It is interesting to consider how we envision boys. We think of them as rather like household pets, in need of being tamed, trained and prevented from bringing too much wildness into the everyday social life of the household. Like domesticated felines, boys are known to be unpredictable and prone to revert to being feral. They seem to want to get close to us only when they need something from us and remain close only until their needs have been met. Like cats, as soon as they can fend for themselves (and sometimes sooner), boys look for ways out of the house, leaving behind their caretakers, who are astonished by how ungrateful their sons seem to be. Out in the world after twilight, boys are thought of as nocturnal creatures that prey on smaller boys, girls, the elderly and developed real estate. Returning from a prowl late at night or, as they get older, early in the morning, boys often display scratches and other evidence of skirmish on their bodies. To be a boy is to pose the triple threat of unpredictability, impulsiveness, and possible violence. As a result, boys are marked as potentially dangerous.
At the same time, however, and as long as mature maleeness is still latent, boys are perceived as possessing feminine features. They still cry when they are frightened, ill, or hurt, but unlike girls, our sons are taught to resent being dependent on adult emotional support, even when they need and crave it.
[…]
Once again, a comparison of boys with cats seems apt. One minute, they are quiet, soft and seemingly helpless, yet in an instant they may become taut, wiry, and apparently rabid. Like a cat’s claws, retracted and curled under its soft paws, a boy’s body is a potentially dangerous and destructive instrument. So the story goes. But does this picture accurately represent who and how boys are? What is a boy, really?
Miles Groth, “‘Has Anyone Seen the Boy?’: The Fate of the Boy in Becoming a Man,” Thymos
