What Boys Need

Two new books agree that young males are in crisis, but oddly neither one asks much of dads

As the mother of an adolescent girl and a former girl myself, I'm happy to report that it's a swell time to be female. Girls today get to be strong or soft--they play with Barbies and bulldozers. Years of concern over the self-esteem of girls have resulted in a tide of aspiring Mia Hamms and Madeleine Albrights. But what happened to the boys? Why does the phrase "girl power" bring Hillary Clinton to mind, while "boy power" reminds us of Columbine?

After years of seeing adolescent girls as vulnerable Ophelias silenced by dominating boys, now it is boys who are supposed...

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