Woman's Hour - Parenting: raising sons to be good men

Episode Date: August 21, 2019

How do you teach gender equality to boys?

This BBC podcast is supported by ads outside the UK. I'm Natalia Melman-Petrozzella, and from the BBC, this is Extreme Peak Danger. The most beautiful mountain in the world. If you die on the mountain, you stay on the mountain. This is the story of what happened when 11 climbers died on one of the world's deadliest mountains, K2, and of the risks we'll take to feel truly alive. If I tell all the details, you won't believe it anymore. Extreme. Peak danger. Listen wherever you get your podcasts.

BBC Sounds. Music, radio, podcasts. Hello, Jenny Murray welcoming you to the Woman's Hour podcast for parents. This week, how to raise sons to be good men. How do we raise them to be kind and compassionate and to believe that girls should have the same rights and opportunities as they do? Well, Jane spoke to a consultant clinical psychologist, Emma Citron, the journalist, Victoria Richards, and a volunteer at the Good Lad initiative, Jordan Jones. Victoria, tell us about your two children.

Presumably you raised them exactly the same. Yes, yes, exactly. And I'm very committed to giving them equal opportunities and uh sort of imparting them with a strong empowered feminist message i suppose i've seen uh things been said that have been said to my daughter that have really made me stop and think wow we've got a long way to go here for example um you know she was she was wearing a dress once that had the emblem of star wars on it and a shop cashier said to her, oh, but Star Wars is for boys. And, you know, her face dropped and she felt really crushed. You could see that it really sort of shook her belief in the world, really.

And she was told that she perhaps shouldn't be playing football after school because, oh, what about the after school clubs for girls? And my son, who's now three, is seeing that because he's around her and he's hearing that sort of injustice and parroting it actually you know whether it's the tv programs he watches something as sort of benign seemingly as peppa pig where he's saying no that's just for boys or that's just for girls or boys can't do that the peppa pig issue is that daddy pig is such a yeah there's a few issues i think yeah okay there's probably more than a few I haven't watched you for a while I must confess um okay I would imagine Emma your your sons are older you've

got a daughter you've also got four sons who the oldest of whom is nearly 30 I think yeah um would you say it was harder to bring up sons now than when you first started doing it I think things there was less interaction with social media for the older children. Well, let's be clear about this. There was less pornography accessible on phones in school playgrounds. Yes, absolutely right. I think they were under less pressures. There wasn't Instagram. They didn't join Facebook until they were 14 or even 15. And even then, they didn't really care about it very much. So I think this opens up the whole social media debate, too, because of the accessibility of all of these forums that we're talking about, like porn, to our youngsters and how that may or may not influence their attitudes. So what do you do as a parent or carer?

I think you try to have good discussions with your youngsters. I mean, you can try. How do you do that? Yes. I think if any, as Victoria was saying, any stereotypes and prejudices leak out, like even from a young child saying, aren't the boys stronger than the girls? They climb the climbing frames and they're the ones that are so good at everything. You can start to present other points of view. Well, you just may not be noticing that actually, you know, that the girls are doing X or Y or actually they're very good at maths or whatever it is.

So I think chipping away at stereotypes from a very young age is important. Chipping away at power stereotypes, you know, perhaps implicit perceptions that, you know, the perhaps implicit perceptions that, you know, boys have the power and the authority and can rule over the girls in some way. I think these are discussions we can start to have very early. Yeah, okay. I mean, Jordan, do you, I know that you grew up in a household with a with a mom who was very much immersed in feminist politics, wasn't she? Definitely. but you still by your own admission didn't always treat women in the right way no not at all um would you like me to elaborate on that bit if you don't mind um we're only live on radio i could

look at you all day but that's not gonna get to you anyway carry on um no definitely i think um myself included you know i'm not um i'm not removed from the society that i operate in um how how we interact with men and women um speaking from a heteronormative or heterosexual point of view growing up it was that thing that um happens in life things like kiss chase things like you know you punch the girl in her arm and you only do it because you like them things that we kind of subconsciously are constantly told and reinforced that this is the way to behave. And it's acceptable. Boys will be boys, things like that.

But having a mother like I had, that was never and still isn't tolerated, constantly being picked up on. But more importantly, educating me on what laid underneath that. OK. I mean, Victoria, from your perspective your little boy is is three i mean he's tight he's done no harm to anyone nor will he ever i'm sure do you worry more about him than your daughter or do you worry more about the influences he's going to be susceptible to i mean i think misogyny shackles boys as much as it shackles girls right and he's going to be facing issues of toxic masculinity he's going to be facing pressures to be a man whatever that means and what that seems to mean in a sort of traditional sense is to not express your emotions not express your feelings

well I know that women in a certain way that was one of Kellyanne's worries she wrote in her email my biggest worry is the message that boys are conditioned not to express their emotions. Yeah, exactly. So, I mean, you know, I feel that it's really simple as parents that we can do that or as a society that we can do that by encouraging boys to express their emotions. And also modelling. Modelling is really, really important within the home. So we've got to look at the traditional stereotypical kind of activities

that parents do in two-parent families if if those if if it's a sort of heteronormative setup if you've got a mother and a father for example then you know is the mother doing the traditionally female activities of cooking and cleaning and child care and you know isn't it really really simple to see dad cooking dinner one night and mum washing the car or mum taking the bins out, you know, stuff like that, that kids will, a lot of kids will be seeing every day that can show them that they don't have to conform to stereotypes. Emma, you've got four sons and would they say, yes, I'm a feminist?

No, I don't think they would. I think they'd feel quite alienated by that term. Who's alienated them? I think it's got very negative connotations in society. It's seen as quite political, quite angry, and quite anti-men, actually. And I think they don't feel like it's their safe space. They don't feel like it's their battle? No. And they don't need to be a part of it. But even they feel threatened by it, I think, in some ways. You look quite upset by that, Victoria. I think I come up against this a lot, even amongst my female friends who sometimes say, oh, I'm not sure if I'm a feminist. And I genuinely think it's because people don't

understand truly what it means. And I give my friends this really simple acronym which is peps which is basically i always say feminists believe in political economic personal and social equality for men and women and if we take that as our springboard then i don't understand what why that could be seen as a negative term or bastardized okay um jordan i think you'd say you were you do embrace the feminist label now, but you might have fought it in the past? I would say... So I definitely would say that I identified as a feminist,

but after speaking to other feminists, I thought it more appropriate to identify as a feminist ally. Interestingly, when someone told me, you know, you're a man, it's not appropriate to say you're a feminist, I immediately got my back up. Okay, well, yeah, I wouldn't... Why did they say that?

Well, I think that's more for them to... That's for them to articulate and to kind of think out. But what I would focus on is more, I got my back up because someone said I couldn't do something. And then straight away, I went into patriarchal man. No, I want to be a feminist. back up because someone said I couldn't do something and then straight away I went into patriarchal man no I want to be a feminist you can't tell me I can't and so I then recreated the exact problem that has feminist feminism exist in the first place all right I want to get some rock solid advice from all three of you in a minute but first of

all let's bring in some listeners uh Rupert says a simple piece of advice cuddles and love from dad amazing how it changes things. I don't know. One would disagree with that, would they? Tamara says, and this is a reasonable point, maybe a man should come on the programme one day far in the future and discuss how to raise our daughters to be good women. Right. Well, OK. I was going to say that just seems like another branch of the what about men argument. As well as men telling women how to be women. Catherine emails, ensure that their father is a feminist and is very present in their lives.

Elaine, an email, I've got a son in his 50s. He hasn't had a father role model in his life since he was seven. He lived his childhood through the 70s and the 80s when the women's movement was at its height and was exposed to the principles and the practice of feminism. He's married with a family and devoted to doing his best, which he achieves. However, recently he has been expressing his feeling of being at a loss as far as being surrounded by strong women, and he feels he doesn't know where to fit in. So I suppose, you know, to be fair, we've never suggested on this programme

that only women face challenges. I mean, that know, to be fair, it's not we've never suggested on that suggested on this programme that only women face challenges. I mean, that's clearly not the case. And Elaine's hinting at a difficult situation there for her son. Sue says it's not just about presenting a positive female role model and enabling girls. It's as much about presenting positive male role models and giving a variety of play materials to girls and boys. That means dolls for boys, tractors for girls and so, so much more. And from my raid, I think we need to equip boys practically cooking, cleaning, babysitting, etc. Sounds weird, but would you want your son to be your partner when they grow up? Yeah, I know what you mean. It sounds weird, but you're making a very good point.

So, yeah, let's put that one on you then, Emma. You've had the most experience with four sons. What did you get right? I hope that they would embrace. I think it's the term feminism that is quite jarring. Well, let's move away from the term. Let's talk about what you did and what you said. Yes, I think I tried to make them very emotionally astute. I read them stories when they were very little that touched on emotions. We talked about a variety of emotions. I think they picked up a lot because I'm a psychologist with a practice at home. So, you know, without names and confidentially, I would sometimes talk to them about some of my clients and some of the issues they presented with in an age appropriate way. So I sort of opened their minds to things that they may not be coming across necessarily in the wider world of their experience. So I tried to sort of connect with them and make them aware of of how other people feel and i think that's

really important victoria i think it's a really fundamental point is to um provide them with a range of options as we've talked about not uh you know not not not supplying them with cars or diggers or tractors but offering them dolls and um buggies and and you know things that people would traditionally give to little girls i brought along a photo actually of my son of what he chose to wear he's only three and for his nursery graduation photo very nice he's wearing a big pink and white checked bow headband and that's not me voicing that on him i mean it's available because he's got an older sister so perhaps that is one that one thing but um it's not me voicing that on him. I mean, it's available because he's got an older sister so perhaps that is one thing but it's not saying you have to wear this.

It's not saying you can't wear this. It's saying you're totally free to wear this if you want to, even from this age, I think it's really important. I think there are battles that aren't worth fighting and speaking as the proud mother of somebody who dressed as Postman Pat for many, many years and had her own sack and would routinely attend formal events

dressed as a Cumbrian postman. But she wouldn't do it now. By the way, if she did want to. That's up to her. She could. Okay, Jordan, over to you. I think as parents, carers, guardians, as well as keeping our children safe and alive,

we have to intellectually and emotionally develop them. And so for me, what I do with my kids is every moment is a teaching moment, whether we're watching Disney or Lion King or outside or on a bus, every interaction, I use that interaction to inform my kids of something and then let them figure out what it is i'll say to mia oh it's quite interesting how old is she me is eight okay it's quite interesting that that man um interrupted that woman when she was speaking

and kind of said the exact same thing that she was thinking what do you think that's about and then she'll say in her eight-year-old brain yeah that's quite weird he's just like explaining it again he didn't have to explain it you know and so she now has the the definition of mansplaining without me explaining it on her yeah um so i think that's what i do practically that's what i do all the time and but do you talk to your son differently well jelani is nearly two okay um but at the end like we were saying earlier vict Victoria, it starts from birth. From when baby is in mummy, the gender stereotypes and everything begins. So with him, it is very much a case of the exact same thing.

Wear what you want, do what you want. As long as it's safe and as long as it's appropriate, then yeah, I treat him the exact same way but what if he goes on to be like you when you were an adolescent or somebody in your early 20s then he's very lucky that he's become like me no um i get what you mean if if he's going to struggle at the end of the day because the way i tried to live and how i was raised is not in line with how most men conform well that's what i was going to say so he might have all your good thoughts all your brilliant intentions and then but he's got to find his place with his peers 100 so difficult it is difficult and what i'd say is

you know you choose the crowd show me your friends i'll show you who you are you choose the crowd that you think suits you or fits you hopefully and so i hope that with the village of people that are raising him he won't be someone that just succumbs to peer pressure and goes along with something just because it's seen as cool or okay just because it's what he believes in yeah um it's hard it is hard but it's a daily we were speaking about this earlier it's a daily But it's a daily, we were speaking about this earlier, it's a daily struggle, it's a daily thing, constantly checking privilege, constantly checking patriarchy. And other men calling it out to each other

and holding each other to account, that's essential. Yeah, that is as important as with the Me Too movement, right? Completely. People, or lads in the pub, you know, this so-called lads culture, men calling each other out for saying that is inappropriate, that is sexist, that is, you're allowed to express your emotions and also we were talking earlier about reading to kids i think there was a study done by the fawcett society that showed that books that challenge gender norms can literally undo children's perceptions of gender stereotyping and there

is a wealth of very interesting literature out there there's the kind of you know good night stories for rebel girls stories for boys who dare to be different fantastically great women in sport and science and um i brought along a book a picture book that i was showing jordan earlier which is called julian is a mermaid by jessica love and it's this beautiful very simple story it's not preachy it's about a little boy who sees women dressed up as mermaids and thinks they're really beautiful and wants to emulate that with his grandma's netted curtain. And his grandma gives everything, gives him props,

gives him a pearl necklace that he can put on. And he swans around looking like this beautiful mermaid. And it's really simple. And it's just saying, yeah, you can experiment. You can be who you want to be. No judgment, just support and love. And Emma, did any of your sons would you have allowed your sons to i am going to dress like victoria's little boy yes you wouldn't

have one i mean i i'm very reluctant to speak for my boys because they're all adults now so i'm aware of that but um certainly one of them would um use the pram and the dolls and dress up way into late primary. And my girl was not a stereotypical girl in the ways that you might expect. She was the old fashioned. Because guess what? We're all individuals. Yes, exactly. Exactly. So it would have been absolutely fine. It was absolutely fine.

And they have their own attitudes and outlooks and they're egalitarians. That's, I think, what they would call themselves. Well, yeah, that's quite a lot of syllables in that. Would they really call themselves egalitarians? I think they would if the concept was explained like Victoria did. That's a bit unfair. Yes, the concept was explained. I think they would. i think they would i think they would

great um sorry i was just going to add as well that um i think we're talking about things that can be done from really really early on in life and it's so true you know through stories through through books but also issues really big issues like consent you know you empower kids to say you don't have to kiss your aging relative at at Christmas. That is, from the word go, that is giving them the power to say no or bodily autonomy, right? So that can start really early too. I think it's, you know, we just need to embed these systems that we're all trying to battle against as early as we can.

We had lots of response from you to this discussion. Jeanette said, I brought up three boys in the 90s. Talk to them from an early age, used television programmes to raise topics like consent in age-appropriate ways. It's too late when they're 14 to start to talk about anything so important. Mairead said, I think we need to equip boys practically, cooking, cleaning, babysitting. Sounds weird, but would you want your son to be your partner

when they grow up? Sue said it's not just about presenting positive female role models and enabling girls. It is as much about presenting positive male role models and giving a variety of play materials to both boys and girls, dolls for boys and tractors for girls, and so much more. And Annie said, I have two sons now in their 30s. I never thought of feminism as I brought up my sons, but I wanted them to be able to be independent. Therefore, I showed them how to cook and clean, but also do electrical work and garden while being a working mother.

It transpires that they now both see women as just as capable, if not more so in some areas, than men. Being their example seems to have served them well and made them good and respectful partners. And don't forget if you have ideas for the Woman's Hour podcast for parents, do get in touch with us through the website. It's bbc.co.uk forward slash Woman's Hour. Bye-bye. I'm Sarah Trelevan, and for over a year, I've been working on one of the most complex stories I've ever covered. There was somebody out there who was faking pregnancies. I started like warning

everybody. Every doula that I know. It was fake. No pregnancy. And the deeper I dig, the more questions I unearth. How long has she been doing this? What does she have to gain from this? From CBC and the BBC World Service, The Con, Caitlin's Baby. It's a long story, settle in. Available now.