About the (lost) boys...

Girl power is on. Any marketing campaign that is addressing unconscious bias towards women, or depicting girls as being strong and aspiring to do great things in life is hitting the marketing jackpot. Many awards have been snatched and amazing commercial results were achieved by initiatives of this kind. This has not been the case for (few) campaigns talking about the new approach to masculinity.

First time I had this thought when we were working on a really inspiring campaign for LEGO Middle East "Imagination has no gender" challenging parents about their perception of division between toys for girls and boys. It was full of emotional moments, when parents would tell us about their unconscious bias in play, how they realized they are directing kids towards certain fields - encouraging boys towards more technical toys, while girls - towards nurturing. When they were called out on those stereotypes, they were really enthusiastic about including girls in STEM play. But not the boys in the nurture or house play.

When Gillette launched "The best a man can be" campaign, taking up the subject of toxic masculinity, they faced a massive backlash from all angles, with accusations of repeating unfair stereotypes and shaming men. It was indeed one of the most 'straight-in-the-face' pieces of advertisement ever done.

But the facts stay clear: in the world full of 'girl power' communication across media, what are the messages we are sending towards boys? Who do we expect them to be when they grow up?

The old school "boys will be boys" is still being repeated far too often to excuse aggression among even very young kids. I hear it often from parents or teachers. The movies, social media, pop culture are full of stereotypical, macho images. But the behaviors those words justify won't accepted or tolerated when the same boys grow up. It's a different world. So, what future are we setting them up for? How will they feel in 10 or 20 years from now? Lost.

Men are usually not anymore the sole breadwinners in the household. However, how do we treat men with the professional position lower than their partner? How do we perceive home-stay dads? Technically, they do everything by 'girl power' rule book. They make choices as a family to jointly pursue the career of the person with bigger potential, to establish true partnership and support one another. How do we judge them as a society? Because we do judge them. Do we see them as weak? Not masculine? Or strong and confident in who they are, taking the most rational choice from family point of view? How should they feel with our judgment upon them? Lost.

The latest statistics from covid crisis show that home schooling and quarantine had the biggest impact on women, pushing them out of the labor market back to the household and child care. It just proves that all the 'girl power' wins in the work place did not come yet with cultural change that would establish a real, new model of the family, with equal choices for the partners.

From my early childhood I remember my boy cousin being in love with his teddy bear and already in the age of 4 hiding it from us, since he knew it was wrong for him to do it. He was shamed by his dad, by his brother, by his friends. I had friends at school who were playing with girls as they preferred our house play. And I remember us, girls, defending them against the bullies. Did it really change? Are we ok with boys showing variety of interests, enjoying figure skating and dressing up? Are we teaching other kids not to shame their friends at school? Sometimes I see boys depicted on the boxes of household toys. But offline I hear the same complaints of 'worried mums' about their sons being 'too soft'. And I am lost as a parent and as a friend.

Then there is the relatively new trend of 'switching roles' and depicting men in an over-sexualized style, usually using humor not to make it grotesque. All the Magic Mike-type of movies, the newest Alexa Amazon ad fall into that bucket. So it's funny and the women finally are not the only ones whose nudity is explored in media. The question is, should be objectify any person this way, independent of their gender. So a girl hears yes, finally I am not the sole piece of meat on the table, I can treat a man like one too. Aren't we losing the whole point of empowerment here?

My concern is, in the world where we are raising the generation of super girls, who are we raising as their partners and team mates? The way we still visualize it is that all the superheroes either settle for the love of their life or lead life full of temporary romances, while super heroines are really lonely existence, either never dating anyone or as soon as they start - loosing them in the battle. Super girls always finish alone on the empty battlefield. That is basically canvas of every fantasy movie I have seen and, believe me, I am a geek and it's covid time, I have seen them all.

Unless we start changing the way we communicate towards boys and about the boys, we are creating a very crooked version of the future, where all genders can be confused, lost and, frankly, quite lonely.