Maybe so. The Anchoress has a good link to a interview of the man that wrote The Little Black Book of Violence: What Every Young Man Needs to Know About Fighting.
Se her links at Little Black Book of Violence
I think he is right on. It seemed these lesson were taught in a informal way through Family, community groups, Churches , and schools at one time.
It seems the message to boys when confronted with situations is JUST DON"T FIGHT. Well that has not proven to be very productive.
The schools have taken this to horrible extremes. School yard fights that were a normal part of growing up now oftenwithout EXCEPTION send you to jail. JAIL!!! Thus the consequence of ZERO TOLERANCE policies that seem to have been enacted to take pressure our schools administrators and teachers and school board members. The results have not been great and strangely it seems has had no effect on violence as these boys grow up. Except it might be getting worse.
The interview is very good and it talks about the lessons boys need to learn. When to fight, how to fight in a productive way when needed, when to retreat, and other matters.
Lesson that boys are not getting now and thus when they get older often result in horrible consequnences.
Don't restrain yourself to boys here.
ReplyDeleteTrue story: we had my niece in daycare (we could not get by on one income given what we earn) and she kept coming home with bite marks. This little boy kept biting her (they were both 3.5, 4 years old) and the staff just couldn't seem to do anything about it.
We found a new daycare, but they didn't have an opening for several weeks. So, Teh Hubby taught our niece to throw a punch. The next day, she broke that boy's nose. The daycare freaked out, but he never bit anyone again.