Boys: An Endangered Species ?

Last week was my turn at Bus Duty.  Bus duty involves standing in the front of the school  before and after school as the buses arrive and depart.  The goal is to get the students in and out of the school without having anyone fall under the buses, be pushed under the buses or jump in front of the buses in order to ascertain which is tougher, student or bus.  Now, keep in mind that I am as dedicated a feminist as one will ever meet.  However, I have observed in my years that girls  will give each other manicures while standing in the bus line, thereby running the risk of being run down, they will throw each other's purses in front of the bus if they are in a snit.  I can recall no instances where  a girl, intentionally, tossed herself or her BFF into the bus lane just to see whether the BFF or the bus  would survive. 

As I stood there, I noticed one young man walking towards me with a lasso in his hand.  This IS the great American West so lassos are as common as I-Pods.  Quite a lot of the kids are let off at corrals in order to ride their horses after school.  This is an activity that is not gender specific.  It is as normal to see a young woman walking out of the school with a lasso as it is a boy.  Therefore, the fact that he had a lasso is not what attracted my attention.  What I noticed was that he was attempting to twirl his lasso in such a way as to grab the feet of the boy who was walking in front of him, thereby causing his alleged friend to fall to the ground and land on the concrete.  Chances are, I thought to myself, the young man will NOT hit that very  special spot on his temple which will kill him instantly.  Chances are, I also thought, that  he  will NOT break a limb.  However, the possibility was there that the situation would not end well.  Calmly, not wanting to incite an incident, (it WAS Friday, and I WAS tired), I said, 'Young sir, if you please. That's not a real constructive activity."  The young man smiled, tipped his hat, and darned if he didn't toss that lariat around his buddy's feet again!  At that point,  the principal walked up behind me, I apprised him of the situation, and he confiscated the rope.  End of story. 

Except that I was thinking as I drove up to Kayenta in search of a chili dog and an unsweetened iced tea.  What is it with boys?  Is it the way we raise them?  Is it the testosterone?  I, and many of my best friends, have raised boys alone and for the most part, it has turned out fine.  However, I did wonder , when my own young man was doing self-destructive things, if it had to do with the fact that my ex, his father, had no issues at all, apparently, with being able to walk away, abdicate total responsibility and then blame everyone else when issues arose.  I have always felt, and will always feel, that the fact that kids don't have fathers in their lives as much as they used to is a problem.  In my own case, my ex chose to surround himself with people who were gullible enough to believe his very revisionist version of things and therefore did not hold him to account for his actions.  Frankly, our kids suffered.  It all turned out ok, for the most part, but still, the whole experience left me with the feeling that, while no one should stay in an unhappy and destructive marriage, some way, somehow , dads should be kept  in the picture. Yeah, I know, if they don't, they don't, and we can just do the best we can.  Also, and as I have told my own family: you grow up, you take responsibility for yourself and stop whining.  Tell it to your shrink. 

Besides, another thing I have picked up on is that boys who have dads who are there for absolutely everything , scouts, religious observances, family dinners, the whole business,  these boys can still choose to do just the stupidest, most destructive, most dangerous things. This would seem to say to me that it's not OUR faulr, as parents.  We do the best we can under the circumstances.   So, again, and I put it out there for conversation:  Is this risk taking behavior genetic or environmental?  

Is it the way we discipline kids in this country?  I'm taking this course (and yes, since the school is paying for it, I  decided to go ahead and finish this semester. Whether I finish the entire program   is another matter.  I also ordered some quilting supplies; that's another post).  At any rate, I re-read some research about the effects of physical discipline, and as most of us know, beaten  kids are bitter, ticked off kids.  Physical punishment of the severe variety (and I'm  not talking about a gentle smack on the hand  of a toddler in order to prevent  him/her from putting fingers into outlets,I'm talking about beatings, and we all know the difference) does not reduce the occurrence of the behavior.  It does raise the hostility level. I also recalled a study I read when I was taking courses at Slippery Rock.  I don't remember the exact statistics, but it was something like this:  over seventy or eighty percent of the males who are incarcerated in this country self-report themselves as being abused as children.  So, it would appear that physical punishment is not the answer. Since beating 'em isn't the answer, what is? We can 't wrap them in tissue paper and keep them in their rooms.  Can we? What do we do?  And the only answer I can come up with is to watch them as best we can , make the best decisions we can as issues arise, pray and if bad things happen know that we did everything we knew to do.   The rest may be out of our hands, I think.