Don’t Label the Boys, Call Them Forward
I have been thinking a lot lately about the way we talk about young men. Depending on what article you read or podcast you listen to, you can hear an entire generation described as anxious, lonely, disengaged, angry, underachieving, addicted to screens, unwilling to marry, uncertain about work, or disconnected from church. Some of those conversations may point toward real trends worth understanding, but Dr. Kathy raised an important caution in our recent Celebrate Kids Podcast conversation: a trend observed in a population should not automatically become an identity assigned to a particular kid. She pushed back on the idea that millions of people can be permanently captured by a single adjective simply because researchers noticed something about a particular moment in time. When we repeatedly tell a young person, “Your generation is anxious,” or “Young men today are lost,” we should not be surprised if some of them eventually begin wondering whether that is simply who they are.
That distinction matters because labels are easy while knowing a person takes work. “Lazy” may describe what my son did Saturday morning, but it does not necessarily describe my son. Maybe he needs correction, more responsibility, better habits, or the experience of discovering that work can be meaningful. But if I turn one behavior into his identity, I have made change harder because I have told him what category he belongs in instead of calling him toward what could be true. Dr. Kathy often says that our words change children's lives, and this is one place where that becomes especially important with boys. We can name what needs to change without reducing the person to the problem.
Boys Need More Than a Diagnosis of Their Generation
I understand why generational descriptions are attractive. They help us organize enormous amounts of information and ask whether something in the culture has shifted. But parents do not raise generations; we raise Josiah, Benjamin, Marco, Samuel, or whatever name God has placed in our home. The statistical boy and the boy sitting across from you at breakfast are not the same person, and parenting becomes much wiser when we remember that distinction. Dr. Kathy's concern in the episode was not that research is useless, but that temporary descriptions can become permanent labels when we stop seeing individual variation.
The better question may be, “What is actually true about this young man?” Is he loyal? Does he stay when friendships become difficult? Is he courageous in some places but hesitant in others? Does he have unusual patience with younger children, a desire to solve problems, a willingness to defend someone, an ability to build, a love for Scripture, or a capacity to bring humor into a tense room? Those are not sentimental observations. They are evidence parents can use to help boys understand who they are and what they are capable of becoming.
Call Out What You Want Them to Steward
One of the things I appreciate about Dr. Kathy's approach is that she rarely stops at, “Your child is gifted.” She wants us to give kids language for the gift and then teach them how to steward it. A strong boy can use strength selfishly or sacrificially. A persuasive boy can manipulate people or advocate for someone who has no voice.
That is why simply telling boys to “be men” is incomplete unless we explain what mature strength looks like. In the framework Dr. Kathy referenced from Raising Gender Confident Kids, boys can be encouraged toward several complementary expressions: sage, explorer, servant, warrior, and husbandman. What I love about that combination is that servant and warrior belong in the same picture. Strength is not removed; it is given a purpose.
A Servant and a Warrior Belong Together
Our culture sometimes talks as though strength and tenderness are opposites, but healthy manhood has room for both. A warrior is willing to protect something worth protecting, stand against what is wrong, endure hardship, and move toward difficulty when retreat would be easier. A servant notices what someone else needs and is willing to use his own strength for their good. Put those together and you begin to see something much healthier than either passivity or domination.
The sage develops wisdom rather than simply having opinions. The explorer has courage to move toward what is unknown. None of these require a boy to fit one personality type, become loud, dominate a room, or pursue the same career. They give him several ways to imagine responsibility.
Leadership Should Make Other People Stronger
This came up in the episode through discussion of Charlie and Erika Kirk. Charlie Kirk was assassinated at Utah Valley University on September 10, 2025; the criminal case remains ongoing, with the accused having pleaded not guilty. At Kirk's September 2025 memorial, Erika Kirk described her husband's approach to marriage as service-oriented and urged men to love and protect their families while becoming “a leader worth following”; she also explicitly said wives are not servants or employees and described marriage as a partnership rather than rivalry.
Whatever someone's political views of Kirk or Turning Point USA, that particular distinction between leadership and domination gives Christian parents something worth examining. Leadership is not simply getting the final word. At its healthiest, leadership accepts responsibility in a way that helps other people become stronger, freer, more secure, and more able to contribute. A father who leads well does not need his children diminished in order to feel important. His strength creates room for theirs.
Security Makes Courage Possible
Dr. Kathy connected that directly with the Five Core Needs. Security asks, Who can I trust? When a family is secure, children know they can ask questions, express an opinion, admit confusion, and sometimes disagree without fearing the relationship will disappear. That security is not weakness or a lack of authority; it allows authority to operate without becoming a continual power struggle.
Think about what this does for a boy learning leadership. He doesn't have to dominate because he has experienced trustworthy authority. He can admit a mistake because mistakes at home were corrected without becoming permanent identities. Before we tell boys how they should lead someday, we should ask what kind of leadership they are experiencing from us right now.
Boys Need Responsibilities That Actually Matter
If we want young men to become responsible, we cannot postpone meaningful responsibility until they are twenty five. Give them work that affects the family. Let them help younger siblings, carry something heavy, repair something, cook dinner, serve an elderly neighbor, mow the lawn, organize an event, plan part of a trip, or solve a problem that actually needs solving. Then resist the temptation to redo everything behind them simply because our version would have been cleaner or faster.
Responsibility communicates something important: we need you here. It answers the Core Need of purpose in a very concrete way. The boy learns that he is not simply another consumer of the family's money, food, entertainment, and transportation. He is a contributor whose presence can make life better for other people.
Courage Is Usually Less Dramatic Than We Think
We also need to rescue courage from the idea that it always looks cinematic. Sometimes courage is apologizing first. Sometimes it is going to practice after playing badly yesterday, speaking to the kid nobody else includes, telling the truth when lying would be easier, or asking a teacher for help. Sometimes it is taking responsibility for the broken thing instead of waiting to see if anyone notices.
That matters because boys can become discouraged if manhood is presented only through extraordinary examples. Most of their lives will consist of ordinary opportunities to be faithful. Courage grows because they repeatedly choose the difficult good over the convenient escape. We should notice those choices and name them as they happen.
Give Boys Permission to Be More Than One Thing
Freedom also comes from giving boys a broad picture of strength. A young man can be competitive and tender, physically strong and artistically gifted, quiet and courageous, analytical and deeply compassionate. He can love poetry and football, woodworking and music. None of those combinations makes him less male.
That is another reason I like Dr. Kathy's warning about labels. Once a label gets attached, we start filtering everything through it. The “athletic one” may stop drawing because drawing does not fit the identity everybody applauds. The “smart one” becomes afraid to attempt something he might fail at. Boys need room to discover the full range of gifts God put in them without feeling as though they have violated someone's narrow script for masculinity.
Nehemiah Called Men Toward a Wall That Was Broken
Nehemiah 2 gives us a different picture of leadership. Jerusalem's walls are broken down, and Nehemiah does not pretend the situation is fine. He names the problem plainly: “You see the trouble we are in.” But he does not stop with diagnosis. He calls the people forward: “Come, let us rebuild.”
I love that movement because it feels different from so much cultural conversation about boys and young men. We are very good at naming everything that is broken. We can list the statistics, failures, cultural pressures, and patterns of disengagement. But Nehemiah's leadership does not leave people staring at rubble. He gives them something to build.
“Let Us Rebuild” Is Better Than “Look How Broken You Are”
That may be the shift our boys need from us. Instead of saying, “Young men today don't take responsibility,” give your son something worth taking responsibility for. Instead of lamenting that boys lack resilience, allow them to experience hard things with enough support to discover that they can endure. Instead of repeatedly announcing that young men are lonely, teach friendship, hospitality, loyalty, forgiveness, and how to initiate.
Nehemiah's people encounter opposition almost immediately. They are mocked and questioned, but they continue because the work has meaning and they understand why they are doing it. Real formation often works the same way. Boys do not become resilient because we tell them repeatedly that their generation lacks resilience; they become resilient because someone gives them worthwhile work and stays near enough while they learn to do it.
We Need Builders, Not Performers
That may be one of the healthiest visions we can give young men: become someone who builds. Build trust. Build friendships. Build competence. Build a family if God leads you there. Build organizations, churches, businesses, neighborhoods, teams, art, ideas, and institutions that make life better for other people.
Builders understand that strength has an object beyond the self. The point is not to appear masculine enough, powerful enough, successful enough, or impressive enough. The point is to take whatever gifts God has entrusted to you and use them faithfully for something beyond you. That kind of leadership creates rather than merely critiques.
Parents Can Start Calling This Out Now
Our sons do not need to wait for adulthood before they hear that vision. We can begin naming it in the little things we see today. “I noticed you stayed and helped when everybody else left.” “You apologized without making excuses.” “Your sister trusts you because you keep your word.” “You were frustrated, but you controlled your strength.”
Those statements build identity because they connect character with evidence. They tell a boy, “This is something real I see growing in you.” And when correction comes, we can speak from the same identity: “That was not how a trustworthy man handles anger. I know you can do better because I've seen you do better.”
We do not need another label for young men. We need a compelling invitation. Become wise enough to listen. Strong enough to protect. Humble enough to serve. Courageous enough to act. Faithful enough to cultivate what God puts in your care. And secure enough in Christ to let other people flourish beside you.
Engaging Boys Through the 8 Great Smarts
Word Smart: Let boys read biographies, tell stories, debate ideas, write, teach, and use language to advocate for truth and encourage others rather than merely win arguments.
Logic Smart: Give them real problems to solve and decisions with genuine consequences. Ask for their reasoning and let them see how wisdom requires more than being technically correct.
Picture Smart: Invite them to design, create, draw, build, photograph, and imagine what something could become before it exists.
Music Smart: Let music become a place for discipline, expression, worship, creativity, and collaboration rather than treating it as somehow less masculine than other pursuits.
Body Smart: Give them physical work, appropriate risk, sports, building projects, outdoor challenge, and opportunities to learn how strength can be controlled and used in service.
Nature Smart: Let them cultivate something—gardens, animals, land, outdoor skills, or stewardship projects that teach patience and responsibility.
People Smart: Teach boys that reading people, listening carefully, initiating friendship, resolving conflict, protecting the vulnerable, and encouraging others are forms of strength.
Self Smart: Give them time to reflect on questions such as, “What kind of man do I want to become?” “Where am I avoiding responsibility?” and “What has God entrusted to me right now?”
Remember: However your son is smart, remember this: boys do not need us to hand them a cultural diagnosis and tell them what is wrong with their generation. They need us to know them personally, call out what is good, correct what needs to change, and invite them into meaningful work worthy of their strength.