The Columbus Park West Nursery School book group held its first meeting last night. We talked about Raising Cain, by Dan Kindlon and Michael Thompson. Some of the points we discussed will be of interest to anyone who is interested in the lives of boys and men in our culture.

I’d like to open up the discussion.

Kindlon and Thompson describe the lives of boys in middle school and high school as a  “culture of cruelty”  in which boys constantly put each other down and even hurt each other, any one who shows vulnerability is punished by the group, and even those who are on top of the social pecking order need to be constantly on guard to maintain their status.
 
Does this seem true to you? We weren’t sure whether it might be exaggerated or might be specific to the private boarding school populations which seem to be Kindlon and Thomspon’s focus.

The largest question that came out of the meeting was—how can we give our boys the inner resources to withstand the pressures to be strong and tough and not to be aware of their feelings?

Please share your thoughts!