(Amazon US has mysteriously pulled this book)

New Book Revives Lost Notions of Boyhood

Tuesday , July 04, 2006

By Wendy McElroy


Snakes and snails and puppy dog tails are what readers of a surprise bestseller are made of.

The Dangerous Book for Boys by the British brothers Conn and Hal Iggulden is a practical manual that returns boys to the wonder and almost lost world of tree houses and pirate flags. It celebrates the art of teaching an old mutt new tricks and accepts skinned knees as an acceptable risk for running through fields with the same dog yapping along.

As of July 3, The Dangerous Book is the number one seller on Amazon UK and it is holding steady at about 7,000 on Amazon in the U.S., where it was published on June 5. The Australian News reports that the book "has made it to the top five of…Amazon , after just a week."

Those results make publishers take notice. But social commentators are also reacting with both applause and condemnation.

Condemnation arises because The Dangerous Book breaks the dominant and politically correct stereotype for children's books. It presents boys as being deeply different than girls in terms of their interests and pursuits. Although it is highly probable that bookstores will sell the book to girls who then will go on to practice skimming stones, nevertheless the genders are separated within the book's pages.

The authors clearly believe that the majority of children interested in learning to build a catapult are boys. Girls are included only through a final chapter in which boys are admonished to treat them with respect.

In celebrating old-fashioned boyhood and providing a blueprint on how to reclaim it, The Dangerous Book is revolutionary. It discards decades of social engineering that approaches children as being psychologically gender neutral. The book implicitly rebukes school texts that strip out gender references. Instead, it says 'boys will be boys'; they always have been, they always will be, and that's a good thing.

Thus The Dangerous Book achieves social revolution without preaching or politics; it does so in the name of fun.

The sort of fun promoted has also raised eyebrows. In a society that is preoccupied with safety, The Dangerous Book promotes activities in which boys are likely to get scuffed. This is a book for tree-climbers who occasionally pause to decipher enemy code or erupt into wood-wielding pirate fights.

Why would the Iggulden brothers imperil children?

Clearly they do not think the rough-and-tumble of boyhood constitutes a health hazard. Perhaps they agree with parents who view over-protectiveness to be a greater danger, who wish to stir the imagination and muscles of their children instead.

But the brothers wish to achieve more than this. In a world where children are isolated behind computer screens and iPods, they wish to establish a niche for old-fashioned childhood.

The brothers state, "In this age of video games and mobile phones, there must still be a place for knots, tree-houses and stories of incredible courage." They advise children to "play sport of some kind. It doesn't matter what it is, as long as it replaces the corpse-like pallor of the computer programmer with a ruddy glow."

Their vision is not utopian or even impractical. For example, a tree house requires only a blueprint, some scrap lumber and a willing parent. The latter requirement turns The Dangerous Book into something more than a work for boys. It is also a guide for parents, especially for fathers who wish to establish an old-fashioned connection with their children.

Indeed, since parents purchase most children's books, it is reasonable to assume that the run-away success of The Dangerous Book is partly due to their longing for a better connection.

One father describes his experience with the book, "I gave it to my 11-year-old son Charles and his friend…Then I stood well back." Raised on The Lord of the Rings, "they immediately turned to the section of the book that showed them how to create their own Legolas-style archery kit, using bits of old branch no longer needed by the Ents. When they began stripping the bark off with a big, shiny, sharp-bladed Swiss Army knife, I had to dig down deep in order to ignore the parental risk-ometer readings that were going off the scale, accompanied by vivid flash-forwards of the inevitable long, bloodstained-bandaged hours ahead in casualty."

Happily, the only injury was to evildoers who lurked in the garden shrubbery.

These days, the news about boys is not happy and often contains the word 'crisis.' The Education Sector, a non-profit think tank, offers a typical description of the perceived 'crisis' within education.

"After decades spent worrying about how schools 'shortchange girls,' the eyes of the nation's education commentariat are now fixed on how they shortchange boys. In 2006 alone, a Newsweek cover story, a major New Republic article, a long article in Esquire, a 'Today' show segment, and numerous op-eds have informed the public that boys are falling behind girls in elementary and secondary school and are increasingly outnumbered on college campuses."

Society is awakening to the possibility that boys have been disadvantaged. In past decades, what it means to be a boy has been redefined, deconstructed, reconstructed, politically analyzed and mathematically modeled. In the process, the meaning of being a boy's father has become jumbled as well.

In the midst of the confusion, The Dangerous Book brings non-political truths into focus. For example, most boys like rough-and-tumble. They are riveted by tales of heroism on blood-soaked battlefields. They will learn history eagerly if it is presented in a chapter on Artillery.

Like Peter Pan, the Iggulden brothers have rediscovered the Lost Boys and are beckoning for them to come out to play. "Oh…and bring along your father too," they add with a dangerous wink and a smile.

Wendy McElroy is the editor of ifeminists.com and a research fellow for The Independent Institute in Oakland, Calif. She is the author and editor of many books and articles, including the new book, "Liberty for Women: Freedom and Feminism in the 21st Century" (Ivan R. Dee/Independent Institute, 2002). She lives with her husband in Canada.

I understand the idea of the book, and it is true, that all our childhoods were stolen, and/or disrupted by indoctrination, but I worry that this book is possably using a romanticized, very generalized view of the memories of our childhoods, as just another attempt to reassert an old and incorret idea, of boys, and girls. True, there are differences in boys and girls, and these differences do NOT need to be reinforced, as they are a natural thing, and will develope naturally along each childs path to maturity. To attempt to reinforce the,"DIFFERENCE", has the effect of overgrowing that difference. Out of it's normal proportion. Much like a body builder muscle man, as opposed to simply a healthy active man. The differences need only allowed to be and develope normally.
In my experiece with children, I've always noticed how similar they are, as to how different they are, and, these too, need to be allowed to develope, unindoctrinated. It is only then, that the children, as each, male and female, grow naturally will develope as individuals. All should be instructed to treat each other,"nicely". In this way, the boys/men, and the girls/women, will find that ALL are different from each other in ways, and similar in other ways. INDIVIDUALS!
We, as adults, are to act as examples. And we are to act as guardians/protectors, of their natural childhood growth, and developement. We do not need to reinforce it. We merely need to provide a, safezone, for this natural developement to take place. Safe from disruption, and danger. Safe from indoctrination.
My parents provided as much of this as they could, and we all, male, female, ran like the wind, and laughed, and joked, built tree houses, and playhouses, and pitched tents, and slept outdoors in the summertime. Caught frogs, and chased lighting bugs. Made cookies, and brownies, and had hotdog and marsmallow roasts over open fires. We all went swimming, and fishing, and we all had tea parties, and made mud pies, and ate mud pies. We played baseball in the summer (not little league) in neighborhood teams with the adults. All ages together.
The story of Peter Pan focused on lost BOYS, because the author was a good storyteller, and writer, and a molester of lost little boys. He only needed a Wendy in the picture to provide the clothes washing, and cooking, and sewing, and bedmaking. A sense of order, and safty, in the world of chaos, into which, he (peter/the author) was seducing these lost little boys to enter.
Many of the things that this book, The Dangerous Book For Boys, may have to offer will probably be a good thing, as in turning off the video games, and TV, and get parents, and children, back out there in the real world, doing real things together, but I would refrain from doing things in the spirit of RE-ENFORCING/MUSCLEING UP of a childs real nature.
When it comes to a child growing, the hands off policy is best. Participation is fine, but don't manipulate, don't indoctrinate. It lends to the unnatural.

as a mother of 7 sons and only 2 daughters, no person on the planet could stand there and tell me there are only MINOR differences between boys and girls!!---

i am not sure if i would laugh myself to death at their false beliefs, or if i would invite them for a week at my house for reconsideration of their opinion..........{ most likely the second option}

miss this place!
PAX, connie

Dorothy Hanna illustrates beautifully the reasons why every parent should refuse to turn their children over to the government for "hands off policy" and "non-indoctrination."

Children need to be taught. They need to develop character. They need to be trained. They need VERY HANDS ON interaction and training. "Hands off policy" doesn't work for training dogs or horses and it certainly does not work for training children.

Boys need men in their lives to affirm them and teach them how to be men.

This philosophy that Dorothy spouts is ruinous to our children. I pray to God that she has no influence or contact with children.

Fortunatly, God is a the dicerner of the heart, and not those that have responded so harshly, to my post.
I was blessed to grow, naturally, among siblings of both sexes, and was blessed to participate in all the adventures and more that I discribed in my original post. God also blessed me with childen, of both sexes. I wrestled with , and prayerfully made the decisions of the daily upbringing of my children. I am happy to report that my children are grown, and are now loving parents themselves. I've been blessed with 8 grankids, of both sexes. All are drug free, and crime free, well spoken, and polite citizens of American society. I, still, recieve compliments on my kids today, as I did throughout their growing up. I also, all along the way of raiseing my children, ran across those who critisized, severly, my method, and thought, concerning their upbringing. The contrast between their children, and my children is simply amazing. Their childrn are drug addicts, and dealers of illegal drugs, alcohalics, some in and out of prison for theft, burglary, shoplifting; they were, and are in gangs, and cults. Many were murdered, or have murdered, and many are dead from an unfortunate set of circumstances that were put in place much earlier in their life. Suicide was the end of some of their lost little lives. I grieve for these little ones that I knew then, that never made it as well as my kids did, some not making it into adulthood. Such a loss. Such an unneccesary loss. If only their parents would have zigged, instead of zagging.
So, you think my philosophy is ruinous, do you? My children graduated two years ahead of their class, and went to college. GPA's 4.0, thank you very much. They never brought homework, as they finished it the day it was asigned. Their I.Q.'s are in the 160's. They were and are polite, and well-behaved in public, as well as private. They write music, and poetry, and play musical instruments as a hobby, as opposed to vidoe games, and watching TV. They are avid readers on a very broad range of topics, as well as their taste in music. They have many skills, and can build a home from the ground up, and make it fully functional, and ready to move in, and set up house. What I am most proud of is their good hearts. They are compassionate, and kind. They are similar in some respects, and they are different in other respects, neither of which has anything to do with their gender.
I'd have to ask the person who spoke of having many children, ONLY, of which two, are girls, concerning these DIFFERENCES in her children that she's attributing to gender: What do you think you might be doing wrong?

Barry,
Who was it that lead you to believe that the govermental schools are HANDS OFF. Indoctrination is a very HANDS ON phenominon.
It is one thing to want a mans influence over a boy, but a man is not enough. It must be a very good man, in order to bring about good results. Little girls need a mans influence also, unless you think a father is not neccesary to a little girls view of men. In which case, for good results, a good mans influence is neccesary.
Anyone who compares raising a child to training a dog, or a horse, I would find lacking in many things.

Constance em,
Nowhere in my original post did I ever say that differences in gender are minor.