The removal of fathers in families and men in the workforce was amongst the goals of the feminist brigade. For the past few years, especially since the emergence of the White Ribbon campaign, we have seen the ultimate attack play out. Moving into our schools in order to change our boys, remove their pride in themselves and others, telling them they will become violent just like other men/fathers by blaming toxic masculinity. What do you think this does to boys forced to apologise to all girls in their mixed school for the transgressions of some other men when they themselves have done nothing wrong.
The aims of women who dislike men, and men who hang onto their coat tails in the hope of receiving approbation is horrific. I just wish they would leave us alone to live our lives as we see fit, then they can live in their own misandrist world, instead of trying to destroy our society.
At last some school headmasters are speaking out.
Sue Price
The King’s School headmaster Tony George said society ‘is in the middle of a genderism experiment’ | The Australian
- EXCLUSIVE
By NATASHA BITA
EDUCATION EDITOR
- 7:31PM NOVEMBER 24, 2023
- 75 COMMENTS
An elite private school headmaster has blasted “neo-sexism‘’ for making boys feel “blamed and accused’’, as the last bastions of boys’ schooling become scapegoats for “toxic masculinity”.
The King’s School headmaster Tony George said society “is in the middle of a genderism experiment’’.
“The narrative seems to be that toxic masculinity is caused by single-sex boys’ schools,” the Sydney headmaster told The Weekend Australian.
“Isn’t that just neo-sexism? Boys are feeling blamed and accused. It’s this massive pile-on in the public sphere, and social media, attacking boys.’’
THEAUSTRALIAN.COM.AU02:11
The Kings School headmaster on “toxic masculinity” |
The Kings School headmaster Tony George defends single-sex boys’ schools in a climate where it has become…
Mr George said it had become “politically incorrect’’ to let boys be boisterous.
“Boys can’t be physical and adventurous and outdoorsy and do manly stuff because it’s politically incorrect,’’ he said.
READ MORE: toxic masculinity is caused by single-sex boys’ schools | Elite Sydney boys school turns co-ed | The only thing toxic about boys’ schools is woke parents | School merger proposal fans co-education debate | Old boys protest new girls at elite Sydney school | Old boys’ legal challenge to co-ed plan |
“At the moment anything that’s physical gets labelled as toxic. Don’t blame boys for being boys.’’
Mr George spoke out after the rival Newington College – an exclusive boys’ school for the past 160 years – announced its plans to admit girls, transitioning to a co-educational school over the next decade.
The decision copped a backlash from a powerful group of “Old Newingtonians’’, including a “devastated’’ Robert Millner, who chairs investment conglomerate Washington H. Soul Pattinson, along with New Hope Group and Brickworks.
More than 1500 people, including Old Boys, parents and students, have signed a Change.org petition demanding that school remain single-sex, as “a place for boys to grow into men, surrounded by their brothers’’.
Besieged college council chairman Tony McDonald has told the school community that boys will need to work with women when they grow up.
“We believe the best way to prepare them … is for different genders to learn alongside each other in an everyday, unremarkable way during their childhood and adolescence,’’ he said.
The King’s School headmaster said boys did not need girls in their classrooms to learn to “kowtow to a female boss’’.
“They’ve all got mums and sisters and female teachers so they all know what it is to submit to a woman in authority,’’ he said.
“So don’t tell me they don’t know how to go out in the workplace and kowtow to a female boss, because they’ve been doing it all their school life.”
Trinity Grammar School headmaster Tim Bowden.
Mr George questioned why parents would want to send girls to a boys’ school, and said “gender stereotypes’’ were more common in co-educational schools.
“Why would any parent think girls are to be used as a solution to toxic masculinity?” he said.
“I hear an argument that single-sex schools perpetuate gender stereotypes. That’s obviously nonsense. I say the stereotypes are going on in co-ed schools.
“If the boys see girls doing drama and music, and the girls see boys doing maths and physics and chemistry, that perpetuates the problem. (At The King’s School) we’ve got kids in the first 15 in rugby on stage in the musical. And when you get boys out of the way, girls are better at doing maths and science and physics. The academic performance of girls in single-sex girls’ schools is one of the major attractions for families who choose it.’’
At another elite Sydney boys’ school, Trinity Grammar School headmaster Reverend Tim Bowden also spoke out, saying it was unfair to blame boys’ schools for misogyny.
“Boys have felt under attack,’’ he said.
Mr Bowden said some families favoured single-sex schooling for the “biological reality’’ that boys and girls behave differently.
“The amount of testosterone in boys’ bodies is such that they literally cannot sit still,’’ he told The Weekend Australian.
“Boys are going to be loud and active and boisterous. Boys develop later and at a different rate to girls.’’
Mr Brown said a challenge for boys’ schools was to control boys’ “tribalism’’ – a “boy thing’’ often on display at games and sports carnivals.
“Boys can be tribal, in the sense that they and their mates are tightly bound and have a shared identity,’’ he said.
“The challenge is that can go toxic, if it becomes an ‘us versus them’.
“Part of the challenge for us in boys’ schools is how to leverage that positive belonging, while excluding harmful tribalism.
“We don’t want to punish boys because they have testosterone … but at the same time there’s no licence for abuse or misogyny or anti-social behaviour.’’
Mr Bowden said that single-sex schools have “less gender stereotyping’’ in subject selection than co-ed schools.
He said Trinity Grammar tailored its lessons to boys, including choosing books that are “more engaging’’ for English literature.
“(At a boys’ school), boys are more likely to see their creative and performing art as valid paths or they’re less likely to be shamed away from those things,’’ Mr Bowden said.
NATASHA BITA
EDUCATION EDITOR
Natasha Bita is a multi-award winning journalist with a focus on free speech, education, social affairs, aged care, health policy, immigration, industrial relations and consumer law. She has won a Walkley Award, A… Read more
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Sue Price
Men’s Rights Agency
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