Bringing Up Boys: Practical Advice and Encouragement for Those Shaping the Next Generation of Men

This book is a timely reminder to parents who are seeking the fundamentals of bringing up boys, such as the importance of being present and spending quality time. Some of its opinion may not go well with feminists and liberalists and is also not very encouraging towards certain groups (such as single moms), but to be fair it was not intended to paint a bleak picture but rather to present a perspective that we should be aware of.

I am not entirely sure how to rate this book. I have managed to finish 1.5 chapters and made a difficult decision not to continue.
I read parenting books when a problem arises and I am not quiet sure how to handle it. For instance when my kids weren't sleeping i got 'healthy sleeping habits', when i had some toddler issues i read '1-2-3' and 'how to talk so kids listen', when my girl started pushing me away i read 'untangled' . I started looking for a book on raising boys when my 9 year old started acting out in school, his discipline plummeted and he lies lies lies. After exhausting my ideas of the cause of the 'problem' and googling about I decided that I need more guidance from the child psychology community. My choice was between this book and the Raising Boys. Interestingly I failed to check out goodreads reviews or it's actually very helpful description, which in retrospect would give me a good idea of whats in store. I relied on Amazon reviews and audible description which tells nothing of the sort. Amazon reviews raved about Dobson and his no nonsense traditional approach. The reviews on the Raising Boys were less stellar blaming the author for pseudo science, over cuddling and other sins. I believe that girls and boys are somewhat different in how they enter and deal with adolescence and my parenting approach is disciplinarian within reason so the reviews of the Bringing up Boys appealed to me.

Mr Dobson begins by telling us that the culture is at war with the family. This choice of words irked me, but I decided to continue. He followed it with an opinion that despite what the society tells us now previous generations always knew intuitively that boys are different from girls.
When right after he described the parental goals which included honesty, hard work, loyalty (to spouse) among others I decided to continue. I am fairly comfortable with evangelical Christians even if their ultimate parental goal is to instill life passion for Jesus Christ and I like to think I keep an open mind.
That was first chapter which also included lots of examples on how the boys are trying to kill themselves.
The second chapter begins with a cute list from a Christian girl who lists all the ways girls are 'more better' than boys which came with reassurance that the author was never accused of being PC and a letter from a mother who disagrees with this list. Then he sites a response from the boys side how all the boys are 'more better' than girls. "Also cute. Also pointless. He's preaching to the choir." i thought. or was it pointless. Dobson spends all this time on children's letters to bring us to this point 'even a child can see that the boys and girls are different. Unfortunately what is obvious to most children and adults became an object of heated controversy in the years of 1970 when a goofy new idea took root. A small but noisy band of feminists began insisting that the genders were identical except for the reproductive operatus..."

This is where my patience has run out. I always seek out alternative views to my believes and I do think that there's an overreach in certain areas during certain periods of time. I understand that mistakes will be made in social sciences given the complexity of the subject and there's always new evidence where these views will be challenged and perhaps changed. This takes time and effort. What I don't appreciate is the moralizing, politicizing and lack of facts for support.

The narrator Wayne Shepherd does not help matters. I tried placing his tone from the very beginning and all I could think of is a teacher I once had who was known to hold opinions and believes and would not under any circumstance admit that a student might hold better or correct opinion. If he couldn't rationalize it he always resorted to 'certain wisdom's become understandable only with age, therefore discussing it with a student is always futile (but I like to amuse myself). The tone of an amused arrogance.

I made a decision to stop when I saw that I will be wasting a bit too much of my precious time trying to find agreement or respect for the narrative and the uncertainty if I will ever get any advice on the issues i'm seeking answers to other than prayer.

PS
He quotes Plato "of all animals a boy is the most unmanageable" or is it "From all wild beasts, a Child is the most difficult to handle"

Oh.

This book was recommended to me by a friend who has pretty different views from mine, but I love her anyway. I had never heard of this Dr. James Dobson person (hi, apparently I live in a cave), and I thought it would simply help me understand the minds of dudes a little better since I'm pregnant with a boy and have always felt like I don't "get" boys.


My friend had told me the book was perhaps more religious or conservative than I would normally read, so I figured I'd take Dobson's views with a grain of salt. Now that I'm about 1/4 of the way through the book, I'm thinking it's time to abandon that plan. I'm not at all enjoying this negative talk of "the feminists", for one thing, and it's starting to look like Dobson is about to tell me all the things I should do to keep my son from becoming gay, because, you know, that's (a) so horrible and (b) so controllable and (c) so everyone's parents' fault. And then I finally decided to google "Focus on the Family" since this Dobson person heads that group up and I could have sworn I'd heard of them but wasn't sure what I'd heard about them (see above re: living in a cave) and, um, yeah, my views REALLY don't align with these folks.

And, really, life is too short to trudge through a book you aren't enjoying or getting a lot out of, especially when one's kidlet is due to arrive in a month and you still haven't finished all the baby knitting and sewing you had grand plans to do.

Overall: meh.

This book has definitely influenced my thinking about some things, and has highlighted in particular some dangers that I need to guard against in my family. However I found that the majority of the book was simply chapter after chapter of criticism of western culture, and the dangers that abound for our boys. Some of this has its place in a book of parenting, but most likely the conservative Christians who read this already agree and are sitting nodding their heads and giving the book 5 stars, whilst liberals, or non-Christians, disagree with his assessment and give it 1 star. I would have preferred to have heard a more positive, practical approach to bringing up boys. For example, Dobson talks about how young boys often have boundless energy and exuberance, have difficulty sitting still, need a lot of supervision etc. Therefore, Dobson concludes, most classroom environments in public schools are not suited for our boys and we should homeschool them if possible. I suspect there is some truth in what he says, but homeschooling is not an option for me, and what I was looking for was some practical advice about how I should manage this exuberance in my son when he will not sit still at the dinner table after repeated, patient, instruction, whereas his sisters will. Do I discipline? Do I lower my expectations? Such practical advice about dealing with day-to-day situations with my son was lacking.

The author at one point, after explaining a biblical principle, states that he does not want to preach a sermon since he is neither a pastor nor theologian. I found this a slightly odd statement, since he quotes bible verses about parenting, and family roles, throughout and gives a quick interpretation of them without any explanation whatsoever - a pet hate of mine, which often occurs frequently in parenting books by American authors.

The book is rather dated now with regards to technology and some other matters, and a lot of the issues I am dealing with day to day are not addressed. Additionally, I do not live in the US and a lot of his advice is culturally hard to translate. In conclusion, I have definitely benefited from reading this book, and have definitely been made aware of some areas in our family life that need extra attention as our children grow up, but, unfortunately, it is not a book that I would feel comfortable recommending to the majority of people in my church.

It had some good suggestions, a lot of them were kind of obvious. I read it when my kids were little and I think it was a good resource.

Al buen estilo del doctor Dobson, es un libro práctico con buenos consejos a tomar en cuenta en la crianza de nuestros hijos

When a book talks about "the male brain" as being so different from "the female brain" that it's essentially an entirely different creature, I stop trusting the author. The distrust runs deep enough that when I see Dobson referenced in other works I now become suspicious of whatever text references him. Men and women see to behave differently, this is true. But more and more studies are coming out that put the blame for that on social pressures, not biological differences.

This was a very good book on raising boys. I read it for an interpersonal relationship class. It helped me confirm some of my beliefs on raising children and being a mom (not that I am anywhere close to that). It also brought up areas for consideration. One thing that struck me was that boys need a fathers influence in their life. One illustration Mr. Dobson wrote was of a greeting card company giving free mother's day cards for inmates at a prison to send for free to their mothers. So many inmates came that the company had to get more cards from the factory. The company decided that since mother's Day was such a hit that they would do that for Father's Day also. Not one person sent a card to his father. It helps to illustrate that although a boy can have a great relationship with his mother, he still needs the teaching that a father, or a father-figure, can give.