“How can I be proud to be a man in this generation?”
At Learning Consent we have become increasingly aware of the critical cultural narrative surrounding masculinity. The headlines tell us that masculinity is toxic, that it is limiting at best and violent and destructive at its worst. We are curious about the effect of this messaging on boys and young men. What are they hearing and believing about such a core aspect of their identity? And how do we engage boys and young men in conversations about gender equality and in work that seeks to prevent gender-based violence without boys feeling as though they are the problem simply because they were born male?
These questions all surfaced recently when, following one of our lessons to year 9 boys, a student submitted the following question: ‘How can I be proud to be a man in this generation?’
Across our programs all students have the opportunity to submit anonymous questions which are answered by the Learning Consent team and then made available to all students as a resource. This particular question was confronting to receive. What messages is this kid receiving about boys and men that are making him question whether there is anything to be proud of about being a man today? If my own son asked me that question, I’d be heartbroken. My team and I felt this question pointed to the impact of the strong critical messaging that currently exists about masculinities, and manhood. It is risky for boys and men’s sense of self, particularly in their formative years.
It is vital that we engage boys and young men in crucial conversations about gender equality and in programs that seek to prevent gender-based violence. But we must be careful in the way we do that, especially in how we design and deliver our programs, there is a lot at stake. Over the next two posts will we share some of the lessons we have learnt from delivering our whole-of-school consent and respectful relationships program to boys and young men.
Meeting boys where they are at: conversations about porn and Tate
Engaging boys and young men requires us to meet them where they are at, ensuring that they feel seen and heard. At the beginning of our program, we find it helpful to communicate directly with boys and young men that we do not believe them to be the problem. Instead, we teach them that the problem of gender-based violence is a result of the social and cultural systems within which all genders function. By placing a greater focus on the structural and cultural factors contributing to gendered violence (the patriarchy) we can then broaden the conversations to be about the ways those systems victimise and oppress all genders. Essentially, we are communicating to boys and young men that “the problem is not you. We understand you are doing the best with what you have, and we see that it’s a complicated territory to navigate”.
We acknowledge that for young people today, navigating relationships is complicated. Young people are under a huge amount of pressure socially to be seen getting it right. That pressure, combined with a lack of adequate and reliable information about sex and relationships makes it very difficult. When formal sex education does not provide young people with the information they seek about pleasure, bodies and the logistics of sex, they will seek this information elsewhere. This often means turning to informal resources, such as pornography.
Pornography has become the default sex educator for large numbers of young people so it is important we discuss pornography's impacts in our work. We cover pornography in our lessons from year 5 to year 9 and beyond, in age-appropriate ways. We don’t take the ‘don’t watch porn’ approach. Instead, we discuss the topic of pornography from a non-judgemental space and invite young people to think critically about the content they see and engage with.
To engage boys and all young people in these sensitive conversations we must tread lightly to avoid shame, judgement and stigma. So, we start with the evidence. There are some great Australian pieces of research that tell the current story of young people’s pornography use and we open the discussion by looking at those stats. We then ask students to consider why pornography is a problematic source of sex education, and what’s missing from pornographic representations of sex. It’s key that these porn literacy lessons are delivered from a place of zero judgement, instead inviting curiosity to reflect on how porn influences understandings of relationships, sex and consent.
We follow the same approach in our lessons that cover sexism and the influence of popular figures such as Andrew Tate. We lead with curiosity here too and open up conversations around why content like Tate’s is engaging for some boys and men, and then we invite students to consider how it is problematic.
To further explore how we engage boys and young men, stay tuned for blog post two. We’ll dive into how we communicate the realities of sexual violence and build empathy through impactful survivor stories, and we’ll share how we partner with boys and young men to co-design and deliver our programs. There are some amazing organisations with deep expertise in engaging boys and young men to build emotional intelligence and positive masculinities, in our next post we will share more with you about those providers.
