Of Boys And Men
A Summary
Before you start reading…
This is a 5,000 word summary of the book Of Boys And Men. I tried my best to touch upon as many ideas as possible while keeping it short and to the point.
I have added page numbers to the quotes so you can get the book for yourself and inform yourself more about the topics that are of interest to you.
Preface: Worried Dad to Worried Wonk
Many people told Richard Reeves - author of the book - that it might be a bad idea to write a book on issues of boys and men. It might be seen as somehow diminishing the attention that girls and women get.
“We can hold two thoughts in our head at once. We can be passionate about women's rights and compassionate towards vulnerable boys and men” (x)
When researching the topic of issues that men and boys face, things turned out to be worse than expected.
“The gender gap in college degrees awarded is wider today than it was in the early 1970s, but in the opposite direction. The wages of most men are lower today than they were in 1979, while women's wages have risen across the board. Men account for almost three out of four “deaths of despair,” either from a suicide or an overdose.” (x)
One could argue that we live in a patriarchal system, and that men must have it good because of it. But,
“Men at the top are still flourishing, but men in general are not.” (xi)
There are structural challenges that underlie the problems men face in the contemporary world, which is why a message of individual responsibility is not enough.
“Boys are falling behind at school and college because the educational system is structured in a way that puts them at a disadvantage. Men are struggling in the labor market because of an economic shift away from traditionally male jobs. And fathers are dislocated because the cultural role of the family provider has been hollowed out. The male malaise is not the result of a mass psychological break-down, but of deep structural challenges.” (xi)
Many social policy interventions do not work for boys and men. Free college, for example, does not impact men. However, because it does benefit women, the average outcome is positive, which disguises the fact that men are not helped.
Another problem is the political stalemate when it comes to gender.
“Both sides have dug into an ideological position that inhibits real change … The Left tells men “Be more like your sister.” The Right says, “Be more like your father.” Neither invocation is helpful.” (xii)
The reason for writing this book is because
“We must help men adapt to the dramatic changes of recent decades without asking them to stop being men. We need a prosocial masculinity for a postfeminist world.” (xiii)
Chapter 1: Girls Rule: Boys Are Behind In Education
“In 1972, the U.S. government passed the landmark Title IX law to promote gender equality in higher education. At the time, there was a gap of 13 percentage points in the proportion of bachelor’s degrees going to men compared to women. By 1982 the gap had closed. By 2019, the gender gap in bachelor awards was 15 points, wider than in 1972 - but the other way around.” (3)
The same thing is true in Finland, a country with one of the best educational systems in the world.
“But although Finnish students rank very high for overall performance on PISA, there is a massive gender gap: 20% of Finnish girls score at the highest reading levels in the test, compared to just 9% of boys.” (5)
In the United States,
“...girls now account for two-thirds of high schoolers in the top 10%, ranked by GPA, while the proportions are reversed on the bottom rung.” (7)
One reason is that brain development for boys follows a different trajectory than for girls.
“Boys’ brains develop more slowly, especially during the most critical years of secondary education. When almost one in four boys (23%) is categorized as having a “developmental disability,” it is fair to wonder if it is educational institutions, rather than the boys, that are not functioning properly.” (8)
In higher education, the gender gap keeps existing. 57% of bachelor's degrees in the U.S. go to women, and in the UK, 40% of women join college at age 18, while only 29% of men are doing so.
Boys and young men are falling behind in education.
“Suddenly, working for gender equality means focusing on boys rather than girls. Disorienting, to say the least. Small wonder our laws, institutions, even our attitudes, have not yet caught up. But catch up they must.” (17)
Chapter 2: Working Man Blues: Men Are Losing Ground In The Labor Market
“Growing numbers of men are detaching from paid work. For most of those who are in a job, wages have stagnated. In fact, one reason that the gender pay gap has narrowed is the median male pay has fallen, surely a suboptimal way to achieve equality.” (18)
Male jobs have suffered from two factors. Automation and free trade.
Essentially, all the income gains that middle-class American families have experienced since 1970 are due to the rise in women’s earnings.” (29)
This has had a great effect on the dynamic between men and women.
“...especially in terms of family life. The economic rise of women has dramatically altered the terms of trade between the sexes. Many men are struggling to adjust.” (30)
Chapter 3: Dislocated Dads: Fathers Have Lost Their Traditional Role In The Family
“In this chapter, I argue that the role of mothers has been expanded to include breadwinning as well as caring, but the role of fathers has not been to include caring as well as breadwinning.” (32)
The idea of the man as a provider is, and definitely has been quite an influential one.
“The idea of the provider is a major element in the construction of a masculine identity,” writes sociologist David Morgan. “It is a moral as well as an economic category.” (33)
“The traditional family was an effective social institution because it made both men and women necessary. But it also rested on a sharp division of labor.” (33)
For conservatives, this dependency is what makes marriage work, and also what turns men into contributing members of society. However, one could also say that both men and women have been stifled in their freedom by the narrow expectations of gender roles.
“Women are now the main breadwinner in 41% of U.S. households. Some of those are single mothers, but by no means all; three in ten wives now out-earn their husbands, twice as many as in 1981.” (35)
This counters the old idea of the man as the breadwinner.
“The transformation of the economic relationship between men and women has been so rapid that our culture has not yet caught up.” (36)
What doesn’t help is that those men with lower earning-potentials are still expected most to fulfill the role of breadwinner.
“What this means is that those who fare poorly in the labor market are also likely to suffer in the marriage market, especially in the working class.” (37)
This happens because women who earn more, relative to men, are less likely to get married. This is problematic in the sense that,
“The family may be a myth,” writes Dench, “but it is a myth that works to make many men tolerably useful.” (37)
Another problem with the decline of marriage is that,
“Economically independent women can flourish whether they are wives or not. Wifeless men, by contrast, are often a mess. Compared to married men, their health is worse, their employment rates are lower, and their social networks are weaker. Drug-related deaths among never-married men more than doubled in a decade from 2010. Divorce, now twice as likely to be initiated by wives as husbands, is psychologically harder on men than women. One of the great revelations of feminism may turn out to be that men need women more than women need men. Wives were economically dependent on their husbands, but men were emotionally dependent on their wives.” (39)
So single-life isn’t all that great for men. But it isn’t great for children either. When children are born outside of marriage, or when a divorce happens in the life of a child, this has a negative impact.
“As well as being good for children, a stronger role for fathers would provide many men with a powerful extra source of meaning and purpose in their lives.” (40)
Chapter 4: Dwight’s Glasses: Black Boys And Men Face Acute Challenges
Black boys and men face issues that other identity groups do not.
“Curry urges the creation of a new scholarly field of Black male studies, on the grounds that the accounts offered by existing feminist and intersectional scholars are missing the mark when it comes to the specific forms of gendered racism faced by Black men.” (47)
Raj Chetty at Opportunity Insights has done research about these issues.
“They find that Black Men are much less likely than white men to rise up the income ladder, while Black and white women raised by poor parents have similar rates of upward intergenerational mobility. Chetty and his team conclude that the overall Black-white intergenerational mobility gap “is entirely driven by differences in men’s, not women’s outcomes.” (49)
“Breaking the cycle of poverty for Black Americans will require a transformation in the economic outcomes for Black men.” (49)
Black boys also suffer tremendously in education
“The gender gap in education between Black women and Black men is much wider than the one between white women and white men … For every Black man getting a college degree, at all levels, there are two Black women.” (50)
…and also in the labor market
“Gender gaps in the labor market are narrowing while race gaps widen. The overall gender pay disparity is closing because the wages of women, especially white women, are rising rapidly. Meanwhile the Black-white pay gap is widening, as Black workers, especially Black men, see painfully slow growths in wages.” (51)
…and they have to face prison often
“One in four Black men born since the late 1970s have been to prison by their mid-30s. Among those who dropped out of high school, it is seven out of ten.” (53)
“One striking study showed that a Black man without a criminal record is less likely to be hired than a similarly qualified white man with a criminal record.” (55)
…all of which has effects on families, and the children who grow up in them.
“The criminalization of Black men in America has resulted in millions of workless men and millions of fatherless families. But men struggling in the labor market often struggle in the marriage market too, leading to higher rates of single parenthood.” (55)
Chapter 5: Class Ceiling: Poor Boys And Men Are Suffering
“In this chapter I set out the evidence on male deaths of despair; show how the economic difficulties of working class men end up hurting families and putting more pressure on women; and describe how many of these men have lost connection to social institutions that once anchored male identity, including marriage. I also describe how childhood disadvantage hurts boys more than girls, resulting in a corrosive, intergenerational cycle. As working-class men struggle, their families become poorer; and in these families, boys suffer most, which damages their prospects in adult life. The male malaise becomes an inherited condition.” (61)
The opioid crisis in the U.S. shows that there are massive social problems in U.S. society. Many of those who have lost jobs turn to them.
“Opioids are taken simply to numb pain - perhaps physical pain at first, then existential pain. They are not drugs of inspiration or rebellion, but of isolation and retreat.” (62)
Men also commit suicide more than women, especially in advanced economies. In research done about the reasons for men to attempt suicide, words like useless and worthless appear a lot.
In the lower classes, the percentage of single mothers is also the highest.
“In the bottom fifth of the income distribution, seven out of ten mothers are now the main breadwinner - usually because they are the only one.” (64)
In 1979, there was almost no difference in marriage rate by social class. In contemporary U.S. society, there is a wide gap. The affluent have kept getting married, other groups stopped.
According to Reeves, men are looking for a sense of security about how to live their lives.
“But this is in fact exactly what many men are seeking; a more solid social anchor, more certainty about how to be in the world.” (67)
But many men have lost connection with the institution, like work, marriage and faith, that can offer them these anchors, and they have not been replaced by anything else.
Moreover, male friendships are also declining.
“A 2021 report from the Survey Center on American Life identified a male “friendship recession,” with 15% of men saying they have no close friends, up from 3% in 1990. Unsurprisingly, these are also the men who are most likely to report feeling lonely.” (68)
A reason for this is because men tend to invest less in social connections, and rely on their girlfriends or wives to organize their social lives, as well as them being their closest connection.
In Japan one can find a possible future scenario of men turning from society. There you have hikikomori (shut-in) that have turned from society and live in isolation for years. The social withdrawal creates a negative spiral of issues, and they,
“...lose whatever self-esteem and confidence they had, and the prospect of leaving home becomes ever more terrifying. Locking themselves in their rooms makes them feel ‘safe’” (69)
Boys seem to suffer more than girls from growing up in single-parent households and/or in neighborhoods with high crime. in neighborhoods with a high proportion of fathers, they tend to do better. Boys also suffer more from the exit of fathers.
“Boys raised by single parents, especially single mothers, have worse outcomes than girls (including their own sisters) at school and lower rates of college enrollment, in part because of bigger differences in behavioral problems in the classroom.” (71)
This then turns into a generational cycle where these sons become fathers, and repeat their father’s behavior, so their sons turn out like them. Ad infinitum.
Chapter 6: Non-Responders: Policies Aren’t Helping Boys and Men
Many policies implemented to help people, are not helping men. For example, programs that offer free college, like the Kalamazoo Promise, work great for women, but have no impact on men.
Another program called “Stay the Course,” created to prevent people from dropping out of college, also worked great for women, but had no impact on men.
A reason for this might be that all people who work in the “Stay the Course” program were women, perhaps making it more difficult for men to relate to them.
The problem is that there is no concrete issue to be solved here. It is more vague.
“I think the main issue is lower levels of engagement and motivation that the young men in Kalamazoo talked about a lot. These are not things that can easily be fixed.” (77)
Women might be more driven because they have the goals of providing for their families, as well as creating independence for themselves. It could also be that women are more persistent in the context of college, and can also plan for the future better.
“Put these together - motivation, independence, persistence, and planning - and it is no wonder, to Tyreese [interviewee] at least, that women are doing better in school.” (80)
Chapter 7: Making Men: Nature and Nurture Both Matter
Men and women are very similar, but there are also some differences we cannot ignore.
“...these three - aggression, risk, sex - are where the differences are most pronounced…” (85)
“Most studies find the biggest differences are at the tails of these distributions, rather than for the majority of people. A large majority of the most aggressive people are male, but the differences in aggressiveness in the general population are much smaller.” (86)
Reeves gives 5 points of thinking about differences between the sexes
While some traits are more associated with one sex, the distributions overlap between men and women
Sex differences can be magnified by culture
Sex differences have a modest impact in 21-st century life
Average sex differences don’t justify institutionalization of gender inequality
Average differences between groups should not influence how we view individuals
What is true is that men have way more testosterone, and that has some effects.
“Boys are five times more likely than girls to be frequently aggressive by the age of seventeen - seventeen months that is. The gap widens until early adulthood before narrowing again.” (89)
Men also take more risk, which is especially useful information for societies in which more and more men have less and less to lose.
“Men who are in danger of becoming evolutionary duds will be willing to take serious risks in order to gain access to a mate, perhaps by committing a crime to get more resources, or fighting in a potentially lucrative war. Even a 50/50 chance looks pretty good to a man who is otherwise unlikely to have any children at all.” (91)
“Even though male psychology is more wired for risk, this usually tips into antisocial forms of risk-taking (such as crime) only in circumstances of intense competition.” (91)
Men also, on average, have higher sex-drive than women. There is a good reason for this because,
“With a much higher chance of failing to father any children, men have had to be ready to take almost any opportunity for procreation.” (92)
“Again, it hardly needs adding that, for good or ill, culture hugely influences the expression of the driven sexuality of men. One of the most important things young men learn from their surrounding culture is how to express their sexual desire in an appropriate way. But greater male lust is a fact of life.” (94)
But, the differences between men and women are down to nature and nurture / culture. For example, testosterone goes down when men get married.
“As the institution of monogamous marriage spread, the number of men directly involved in raising families rose. The collective impact, via reduced testosterone levels, was to dramatically reduce overall levels of male violence.” (95)
The male identity is more fragile than the female one, because women have the innate role of reproduction.
“Culture has played a particularly important role in channeling the energy of men toward positive social ends, especially by teaching them to care for others. But, “this behavior, being learned, is fragile,” warned Margaret Mead, “and can disappear rather easily under social conditions that no longer teach it effectively.” This is a warning we should heed.” (97)
In the STEM-fields you can also notice a difference between men and women.
“...in more gender-equal countries, such as Finland and Norway, women were less likely to take university courses in STEM subjects.” (98)
Of course one must not rush to a causal relation. But it should make us wonder whether gender parity in all walks of life is desirable.
“While conservatives sometimes suggest that women who don’t conform to traditional roles are denying their nature, many on the Left insist that women who do must be surrendering to sexism.” (98)
The fact that anti-male attitudes can have real-life consequences can be seen in the 2018 guidelines of the American Psychological Association on working with boys and men.
“The guidelines contain not a single reference to these positive aspects of masculinity.” (100)
Also, and this is quite strange as well,
“As far as the APA is concerned, it seems, masculinity is entirely socially constructed.” (100)
But this absence of biology is not there when talking about girls.
“So while girls and women are treated as flesh and blood, boys and men are treated as blank slates. This is obviously absurd. But it is also damaging, not least because of the poor guidance it provides to psychologists, 80% of whom are women, as they seek to help boys and men.” (101)
Chapter 8: Progressive Blindness: The Political Left Is In Denial
The term toxic masculinity is often used to describe a wide variety of male behavior, yet it is never really defined.
“It is one thing to point out there are aspects of masculinity that in an immature or extreme expression can be deeply harmful, quite another to suggest that a naturally occurring trait in boys and men is intrinsically bad.” (106)
“Adolescent girls are after capable of similar kinds of bullying and disrespect, often toward other girls, but it is not instantly cast as “toxic femininity.” (106)
So the poorly defined terms “toxic masculinity” appears to signal disapprovement in so many cases that the,
“Lumping together [of] terrorists and delinquents, ultimately poisons the very idea of masculinity itself.” (107)
For the otherwise great appetite of pointing out structural problems, the Left seems unwilling to do the same for problems of men.
“Carol Harrington believes that the term toxic masculinity plays an important role here, since it naturally focuses attention on the character flaws of individual men, rather than the structural problems.” (109)
During COVID, for example, for every 100 women that died, 184 men died. And for all the structural problems that were pointed out by the media, this gap got no attention.
“When it comes to masculinity, both the Left and the Right fall into the individualistic trap, but from different perspectives. For conservatives, masculinity is the solution; for progressives, masculinity is the problem. But they do both agree that the problem lies at the level of the individual, and therefore in the realm of psychology, rather than economics, anthropology, or sociology. This is a profound intellectual error.” (110)
Progressives also deny science regarding sex differences, and focus more on ideas of social construction.
Furthermore, progressive fail to acknowledge that gender gaps exist in both ways, and tend to focus only on instances where men outperform the women. This is unnecessary because,
“We can hold two thoughts in our head at the same time.” (114)
An example of this thinking is that the WEF’s research method cannot account for gender gaps in which men are the underlying party.
“The idea that gender inequality only counts in one direction is baked into WEF’s methodology. But this assumption is untenable, especially in advanced economies.” (114)
The problem of the Left in acknowledging men’s issues might stem from a zero-sum assumption about identity politics.
“Many people on the political Left seem to fear that acknowledging the problems of boys and men will somehow weaken efforts for women and girls.” (115)
Chapter 9: Seeing Red: The Political Right Wants To Turn The Clock
People on the right - in the book Reeves gives the example of Senator Hawley, have
“...argued that boys and men are struggling because the Left hates them. This is a powerful message because the first part is true, and the second part can be made to sound plausible given the tendency of many on the Left to pathologize masculinity.” (117)
“Conservatives have paid more attention than progressives to the growing problems faced by boys and men. But their agenda turns out to be equally unhelpful. There are three big weaknesses in their approach. First, many conservatives fuel male grievances for political gain, which simply creates more anger and discontent. Second, they overweight the importance of biological sex differences for gender roles (a mirror image of the progressive tendency to dismiss them altogether). Third, they see the solution to men’s problems as lying in the past rather than the future, in the form of restoration of traditional economic relations between male providers and female carers. Rather than helping men adapt to the new world, conservatives beguile them with promises of the old. This may provide some temporary psychological relief. But we don’t need painkillers. We need a cure.” (118)
Men who feel like there is no place for them might end up in the “manosphere,” a world of pick-up artists, incels and some male separatists called MGTOW (Men Going Their Own Way).
“The term red pill, adopted from The Matrix, refers to a choice to see the world as it really is. Here, it means to see that, far from being an oppressive patriarchy, our society is actually dominated by feminists, seeking to entrap and exploit men.” (121)
While some of these communities might not be helpful in giving men a positive place in the real world,
“Some find a genuine sense of community, which may be lacking in their offline life.” (122)
Feminist activist Laura Bates says about this,
“...the boys who are lost, who fall through the cracks of our society’s stereotypes and straight into the arms of the communities ready to recruit them, greedy to indoctrinate them with fears of threats to their manhood, their livelihood.” (122)
The conservatives also seem to have a zero-sum view of identity politics, where gains for the women have meant losses for the men. Therefore, if men need to do better,
“...the only way to help boys and men is to restore traditional gender roles, which means reversing some of the gains made by women in terms of economic independence.” (126)
“Men do need help. But we can help men without hindering women or trying to turn back the clock. Fatherhood in particular can be reinvented for a more egalitarian world.” (128)
Chapter 10: Redshirt The Boys: Boys Need an Extra Year in the Classroom
“I propose that all boys be redshirted by default. Introducing a 1-year chronological age gap would reduce the developmental age gap between boys and girls.” (135)
Besides that, there is also a need for more men teaching in schools.
“When the share of men teaching in Finnish primary schools was boosted by a 40% quota for training courses, both boys and girls did better in school.” (142)
Also, it would be useful to revise the curricula of high schools.
“High school curricula need more “hands-on” elements. This does not mean sending all the boys into shop class to learn a trade while the girls polish their college application essays. But it does mean incorporating more practical and vocational elements (i.e., CTE) into the general curriculum, and especially creating more stand-alone technical schools.” (146)
“Many of the differences between boys and girls in today’s classrooms are because the girls are just much “older” developmentally speaking. We can send boys to the same schools as girls, just a year later.” (149)
Chapter 11: Men Can Heal: Getting Men Into The Jobs Of The Future
Reeves describes HEAL jobs as jobs in Health, Education, Administration, and Literacy. Since the jobs that men used to pick are in decline, and jobs in these sectors are growing, it could help to point men towards these sectors so that they can find employment in the future.
“We face labor shortages in two of the largest and most important sectors of our economy - health care and education. But we are trying to solve them with only half the workforce.” (155)
Just as we are spending a lot of money to get women into STEM-fields, we should be spending a lot of money on getting men into HEAL-jobs too.
“I propose at least a $1 billion national investment, over the next decade, in service of this goal. This money, from both government and philanthropy, should be spent in three ways. First, creating a pipeline of future male HEAL workers in schools and colleges. Second, providing financial support to male students and workers in HEAL. Third, running social marketing campaigns to make these career choices more appealing to boys and men.” (158)
“We need, in short, a national effort. As I have argued here, getting more men into HEAL jobs is important for their own economic prospects, given the decline of many traditional male jobs. But I also hope to have persuaded you that it would be good for society too.” (166)
Chapter 12: New Dads: Fatherhood as an Independent Social Institution
“In general I think the claims of a “crisis” are almost always overblown, and usually invoked in the service of a partisan goal. But I do think that the loss of the traditional male role in the family has been a massive cultural shock, and one that has left many men reeling.” (167)
Fathers being around in the upbringing is important for children.
“Engaged fatherhood has been linked to a whole range of outcomes, from mental health, high school graduation, social skills, and literacy to lower risks of teen pregnancy, delinquency, and drug use.” (169)
Fathers are especially important to teens.
“Sixteen-year-old girls who are close to their fathers have better mental health at 33. Father involvement predicts stronger academic outcomes in adolescence too. The teaching role of fathers really seems to kick in strongly during these years. Machin writes that “many dads in the West really step into their role during late childhood and adolescence, particularly when the time comes to teach their children.” (171)
And while fathers and mothers offer a lot of similar things, they also each bring something unique to parenting meaning that two is often better than one.
However, the idea that fathers need to provide is still baked in societies in, for example, unequal leave for child-care.
“...I now believe that if we are serious about expanding the role of fathers, equal leave is essential. The signal policymakers need to send is that paternal care matters as much as maternal care.” (175)
“To those of us blessed to be dads, fatherhood is a core component of our identity. I have argued here that it now needs to be a bigger social role too, one that is different from, but equal to, motherhood. Prosocial masculinity no longer means having to get married or having to be the main breadwinner. But it does require stepping fully into the role of father.” (182)