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Boyhood Is Not a Mental Illness
American Spectator ^ | October 18, 2013 | Marta H. Mossburg

Posted on 10/18/2013 4:11:28 AM PDT by Cincinatus' Wife

All the employees of school districts on a witch hunt to expel and otherwise permanently punish young boys for shooting toy guns or forming their fists into the shape of a gun need to read Back to Normal.

The purpose of psychologist Enrico Gnaulati’s 2013 book is to argue how ordinary childhood behavior is often misdiagnosed as ADD, ADHD, depression and autism — frequently with life-long, disturbing consequences. But along the way he raises the taboo question of whether we “label boys as mentally unstable, behaviorally unmanageable, academically underachieving, in need of special-education services, or displaying behavior warranting school suspension just because their behavior deviates noticeably from that of the average girl?”

He adds, “In a sense, girl behavior has become the standard by which we judge all kids.”

He cites numerous studies showing that typical boy behavior – wrestling, rough games of tag, good guy/bad guy imaginative play that involves “shooting” — are condemned by preschool and elementary school teachers, the vast majority of whom are women, without the behavior being redirected appropriately to release boys’ “natural aggression............

(Excerpt) Read more at spectator.org ...


TOPICS: Crime/Corruption; Culture/Society; Editorial; Philosophy
KEYWORDS: add; adhd; boyhood; boys; childhood; masculine; medicatingkids
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1 posted on 10/18/2013 4:11:29 AM PDT by Cincinatus' Wife
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To: Cincinatus' Wife

The main “problem” with boys is that school is BORING. And evil.


2 posted on 10/18/2013 4:17:12 AM PDT by Arthur McGowan (If you're FOR sticking scissors in a female's neck and sucking out her brains, you are PRO-WOMAN!)
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To: Cincinatus' Wife

Human beings, male or female, are at the beginning, abrasive and unsettling little creatures, genetically programmed to test boundaries and confront authority.

Some of the compliant little “goodie-goodies” set a totally false standard that almost all the rest of us are unable to live up to, and since that completely artificial bar is impossible for the vast majority to abide with fully, some kind of labeling or punishment is in order.

Liberalism is a mental disorder in and of itself.


3 posted on 10/18/2013 4:25:05 AM PDT by alloysteel (Those who deny natural climate change are forever doomed to stupidity. AGW is a LIE.)
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To: Cincinatus' Wife

Suffer from male pattern behavior? We’ve got a pill for that.


4 posted on 10/18/2013 4:25:28 AM PDT by Pan_Yan
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To: Cincinatus' Wife
It wasn't always this way. Here is an excerpt from a Foreword to a book written for boys (by a woman) in 1921:

"This book is written for that noisy, fun-loving, mischief-finding, contrary, lovable being known as a Boy....The healthy, normal boy of today is two-lunged and two-fisted and very much alive to the fun there is to be had in his world. If he could he would sleep with his eyes open and his clothes on so he would not miss any fun that might come along...."

--Personal Help Library, v.iii. by Louise Frances Spaller, 1921.

5 posted on 10/18/2013 4:27:50 AM PDT by hinckley buzzard
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To: Arthur McGowan

The main “problem” with boys is that school is BORING.

...also, the entire concept of mandated schooling is designed to rein in boys’ spirit, and to socialize them so as to be acceptable to cohabitate with women in the future...of course, what makes school a prison for boys, the incarceration of their spirit, makes it a haven for the collectivist mentality of females, a celebration of the group...

...that said, a structured upbringing for males is necessary, for otherwise we have what we see in urban settings, youth gone feral and holding the rest of society hostage to their violence...and if the authorities cannot contain them, or more likely, will not, then we go third world into oblivion...


6 posted on 10/18/2013 4:33:01 AM PDT by IrishBrigade
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To: Cincinatus' Wife
All the employees of school districts ... need to read Back to Normal.

The author appears to be assuming that the school district employees have sufficient reading ability to take in a work of popular psychology. How odd.

7 posted on 10/18/2013 4:34:24 AM PDT by Tax-chick ("The heart of the matter is God's love. It always has been. It always will be."~Abp. Chaput)
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To: Cincinatus' Wife

Orthodoxy from sissified eunuchs.


8 posted on 10/18/2013 4:46:53 AM PDT by Red Steel
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To: Cincinatus' Wife

Medicalization is a halfway measure to objectifying all. They’re just starting with the more dangerous element, the better able to defend themselves and others. Like gun control and conscription of the males first, then genocide.


9 posted on 10/18/2013 5:08:03 AM PDT by HomeAtLast (The original Tea Party entailed a willingness to do without some tea.)
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To: HomeAtLast

Yes. Cripple natural leaders.


10 posted on 10/18/2013 5:09:15 AM PDT by Cincinatus' Wife
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To: Cincinatus' Wife

What do you expect when you give your children to the government?


11 posted on 10/18/2013 5:10:56 AM PDT by freedomfiter2 (Brutal acts of commission and yawning acts of omission both strengthen the hand of the devil.)
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To: Cincinatus' Wife

The rise of criminalizing boy’s behavior in school is frightening to be sure. Boy’s making guns with their hands and shooting at other boys should not be cause for suspension. However, what is even more harrowing is the over/mis diagnosis of ADHD, bi-polar disorder etc going on among our kids. That does not mean that these conditions do not exist among our youth, but if I were a betting man, I would say at least 85% (if not higher) of these diagnosis is B.S.

Kids in society today are over medicated. I work in a youth group and it is frightening how many of these kids are on medication. It scares me and makes me worry for the future of our country. I was a perfectly normal little boy growing up, but I’m pretty sure that if I grew up in today’s environment, I would have been diagnosed as ADHD and been medicated for it so I would stop playing cowboys and indians etc...


12 posted on 10/18/2013 5:41:56 AM PDT by Old Teufel Hunden
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To: IrishBrigade

Raising boys is what fathers are for.

Oh. That’s right. We’ve abolished fathers.


13 posted on 10/18/2013 5:49:57 AM PDT by Arthur McGowan (If you're FOR sticking scissors in a female's neck and sucking out her brains, you are PRO-WOMAN!)
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To: Cincinatus' Wife

Our son is ADHD. I can deal with the hyperactivity, but the attention issues are so very frustrating. We are against medications and have chosen to approach the issue using dietary and therapeutic strategies. We do private school so I know that he won’t be pushed onto an IEP for more money. That stated, our private preschool encourages boys to be boys and girls to be girls. The nuns even allow the boys to wrestle as long as they are not destructive. The girls are encouraged to be “little flowers.” Other preschools encourage girls to wear pants for play, but the nuns encourage dresses and ensure that they sit like ladies. I think that there is a war on boys and girls. Society wants boys to behave like girls, and girls to embrace masculine traits while still behaving like girls.


14 posted on 10/18/2013 5:52:28 AM PDT by goodwithagun (My gun has killed fewer people than Ted Kennedy's car.)
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To: goodwithagun
Our son is ADHD.

Really?

Can he sit motionless, concentrating on a small LCD display screen for hours at a time?

15 posted on 10/18/2013 5:54:19 AM PDT by ROCKLOBSTER (The "government" is nothing but a RAT jobs program)
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To: Cincinatus' Wife

If my son did all of the experiments now with chemicals and electricity that I did in the 70’s as a kid, they’d put him in jail.


16 posted on 10/18/2013 6:11:46 AM PDT by mikey_hates_everything
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To: hinckley buzzard

Love it! Thank you for the title and author.

in regards to the feminization of our boys, soy is a big problem, too. You figure that the Eastern cultures so big on aphrodisiacs that rely on tusks and other weird foods would have figured out not to eat soy.


17 posted on 10/18/2013 6:12:03 AM PDT by huldah1776
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To: mikey_hates_everything

Then again, no one ever knew what I was doing...wishful thinking on my part for my kid?


18 posted on 10/18/2013 6:14:26 AM PDT by mikey_hates_everything
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To: hinckley buzzard

That boy just needed to be appropriately drugged. We know this now. /s


19 posted on 10/18/2013 6:28:02 AM PDT by CatherineofAragon ((Support Christian white males----the architects of the jewel known as Western Civilization.))
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To: goodwithagun

I homeschooled my ADD son. Heavy lifting and activities before EVERY day began. We heated with wood and he had to cut and chop and carry. EVERY Morning.


20 posted on 10/18/2013 6:38:57 AM PDT by Chickensoup (we didn't love freedom enough... Solzhenitsyn.)
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