March 24, 2025 - 7:00am
In sixth form, more than 20 years ago now, our class was shown the 1995 film La Haine, a self-consciously gritty drama about the Parisian banlieues and the alienated young men who inhabit them. Besides the film introducing us to a more colloquial version of French, I recall feeling that we were meant to learn something about the wickedness of society, police oppression and the rest. Even as a not very rebellious 17-year-old, I strongly disliked the sense of being lectured.
This experience came to mind when I saw the news yesterday that “anti-misogyny lessons” may be on their way to British schools, prompted at least in part by the new Netflix series Adolescence, which has dominated the national conversation over the last week. Questions have been asked in Parliament about the rise of influencers who push “toxic masculinity” and encourage “incels” to resent and despise women.
It is clear that there is a problem with many teenage boys in Britain feeling alienated from mainstream society, or coming to believe that it is rigged against them. The deeper question is what ought to be done about this, beyond well-meaning moralism. Public figures talk about “reaching out” to young men; or providing better role models, as former England football manager Gareth Southgate proposed recently; or correcting their allegedly problematic views. But there is a striking vacuum at the heart of this discourse. No one seems genuinely interested in addressing the material concerns at the heart of young male ennui.
That’s because it is hard to even discuss topics such as the mass entry of women into the professions, the disempowering of men in modern divorce law, and the erosion of all-male environments without being accused of wanting to return to the bad old days. Very few people in positions of authority would even know what you meant if you lamented the way in which society increasingly rewards classically feminine characteristics — consensus, inclusivity, and the therapeutic mindset — while penalising typically masculine ones, such as a preference for directness, individual action, and robust but non-personal disagreement.
Nevertheless, if we actually want to show teenage boys that there is a place for them in the world, that they do not have to shed ambition and drive and agency in order to succeed, that they will be allowed to take risks and give offence during their development, we need to be honest about why they feel frustrated and suffocated. We need to have some difficult discussions about how feminist advances over the last few decades have created losers as well as winners.
Unpleasant and cynical men like Andrew Tate gain an audience because they appeal to boys’ contempt for the kind of well-meaning finger-wagging that they so often encounter from Official Britain. You know the sort of thing: to become a better man you need to cry more often, to get in touch with your feelings, to be less divisive. In response to the debate which has sprung up around Adolescence, the BBC programme Newsnight asked a panel of young men when they last wept.
But this is not the only alternative to the cruel, stupid dead end of Tate-ism, and it is not one that is likely to be attractive to many boys. It is surely much better to understand, appreciate, and unleash the real masculine virtues, and to re-examine our dogmas about how men should embody them.
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SubscribeThe problem with all such initiatives is that they only face one direction. A boy is going to be more impressed with any message about toxic masculinity if he knows the girls and women are getting lessons to counter toxic misandry.
Unfortunately, those proposing such classes just fail to register that toxic masculinity is a reaction to widespread toxic misandry since they are simply blind to it. In the intersectional world girls and women can only be seen as victims just as racism can only be committed by whites never the reverse.
The problem is that we keep doing the same thing every time there is an incident involving angry young men. We scream that young men need to be “educated” not to be toxic. The situation is not getting better so why do we keep repeating the same ineffective solution?
As a mother, with a son, I would always refer to my husband’s wisdom when dealing with any issue arising because I recognise that our view points will be different. This is half of our problem. Schools are largely female led and many families are single mothers and dad kept at arms length. Positive male influences are few and far between.
Is toxic femininity not a thing? Do women never use sexuality to manipulate men? Do women never lie about the paternity of their child? Do when never make false accusations? Do women only judge men for their decency and never their incomes? Do women never hold grudges?
I’m so tired of the concept of toxic masculinity. Yes, all men behave badly at times (well, not me, but I’m a saint). Some men behave in incredibly destructive ways. Are women special and they never do wicked things?
Was it like this in the Victorian times with women at that time being generally judged as bad and stupid?
“Inclusivity” is far from a classically female characteristic (just ask any school girl on the wrong side of the in group)
“Well meaning finger wagging” is exactly what these classes would be and will almost certainly alienate the teenagers they’ll claim to be helping. I’d be more surprised than not if these were also entirely female led.
Having been a young man (being in my mid-30’s some might say I still am), they generally aspire to be tough, resilient and would love nothing more than a chance to play the hero. We’re talking about a demographic that would happily be part of the 300 Spartans at Thermopylae, but are simultaneously terrified about asking a young woman out on a date. You aren’t going to win over people like that by telling to be more inclusive and sensitive. That comes later in life as you mature
There’s an interesting point there about the power that young women hold over young men, and just how important their approval and acceptance is to them. Small wonder if negativity from that quarter impacts them badly and they react to it in an equally negative way.
Perhaps the lesson they need is in developing pride as a man independent of female approval, accepting that the judgement of young women doesn’t really count for much in terms of real human value (they are young, inexperienced and have their own issues) and learning to reject views of themselves which are based in hate, resentment and neuroticism – and do not have their best interests at heart.
Men’s formative influencer has always been feminine either his mother of a female servant or relative. Traditionally, however, women’s interest has been to encourage the masculine elements of their male children’s character since they recognised in a hard and uncertain environment their protection against invaders raping and enslaving them relied on bring up tough ingenious masculine workers and fighters.
In the West we have had an unprecedented period of peace and work, particularly well-remunerated work, has decreasingly relied on masculine strength and toughness. The result has been to downgrade masculinity.
The war in the Ukraine is a reminder of an earlier age when masculinity was more appreciated. A society that fosters the feminine virtues in men risks being swept aside by one that prizes more competitive virtues. Young women may then have to revert to bring up sons to be capable of protecting them. Patriarchal societies are formed by men and women’s interests coinciding.
“It is clear that there is a problem with many teenage boys in Britain feeling alienated from mainstream society, or coming to believe that it is rigged against them.”
Well that is because it clearly is.
Education from primary school to university is riddled with misandry. Television, film and the MSM are similarly afflicted. Surely this is the first issue that has to be addressed.
In addition, under the guise of the weasel word “equality” the job market is also rigged against them. When the female CEO of an organization like Aviva can say publicly without any adverse consequence that organization will not appoint white males to senior positions you know you have a problem.
It is not actually well meaning. It is a concerted effort by the feminist movement to crush young men. There is nothing benign about it at all.
anti-misogyny lessons is just code words for mental castrating. If the sick minds who come up with this stuff had their way they would put all boys on hormone blockers at 12 and just make them capons.
Like Peterson said – take toy guns from boys and they will point sticks at eachother and say ‘Bang’. (take dolls from girls and they would dress up and cuddle pillows)
Sick world now days. They are out to destroy the family; this is what it is all about.
Yes, quite right, but an open, honest, difficult discussion will not happen in the MSM or in Parliament. The current orthodoxy is overwhemingly feminist, it is driven by neo-liberal economics as much as by marxism. That does not mean that everyone subscribes to it, the silent majority carries on as best it can, as it always has.
We will just have to find ways to help our boys and young men flourish despite the current situation, it won’t go on forever.
Additionally, I think, despite what feminists imagine, that the current situation is far from ideal for girls and young women as well. They seem more confused and depressed than I’ve ever seen them in my life before.
Difficult times for both sexes.
That’s the most sensible and balanced comment i’ve read so far. The simple fact is, yes: both sexes have to navigate their youth and young adulthood within the grip of social media which it’s now prosaic to say is unheralded in our history.
There was a clear purpose to feminism when it first arose, and it involved a rebalancing of agency which was much needed and as it happened, coincided with the decline of work requiring muscular strength. I believe the latter to be the most prominent issue, in that young males have been unable to adapt to the new world of work which seems to confer advantages on those with more feminine characteristics (whether female or male). However, AI is well on the way, so we may see a further paradigm shift.
Simply blaming feminism (as a lot of males seem to do) is to miss the much bigger picture. The author also partly falls into this trap, or skirts close to it (pun probably intended!)
While I agree that the aims of feminism were important and that enabling women to have the same agency as men is a wonderful thing, I suspect that the automatic washing made more difference to people’s lives
I strongly disagree.
Feminism developed out of Marxism, it is divisive and very much to blame for the trouble we see between the sexes.
It was technological advances in the West that have given women autonomy; hot and cold running water, effective sewers, electricity, washing machines, fridges, clean cookers, central heating, better homes, and the Pill, all invented by men.
These are the things that have set women free, most definitely not feminism.
If Progressives are so concerned about alienation of young working class white men pushing them towards toxic masculinity, then maybe stop lecturing them on how privileged they are and blaming them for pretty much everything wrong in the world.
The current pearl-clutching about Adolescence is a case in point and I predict will do more harm than good.
What young working class boys is the old fashioned apprentiship where youngsters work alongside older experienced men. They learn to behave and grow up quickly become confident and asured of their abilities and place in the world.
Likewise public houses
The day I start taking instruction on How To Be A Good Man from the armies of self-obsessed, self-serving narcissists who work in the television industry, the film industry, the recording industry, the popular media in general, including journalism, and elite commercial sports…
…is the day I will take advice from Harvey Weinstein on how to treat women with sexual respect, from Jordan Belfort on how to be an honest businessman, from Bill Clinton on how to be a truthful politician, from Woody Allen on in loco parental responsibility, from Bill Cosby on being a gentleman towards women who have over-indulged, and from Jeffrey Epstein, Jimmy Saville, Rolf Harris and about ten thousand other Show Biz Sh*t Men since 1967 on appropriate conduct regarding minor boys and girls.
As for Gareth Southgate…for every one talented young footballer who prioritises his own individual masculine ambitions, wants and wishes – the kind of necessarily selfish choice prerequisite to any elite sports career – there are ten thousand other talented young footballers who at some point choose to put those selfish dreams (wistfully) aside, and instead put everyone and everything else first. That noble, generous tribal instinct, more than any other marker of masculinity, is what a good male role model should embody.
Women and children first, all that.
There are millions of men who make that choice every day, Gareth. For their entire individually-invisible, collectively-productive life. You and your chums just never hear much about any of them up there in MediaCelebrityLand. Where most of the men are arrested-adolescence f**kwits, even if you yourself are not.
This article like much of the debate misses the point. The government wants to censor not just the unpleasant views of Tate but any criticism.
The effect of influencers is much smaller than the influence of the environment in which boys spend around 7 hours 200 days a year – their schools. There are schools where misogyny, homophobia and racism are tolerated and there are schools where it is not. These schools are all run by or for the government. In focussing on the influencers like Tate, the government is running away from its own responsibility – making schools safe for girls, gays and lesbians and for minorities (which in many inner city schools means white British).
14 year old boys are not “incels”, it is normal for them not to have intercourse yet. There is a problem with knife crime but males are usually the victims. There is a problem with Oxbridge educated script writers from the south regularly using working class boys from the north as the key villains particularly after the rape gang scandals and Southport murders, this is at least insensitive or possibly an attempt to create a counter narrative. The prime minister is a lawyer and knows the difference between a documentary and a drama. This is a lawyerly attempt to lead the the jury (public) to believe a false narrative.
Look, the left needs a boogeyman. Its endless hysteria about white supremacists, racist, and other baddies has fallen flat so they have now chosen to attack a group that is pretty much defenseless
This exactly.
Young men in the US and the UK look around them as young women are flattered, coddled, assisted, or otherwise helped, while they themselves feel they have no future.
Telling them they’re responsible for things they have little or nothing to do with is at best nonsensical, and more often destructive.
Tate, crude and odious as he is, is about what I’d expect an ambitious and intelligent young man to become, were his only avenues to success limited to prizefighting or internet grifting.
We’ve obliterated religious beliefs, nuclear families, patriotism or military service, and most of our industrial sectors, while denigrating masculine virtues and self sufficiency, and are then appalled by men like the Tate brothers.
And we are then smug and reassured of our own moral superiority, utterly oblivious to the possibility that those men are monsters of our own making.
Stephen Graham is not Oxbridge educated and is not from the South.
The writer of “Adolescence” Jack Thorne is though.
Jack Thorne, playwright.
Still a sanctimonious “*&# though.
First of all, all this should be so obvious that no one even needs to say it. But for many it simply is not. Good to see Unherd start to tackle this from a viewpoint other than the standard feminist one.
More please. And especially more in-depth pieces.
What’s wrong with Tate? He says study hard, work very hard and make a good pay. Pay attention to grooming, workout at the gym, be a man and do not be pushed around. Seems 100X better than the gender neutral ideology which has pretty much destroyed boys today.
The day will come when feminists are confronted by Islamism.There will only be one winner.
The whole thing is absolutely ludicrous. It’s as if the drama was written to roll in time with new governmental legislation and this drive against “toxic masculinity”. It truly nauseates me as this new initiative will be coming from the very same quarters that are wanting to impose de facto blasphemy laws in order to shield a monolithically patriarchal religious ideology infamous for its oppression of females. I can’t help but see this as yet another attack on working classes and their culture. We have a crisis in the education of white working class boys – they are failing and being left behind. No wonder, they, their culture, their history, their country is constantly being undermined. That has been the case for at least 20years now and this is what they come up with?
Those who have fallen for this are the same who rushed into lockdown, who snarled at any who didn’t wear a face covering. Depressing.
When did I last weep? It was on seeing Adolescence.
In the past, people young in years didn’t spend nearly a decade in a state called adolescence. It has become a state to warehouse young people for whom there is no work and who could not afford homes of their own.
More like a-dole-sense. A state where growing up is never fully completed. De-toxifying toxic masculinity really being masculinity regarded as an ‘appendage’ (let the reader understand).
One moment the Jamies are encouraged to weep and feel vulnerable. The next moment they are needed on the front line in Eastern Europe. One taboo element in the assessment of these young men is their drug abuse in early teenage years.
As for certain ‘influencers’, even the Victorians would have regarded them as cads. The whole precept of shows like Adolescence is that the young males are flotsam and jetsam on a rip tide of the internet. A narrative that is a prelude to demands for more censorship.
The shortest verse in the Bible? Jesus wept.
Adolescence is a wholly dishonest piece of propaganda ands another attack on white males.
So the story is based on real life knife crime, well who is largely responsible for that
And Tate is not white and is an Islamic convert so you can guess who his main audience is
EXACTLY. Always a feint with this rag.
Not convinced they need such lessons either, although Tate-isms need firm countering too.
The question perhaps is too detached from an appreciation of what our economic model is doing to many of our young. They are the first generation who cannot expect better life chances than their parents. They can see inequality is worsening and the dice is loaded. It may be they cannot discern the true causes but they feel the impact, even the vibe, all the same. Lashing out at the wrong scapegoat will be encouraged by some, esp if they’ve a chance to monetise. But eventually sufficient will grasp the economic model is our problem with an increasingly small minority benefitting from the increased concentration of wealth. Gilead is not where we are heading, although some would no doubt prefer that.
The Govt, and through them the schools, need to stop trying to replace the parents by forcing political and woke views on all our children.
The parents must be paramount and the schools job is to teach and to discipline and that’s it.
What if their parents are feckless and neglectful, or worse? There’s plenty of handwringing goes on whenever social services miss an opportunity to intervene on behalf of a child at risk of abuse.
It’s fine proposing less state intervention (and in other areas i’m an avid non-state interventionist) but the picture is far more complex than simply “parents must be paramount”.
The feckless are the great minority, perhaps with less interference parents can be more accountable and those that really need help with parenting can be afforded it more readily.
Niall, thanks for an insightful piece. Unherd has a substantial number of feminist contributors (Julie Bindel, Kathleen Stock, Sarah Ditum…) and no anti-feminist ones – Professor Janice Fiamengo and/or Bettina Arndt would be a good start – so I was surprised (but) pleased to read this in your piece:
“… we need to be honest about why they (teenage boys) feel frustrated and suffocated. We need to have some difficult discussions about how feminist advances over the last few decades have created losers as well as winners.”
The whole PURPOSE of feminist “advances” is to create male losers. Female privilege and male disadvantage are opposite sides of the same coin. How could they not be?
JUSTICE FOR MEN & BOYS http://j4mb.org.uk
CAMPAIGN FOR MERIT IN BUSINESS http://c4mb.uk
LAUGHING AT FEMINISTS http://laughingatfeminists.com
In fairness to Kathleen Stock, in her writings and interviews, I always thought that she rather liked men. Julie, less so but she’s doing work to protect women from the bad things that some men do do. Okay, she tends to omit the word ‘some’.
I think KS is just a lot more intelligent, to be honest – and more reflective.
I’ve yet to see a definition of the ‘misogyny’ that is being blamed as the problem with boys. It seems to be regarded as something that is socially generated, or more properly, social-media generated. As an Ancient Greek term, it has been around for millenia, so from where does it originate? Could it be tied up with boys’ needs to separate from their mothers as they mature? Does their development in an ever-increasingly feministic social environment play an interfering part in that, as this article’s author suggests? The feminist-influenced ‘progessives’ in the MSM don’t seem to know, nor do they want to ask–after all they couldn’t be wrong in their ideas about ‘fixing’ boys and men, could they? The author is right: we don’t need de-misogyny lessons. We need better recognition of male-female relations and differences, which will mean changing from the unself-critical feminist and genderist influences that have created the mess with which we’re now trying to live.
It´s a bit rich that the politicians are asking questions in parliament about online influencers’ effect on young boys because they themselves have seen a work of fiction and been influenced by it, especially as government policy is now seemingly to be based upon it.
There’s a local club that incels could join, which not only meets their direct needs, but also protects them from criticism. It offers as its role model a paedophile rapist who used rape as a weapon of war, captured and traded women and children as his slaves, and teaches his followers that if their wives don’t obey them or submit to their demands to beat them. So hop along to your local mosque chaps, the answer’s there.
Boys and men if not reined in are completely controlled by their dicks. Usually society has had structures in place to displace and distract these desires and control them and they became part of one’s self respect and self control. Well done. But unfortunately since the internet and many other influences on freedom, and identity, and being yourself, etc etc these self imposed restrictions have been loosened and it has had a dreadful effect on boys. And girls.
Boys now expect sex when they never did. Immediately. Girls are self pressured to comply although their desires are not in the same physical league, they are more interested in being popular and loved romantically. They are sexually more deep.
It’s a mess.
The horse has bolted, I don’t think teachers can get them back. It would have to come from the kids, from fashion. I believe in Japan girls no longer have sex at all with boys. As that is the cool thing. Perhaps an over reaction. Involuntary celibates indeed, where did they get the idea that sex was a right due to them just because they were male?? Neither sex have believed this in the past. Sex is a gift from the other that has to be earned and respected but they will have to painfully discover that themselves now unfortunately.
It’s interesting and telling that the program under discussion (which I admit, I haven’t seen) is called “Adolescence”. and not “Misogyny”. Is it maybe because its creators understand that the social ill that gives rise to both misogyny and its opposite is the mass infantilization that has occurred over the last fifty years or so?
Very young children aren’t able to distinguish between wants and needs, but as they mature and develop their cognitive skills they usually learn to make that distinction. However, they are now having to make this transition under enormous pressure (from early childhood on) from an advertising industry whose sole purpose is to blur that distinction; that tells everyone, young and old alike, that something they actually only want, is something they really need, and that has incredibly sophisticated means at its disposal to get that message across. There are other factors involved in our infantilization, but I regard this as the main one.
The misogyny that worries parliamentarians, as embodied by despicable characters like Andrew Tate, is just the expected reaction of a child denied access to something it considers a “need”. But, if anyone thinks that the female half of the population has miraculously avoided being infantilized in this way, they haven’t been paying attention. It just manifests itself in different, somewhat gentler ways.
I’ve always thought there is a certain irony in seeing the extent to which the readers of a publication called ‘UnHerd’ tend to congregate on one side or other of the comments on its articles.
Absolutely spot on NG! It’s insanity to expect adolescent boys to behave like Zone 2 intellectuals at a dinner party.
The system is failing boys, in particular white boys from working class backgrounds, but as they are not a favoured minority nobody really cares about finding out what their problems really are and instead just want to make them the problem.
the same is happening in the US, where a couple of generations worth of inspiring ‘girl power’ and creating new opportunities for females is treated like a zero sum game in which a woman can advance only if a man is held back or made to fail.
Top comment. Thank you Alex.
How about you discuss the real story behind this film? Just another attempt by Sigmund Freud’s lineage to smear the reputations and psyches of Christian Europeans/Americans.
Well-done Niall, not a particularly new topic but a needed essay that fits perfectly into the puzzle taking shape — the puzzle that depicts the downfall of Western civilization.
Being kettled into a room and lectured by a woman or a sandal wearing leftist ‘dad’ / teacher on how bad and evil and prone to shite you are as a male at age 11 – 18 is about the most effective method I can think of for generating a single negative reaction.
All the woke actors and hand wringing liberals pushing this kind of boy = misogynist ; boy > must be an ‘Ally’ for girls, queers and the BAME / DEI is a fertile seed bed for the development of negative responses.
You want to develop upstanding decent young men? Give them a pathway for a decent job, an opportunity to get a home of their own, buy a car, and take care of themselves and their potential future families.
Without the sight of a million BAME arriving and living on welfare, taking priority for housing, running riot on our streets, grooming, raping and murdering young girls – all of which is colluded in by Leftist supporting governments, the police and the judiciary.
Anti-misandry lessons have been needed for 50+ years in the anglosphere. Toxic feminism has destroyed the natural relation between men and women. We now have the bizarre phenomenon of (cringing) biological males apparently assuming a female persona, or at least ghoulish poses, to gain the highly privileged status of womanhood.
What will the girls be doing while the boys are having anti-misogyny lessons? Needlework?
Cooking surely
While it is a great thing that women should have as much autonomy over their lives as men and they should certainly be regarded as equally capable for any employment position, we should stop pretending that they are not human and not just as flawed as men. Flawed in different ways but flawed.
I am cautious in suggesting exactly how these flaws manifest themselves but I guess, in my environment, it’s in over-diagnosis of mental health problems and learning difficulties. I’m sure when men had most of the power in education, things were missed. I think, now, with women dominant, too many things are “fixed”.
Comments from a supporter, Nigel, in response to this article:
“As usual the whole thing is fact free. So I thought I’d research the statistics. I found that deaths of under 19s by knife or sharp object were 53 in England in 23/24 (of a total homicides 64 in the same age group). In that year two of the victims were females. In fact in some previous years there were no female victims at all. So we can be sure that generally over 98% of the victims of teenage “knife crime” are male. Making such things very rare and not the norm in the issue of teenage knife crime. Clearly not about a pervasive “misogyny” because almost all victims are male (in some years all). It turns out my home Greater Manchester is the most risky for teenagers being killed (even than London which leads the overall league table due to its sheer population size). The figures rise, like almost all crime, in the mid twenties age range. And the number of female victims rises slightly too (from almost zero). There is no “trend” upwards over the years (you can have a 100% increase in female victims to 1 if there were non in the previous year etc). So we have a classic “moral panic” in which a real problem, knife crime amongst teenage boys and young men in gangs in major conurbations, becomes coopted into an agenda about misogyny amongst schoolboys.
As for the idea that boys are being turned into “misogynists” I have seen no statistical evidence at all of this. Yet even this article and people commenting appear to believe this is true, based on some anecdotes and impressions. Meanwhile I’m sure Andrew Tate is happy he has such excellent publicity, as anything that is disapproved of by adults is alluring to teenagers. It interesting that though there are vague references to the “manosphere” in fact Tate’s is the only “brand” that ever gets mentioned!
However I do think stepping up the “finger wagging” and doubling down on the anti-male propaganda will have the effect of propelling more young men to that “manosphere” and indeed any other escape from such stifling orthodoxy. Much is made of the supposed “shift to the right” of young men. Blamed on the all powerful Tate in reality probably simply a reflection of youthful rebellion and the observation that discrimination for females is discrimination against males and this unfairness against men is now done by the establishment.”
JUSTICE FOR MEN & BOYS http://j4mb.org.uk
CAMPAIGN FOR MERIT IN BUSINESS http://c4mb.uk
LAUGHING AT FEMINISTS http://laughingatfeminists.com
All of this will be moot when the demographic tipping point inevitably puts post-modern Europe out of business. A kind of conservatism is coming that will render all of our fevered talk of feminism, toxic masculinity, gender fluidity, wokeness, and the rest irrelevant. Before the end of this century Europe will bend in prayer to the East, its laws will be rewritten by those who hold in contempt both the fading Christian traditions and the secular culture that displaced it. The sad young unmanned men who have been disenfranchised from their own culture will not “man” the ramparts to repel the invader; they will embrace them as liberators. So too will many young women, who are lost, lonely, empty and depressed, for whom the muezzin’s call will find a receptive ear.
I mourn the passing of the West but we have passed the point of no return.