. It is true that there is more growth in the numbers of girls who attend college, but attendance for both sexes is growing both numerically and proportionally. (So says the US dept. of education, at least.)
I need more statistics from you before I can agree with you that this "crisis" is really and truly a crisis.
And I'm still wondering what feminization/emasculation have to do with all this.
Posted by: Jack at July 31, 2007 08:53 PM"If that happens to describe some boys, it sucks for them, but again, that doesn't mean all boys get screwed over."
The point of the article (and the Today peice) was that the system as a whole is shortchanging boys. No, not all boys will be affected by this, but when a system is broken, it has a heck of a lot greater effect than just individual circumstances.
"Nor is 40% of boys not graduating college a necessary evil."
I should have been more specific, the statistic was that 40% of boys who DO GO TO COLLEGE in the first place, do not graduate. That is a problem. I will agree that 40% of all boys not going/graduating college is a fairly normal statistic, but 40% of those who DO go is absolutely tragic and says something quite strong about the failure of the educational system.
I'll let Anthony talk about how he used "feminization" and "emasculation." I think I understand how he used them, but he is far more learned on the topic than I.
Posted by: Brad at August 1, 2007 11:06 AM