Supporting Boys to Belong

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‘... alone in the bright host of companions, lost in the blue unfriendliness of space …’ – AD Hope

We are a social species; we all seek relationship and belonging. As our boys mature, they start to look at how to code the world: what might fit their own image, the image they wish to portray, and also what doesn’t. They seek connection. A natural part of this is the desire to belong to groups. Through socialisation they learn what is ‘in’ and what is ‘out.’ And to do this, we want them to have a healthy set of criteria.

Right now, the stakes are high. Young men are increasingly influenced by leaders like Andrew Tate. This generation of boys and young men are growing up with mostly unsupervised access to the internet and its great shadows—pornography, the objectification of women, and risk-taking behaviours. Compounding this is an unhealthy image of success for boys: that of the stoic loner, the man who uses dominance; someone who has power ‘over’, not power ‘with.’

Judy Chu, biologist and author of When Boys Become Boys, describes how boys must continually ‘prove’ their masculinity. But critically, boys as young as 4 years old learn that whilst they are naturally relational, they have to trade out intimacy.

They pay a huge price and hide their real selves.

So what can we do?

Our research into positive masculinity suggests we need two broad approaches: knowing and being.

'Knowing' refers to the reality we teach boys, in contrast to what they are consuming in their media diets.

‘Being’ is the principle that even when people know things, they don’t always act in accordance with that knowledge.

Kids make mistakes. What is important is to have an ongoing dialogue about what matters. Our boys need repeated exposure to the good medicine and the right dosage.

So here are some things that matter:

1. Be authentic. In positive masculinity, we talk about developing authenticity. As researchers, we know that we don’t simply want to replace one type of masculinity with another. Gender identity is complex: It is made up of interconnections to other parts of how we see ourselves. But we also know that there are some guiding principles we can work towards. Research (Wilson et al 2021) suggests that authenticity is simply being comfortable in our own skin.

To support boys in being more authentic, we need to honour and acknowledge the gifts that they are bringing to the world. We can:

• Have presence when we talk to boys, seeking first to listen and understand
• Be slow to judge and quick to listen
• Have a sense of playfulness

2. Promote voice. To help boys form the right conditions for belonging, they need time to discuss and unpack what they are seeing and how they are feeling. In places like schools, it has been found that where there is a culture of ‘high student voice’, engagement and self-confidence are also high. Across the world there are falling literacy rates for boys: They don’t talk enough to build the language to articulate their perspectives.

Using dialogic structures (ways to talk) can really help to build language. Here are two simple ones:

• Over dinner ask for ‘two roses and a thorn’ – each person over dinner briefly shares two things that went well during the day, and one challenge. Of course, we do this by listening and not judging.
• Use the WIN framework to help boys think (but importantly talk) through their feelings.

Source: Source: Paul Sidup/Pexels

And finally...

3. Be a witness to the ‘good.' Our kids learn a lot from us, and how we relate to other adults and people. Role modelling matters, but boys knowing they are loved and valued matters just as much. Calling out the ‘good things’ publicly helps boys be seen. We remember the rule of thumb ‘praise publicly and criticise privately.’

In a world where antisocial and unhealthy values are held up as being successful, taking time to acknowledge in the boys and young men the good they do – acts of kindness, compassion, consideration, care and support – helps to amplify in them the good values and aspirations. In turn, they will seek it in others.

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Supporting boys to foster genuine belonging is not just a goal but a necessity for future fit masculinities.