The real reason boys turn to extreme online role models

I think the idea that you can somehow just invent like a progressive version of Andrew Tate or

somebody and just throw them online, add water and here's this new suddenly globally famous

alternative, that's not how online influence works. But the bigger issue for me is that

the best antidote to an unserious online male role model, I'm using that term advisedly

is an in-real-life, flesh-and-blood, actual man. By having male teachers, male coaches

fathers, uncles, neighbours, etc., just being a living and breathing version of what it means to be a man

I continue to believe that in the long run, boys, young men, will believe their eyes

more than their ears. If there's a lack of real-life men showing what it means to be a man

rather than telling you how to be a man, then I think that creates a vacuum which then gets filled by online figures

I'm Richard Reeves. I'm president of the American Institute for Boys and Men

I'm also the author of the book, Of Boys and Men, Why the Modern Male is Struggling, Why That Matters and What to Do About It

The Antidote to Toxic Male Influencers. If we're not careful, these conversations can shut the conversation down with boys and young men

rather than opening it up. And so when we're talking about online influencers

we're talking about some of the kind of reactionary figures online, sometimes parents sort of react to discovering that their son, for example

is consuming video content from somebody like Andrew Tate, pretty well-known misogynist influencer

It's almost like they're watching hardcore porn. They slam the laptop with the same kind of moral fervor

as if they caught them looking at some pretty kind of horrible porn. And that's the wrong response

It's a natural response, but it's the wrong response. Instead, you've got to have curiosity. You've got to figure out, like, well, why are you interested in this

Let's have that argument. Because one of the things that the most successful reactionary online figures say is

nobody will want you to talk about watching my stuff or listening to my stuff

If you even mention to somebody that you're interested in this, watch how they react

Watch how your mom reacts. Watch how your school reacts. And see how they react

They almost, they set it as a test. and then so sure enough if you raise this issue you say to your mom that you've been consuming

some of this content or you're doubting some of what you've been taught and if the reaction is

immediately like how dare you watch you've just proved the point that the reactionary was making

and this is one of those moments where it's hard but i'm speaking here as a parent as much as a

policy wonk is that you take some deep breaths, you try to be open-minded, you don't in any way

compromise your own values, and you have some curiosity. And you try to become an ally and a

partner to your son as they navigate this difficult online world and offline world

And I worry sometimes that the uninformed, frankly, reaction that many middle-aged policymakers are

having to some of these issues online. A, they look out of touch and they sound out of touch

but it also has this really chilling effect on an open conversation about what's really going on

And that then just drives these boys and young men even further into the recesses of what's

online. The question is, who's having an honest and good faith conversation about this? And I

don't think that forcing boys and girls to kind of watch a fictional drama in schools

which is by definition fictional and not true to life in many ways

is going to open up that conversation. At least it won't open it up for most boys

So I worry that it'll actually backfire and be unhelpful. There's a big difference between a show like Adolescents

becoming a big Netflix hit for people watching it and governments, as the UK government has

proposing showing that in every secondary school. Then it's a matter of policy

and therefore I think it becomes an issue that we should pay more attention to

And there's a real danger that you take something that's fictional and assume that it's more true to life than it really is

It can create a moral panic. It can make many parents fear that they're kind of inadvertently raising a monster

which is almost certainly not true. So the good news about something like a show like Adolescence

is that it draws attention to some of the kind of risks online, some of the more reactionary figures online

It's good. Parents should be thoughtful about that. But the downside is that it can run into this common problem we have when we're discussing the issues of boys and men

which is that they're just a couple of clicks away from becoming kind of an incel, violent criminal

And that's just not true. And their presumption that that might be about to happen can actually shut the conversation down

I think the idea that you can somehow just invent like a progressive version of Andrew Tate or somebody and just throw them online, add water and here's this new suddenly globally famous alternative

That's not how online influence works. It grows organically. It grows through algorithms

It grows through clicks. And so I think it's just unrealistic to think you can somehow just create

These things don't get created that way. So first of all, it's very naive, I think. But the bigger issue for me is that the best antidote to an unserious online male role model, I'm using that term advisedly, is an in real life, flesh and blood, actual man in the lives of boys

The way to beat the online version of it is by having male teachers, male coaches

fathers, uncles, neighbors, etc. Just being a living and breathing version of what it means to be a man

I continue to believe that in the long run, boys, young men, will believe their eyes more than their ears

And so if there isn enough of a sense of what does it mean to be a man in my community in my home in my school etc If there a lack of real men showing what it means to be a man rather than

telling you how to be a man, then I think that creates a vacuum which then gets filled by online

figures. I honestly believe that the way to beat the online world is offline, is in real life

that doesn't mean we shouldn't be online it doesn't mean we shouldn't of course support the

people who are and there are lots of people in the so-called manosphere a term i think is probably

now redundant because i i don't know who's included in it anymore but there are lots of

guys online a lot of doing fitness stuff doing kind of motivational stuff i really love for

example arnold schwarzenegger's pump club i don't know if you've seen any of that but and what's

great about that is that like and i probably i sympathize with this like somebody will show a

video of themselves doing their first push-up right and they managed to do like one or two push-ups

and then arnold himself will come on and say that's great go for it etc it's incredibly warm

and it's like welcoming and so there's a lot of really great stuff happening around this stuff

online but in the long run you can beat an andrew tate video with a classroom exercise or a hike up

the mountain with your scout group any day of the week if there's a young man and he kind of watches

some stuff online and it's kind of and it drifts into kind of misogynist stuff whatever then first

of all which which man is he going to talk to about that right maybe the father certainly it's

something i spoke to my sons about but who are they going to talk to about that who are they

going to test those ideas on? Probably a man. So is there a man in their lives they can test that on

But also then they're going to look at the guys and they're going to say, does my teacher or my

scout leader or my uncle act like Andrew Tate? No. Is he a good guy? Yes. Would I rather be more like

him? Well, hopefully the answer is yes. Well, there is a big question. Should we have any single

sex space. Should we have male-only spaces or female-only spaces? Maybe we should just get

rid of them all together. I think as a general point, we don't want them in the workplace as

places where power and favors are traded, right? There's a reasonable suspicion of what was called

the old boys club and the idea that kind of men were congregating in male spaces and the power

and influence were being shared in those spaces. We quite rightly tried to turn against that

But that's very different to the Boy Scouts and the Girl Scouts

It's very different to youth organizations. And I think it's a mistake to move from the correct claim that we shouldn't have an old boys club

to saying that we shouldn't have Boy Scouts or we shouldn't have single-sex classes or even single-sex sports

for both boys and girls. I'm quite angry at the Scouts for giving up Boy Scouts

Boy Scouts of America no longer exists. It's now called Scouting for America

And girls are allowed in. Girl Scouts remains Girl Scouts and single sex

And the reason I'm angry about that is because I've been a scout leader, I was a scout, etc

is I think for pretty progressive reasons, which is that single-sex spaces, when done well

they don't amplify the more stereotypically male or female characteristics. They help to balance them out

And so in Girl Scouts, for example, there's a huge emphasis on things like leadership and going into STEM

taking more assertive positions etc so they're kind of working Girl Scouts don't spend a huge amount of time

with the girls talking about the need to be more caring or more nurturing

or to open up emotionally to each other or be there for each other they spend a lot more time

on things like being more competitive being more aggressive being more assertive

and I think as a result of that Girl Scouts has done a really good job

of actually kind of helping girls to kind of balance out some of those perhaps

more naturally occurring tendencies with others In Boy Scouts, this is certainly my experience as a scout leader, you don't have to typically work very hard with boys to make them more competitive

Boys will turn throwing trash into a trash can into a competition. You don't generally have to get this idea of being more aggressive because that's a little bit more on average baked in

But what you do instead is you work on teamwork. You work on how to care for the other people in your patrol

You learn how to love each other and to serve each other

And so you balance out so that hopefully as a result of those single sex spaces

you actually end up with both men and women who are somewhat more fully filled out

There's like a stereotype of like boys spaces will make boys more boyish

But actually, I think the opposite is true. I think that boys spaces, whether it's teams or scouts, actually help boys learn to love

learn to care, learn to be of service, think about other people. And the same with like girl spaces done well, they don't make girls girlier, they actually

help them to kind of develop other skills. And so done properly and in the right balance, I actually think that single sex spaces make

a lot of sense. I certainly don't think we want to end up with a world where we think that it is necessary

or good to have single sex spaces only for girls. we get rid of all of the ones that existed for boys

It's pretty clear to most people that when boys are around girls, the presence of the

girls affects how the boys behave, including towards each other, and vice versa

It's one of the strong arguments that's been made, for example, for single-sex girls' schools is to get girls away from some of the presence of boys and what that means

In practice, in an all-boys space, what it allows you to do is work more on skills around

emotion, sharing, caring, etc. You may not use that language, particularly if it's like a team

sport or something It be more around maybe use more masculine language right The other fellow first or the team first or whatever But what you really learning about is love and care and nurturing I just think some of that easier to do if you not feeling the gaze of your female peers

and vice versa too. And so if you're trying to kind of incubate spaces where you can really kind of develop full human beings

there is something to be said for at least some spaces where you're doing that in a single sex

environment. The share of boys playing sports is going down and that's for all kinds of reasons but

a big problem there is the loss of team sports. Team sports for boys is a place and a space within

which they kind of learn to think about each other, to be part of a bigger whole, they learn

to love each other. There's a real solidarity and camaraderie in team sports that I think is very

good for girls and boys, but looks especially good for boys. But that's a safe space within

which they learn a lot of the skills, including those social skills, those teamwork skills

those caring skills that they're going to need to be good fathers, to be good husbands

and to be good workers. I also think that coaches are mental health professionals in disguise

They're sitting shoulder to shoulder on a bench or in a group

They're working with boys or with young men and they're very often noticing that they're

struggling and they can in a very, very safe way, in a non-threatening way, they can open

up a conversation with them. And there's a reason I think why so many men will say that a coach played a hugely

important part in their role, especially if they didn't have a strong relationship with their father

It's a trope at this point to say that coaches are father figures. But it's also a truth that

for many boys they absolutely do play that role for men. I've seen this, I have this image in my

mind of a coach sitting next to a young man, a boy or a young man, and they're just sitting like this

shoulder to shoulder, and the coach is saying, how are you? You seem a little bit off today

everything okay? How's stuff at home? How are things with your mom? You know, did you sort that

thing out? And they're probably watching the game a bit too. And what's really interesting about that

is it's beautiful, but it's also they're shoulder to shoulder. And one of the things we know is that

men communicate more comfortably with each other shoulder to shoulder, as opposed to face to face

When men are face to face with each other, that's quite a threatening position. Men, And now if I tell you this, you won't be able to unsee it

Every time you go to a social event, look at the way that the men are standing in relation to each other

They're always slightly catty-cornered with each other, always at an angle, because being face-to-face is a threat posture

It also means that if you want to communicate with young men, go fishing, go for a drive, go for a hike

A lot of psychologists now will do the walk-and-talk therapy. Do not sit them down and stare them in the face

That is not a very comfortable way for most men to communicate with each other

They are going to communicate much more comfortably with each other when they're doing something else, when they are shoulder to shoulder

And so there's something also about those activities, whatever the activity is, whether it's sports or hiking or building something or hammering something or fishing for something

It's the only explanation for golf that I've been able to come up with

There's this sense of like you're doing something together shoulder to shoulder. what you're actually doing then is communicating

And I think that's fine. You could roll your eyes at it and say, oh, you know, well, why can't men just sit in a coffee shop

and stare at each other? Why do they have to go and do something? Why do they have to pretend to be doing something else

or be doing something else when they're communicating? I don't roll my eyes at it. It's just true

And if it's true, then we should create more and more spaces

where men feel able to be shoulder to shoulder with each other and communicating with each other

in a way that is just a little bit more friendly towards men. And if that means Boy Scouts and it means boys sports teams, then good

I mean, there are these groups now, the Men's Sheds Movement, which is basically just a bunch of guys that kind of get together

It started in Australia. They get together and kind of fix stuff together. So they're fixing engines or they're doing something

and the guys are tinkering or whatever. And it just does seem to be true that, on average

men communicate a little bit more easily with each other when they are doing kind of something else

when they are in a shoulder-to-shoulder phase. And that's what a coach will do. that's what these activities will do is create that space which is actually incredibly therapeutic

space but where there is no therapist to be seen at least not officially and and so that's also one

of the reasons why I'm borderline obsessed with the share of men in mental health professions and

in health care professions because they kind of know that naturally I have I have a friend that

volunteers in a school and he goes into the school and he says which boy are you having the most

trouble with, they identify the boy and he just takes him for a walk. He doesn't sit down with

him. He doesn't pull up a chair in the classroom. He certainly doesn't sit opposite him. They go for

a walk. And he finds that they are much more likely to open up. So let's just take a walk

and then talk. And again, you could roll your eyes at that and just say, oh, what's wrong with men

but we have to be really careful generally not to treat men like defective women or vice versa

It's just that there are some of these differences between us that we don't really think about

until it becomes an issue and which should just be part of just a natural difference between us

that doesn't in any way trap anybody, right? I'm not saying that some women don't also communicate better shoulder to shoulder

and many men probably are fine face to face. But overall, there is a pretty big difference between those two

And it's one reason why the right kind of male-only space is a good thing

And not just a good thing for men, but a good thing for women. Because if men come out of those spaces with better relational skills, better soft skills, etc., that's good for the women in their lives as well

And I think what I seeing is a growing sense among women that they want their partners sons to have more opportunities to hang out with other men and the reason for that is not just because they want them out of the house although that may be part of it I think it because they recognize that actually

for men to be flourishing as men, it's great for them to have time with other men

just as it is for women. Any spaces that have boys and girls in them

young men and young women in them, should be safe. And Boy Scouts, Girl Scouts, youth organizations generally

have really done a very good job of ensuring that they're doing everything in their power

to make those spaces as safe as possible. We should continue to do that

But it's a good example of a space where we can't let the very, very small risk, even today

of there being something bad happening in those spaces to blind us to the overall positive benefits

of those spaces more generally. There have been plenty of scandals in institutions

including Boy Scouts and others, where quite rightly, the result has been to really be much more careful

about the safety of kids and have the right rules and the right practices

So we have to acknowledge that, but we also, we don't want to react in a way

that just closes all those spaces down, any more than we want to say that

because there are tragically always going to be some examples of kids being abused at school

so we don't send them to school, or that we don't want any men in our classrooms. I've actually had people say to me like

Well, I don't think we want any men in early years education

I think there's something a bit fishy about that. And didn't you hear that story of the male from state X where there was some horrific story

And the danger with the argument is that it has no end

In the end, what we're saying is that even the slightest risk of something horrific happening

such as something like abuse, then we shouldn't have these institutions at all

It would be a tragic mistake to take the correct concerns of every parent, myself included

to want their kids to be safe and to be safe in whichever spaces they're in

and to say that the way to do that is to shut all those spaces down

or to say that those spaces can only be co-ed. It's always been true that men have been underrepresented in elementary school

where it's only one in five. And actually there's now been a big decline in secondary school

where men have now dropped below half. And we see actually men actually make up the minority of teachers

in basically every subject now, including career and technical education. I think it's a perfectly reasonable question to ask, does it matter

Would it matter if our entire K-12 teaching workforce was female or male

Does it matter? I think it does matter. It matters because it sends a message that this is more of a female enterprise than a male enterprise

It codes education, educational success. Also, I think that the presence of men in schools and in classrooms acts as a way to have some actual role models that are a good alternative to the ones online, perhaps especially for boys who don't have a father figure in their lives or a good relationship with their father

So my own son teaches fifth grade in Baltimore and he's doing great

He loves it. But also there's just probably something about the fact of him at the front of that fifth grade classroom, which is powerful, sends a strong signal

You don't have to have a curriculum on positive masculinity if you've got positive men at the front of the classroom

There is something very important about boys and girls seeing education as something that both men and women value and do

And I really struggled in English. I was in remedial English for a while. I was the kid who would like never bring the book home and my mom would march me back to the school to get the book and read it

But the whole words, writing, books thing just didn't come naturally to me

And I had a teacher in secondary school, Mr. Wyatt, and he was a Korean War veteran and had been wounded in the Korean War

He was a part-time bus driver. I have no idea how old he was

He seemed like a thousand years old, but he was probably my age, as I am now

And curmudgeon, real curmudgeon, like broody and amazing English teacher. And he had us reading poetry

He had us reading metaphysical poetry, Andrew Marvell and people like that

And he had these kind of mostly working class boys just totally engaged in poetry and actually being quite moved by some of it

He brought to life this idea that words and literature was absolutely not a female pursuit

Every English teacher I'd had up until that point had been a woman. I felt like it was very coded female

And who knows? Who knows whether it was Mr. Wyatt that did it

But I think about him often. and I know that something happened to me in that class

which made me fall in love with words and writing in a way that I would previously have thought unimaginable

and I'm pretty sure that the fact that he was a guy

helped me get through that. Now, you could roll your eyes and say

well, what's wrong with Reeves that he couldn't get that from a woman? Like, what a troglodyte that it needed a guy

to kind of make him think all of that. Fine. I'm just sharing that that was my experience. I don't think it's that unusual experience

And I do think it was just as important for me to have an amazing female math teacher

And in the end, a good teacher is a good teacher. But there's something very important about making

sure that we don't allow education itself or particular kinds of learning to just get coded

It is just as important that we don't allow the love of language to become coded as a female thing

as it was to really break down the idea that math or science was a male thing

We're trying to get to a point where we're trying to see them as just things that anyone can do

but that gets harder and harder if you don't have any guides doing it. Want to support the channel

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