Young men are in crisis. When I grew up dad showed me how to be a real man. Now boys watch porn & look up to Andrew Tate
These boys who get their sex education from woman-hating porn have ludicrously warped ideas about penis length, how long sexual intercourse lasts, what is pleasurable — and even what happens on the average date night.
The CSJ report quotes a specialist teacher who reported that many boys thought it was true that, “it is common to ejaculate on a woman’s face after sex”.
There was no porn-on-tap when I was a lad. If there had been, I would probably still be in my bedroom in Billericay.
A real man was both tough and kind. The great provider for his family, and their great protector too.
And in all seriousness, what would a diet like that have done to me? Nothing good.
A central theory of Adolescence is that 80 per cent of women are attracted to 20 per cent of men, a statistic that strikes an excruciating chord with shy, awkward, self-conscious boys who fear they will never get a girl in the real world.
This notorious 80/20 statistic fuels the kind of misogyny that has been so successfully exploited by influencer Andrew Tate, with his ten million loveless followers on X.
Tate is namechecked and then dismissed in Adolescence. One schoolmate suggests that Jamie has been “indoctrinated by voices a lot more dangerous than Tate’s”.
Blithely blaming what ails our boys on the professional women haters of the “manosphere” feels hopelessly inadequate.
If Andrew Tate had never been born, the internet would still reek of misogyny. What can be done to save our sons?
Adolescence co-writer Jack Thorne has said that smart phones should be treated like cigarettes and banned until the age of 16 — a digital age of consent.
It sounds like a great idea. In Australia, there are already heavy fines for social media platforms that do not prevent children under 16 from holding accounts.
Few parents — worried sick about what their kids are looking at behind all those closed bedroom doors — would object.
But a Safer Phones Bill, that would have given headteachers the legal right to ban phones in school, has already stalled.
Jack Thorne’s son is eight years old. Jack has yet to experience just how all-consuming the online world is for a growing teenager in our time.
Try taking a phone away from a 14-year-old, Jack!
What is so powerful about Adolescence is that there is nothing inherently evil about Jamie.
“Neither good nor bad, just a kid like you,” Hank Williams sings in Lost Highway, a song about a young man who goes astray.
Neither good nor bad, Jamie’s life goes tragically wrong after making too many bad choices.
In his blank, unformed features, you can see the frustration, confusion and rage of an entire generation of lost boys.
Jamie could be your son; he could be mine. And that is why we must find the space to let our boys grow.
This generation of boys, like any generation, still need to be able to celebrate their youth, to let off steam and enjoy being a boy.
And we must teach them that being a man does not mean resenting, fearing or hating women.
Even in these changing times, it means exactly the opposite.
“This is a man’s world,” James Brown growled a lifetime ago.
Not any more.