Experts call for young men to receive better education around healthy expressions of masculinity, as well as how to safely handle rejection

ABC NEWS (Australia)

Experts say young men need better education about how to handle rejection. A new report has examined the attitudes, relationships and behaviours of teenage boys. While it found some boys still hold rigid views of masculinity more want a gender-equal world.

Transcript

00:00Just page by page seeing myself get a bit darker

00:05and afraid of people that I'd never met before.

00:09He found himself lost in the hateful online manosphere.

00:13I went online harmlessly just looking up how to get a girl to respond

00:18and very quickly those tips just turned to anger and hatred about women.

00:23The algorithms were also just recommending harsher and more extreme titles.

00:2722-year-old Isaiah Gee felt many of the same pressures as a teenager.

00:32I was quite an insecure teenager.

00:34I was always looking for validation.

00:36And in high school, that usually came from the approval of my peers,

00:40whether that was how many girls you could meet or how loud you could be.

00:45When confused about relationships and sex, he turned to pornography.

00:50It definitely distorted my perception of women generally.

00:53I think made me sexualise most of my relations to even female friends or co-workers.

01:01A new study of 1,400 young people has found many teenage boys feel pressure to appear confident and strong

01:08and that being thought of as gay makes them seem less manly.

01:12The majority of boys had watched porn, many of them regularly.

01:16But many were bothered by sexist jokes and the harassment of women.

01:20We've got to make sure parents have the resources to have conversations with adolescents

01:25to address contemporary issues that are impacting them.

01:29Increasingly, pornography is violent and adolescents are telling us that it's shaping their relationships.

01:35What skills are we giving adolescent boys to deal with rejection?

01:40How are we teaching them to sit in the discomfort of being told no but to do so safely

01:47and to do so in a way that doesn't put others at risk?

01:51Mikey sees a positive change in the men around him.

01:54I think what masculinity is turning into today which is kind and empathetic and have really strong friendships

02:00with your male friends and to exhibit a lot of love and softness and curiosity.

02:06You don't need to categorise yourself or adhere to anything that anyone tells you that's so boring.

02:13Good morning.

02:14Good morning.

02:15Good morning.

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