On the day I officially started my PGCE placement, I volunteered to help with a year 10 carousel day. Run by a committee of students (all young woc, waddup) they had a focus on mental and physical health with job opportunities and work experience etc. They were perfect, I’ve never seen a bunch of teenagers so in the know, confident and ready to do something for themselves.
The stall that I helped at was promoting mental health well-being and it was armed with a local council official who was highly ‘qualified’. I watched them give their spiel and was completely taken a back at how clueless they were. They were throwing things about like “if you suffer with mental health, you should exercise more” or “mental health problems means you might go quiet so you need to be vigilant with your friends”.
They firstly didn’t know the difference between mental health and mental illness, but secondly they were pushing antiquated, unproven ‘remedies’ about exercise and ‘just talk if you’re feeling low’ crap. I was infuriated. So, I learnt the spiel in a couple of minutes and went forth to try and have some meaningful conversations, from a learned perspective.
I spoke to the kids about their networks, their support system, what was home life like and, if they were willing, I asked about their own struggles. I got an overwhelmingly positive response - from young womxn. The boys? Not so much.
From a year group of around 200 students, and I was there for 3/4 of the day, I must have seen 100-120 kids. There was no disproportion to who I saw, because there were ushers making sure each kid went to every stall, but the school was 60/40 ratio of (assumed) boys to girls.
Every single interaction I had with young womxn was honest and open. I got told about depression, anxiety, mood swings, stress, pressure, illnesses and family life within a minute or so. Some were shy, but still shared because they were normally given some confidence by their friends. So, we spoke, chatted, laughed and they took the literature and it was happy days.
The boys? I had two meaningful conversations and it took me almost 15mins with each group out of this two. They wouldn’t respond, refused to answer, laughed and joked - immediately - and tried to disarm me or their friends with ‘ladish’ behaviour. So, I switched it up, I had to. I started asking groups of boys if they thought girls were more open or if they behaved differently. I asked them if they felt more comfortable speaking to their mums, aunts or nans. I pushed them to answer questions based around made-up scenarios, to detach them from having to be open. I barely got responses. I got a lot of laughs, deflection and awkwardness.
This is what we teach young boys. We teach them to think it’s weak to cry, attach homophobia to showing emotions and support to same gender friendships, give them a skill set so inept at dealing with something that might trigger poor mental health or exacerbate a mental illness - diagnosed or otherwise - that they cover every conversation up with ‘bants’. That amazing humour and ability to laugh at anything I hear about all the time in all same gendered groups of men.
And so, when people tell me ‘oh the next generation (genZ) is gonna change everything, they are so aware, educated and connected’ I agree, yes, the next generation of womxn are! They are fucking awesome. They are literally gonna change everything. Boys? No. We need to help them change, they need interventions, re-education and guidance. Heteronormative patriarchal masculinity is killing boys and men. Literally.
