Thank you Michael and Peter for your insightful comments and for writing
them with such clarity. I agree whole-heartedly that we need to stop
inculcating those stereotypes you mentioned, which make men vulnerable to
current social whims and ideologies.
Another fashionable stereotype for boys and men is that they are only
interested in sport, violence, or doing things with their hands: that boys
and men are not really very smart. Of course this issue is significant in
the context of educating boys. We can counter such stereotypes by pointing
out that it is men who have provided most of the creative intellectual input
in society.
Anne, if you are developing material for boys, you might want to give
examples of men and boys enjoying self-fulfillment and achievement in
intellectual endeavours such as science, maths, writing, poetry, law, music,
engineering, philosophy, art, and computer science. This would help to
avoid the dull stereotypes which abound at the moment.
Regards,
Vincent Patrick
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