What is wrong with boys is that society has such low expectations and such negative stereotypes of them that they are starting to live up to them. We have created a self-fulfilling prophecy, and the analysis is so shallow and lightweight, that nobody sees what is in front of their eyes.
Has anyone checked the archives for similar articles in the 70s on girls’ underachievements? I suspect the emphasis then will have been upon society letting girls down - not the other way around.
Take a look around. We have such positive role-models as EastEnders’ Mitchell brothers, whose greatest achievement is shaving without harming themselves - even the positive role model of a black male doctor was accused of something akin to child molesting.
Coronation Street features a male psychopath murderer; car adverts portray men as dim-witted losers, cola adverts portray them as sexual objects. So-called current affairs focuses on the “tearaways” and “hooligans”.
The real tragedy is that this is simply portrayed as somehow creating equality and the natural turnaround - or worse still, as the fault of the children.
Adrian King
10 Copper Beech Crescent
Hooton Levitt, Rotherham
