I would get stopped in the street and I still

I still get stopped in the street by guys

these big guys come over to me and say you're

you're Steve Biddulph aren't you

and I I said yeah

what what you gonna do to me

you know you gonna break my head off

ha ha ha ha ha

and and I said

that book that that

that effing book of yours

that that's the story of my life mate and

and it it really helped me

and I just wanna let you know I

you know sometimes

you know

like I wouldn't be alive if it wasn't for that

welcome back to Raising Men

one of the founding hypotheses of this whole project

is that there is a quiet crisis happening with boys

today across classrooms

playgrounds and homes boys are falling behind in school

they're struggling with identity

and they're being forced

to grow up in a world that's not quite sure

what to do with masculinity anymore

and my guest today Steve Biddulph

has been one of the world's leading voices on this

for over three decades he's a psychologist

an educator and an author of two books

Raising Boys and The New Manhood

and those books have shaped how millions of parents

and teachers understand

male development his message is simple

but I think profound if we want strong men

we need to raise emotionally healthy young boys

Steve welcome to raising men

hi Shawn

and hello to everyone that's watching

or listening to this great to have some time with you

well thanks so much

and now how did you come to focus

on boys and men and fatherhood

and parenting and education for your career

okay well

long people who are watching this can see

I've got grey hair and I'm seriously elderly and um

geriatric now and so

but in the 1970s I was a young um

keen young guy um this

this just graduated as a psychologist

and I got recruited to a

a new clinic that was being set up in a

an industrial kind of town in Tasmania

Australia

and this clinic was doing something pretty radical

it was seeing the whole family

it was a family therapy clinic

which in those days was a new idea

and so we uh

someone had a a kid with all

with some kind of problems uh

with the law or with with behaviour or something

my boss said the whole family's gotta come

we're not seeing kids on their own

which is pretty sensible thing when you think about it

um let's yeah

I'm astonished that that was revolutionary

but it absolutely is

that seems like an obvious thing to do

yeah cause in those days

it was like you getting your car serviced

you know you would

you drop your kid at the psychologist to get them fixed

and that that never worked but

but anyhow we

we got to see hundreds and hundreds of families

and these were what we call

I think you call it in the States as well

blue collar families that's right

um

families

parents who worked at the mill or worked on a farm

or worked in the forest and um

and what we found was that the mums were great

the mums pretty much knew what they were doing

um but the dads really struggled

and and in

in in the families that came to see us

you could tell that dads they love their kids

and they work their guts out

all their life to provide for their kids and um

but the when it came to actually relating to their kids

they were kind of distant and stiff and awkward

um and

and so I'm so began to think well

someone's gotta help the dads and um

and then something happened Sean

which was more personal that I was a

a young I

I was married with Sharon

I had a farm and we had a

um

had um

a little boy and we are ready to have another child and

um and the

the pregnancy of our much hoped for second child um

miscarried and um

and that's the thing that happens

very common thing

happens to millions of people every week

um but it really knocked me around

I don't I didn't understand it

but it put my wife Sharon and I

we kind of we had a

kind of

a grief reaction that was on a different timetable

her grief was different to mine

and she didn't want to talk to me

and I I didn't know

what was happening and I just got very

very sort of depressed and

and really affected by that

and when I tried to talk to my friends

they didn't they just didn't come through for me Shawn

they just didn't know what to say

and I began to realize well

have I even got friends you know

I thought these were my friends um

us guys don't um

we don't support each other properly and um

and this began a lot

a journey right into the whole thing

Robert Bly had just written Iron John

his book about men um

the idea of father hunger and the father wound

and so

manhood was the book I wrote out of that experience and

and so I it was it was personal

but it was also something professional

I saw the need for

and manhood started 500 men's groups around Australia

and I would get stopped

I would get stopped in the street and I still

I still get stopped in the street by guys

these big guys come over to me and say

you're you're Steve Biddulph

aren't you and I

I said yeah

what what you gonna do to me

you know you gonna break my head off hahaha

and and I said that book that

that that effing book of yours that

that's the story of my life mate and

and it

it really helped me and I just wanna let you know I

you know sometimes

you know like

I wouldn't be alive if it wasn't for that book

and that was just you know

I'm a quiet sort of guy

and I'm very unsure of anything that I do

but this was very affirming message

that we were onto something here

and we had to we had to help the guys

and the guys would respond to that

and they would turn around

you get you give a man the right help

he will turn around you know and

and um

it's just that no one ever did that

and so that was this that's enough of

of the origin sort of I'd story but

but that's that's where it began

that is such a powerful story I

I love it and I love that legacy that

that you have

I love the fact that you get recognized on the street

that is that's

that's fantastic hmm

now you have argued that uh

and I agree with this argument

that boys might benefit from starting school later

um but that

you know that's a big kind of systematic change

and I don't think we should be holding our breath

waiting for the culture to catch up to this

so since

traditional school environments can disadvantage boys

in in areas like

like reading or behavioral expectations

emotional development that sort of thing

what do we

what can we do to support our son's education when

you know within the current system

that funnels them into a situation that's

frankly suboptimal yeah okay

well we gonna take a while to unpack that one

um sure

because okay well

we got a while first of all to understand um

what's going on is that when

when a little baby is still in the womb

you know it was still inside his mum um

if it's a boy baby in his

his

there's a point about third trim

third sort of month of pregnancy

the little testicles start to pop out and start to grow

and straight away they make testosterone

that's their job and they start making testosterone

and they start shaping this little fetus into a boy

baby

and one of the main effects they have is that they

they put the brakes on the testosterone

slows down the development of a boy

and whereas a little baby girl in the womb is kind of

kind of surging on little baby boys grow more slowly

and we have no idea why that is

but at the moment of birth they're

they're probably three

three or four weeks less developed than baby girls

wow that that's counter intuitive yeah

yeah and um

and maybe it's got something to do with that

they've got extra things they need to

to develop but we

we don't know but the

the result is that with a little baby boy

he's a little bit harder to switch on in

it's sort of like you know

when you hold when mum's holding him and talking

to him and you know

how you going little fella

you know you

and tickling him and and smiling at him

you have to work a little harder to get him

on the outside and uh

Richard Reeves who's written about the science of this

it's it's

you know that they're um

they're even more likely to

you know to die in

in in early childhood um

it's a vulnerability in boy babies

and and so

and by the time they are starting school

it would coming to your question

um so age 5 or so

4 or 5 the difference

between the boys and girls is from 6 to 12 months

difference Sean

so it's a you know enormous

the gap gets bigger

yeah at that age

it gets bigger and and

and then they slowly start to catch up

but they don't catch up till they're about 22

and so so it's a lifelong thing

and so girls for instance

have puberty um

a year and a half to two years sooner than boys do

um and

but if we stay with our school be

school starting what this means is that little boys are

can be a year behind the girl that's sitting beside

in the desk yeah

and and that's not good and and

and a year behind what that

what they're behind in is two things um

talking

you know be able to put a sentence together

and express themselves and

and getting finger control

you know

picking up a pen and being able to do nice work

in which

and schools have traditionally been very big on

you know neat work

you know and answering the questions and and

and so if you're a little boy

and you just get this pretty immediate

you know they're not silly

they're not stupid

they can see that those girls are so good at it

you know um

what can I do um

and so very likely to get restless

discouraged not be able to follow the teacher

and the whole trajectory which of course

ends up in not very good places sometimes

and so I began when I wrote Raising Boys

which was 1996 um

I said don't send them

if you if you got any doubts

just hold your kid back um

send them the following year

and so many parents as I said

Raising Boys

is the top selling parenting book in the world

so far this century and

and it was massive particularly in Europe and

and Asia and

and so I

I met someone who was a Scottish education bureaucrat

he said your book gave us so much trouble

he said we had

like 10,000 families held their kids back

the year your book came out

we had to we had empty classrooms

we had to build other classrooms in other places

because they this great wave came through the next year

yeah the year that gets implemented

you don't have any boys in school no

that's right that's extreme

but yeah but but

but I get you know

I get stopped by mums and dads

especially when I used to do my speaking tours

and they say we did that

we kept our son back and and he did great

you know he

he was a year more mature

he could hold his own and um

I'd never met

in out of thousands of people who told me that

I never met anyone who regretted doing that

you know cause it paid off in high school as well

and it does does that make sense Shawn

just as a as a dad to you

so yeah

I mean what your

your description of that problem is

I mean it's like you're talking you're

you're telling my story of my childhood

I I have this distinct memory when I was quite young

maybe kindergarten aged and I went

my parents brought me over to a friend's house

and they had a daughter my same age

and we were sitting down

and the parents were socializing

and me and the daughter were hanging out

and she had a bunch of coloring books

and I was coloring with her

and she colored beautifully

she outlined the area that she wanted to color in

the color that she wanted to use

and then she was just filling it in

and it was her pictures were gorgeous

and I desperately wanted to be able to do

that and she was getting on me like why

you know stop coloring outside the lines

stop coloring outside the lines

and I couldn't physically do it

I I

I I

I was so frustrated

because I actually couldn't physically keep

the crayon from going outside the lines

and it it ended up I ended up in in school

I I have a September birthday and in September

you can kind of fall on that edge

where you can be in the earlier school year

or in the later school year

and my parents put me in school early and and then

and to make matters worse

I was big for my age and I started skipping grades

and I prided myself on that

I was so smart that I'm skipping grades

but my emotional development

and my intellectual development

diverged and I was and frankly

the best thing that ever happened to me is

after 8th grade my parents decided to put me in a

I was in a public school for 8th grade

and they decided to put me in a private school

and the private school said

we don't want him to go into 9th grade

we want him to repeat 8th grade

wow and that was actually a blow to me

because it was such a an area of pride

that I'd skipped all these grades when I was younger

and did all that stuff and they said listen

like he's just he's gonna fit in better if

he repeats 8th grade and cause

he's not gonna be the youngest kid in class anymore

and um

and I I

they could very well have cited your book

it would not have surprised me

and that's what they did

and it was the best thing that ever happened to me

it wow

it just I

I wasn't playing ketchup anymore and I didn't feel

I felt so much I didn't even understand

how much anxiety and stress I had

associated with this having to perform at this level

that I just wasn't ready for

and it took that all off the table for me

and now I look at my son who has my same makeup

he's he's only 6

unfortunately he's a January baby

so he's like

fully smack dab in the middle of the school year

um but

and and

but he's very big he looks

he's 6 but he looks like he's 9 or 10

and so people have expectations of him

that he has maturity that he doesn't

he can't access

and I can see that same frustration in him and

and it is I'm

I'm just like

I really struggle with knowing what to do about that

and we've had conversations where I

where I've sat him down and said listen

this is what happened and it can't happen that way

people it's not fair

but people have expectations of you

that are well beyond your age

and that's not fair sometimes life isn't

fair and this is one of those times

we're gonna have to figure out how to

how to do the right thing here

and it's it's been a real tough thing for us

hmm and he's only 6 still and and

and yeah

yeah and

and and so yeah

so we need to we need to do both we

we we gotta

as an individual mum and dad

we have to do what we can to slow this down

and and the school systems need to change um and

and give people a option and

you know in the school of the future Sean

the average boy will be a year older than the girl

he sits beside yeah

and and

and that'll and because it

for people listening it's you

what happens is the way girls bodies develop is they

they get their fine motor skills at about 4

you know they pick up their

those crayons and pencils you were talking about

and they're good at it straight away

their fingers work properly

but boys develop and so what if you've got a daughter

anyone listening who's got a daughter

what you've got to do with girls is you build that

you have to build their core strength

you know so you get girls on trampolines

you know and

and throwing um

throwing big netballs and baseballs sorry

um basketballs to them

because girls need strength in the core

but boys develop core outwards

and so so first

of all they develop the trunk muscles and

and then they develop their arms and legs

and also the nerves running to those

you know the nerves that control those arms and legs

and then when they've got that

finally it's the fingers that come last

and so what a boy's body tells him to do is move me

you know a little boy sitting in the classroom

and his body is saying you know

move me ha ha

run around yeah

yeah noise yeah and

and he's he knows

he knows you know

a good kid is a still kid

you know in a elementary school classroom

you're supposed to be still

but his body's screaming and

and guys that are listening to this

if you think back you'll remember this feeling

it sitting at a desk

it hurts it actually physically hurts

it was yesterday

I remember that feeling like it was yesterday yeah

yeah

and so I work a lot with elementary school teachers

and I and I help them to

to realize you know

that little guy get them moving

you know and so a lot of our schools now they

they have exercise at the start of the day they

they do a lot of moving around that you you

you can get up from your chair and

and you know

stretch yourself and stand up and

and you won't get sent to the principal

um so you

you've got to find a boy find

a boy friendly school and and

and the teachers are are attuned to this Boyd needs um

then it's it's my

it's a whole lot better but but

but the main one of course was

you know that

I mean I think that probably changed your life

Shawn changed the trajectory of your life

it really did it there's no question

it changed the trajectory of my life

no question at all and if it had happened earlier

it would have changed it even more

even better I

I would have gotten involved in sports

in a different way and

or much earlier

which has been a wonderful part of my life

but you know I it

you know it would have been it

it really would have changed things for me

let's shift gears a little bit

I wanna talk about you know

it's increasingly the case that households

are becoming separate

moms aren't living with dads as much and

and there's a bunch of research

that links the absence of a father

in the home to higher risks of

bad outcomes delinquency

poor academic performance

and you know one

and at least here in the US

more than 1 in 4 children are living without a

a male in the home

and for a lot of parents it's just simply

that's just the reality mom and dad don't live together

so what what do you think we can do to mitigate

the issues there I

I

if you're staring down that reality

what do you do about it

okay so again

this is this is huge um

and it's it's lucky this is not new

this has been the case for

for the whole 30 years that I've been writing about it

that that um

a lot of kids are in single parent homes

um and it's always really important to say to to

to single mums that are listening to

to the podcast um

that women have raised boys on their own

for thousands of years um

and and done just fine

had them turn out really well and

and what I it just means you gotta understand the

the landscape and

and because when I came I came back to live in

the town I live in is called Launceston and

and I I came back here um

after a 20 year absence

I lived in the UK and I lived in

in up in the rainforest of New South Wales and

and I but I came back to Launceston and

and when I go to the supermarket

I'd sometimes bump into people who'd been

clients of mine back in the seventies

and and

and it's kind of like the elephant in the room

it's it's like um

I'd have to ask them they say

oh Steve

it's us you know

we saw you when we came with our little boy

you know and and

and it was a single and the elephant in the room

was well

was it any help you know

I was a young yeah

how'd it turn out

yeah how'd it go and

and but more well

and that they say well

you know um

yeah look

it was it helped and um

and I'd say well

what would you

what would you pass on to a young single mum today

what as

as you've raised a son I've met him he's doing great

what would you pass on and they'd say

it was always the same thing Sean

they'd say

I made sure he knew what a good man looked like

because you can't turn into one

if you've never seen one

and so those mums they

they recognise OK

I can do I can get him 90% there

you know if I'm loving and if I

if I'm understanding of his boy energies

and I don't get into negative

um you know

put downs and fights with him um

then I can get 90% there

but he's got to see some good men

and so that's right you know

so we we say don't send him to Kev's College of karate

um unless you like the look of Kev

ha ha

you know if

there you go you know yeah

whether it's a sport or a musical instrument

or whatever it is um

role models are the real thing

and in a second

we can talk a bit about that if you've got time Shawn

cause it's a big theme of mine

but but those mums they

you know they kind of recruited

you know they said OK

he hasn't got a dad um

but he's got an uncle who's really nice guy

you know so uncle

can you take him fishing every

you know couple of times a month

and um

Grandpa you know

can you take an interest

he's having a bit of a struggle

can you take a bit of an interest in him

um you know

it doesn't matter who it's what

you know the

the guys who the two guys who live next door

you know if if um

he can he gets this kind of

palette of a lot of different styles of masculinity um

then he can begin to

to have a bit of that and a bit of this and and

you know learn what kindness looks like in a male and

and um

and that it's a combination of of

kind of taken in the the

this this

the way of being male

but it's also feeling validated as a male

you know Grandpa and I hang out

Grandpa thinks I'm alright

even though I'm struggling at school

Grandpa says I'm a great kid and I'm good company

and I'm good with a fishing line and

and so um

and that that's what those mums did

they made sure that the

the boy didn't go up in a kind of hostile

a world hostile to males um

yeah does that

make sense Shawn

it does well

and I think that there's

you know the

the thing that we talked about in the very beginning

where men aren't supportive of each other

in the way that women are right

my wife has eight friends

that she tells every detail of her life to

and I

I really struggle to open up to even my closest friends

and in that same way

we're not we don't seek out

you know young men to to to mentor necessarily

or we're not necessarily going to seek out mentors

if we're a high school age boy

or something like that and it's so critical

and the cultural institutions that used to exist

to make that happen your church or

you know local programs and those sorts of things

those are all gone now

and so it's not gonna happen by default

and that

that means you have to take responsibility of it

you have to design it yourself

you have to be intentional about it

now that also means that you can customize it

you don't just have to go to the Catholic Church

on the corner where there might be some problems

you can customize it for your own needs

but you have to do it

yeah

and and um

knowing that

I think people can get very intentional about it and

and and

and and

and and it's not it's not rocket science

it's not that hard the guys that are in the

the terrific thing about the psychology of us as men is

if someone points us to a job

we'll do it yeah

um and and and

and we we have a

a really great quality which is a

we like to do heroic things and

and if someone says my kid's in trouble

you know can

can you know it's

I think it's it's

you know it's gonna be a year or two

where he needs just someone a bit that

that's a bit involved in his life um

so you know

we think OK

well if that's what you like

yeah I'll

I'll give it a go and

but we would have been there is a man on the planet

I don't think that there is a man on the planet

a decent man on the planet

that being asked that question

wouldn't love the opportunity to do that for somebody I

I think I I just

if I just can't imagine anybody I know

any decent man I know when come

when having that question posed to them

every single one of them would jump at the opportunity

to do that is yeah

yeah it's a hopeful message

and Sean

can I talk about a little part of this that will make

it make sense to people more and

and because it's um

it's to do with um

there are qualities that you would wanna have

you know when we talk about um

a good man or a life affirming masculinity um

that that um

it opens up into some things and and for instance

you know you would be patient

you know he's always gonna grow up

he's probably gonna be a dad

and be a husband or a partner um

so you want him to be patient

you want him to be kind

you want him to have stickability and endurance

and want him to be a man of his word

and those kinds of

whole bunch of things now

if we take take patience for example

that's

it's actually quite a complicated thing to be patient

yeah um yeah

it's not you can't sort of say to a kid be patient and

and I'll have it in a Powerpoint presentation and

and because what it is

it's actually it's a way of breathing

you know when you when you're patient

you kind of change how you breathe

and you change how you stand

and yeah there's a physiological component to patience

yeah yeah

there's and there's a whole um

you you drop you drop your agenda that

you know and you say okay

this is gonna take a bit

I'm gonna listen to this kid while he

unpause something out

or I have to wait'cause he's really slow with this

and so so patience is a very complex

nonverbal multifaceted skill now

the only way to learn that is it's a right brain thing

you have to see it going on and you take and

human beings it's called mirror

mirror learning and and we

our nervous system I

you know I watch you and I

and I take in your movements and your breathing rhythms

and your the

the way that your face moves and your eyes move

and I've got a

kind of a Shawn sense that I can take on board

if I if I spend it

you know a couple of days with you

I could do Shawn

and qualities that you have that I don't have

and I can put those into my masculinity for future

you know use

and so so the

the the role modeling is made up of

you know

the a boy

we drink in what we are

is

we're a bundle of all the good people we've ever met

male or female and so if your

if your son has seen patience

and he's seen forbearance

and he's seen stickability and

and vulnerability and and all those qualities

then it's it's

it's it's programmed into him and he can do it uh

and and so we

so they they need thousands of hours of male company

um school teachers and coaches and guys on TV and and

and um

and in the old days that was there you would yeah

it happened by default all the yeah hmm

yeah I wanna touch on one more really

really big subject and I know this is something

we could probably go hours on but

but I really wanna get your opinion about it

and that is navigating the digital wild west

I'm talking about like

stuff like screen time and pornography

and gaming

and gambling in our pocket and all of those things

I'm terrified about these things

this is in fact

one of the reasons that I started this whole project

is because I realized that the world that my boy

is gonna graduate into is so completely

it's a foreign territory for me

it might as well be a different planet

from the one that I grew up in

and and because of these things

how what is your advice to parents

to navigate these boundaryless

digital realities rather

I mean

I think a lot of us just stick our head in the sand

and pretend it doesn't exist

or pretend it's you know

a matter of force of will or something like that

but they rewire your brain

what do we do what what what is your advice about that

very important question

Sean and it's a it's a combination of two things um

one is just restricting the the whole phenomenon

you know putting the brakes on um

and the other is giving them some

giving them some guidance and

and tools to use when they do encounter it um

and I can spell those out a tiny bit now in

in my country Australia

I don't know if you know this but about I do I love it

go go ahead and tell everybody four weeks ago

the government passed a law

legislation

that social media companies are not allowed to

subscribe under sixteens

and so under sixteens and are not are not able to go on

not able to have a um

a Facebook account an Instagram account

a whole bunch of the of TikTok

all of those

they can still do YouTube's

but they can't have an account

so that they can't be algorithmed

and because it's the it's when you have an account

the algorithm steers you into

you know the matter sphere and the

and the toxic stuff

and so already parents are incredibly um

relieved and and it meant that

you know if

I mean if you had a involved mum or dad

they were already putting those brakes on

but if you had a a kind of deadbeat parent who didn't

just was too exhausted or didn't care or whatever

it meant you didn't miss

you didn't have a horrible childhood

because the government had solved that problem for you

yeah um

and this is sweeping the world now

there are countries in Europe are just following

quickly they're watching our

you know the experiment here

and they're pretty much bringing it on board

but meantime yeah

I mean and it's just

it's the kind of thing

the government has to step in and do

because I mean you could say oh well

you know just

don't let your kid use social media until they're 16

alright good luck

that's somebody who doesn't have kids

that's somebody who isn't getting pestered day by

when can I get a smartphone

when can my kid my six year old boy is asking me

when he can have an iPhone already

he's already pushing me on it

and yeah I mean

I don't it's tough

yeah and so

so it's like um

we're a herd animal and and

and it's very hard to stand against the herd

and so um

so it helps um

you know there's

it's called in Australia

there's a thing called the Heads Up Alliance

and it's kind of heads up from your phone

from your device yeah

and it's a school communities

it tends to happen school by school

um that the school will say look

can every let's all get on board

let's

none of us give kids smartphones till they're fourteen

um and and

and and our whole

let's all do this

so it makes it easier on the individual

um and I know we're running out of time Shawn

and so I'll come around

to the other part really quickly for you

um yeah

that um

the

the other part is that particularly with pornography um

kids they will see it um

and there'll be some kid in the in

you know usually by the age of 10

some kid in the school will have shown them some

horrible thing on their phone or

or in a photograph and so we

have to let them know you say look

there's this thing around it's called pornography and

and it's people doing things with each other's bodies

and

um and you'll be if you see you'll be kind of

you know like wow

what's that you know

you you wanna have a look

cause you're curious and that's alright

and if it's a you know picture of a

you know girl with no clothes on

of course we're attracted to girls and they're

they're beautiful and um

but there's some problems with this stuff

and it's in particular the

what happens in pornography is different to real life

and um

and in in our books we have we list the differences um

that you can teach your kids for instance

people are not up for sex

the minute they first meet each other um

and um that um and the most specific one is that um

real girls don't like being strangled

they don't like being slapped

and they don't like being um

put down you know

with put downs and and verbal abuse

because I think it's

70% of pornography depicts those things

wow

and and and the actresses are are are paid you know

they and you explain to your kids

the actresses are often really poor

and they have a lot of trouble

you know paying their

for their food and their kids and their apartment

and so sometimes they make this

these movies to make some money and

it's really sad that they have to do that

and they have to pretend to like it

uh and so

trust me girls don't like that stuff and

and if you do that stuff to girls

they won't like you and

and so you know

so pornography is is mis

miseducates you and

and so

this is the sort of thing you talk to kids about

when they're about 12

Shawn um

when their age you just

look what a powerful way to

to communicate that and I

I love that trigger of when they see it

they're gonna come to you

I mean you've got to have that kind of relationship too

and then you have

you get prepared for that conversation

hmm yeah

and and so

and because the effects of all of these things are

are to do with exposure with

it's a dose related thing

the more you see the worse you are was is

is you don't have devices in bedrooms and um

and and

and only in in the public parts of your

of your house that

where everyone sees what each other's doing

um yeah and

and very you know

very important

because the kids get so messed up with this

and there's huge companies

making a lot of money from messing your kids up

and so you have to fight back

yeah

wow that's

that is tremendous advice

I appreciate it now

I always love I like to finish off every single

one of these discussions

by asking the same question of everybody

you know I'm gonna put you on the spot here

feel free to take as much time as you want to

think about it but um

give me one principle that you think is important

for raising strong powerful

uh excellent men

okay look

I think it's a paradoxical thing Shawn

that tenderness is um

is the secret of

of strength and that what happens if we

if we tender and gentle with our little guys um

including when we wrestling with them

and fighting with them and things like that

where we where we never ever hurt them yeah

and and they know that they can um

that they're deeply loved um

then their natural empathy will stay and so

so when they see someone hurting

they'll wanna help them

and they'll never be the cause of hurt

to somebody else

and so it's the stuff you do in the first two years

you know where

where you're gentle with them and

and patient and and um

and even when they're just impossible

you know and you gotta kind of

you know hold them

you know carry them back to the car in a screaming heap

um um

don't get angry don't hurt them because when you

when you put hurt into a kid

the hurt will come out on someone else down the track

you know kids

kids who are hit will hit when they grow up

kids who see their dad hit their mum

will hit their wife as well

and you know

if if you hit your kid and you hit your wife

it's almost a guarantee your son will end up in jail

guarantee and so um

so that that

those are things if if you're a dad

you know and this is not just a minority

it's all of us all of us dads

me too we had to learn how to be safe and

and how to

to manage our strong feelings to walk away when we're

when we just don't know what we're gonna do

and so that so that a kid can say

I always feel safe with my dad um

he's he's my safety go to guy

that's the foundation of everything yeah

yeah that's what I mean

half of masculinity is being a protector right

you're being a you're a protector and you're a provider

yeah and you're not a protector

if your kid can't say that about you right

you know he's not protected

he's protected from you that's right yeah

yeah

I love that that is a fantastic principle

thank you for adding that to my list

I I

that is that is tremendous

the books are raising boys and the new manhood

check them out this

you can learn more about Steve's work at Steve

bedoff.com the link is in the show notes

if this episode moved you

please share it with another dad or

a mentor a teacher or

or another parent

who's in the fight for the soul of our boy

Steve thank you so much for joining me today

great interview Sean

thanks very much and

and love to everyone who is watching or listening

see you later bye bye

raising men is produced by Phil Hernandez

this episode was edited by Ralph Tolentino