The Boy-Crisis Resides Where the Fathers Don't Reside

In 63 of the most developed nations, boys are at a crisis. They are falling behind girls in every academic subject, and are 'failing to launch' in every aspect of their lives. From lack of motivation, depression and ADHD, to lower sperm count and even shorter life expectancy - boys are hurting.

"This is a global crisis" explained The Boy Crisis author Warren Farrell, "boys fall behind in their mental, physical and psychological health - their failure to perform leads to rejection, and they end up bitter and resentful, addicted to video games, porn and drugs." 

But what is it about the developed nations that leads to boys' decline? 

The answer is dad deprivation. Farrell's comprehensive research has led him to the grim discovery that "the boy-crisis resides where the fathers don't reside." 

These nations have done a great job in creating new freedoms for men and women, said Farrell, "most notable for women are the freedoms to divorce and have children without being married, and so, among a very high percentage of divorced couples, children have minimal to no father involvement at all - these children are the ones doing much worse than those who have both father and mother involvement."

The devastating impact of dad deprivation is felt in every part of modern life, and it is thanks to Farrell's research that we can clearly see the direct link between the lack of a fathers' involvement and boys' wellbeing. 

"I knew that fathers were important," Farrell told John Anderson recently, "but I didn't have a clue that the absence of a father, for a boy in particular, leads to a boy having problems in more than 50 areas." 

Dad deprivation means that the child is far less likely to be able to postpone gratification - "postponed gratification is probably the single most important quality to becoming successful," explained Farrell, "especially being employed in a job that has some meaning for you, is one of the most important ingredients in happiness and a sense of purpose." 

A dad-deprived child is far more likely to be depressed, drop out of school, feel withdrawn, feel alienated, be addicted to video games and video porn, and fail in every academic area - "especially reading and writing which are the two biggest predictors of success." The child is also far more likely to have a lower sperm count and live a shorter life - "without father involvement," Farrell told Jordan Peterson recently, "by the age of nine, boys and girls without a significant amount of father involvement were likely to have shorter telomeres, which are pivotal in predicting life expectancy. Telomeres for a nine-year-old boy or girl without father involvement were 14 percent shorter, but the boys' telomeres were then again 40 percent shorter than the girls'."

The dad-deprived child is far less likely to be assertive and not aggressive, and is far less likely to be empathetic. The latter might come as a surprise to many but as Farrell and others have observed, it is not the parent being empathetic to the child that makes the child aware of others' plight, but the child's actions for the benefit of others that evokes empathy within them - "when a parent is always empathetic with the child's needs and desires," said Farrell, "the child becomes narcissistic, not empathetic."

And so, the boy who falls behind becomes angry at his teachers for not giving him any positive feedback and at his peers for not paying attention to him.

"When it comes to boy-girl time, if he feels he's a sensitive boy - and his mother oftentimes will help him see how sensitive and caring he is, because his mother is usually very sensitive to him," that sensitive boy is being rejected by girls "because girls tend to date winners, not losers." The boy is now experiencing himself as a loser because "he doesn't accomplish things very well," so he becomes hurt and withdrawn - "if the video game addiction doesn't satisfy him, or the alcoholism or the drugs don't satisfy him," said Farrell, "he can turn to porn, which will get him addicted to girls and women as objects rather than as real people."

The boys' addiction to online porn creates a level of stimulation that cannot 'be matched' by a 'normal' girl in real life. This boy is not turned on by the mere touch of the girl's hand, or the hinted sexual electricity of the one to one interaction. The girl senses that "she is treated as an object" and rejects his advances, which to him acts as yet another proof of his worthlessness. 

"Those are the boys that are set up for the mass shooters," reflected Farrell, "they look to ISIS or some other larger sense of purpose that their dad didn't provide, or they become our prisoners - in the United States 93% of the prison population is male and about 90% of that group is dad-deprived males." Dad deprivation is also common to 85% of mass shooters and counts for 80 to 90% of ISIS recruits.

These boys are dealt a losing card from the get-go - dad absenteeism robs them of a pivotal character-building interaction, and sets them on a cruel downward spiral. Without the distinctly masculine reassurance and push, they fail to form many of the qualities needed to face the world, they are ill-equipped, and are consequently crushed by every disappointment, rejection or failure to attain a goal. The failure to perform in turn leads to dysfunction, disillusionment, self-loathing, lack of motivation and possibly the worst possible outcome - all-consuming resentment of the world. 

Dads' irreplaceable rough and tumble play alone holds within it a multitude of vital skills for life - it helps children parameterize their bodies, learn to distinguish between assertive and aggressive, learn what limits there are in the use of physical interactions with another person, what is pushing-it too-far and what causes pain. It forms a unique bond that in turn builds trust and even instills ethics. Consider the fact that rough and tumble play has been removed from much of the education system and you can appreciate the massive loss to children, especially boys. 

Bottom line is that all children need a father in their lives, and that boys suffer severely without a dad. The staggering statistics in Farrell's' The Boy Crisis point to a society in decline, with the erosion of masculinity as the most impactful perpetrator - one example of many shows that the United States jail and prison population has increased by more than 700% between the mid-seventies and now. 93% of prisoners are male and as previously mentioned, 90% of them are dad-deprived. 

"Boys used to have a sense of purpose of being a warrior, a sole breadwinner, but now they have a purpose void," explained Farrell - it is this soul-destroying purpose-void, combined with the dad-void that creates a combination that does not allow a boy to discover his unique self, and find meaning in the world."

Dad-deprived girls suffer too, Farrell told FoxNews in 2019. "They are impacted as the boys are but not nearly to the same degree, the girls at least have the role model of a female, the boys don't have the role model of a dad. 

Farrell's advice to a dad-deprived home is to make sure the child goes to a school with male teachers, attends boy scouts and joins group activities with male friends, guides and mentors. 

Author of The Boy Crisis, The Myth of Male Power and Women Can't Hear What Men Don't Say, Farrell is a regular commentator on mainstream TV shows, from Fox News and morning TV to Oprah. 

The former feminist grew disillusioned with the late 60s, early 70s women's movement, and they eventually parted ways. Reflecting on the movement he points to it having made "a very serious error" that is impacting women's outlook to this very day - "we had come through the civil rights movement where there was a group of oppressors and a group of oppressed," Farrell told Anderson, "and then we went through Marxism being popular around the world where there was oppressors and the oppressed, and then we … said in the feminist movement that men earn more money than women do … therefore men are the oppressors and women are the oppressed; we didn't understand that the men, when they became fathers, that's when they started earning more money than women did. It's not men that earn more money than women do, it is fathers that earn more money than mothers earn because when they become fathers they give up doing the things they want to do - like being a teacher to become an administrator that almost nobody wants to be because the administrator earns more." The feminist movement failed to understand that men earning more was not about male privilege but about male sacrifice. 

Here, Farrell shares his thoughts on the myth of male privilege, why we need more male teachers, why we need to socialize our daughters to share the risks of sexual rejection, oppose #MeToo's victimhood culture and see that 'I am woman, I am strong' is not fulfilled by a culture of 'I am woman, I've been wronged.' 

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Is the White House Council on Boys and Men now a reality?

“The White House Council on Boys and Men is not a reality, even worse, President Biden created a White House Gender Policy Council which specially excluded boys, men, and fathers. specifically excluded boys, men and fathers. 

“It also claimed racial justice as its mission, but since black males are doing worse on every metric than black females, and the black males without fathers are suffering by far the most, its neglect of boys, men and fathers makes the White House Gender Policy Council both sexist and racist.”

Are people starting to make the connection between the war on boys and the boy crisis? 

“Very slowly. The Staten Island Borough President, James Oddo, read The Boy Crisis on his vacation and was so disturbed that it motivated him to work with me to start a Staten Island Commission on Boys and Men.

“In 2019, the White House invited me to brief them on the findings in The Boy Crisis book. When I finished, they invited me to write a potential presidential speech. The draft I wrote was praised but there was fear that it would only expose President Trump to criticism about his multiple marriages, etc. The crisis is a global crisis, and I have been fortunate enough to talk about it with the Norwegian Parliament, and with the former Deputy Prime Minister of Australia.“

Candace Owens was heavily criticised online for saying that we need more masculine power within society. How have we reached a situation where such an observation is considered controversial?

“What I share in a book called The Myth of Male Power is that men have learned to define 'power' as feeling obligated to earn money that his family spends while he dies sooner. He has learned to consider himself as having 'male power' by accepting the social bribe of being called 'hero' to be willing to die in his generation's war.

“We need to understand that males have not had 'male privilege' - they have had male obligations just as women have had female obligations. 

“Father's Day is a perfect day to absorb the need for men's and dads' contributions when those contributions are made, and the damage done to our children and to women when we do not know how men are needed, or actively disparage men.”

Increasing the number of male teachers would make a fundamental, positive difference within society, do you agree? 

“Yes. I proposed to the White House under President Trump that we create a 'Male Teacher Corps' to give men college scholarships in exchange for a two-year commitment to serve as teachers in a school district with a high percentage of dad-deprived children. When I did my research for The Boy Crisis, I discovered the degree to which dad deprivation at home combined with male teacher deprivation at school makes boys vulnerable to destructive male role models such as gang leaders and drug dealers.” 

It is important for boys to occasionally be in exclusively male company. Boys/men behave differently when girls are present but also, it triggers emotions unique to the exclusively male experience. As girls and women enter traditionally male domains, is the freedom to be in exclusively male company in jeopardy?

“Yes. Both sexes exercise different parts of themselves at same sex schools, retreats, parties, events. 

“But when Boy Scouts must accept girls and Girl Scouts will not accept boys; when every major profession has the equivalent of an Association of Female Lawyers but no Association of Male Lawyers, and all-female colleges still exist as all-male colleges are in jeopardy, then we have a double standard. More important, though, is that virtually every major business has HR departments which are really HER departments - they register her complaints about him. Those complaints are rarely followed up with a healthy dialogue to help both sexes understand how to better engage with the other. They result in the male-in-jeopardy. Women expressing their complaints is important, as in #Metoo, but #Metoo is currently a monologue - #Metoo must become a dialogue. Right now, every male CEO and top executive I have talked with since #Metoo is afraid to mentor a woman and even hire women. This doesn't empower women.”

Dad deprivation is catastrophic for boys and hurting girls too - a charity for pregnant teens has noted that the girls come from different backgrounds but have one thing in common - they are all fatherless. 

“Yes, dad deprivation does indeed increase the likelihood of a pregnant teenage girl, and also damages both female and male developmental success in more than 50 areas, all of which are discussed in The Boy Crisis.”

There is something in father's guidance, voice, or attitude that is essential to healthy development. Why are some people still refusing to accept this? 

“We refuse to see this for multiple reasons. One is that feminists have developed institutional structures such as gender studies as women's studies; HR as HER; the WH Gender Policy Council, and seven federal offices of women's health and no offices of men's health that have aggregately led the media and education systems to think only of women's issues and be completely oblivious to the boy crisis. Employees in these institutions aggregately earn more than a trillion dollars a year invested in the woman-as-victim ideology. Many fear speaking up about any deviation from that lest they seem to be misogynists and put their career advancement in jeopardy.”

What do you make of feminist men who are willing to crush young boys' masculinity in the name of political correctness?

“There is such a thing as toxic masculinity, as well as toxic femininity and toxic feminism. When I was on the Board of Directors of the National Organization in NYC and began talking about boys' issues and the importance of fathers, my speaking engagement referrals went from more than 50 a year to zero per year. Focusing only on feminist issues brought me considerable income and fame until I realized that we are all in the same family boat - that when only one sex wins, both sexes lose.”

Teacher Will Knowland lost his Eton job when he refused to remove his Patriarchy Paradox video from his YouTube channel. What would your advice be for a man battling feminist agents at work?

“To save enough money to survive and then have the courage to speak up. Gather together your allies. Do not battle with ideological feminists, do persuasion of more balanced individuals who have the courage to speak up with you.” 

Why are some boy schools not proud to be educating boys? 

“Feminist ideology has demonized masculinity and it dominates the educational system.” 

There is a blatant double standard at play at many schools - from a female-oriented curriculum to school uniforms where girls are granted 'flexibility' - sixth-formers wearing black mini skirts while boys adhere to the expected suit and tie.

“Parents need to quietly discover and organize their allies. They need to elect each other to their Boards of Education and PTAs. They need to study their issues, both in The Boy Crisis and in Michael Gurian and Leonard Sax's writings.” 

Manly traits are being suppressed in businesses and offices to help accommodate females. The problem is that suppressing competitiveness, risk-taking and yes, stoicism, reduces productivity...

Yes. We are not socializing our daughters to learn how to take risks. For examples, we need to socialize our daughters to share the risks of sexual rejection - not by option, but by expectation; to learn about business by starting one in their garage rather than getting MBAs; to understand that trigger warnings, safe spaces and becoming snowflakes and #MeToos as a monologue rather than a dialogue is honing victimhood as a fine art. "I am Woman, I am Strong" is not fulfilled by a culture of "I am woman, I've been wronged." When women discover the best in men, they will discover the best in themselves. 

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Farrell's The Boy Crisis is an alarming wake up call to society, teachers and parents. I would argue that it is one of the most important books of our time, delivering one of the most important messages ever.

Children need fathers, and boys in particular suffer without a dad. We need to help boys become healthier, stronger men, confident in their masculinity and with a sense of purpose in life.

Farrell's mission is to create a White House council on boys and men. My hope is that the proposed council would make the plight of divorced and divorcing dads a priority and that it brings to light the family courts' conduct. I pray that it speaks openly of the immense pain caused by parent alienation, and the hell that brings a man to suicide, as he fights for the right to see his own child. 

Find Warren Farrel’s work at warrenfarrell.com and boycrisis.org​​

Hannah is a London based journalist covering culture and current affairs. She writes about photography, film and TV for outlets in the UK and US, and covers current affairs with particular interest in the Jewish world. She is also an award-winning filmmaker and photographer. Her films were screened in festivals worldwide and parts of her documentary about Holocaust survivor Leon Greenman were screened on the BBC. You can find more from Hannah here.