Words Heal

“Its a boy!” I heard the doctor say in my half conscious state. I can’t exactly remember my first thoughts then, except wanting to know if the baby is healthy. Five years later, in another operation theater, I heard the words again. “He is perfect!” This time, with my husband by my side, I knew he will check on the baby & my 1st thought was “I am a boy-mum, will always be here on”.

The stereotype exists for what an “all boys” home is like and as much as Indian families fuss over boys, no one lets u forget that not having a girl in the house (besides urself) can mean less “raunak” (beauty/festivity). They picture boy-mums being extra exhausted, always messy, always on the soccer field or nursing bruises as bravery badges. While girls get to play dress-up with mums, be daddy’s princess, speak & cry softly. These were conventional narratives when I became a mom 20yrs ago.

Most of it was wrong. In an age where gender norms stand challenged, boundaries pushed and parents breaking away from stereotypes, we are raising our girls differently, as warriors & explorers, breaking free from traditional biases that put girls in a bracket. But we are failing our boys – as parents, as educators & as a society. None of us understand the pressures boys go through, therefore we don’t talk about it enough. As a result, we are leaving it to the likes of Andrew Tate / Sneako to be their role models. I discovered ‘manosphere’ about 6years ago when my older son was a teen & was shocked by its fan following. As a mother, it was my worst nightmare that my kids are at risk of being influenced by toxic creators who, once u start listening to them, sound very inspirational & touch all the right chords at surface level but have an undertone of extreme misogyny. Its only getting worse as their cult following grows and new stars are joining the space.

Parents fail to pick it up because it is impossible to be constantly monitor what our tweens/teens are watching or reading online. Its masked behind gaming commentary or a live stream but if you care to listen in, you quickly realise whats being pushed to these young minds. The new Netflix series – Adolscence is a jolting reminder of this sad reality.

I was raising my kids in a 1st world country, with them attending an elite school that empahsized on mental health, digital safety, they were surrounded by diverse cultures and ethnicity. Yet they were at risk. Let me tell you how it starts:

1. As an 8year old when my younger one went on a school camp (he doesn’t do rustic well), he was upset that the girls were given nicer dorms with attached toilets while boys were put up in make shift tents & bio-toilets at the camp site. He asked me “how is it fair?”. A year later, another incident happened where his friend was being bullied by a girl in class. One day she pushed him & he pushed her back & she started crying. The teacher took notice & reprimanded the boy for being ‘rough’, when he tried to explain, the teacher said “but you are not the one crying are you?” My son’s question that night to me was “does crying justify bad beahviour”? I had no answer but I did bring it up with the teacher and asked her to have a chat with all 3 kids. We can brush it off as a trivial incident and we know how stressful it can get for teachers managing a class of young kids but for a child it is a BIG feeling. Girls are given leeways that boys are not, and at that age it is very hard for them to process it logically. Later in life even when they finally understand it, the feeling of being treated unfairly by a teacher or a parent still stays.

2. In another incident at age 13 there was a serious matter in the grade above my older one’s. Something involving inappropriate photos circulated in a boys whatsapp group that one mother found out & reported. Now this happened outside of school, the girl had sent the photos on her own will to the boyfriend. It was absolutely wrong on the boy’s part to share it forward with his mates. The school went out of their way (rightly so) to protect the girl’s identity and she was sent for counselling but the boys were all squared up (grade above & below) and given a talk in a room while the girls stood outside & giggled at them getting a dressing down. My son’s question was why is it only a boys issue? Most of them were not on that whatsapp group, yet they were considered potentially guilty as a gender. Why? As he got older, he understood why but back then it seemed unfair.

These seemingly small incidents leave a mark, a memory on young minds. In the absence of an open dialogue or a safe space to talk / vent with the appropriate adult, a parent or teacher, it remains unaddressed. Putting them at risk of other interpretations, impressions.

Over the years on many such instances I was conflicted as a parent and forced to have hard conversations with my kids on why the world doesn’t owe them anything. Sometimes they shared willingly, other times I had to dig & find out. When they sighed – but thats unfair! My parroted response was – such is life! I had a few rules like – (a) no locking doors or phones till you are 16, (b) I will check your phone, read chats/DMs without notice, c) no headphones while gaming or watching live streams. I was doing my best not with an intent to snoop around but because I was constantly worried about this new virtual world and its stranger danger that I didnot know or understand. I read their chats on discord, on whatsapp, on DMs only to watch out for signs of toxicity or resentment seeping in from how things were in their external environment. Our dinner table conversations were on sensitive topics from school or in their friendship groups. I tried using their slang, asked them about emojis, mostly to be either laughed at how silly or nosy I was or get an eye-roll with an irritated dismissal. I slowly learned to preach less, listen more and not pounce with a lecture everytime they said something controversial. I began to see how boys their age do not really understand why are they (as a gender) demonised for violence against women, unequal pay or sexism. They were growing up when the world echoed with “me too” movement, competitive colleges reserved 50% seats for girls in STEM while only maybe 25% girls in their highschool class were opting for STEM courses, where a big tech co. would come to undergrad campus for recruitment (real story) & ask the boys to leave after group discussion round because hiring positions were ‘reserved’ for women (tick the DEI box). Completely defeating “hire best person for the job” objective, isolating an entire gender. Instead of helping promote equality, these practices were/are fuelling resentment.

Puberty is hard for both girls & boys. It messes them up as they start to become aware of biological differences in self & peers. With sex-ed in school and topic of consent a bit later, its a lot to take in for teens. As parents if we do not own the narrative, be unafraid to dig and talk about it without worrying about being politically correct, we are only leaving it in the hands of a stranger to shape how our kids think and act. Thats why #Adolscence has caught our collective conscience, it says out loud what parents fear silently. We are clueless and alienated from our kids and their virtual reality.