America’s Young Men in Crisis

E ach school shooting is its own unique horror story. But as we learn more about each of the perpetrators, they seem to have some common traits. Almost all of them are young men. They are isolated, depressed, were often bullied, experienced childhood trauma, frequently have troubled families, and have insatiable anger toward the world. Despite the clear signs of psychological problems that they demonstrate, they rarely get the help they need. Michael Gurian, family therapist and author of Saving our Sons, tells National Review, “The common denominator is that they’re mentally ill . . . they are all biochemically and neurally depressed . . . then they get a gun, and the frontal lobe doesn’t override, and they kill.” In order to stop this trend, we need to address the root problems behind the growing mental-health epidemic among young men in America.

Young men have been neglected by society for years. Education is geared toward girls. Boys who act like typical boys are disciplined for misbehavior. According to one report, boys account for 70 percent of school suspensions and 80 percent of high-school dropouts. Recess, often a necessary part of the school day for boys, is in sharp decline in schools. According to 2011 research by the American Association for a Child’s Right to Play, 40 percent of school districts have cut down on recess since the passage of the No Child Left Behind Act. The legislation pushed schools to boost test scores, which meant cutting recess in many cases. Many fewer men are going to college, a pathway that is often a necessary prerequisite for financial success; nearly 60 percent of college students were women at the end of the 2020–21 academic year, according to the National Student Clearinghouse Research Center. Given all of this, it is no wonder that so many boys are falling behind in reading. Yet we still hear more about the greater importance of getting more girls interested in STEM than about helping boys to catch up to girls.

Our society has not only neglected boys but turned against them. Gurian says, “While in the past our systems were not perfect, the difference with the present is that past systems understood the need to nurture boys into healthy, honorable, character-driven adulthood. We have focused for more than 50 years on neglecting and abandoning male development systemically.” This began with the second wave of feminism. Gurian, who describes himself as an “equity feminist,” says he believes in “equality but not sameness.” He explains that beginning in the 1960s, “gender feminist” academics used the “sameness approach” that encouraged sameness between boys and girls, believing that in order for girls to achieve full equality, they needed to be exactly like boys. This turned out to be wrong and highly detrimental to our nation’s boys.

Today, we teach men that masculinity is to be scorned. In fact, it is toxic. The idea of “toxic masculinity” is so in vogue now that companies like Gillette make advertisements about it. Masculinity is not toxic when it is used for good rather than evil. Yet the Left dismisses masculinity entirely as a negative force in society. In fact, contrary to popular belief, decreased male testosterone actually can lead to more violence rather than less, according to Gurian. Therefore, while they perhaps have good intentions, the Left’s constant attacks on masculinity may be producing more violence-prone men.

Pathways toward proper masculine virtue more widespread in the past are less common now.

Today’s 18-year-olds, for example, don’t have to worry about being drafted to serve in our armed forces (outside of exceptional conditions yet to be invoked). Unlike in the past, there’s no crisis such as World War II or the Vietnam War where an overwhelming portion of them will be asked to fight and possibly give their lives for their country. That kind of sacrifice encouraged positive masculinity, gave young men purpose, and built character. It is still possible for young men to enter the military, but far fewer do. Across the rest of culture, other such pathways are either shrinking, disappearing, or becoming tainted by political correctness. Increasingly, what is left is a culture in which boys today are taught that it is okay to identify as the opposite sex or as one of the 58 genders recognized by Facebook (or one can create “their” own gender), be it Gender Fluid or Two-Spirit. They can look at their iPhones and find a pregnant-man emoji. What message does all of this send to boys and young men?

As Dan McLaughlin has pointed out, we do not need to obsess over masculinity to understand its importance to our society. McLaughlin underscores how we should properly cultivate the next generation of men: “Our society’s goal in raising young men should neither be to stamp out their masculinity nor to fetishize masculinity for its own sake but to teach men to put masculinity to its proper uses.” McLaughlin also emphasizes that masculinity is inextricably tied to manhood, which he defines as putting the tenets of masculinity toward a “righteous use.” He’s right — it is not enough to just encourage masculinity. We must teach our young men to embrace manhood by using their masculinity to do the right thing and improve society.

Christina Hoff Sommers, senior fellow emeritus at the American Enterprise Institute and author of The War Against Boys, tells National Review, “Something has gone seriously wrong in the lives of boys. There are millions of lonely, fatherless boys — detached and angry — in a society that does little or nothing to help them.” Sommers highlighted the decline of the Boy Scouts and 4-H clubs along with decreases in religiosity and church attendance as factors contributing to the current masculinity crisis.

Sommers continues, “Engaging the male imagination and directing young men towards healthy masculinity is on few agendas these days. And, against all the evidence, we seem to have accepted fatherlessness as a workable norm. The vast majority of lost, forgotten, and neglected boys are on their own.” As Sommers also points out, while most boys who feel this way will not revert to violence on the scale of a school shooting, it only takes one to commit a heinous crime like we saw in Uvalde last week.

Some argue that guns are the real problem here. Gurian supports “gun-safety” measures, including banning AR-15 rifles and high-capacity magazines as well as implementing a 30-day background check on all gun purchases. He believes that access to guns is one of the biggest factors that lead to these shootings. Sommers also supports more gun control. However, she also questions the efficacy of imposing more gun laws: “Guns have always been easy to get. There was a time when American high schools had rifle clubs and boys brought them to school. No one thought to slaughter classmates. Why now?” Gun access, in other words, is the constant; something else must be the variable.

And there’s strong evidence that much of modern America has changed for the worse the way it treats young men. The perpetrators of these heinous shootings are often in need of help, but they fall through the cracks. Their families have often failed them, and society has as well. Something must change.