Episode 215

Episode 215 Transcript:

If you are currently parenting a boy, you know there are so many challenges in the world today and how we are raising sons. So many mixed messages that boys are getting from social media, from culture, about how to grow up and just be a respectful, resilient, kind man. And I think it is a complicated question, but it's an important.

conversation we need to have. so Sarah and I wanted to bring on Dr. Katie Hurley, who is the author of the book, The Boy Code. And she has dove into the research about what's going on with boys, what are the messages they're hearing, and how can you as a parent help have those conversations with your son to where they aren't being the guiding force in telling them how to be a man, but instead you are, that you as a parent are there to...

do this hand in hand with him instead of some other person caught up on TikTok or Instagram or whatever that's trying to teach them how to do this and trying to really teach them the values of manhood. We really believe you are that person that we want them having that conversation with you and not with these strangers that are kind of guiding them down paths that are really unhealthy. So I know you're gonna really enjoy this conversation. And if you, after listening to us, say, man, I need some help, I need some coaching,

on this, that's what I do. So reach out to me at kyle at art of raising humans.com. And I'd love to have a conversation with you about how I can help you be able to switch some of these relational dances and dynamics that are going on in your home with your sons and your daughters. And would love to connect with you and see if you'd be a good fit for the program that we do. Also, if you haven't yet taken time to pause to rate, review, comment on the podcast, let us know if this conversation with Dr.

Hurley is helpful to you and helps give you insight. You're gonna really get a lot of great meaningful wisdom, but also practical steps in how you can change these dynamics with your son. So sit back, enjoy this conversation.

Kyle Wester (00:01.194)
Hello and welcome to the Art of Raising Humans, I'm Kyle. Hello everyone, I'm Sarah. And you know, Sarah, and some subject that keeps coming up a lot in parents that we've been talking to and coaching and lately over the past several months in particular is aggression in boys. Okay, like I'm seeing a lot of parents who are confused as to why they're sweet sons, like I've met them and they're like super sweet, caring kids. And in many ways, I mean, they're not like hardened criminals, yet they are.

Dr. Katie (00:24.238)
Check it.

Kyle Wester (00:30.494)
being very aggressive physically or verbally and the parents are just confused where that's coming from. Yeah. So what I wanted to do, and we're so happy to be able to have a guest on the talk to our audience specifically about this and what's going on with boys these days. And we have Dr. Katie Hurley, who's author of, show the book there, The Boy Code. And this book just came out recently and we want to welcome you Dr. Katie to our podcast.

Dr. Katie (00:44.365)
Yeah.

Dr. Katie (00:55.234)
Thank you so much for having me. It's delight.

Kyle Wester (00:58.062)
Now, what was the inspiration for, I mean, I know as I'm dealing with these families trying to help these parents, I'm like, someone needs to write a book about this for goodness sakes. And then I like, Tina Bryson's like, somebody did write a book about this. So then we dived into it. someone did, this is great, we gotta have her on. But how come you decided to dive into this work and study what's going on with boys?

Dr. Katie (01:19.02)
little bit of the same. mean, I also have a clinical practice outside of my work with the Jed Foundation. And I work with boys and you know, they're coming to me on the other end of it, like, I can't do anything right, right? Like everything I do is wrong. If I do one thing, you know, act one way at school, but then come home and act another way, like I feel like I'm failing all over the place. you know, the research, as you know, because you've read part of the book, at least it's, there's so much research about

men and young men and boys and how they process emotions. And somehow that research has never been operationalized to the people. And so I find that something like, you know what, we talk a lot about girls. We talk a lot about the emotional development of girls and young women, and we don't talk enough about boys. And that's part of our societal problem where we just keep telling boys to suck it up and get through. And that advice is lousy for anybody.

Kyle Wester (02:12.147)
Yeah.

I would, I've, so I'm working through the book right now and really, really enjoying it. And we have a son and of course we're working with boys all the time. I think I would, you kind of were speaking to this, but if you could, this is a really big question, but if you could try to sum it up, what are our teen, our young boys, what kind of world are they facing? What is going on right now for them that as parents we need to be aware of and know is happening and what they're learning about. I mean, it's the boy codes.

So I'd love to have you just kind of explain that as much as you can in this short time.

Dr. Katie (02:47.926)
Yeah, that is a huge question, but it's a good one. So it's like, you can't start talking about this without saying everybody has to look up because part of the problem is the structure of our country, how people are just treating each other in general. mean, you know, we know this, that people are not treating each other as respectfully as they have in the past in general right now. This is like,

a timeframe we're in where people are sort of emboldened to like, I'm just going to say whatever and you know, my opinions matter most and that kind of talk. We're seeing it with adults online. We're seeing it in person where people have less patience with each other. That trickles down first of all. So, you know, if children, boys, girls, whatever are watching the adults in their lives act in this kind of short tempered, very opinionated, not open minded, not empathic way, they're going to learn that. that's

kind of number one, we always have to say what's happening at the top in the outside world. Boys then are navigating a complicated social hierarchy. And I think forever people have always kind of had this idea of like, boys are boys, they do their thing, they're fine. And that's never been true. There's always been a complicated hierarchy. It's why so many movies are made where the football players are the top of the food chain and know.

Kyle Wester (03:56.436)
Yep. Yep.

Kyle Wester (04:02.408)
Yeah.

Dr. Katie (04:09.698)
like Revenge of the Nerds. mean, I'm old, it's like, that was like a, hey, we can be cool too, right? so, so this has always existed. We've just never touched it. For whatever reason, people just never touched it. It was like, boys get through, girls, we need to talk about it. And, you know, right now, boys are living in this world where they've got one foot online, you know, and then another foot in real life. And they're trying to make sense of the two worlds. They're being heavily influenced by...

Kyle Wester (04:11.498)
Yes, exactly, yes.

Dr. Katie (04:37.614)
a number of influences. Some of them are good. I have a 17 year old son. know, Jason Tatum is like his idol in life, right? And we always talk about not just his basketball playing, but like his life as a family person. Deuce is at every single game. You know, his mom is at every single game. Like we talk about like, what's great about Jason? What does he do outside?

Kyle Wester (04:43.882)
Yeah, yep, yep.

Kyle Wester (04:57.074)
Yeah, well, we do the same. in Oklahoma, so we've got Shay, Shay Gilders Alexander with the Thunder, and he's, he's a good role model. He seems like he's really doing those things right. Yeah. Yeah.

Dr. Katie (05:03.725)
Yeah.

Dr. Katie (05:07.752)
Like, where are they pouring back into their community? All that good stuff. But then, you know, there's all these other influences that are sort of like hard to find. And if you're not talking to your kids about it constantly, I mean, my son is like, Mom, I know, you know, we've reached the point of mom, we've had this conversation 75,000 times. And I'm like, just in case, you know, but if we're not doing that, yeah, if we're not doing that, we don't know who they're actually.

Kyle Wester (05:22.557)
Thank

Kyle Wester (05:28.138)
I want to make sure.

Dr. Katie (05:34.798)
watching and listening to and looking up to. I remember years ago, he was in maybe middle school. That was the phase of like, you know, when boys watch other guys playing video games on YouTube, and it's like, why are we doing this? We're watching other people play video games. So it and couple of them were like really funny. And I would kind of watch and be like, Oh, I get it because this guy's funny. And he's talking about how he feels. And then all of sudden, one day, he's watching this one guy from Nashville, and he starts saying some hateful things. And I'm like,

Kyle Wester (05:45.758)
Yep. Yes.

Dr. Katie (06:02.168)
Click, power off, like, who's this guy? And like, no, we're not watching this guy, because we don't want to talk like that. So there's all this stuff out there. then we're finding now, teachers are reporting it live in the trenches, the misogyny that's occurring online is coming into the classroom, it is coming into homes. And it's all getting mixed up. And so I don't even know if I answered your question, but...

Kyle Wester (06:03.646)
Yeah. Yeah. Yeah.

Kyle Wester (06:21.662)
Yeah.

Kyle Wester (06:27.159)
you did? Yeah, no, you come. Yeah. I mean, even talk about

Diving into that, think I was, even though I work with boys, when I saw the movie Adolescents, and any of our listeners who've not got on Netflix and watched that, watched the movie Adolescents. But that really surprised me. I thought that was something lots of the boys I'm seeing here, the teenagers in Tulsa, I'd heard a little bit of some of that talk, but that movie then really shined a light on it. And maybe it was there all along and I just wasn't aware of it. I wasn't hearing it or seeing it when I talked to these boys. But tell me how a movie like that,

really speaks to the problem.

Dr. Katie (07:03.21)
Yeah, I mean, it does because there's a lot of shame in male mental health. That's like the undercurrent of all of it is shame. So dads don't feel like they can go to another dad and say, Hey, my son is like watching this thing. And like, I feel like I'm failing and I feel like I've lost control and I don't know what's happening. So so that that layer, like at that level, parents are struggling to talk with other parents about it. But then kids are like, they know like,

They're being exposed to pornography at nine, 10, 11 years old now. It's not, you people who say, the average age is 12, which was bad enough, but it is trending younger now in live time. so, and they know that they shouldn't watch it, but they're being shown it and to walk away, if a whole group of boys is huddled around the phone and they walk, first of all, they may lose their social position. They may lose their group entirely. They'll be called a narc. They'll be, you know, all the stuff, right?

Kyle Wester (07:37.983)
Yep.

Kyle Wester (07:53.278)
Yeah. Yeah.

Kyle Wester (08:00.83)
Yeah.

Dr. Katie (08:02.008)
to try to shut your eyes and not see it and hear it is also difficult. But then to go to mom and dad and say, I did this thing that I know is gonna disappoint you. There's so much shame and guilt that males carry around. Girls are socialized to talk. And so like I have a 19 year old daughter. I I know more than I ever wanna know.

Kyle Wester (08:12.084)
Yep.

Kyle Wester (08:25.932)
Hahaha!

Dr. Katie (08:27.32)
Thanks, that's enough detail, right? But it's great because she can come to me and she can blurt it all out and I'm not gonna get mad at her, she knows it. My son knows the same thing, but I never quite get the same amount of detail out of him about things. And then I notice like, he'll be lurking around me a lot or like, you know, he's come out of his room and he's kind of pacing and I'm reading a book or something and I'm like, hey, what's up, come sit, you know, and then he'll like warm up and then he'll tell me whatever it is he's thinking about.

Kyle Wester (08:29.032)
Yes. Yes.

Kyle Wester (08:41.266)
Yeah.

Dr. Katie (08:56.11)
It's a much harder process because boys are not socialized to talk and to go to parents for help. They're afraid of what their parents will think of them. It's not even getting in trouble. Parents think like, they're afraid they'll get grounded. They're afraid I'll take their phone. No, they're afraid of what you're going to think of them because boys experience extraordinary pressure to succeed, to behave, to be good at sports.

Kyle Wester (09:12.702)
Yeah.

Dr. Katie (09:21.154)
to have a thing, to have a passion project that they're, they, all those same stressors really impact them deeply, but they're carrying it inside.

Kyle Wester (09:28.65)
Yeah, man. That's something that really jumped out at me as I was reading through your book. Just all the pressures and I think I may, I don't know if I'm saying it right, but I loved how you shed a light on some great work that's been done to help girls, but boys are needing this and we don't have a lot of awareness of what

it's like, I think we all, it's all there. And once, when I read it your book, I'm like, well, yeah, I I see that, but we're, it's so present all the time. We don't even recognize this boy code. We don't recognize the pressures. We know it to a point, but.

I appreciated how your book really brought it more to my attention, especially thinking about my son and thinking about what, what he has to face every day when he's around other guys or when he's going out into the world and he's in this teenager, I'm trying to grow up and be, become a man. And, and, and I think there's your book does a great job of explaining that. I,

as a parent think you said, he comes in and he's kind of just drifting around. But what can we do as parents? I mean, I know we can raise our awareness, but then I immediately go to, man, how do I help my son? Especially some of these boys, they're hours a day with other boys. They're hours a day in this other culture with coaches and other people with all these influences. And we already talked about social media and how that algorithm is shooting stuff at them all the time.

as a parent you can have this moment of how what do I possibly do?

Dr. Katie (11:08.652)
Yeah, it can feel helpless. Yeah, I totally get that. So I think parents can do a lot. And the first thing is I always tell parents, know, years ago, I was working with a young man, a high school boy, and every therapy session, shooting hoops, never in my office, we were always shooting hoops. And he would talk about deepest, darkest fears, worries, things, everything he needed to get out. But we did it while playing. Boys and men like to

engage while talking. if they're going to engage and there's actually this, I'm forgetting the name of it now, but there's this really cool men's group that started, maybe you've heard of it. I wish I could remember what it's called. I'll find it for you. But they started a group of like men who walk and talk together before work in the mornings. And it started in like one area and it has like spread across the country. And it's just men in their neighborhoods and they go and they walk and they actually talk about stuff as they don't have to stare at each other. They can look down, they can look in front, they can

Kyle Wester (11:55.878)
Wow. Yeah. Yeah.

Yeah.

Dr. Katie (12:05.61)
research actually shows that when we're engaged in something, we're more likely to open up because we're not feeling that pressure of being interviewed or of putting our shame on display, right? So it's, we all have some, some level of it and being able to get it out. So, so do things with your boys, whatever it is they like to do when they invite you into their worlds, you know, for the longest time, my son was trying to get me to, learn how to play 2k. I'm terrible at video games. don't.

Kyle Wester (12:16.511)
via

Dr. Katie (12:32.887)
I have a lot of skills, I just can't do it. I'm not good at video games. Pac-Man is where I like that was like my prime, right? So I would try and I would lose character like I couldn't even shoot the ball, you know, and we would laugh and it was like so funny. And then he'd be like, you just passed it to my team, you know, and we would have fun, but then he would start to talk, you know? And so do the things when they invite you in, even if you're like, this is not my thing, I don't want this, you got to do it. Because an invitation into their worlds.

Kyle Wester (12:34.644)
Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.

Kyle Wester (12:40.691)
Yep.

Kyle Wester (12:45.61)
Yeah.

Dr. Katie (13:00.782)
is huge. When you get it, you got to take it. So I always say that. But also just like checking it, getting into the habit of just checking in on them and like asking questions. you know, for a while, a couple months ago, Clavicular was making the rounds in the news and he's this influencer. If you don't know him, it's wild. He's an influencer who is just teaching all kinds of terrible things. He just got himself arrested. So he's starting to come down from his throne. But

Kyle Wester (13:18.602)
Okay, yes. Yeah, yes.

Dr. Katie (13:28.974)
you know, he was a wild influence. like, so I would be like, Oh, have you heard of this guy? And he's like, No, and I'm like, let's look it up. Like, let's find out about this guy. I would do this in session with my clients, like, Hey, do you know about this guy? Tell me what you know. So when you see something in the news, or when you hear about something, ask about it, you know, people say like, that they understand the algorithm. I got to tell you, I went into the Manosphere. I literally went into the Manosphere for six months. I didn't even disguise myself. I just went as a 51 year old.

Kyle Wester (13:54.036)
man yeah

Dr. Katie (13:58.872)
therapist, okay? Didn't even pretend. And it is gnarly what happens once you enter that place. Most boys are not going to TikTok or YouTube and putting in manuscript, right? They're asking, how do I do my hair? You know, how many times do I have to shower? You know, some of the tips are good. Like, yeah, take a shower every day. Like parents are like, hallelujah, my kid is showering, right? So it, to some degree, it's like, it can be positive.

Kyle Wester (14:00.801)
Yeah.

Kyle Wester (14:13.13)
Yes, Yeah. Yeah.

Dr. Katie (14:28.044)
The trouble is, people say, you'll hear people say it's like a snowball, the algorithm, like it just gains and gains. It is an avalanche. It's like a fire hose. It's not a snowball rolling down a mountain. It comes at you so fast. And so you look up, how do I do my hair? And the next thing you know, it's like right wing ideology, white nationalism, terrible things, words that you never thought your kid would say. It's just coming at them from every direction.

Kyle Wester (14:48.03)
Yes. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Well, just to slip into how they talk about women and it's all, yeah, whenever I've seen it, it's like these, you can see it as a grown man. It's like a, looks like a boy that's just grown up in a big body who's still talking like a teenager. And it's like, that's why it's so appealing to the teenagers because they're like this grown man who looks rich.

Dr. Katie (14:58.808)
Sajini, yep.

Dr. Katie (15:09.442)
Yes.

Kyle Wester (15:16.636)
and handsome and ripped. And he's gonna tell me, and it's like, I think as a 49 year old man, I look at it say, that's just like a, he's still like a little boy. Like this kid's just an insecure boy, you know, but they don't see it that way. They see it as some kind of role model to look up to.

Dr. Katie (15:31.752)
And they also like, they have a playbook. I mean, it's it's very clear. So the first thing is, make the boys think that you're the only one who gets I always say it's like a cult. mean, call a spade a spade, right? Like if this were outside of the internet, we would be calling it a cult and sending in the FBI. But it's online. So we're not doing that. But so that you know, you I'm the only one who gets you like, I get it. I get it. Yeah, you don't know how to do your hair. I was a loser who couldn't do my hair. I'm to make you a winner. This is how you do it.

Kyle Wester (15:42.452)
Yeah.

Kyle Wester (15:48.286)
Yeah,

Kyle Wester (15:58.634)
Yeah, no girls liked me back then either. I was a nerd, yeah.

Dr. Katie (16:00.554)
Yes. Yep. had acne. It's the same. They all say the same thing. And then like, do girls like? they like rich guys. I was talking to a group of parents not long ago, up north in Northern California. And I was talking about this. And I was saying how one of the plays in the book is like gambling. So they're funneling boys right to sports betting and to day trading as betting, essentially. Okay. So boys are losing thousands of dollars, like all their summer money they earn, they're losing it.

to day trading apps and sports betting apps, because these guys are saying, you can get rich, you can make $10,000 in a night, you know, doing this. And so I was describing that and this mother all of a sudden said, Oh my God, that's why he keeps asking me to join a day trading app. He's really into stocks all of a sudden. And it's like she started putting the pieces together. She, you know, later she emailed me and was like, thank God you said that because I was able to talk to him about that. there's that, you know, there's

Kyle Wester (16:30.418)
Wow.

Dr. Katie (16:59.118)
to get girls. Buy my course pack. Thousands of dollars, like $599 for how to look good and not have acne. mean, hint, it's Neutrogena and it costs $7 at CVS. But they're manipulating. They're absolutely manipulating and making them into followers. asking, but you can't say that. If you say that, you're going to shut your boy down, right? So what you want to do is say like, what are you learning? What's interesting? Do they have any good tips? Are there certain kind of haircare products you want? Are there certain kind of...

Kyle Wester (17:01.938)
Yeah. Yeah.

Dr. Katie (17:28.76)
face washes that you want, like what's appealing? So being really open-ended in your questions so that you can learn from them, make them the expert, you'll start to hear the threads of like whether they're still in like a positive, it's okay lane, or they've dipped down into like some of the more dangerous content.

Kyle Wester (17:47.122)
Yeah. You can see where that would be so appealing because, know, we've all been teenagers and the insecurities and the questions and the, am I and how do I measure up? It's hitting right at that. And these guys are saying, I got the answers for you. I've arrived. I'll tell you how to get there. And it's a, you know, legitimate need, right? It's a natural space of development. Yeah. And,

And I think as parents, you're like, okay, how can I move into that space? And so I love the idea of having these conversations and just coming with the curiosity to say, just tell me more so you can hear the things that are being fed to them and, and bring.

bring light to it. When we talk to our son or all of our kids, sometimes it's just about illuminating what's happening here, illuminating even the algorithm and saying, Hey, you're in this space. They're going to market this to you because of your age, because of what you are. And I think even just the awareness gets you a lot further. I want to, if we can, I want to hit a little bit on anger because,

I think that is a really big one. mean, I, I, you see it all the time. I, I, you, you said this little spot in your book that I read that said you can be vulnerable and resilient, resilient and vulnerable, that boys can be resilient and vulnerable.

Dr. Katie (18:57.998)
Absolutely.

Kyle Wester (19:08.74)
And I'm going in, I'm in the anger section right now, so I haven't reached the end of it. But can you talk a little bit about the anger and, and I, you know, I see anger as it's very protective to our sad, hurt feelings, right? Cause even it's safer for me to look something up if I'm worried about my acne than to be vulnerable and go to somebody, you know? And so I think we use anger and we look this stuff up and it's always these boys are protecting themselves from, from that feeling vulnerable.

Dr. Katie (19:29.965)
Yeah.

Dr. Katie (19:35.459)
Mm-hmm.

Kyle Wester (19:38.132)
to whoever.

Dr. Katie (19:39.886)
Absolutely. it's so interesting because when I, my husband and I talk about this a lot, when we were growing up, we absolutely got no guidance in terms of wash your face, right? Gen X didn't get that. was like, just figure yourself out and whatever. And so one of our things was we're going to give them the good face wash and moisturizer starting at age 10. they're not 10, middle school, right? So that they can, you know...

Kyle Wester (19:51.986)
Yes. Yes. Yes. Yes.

Kyle Wester (20:05.8)
Yeah. Yeah. Yes. Yeah.

Dr. Katie (20:09.388)
At least they have a fighting chance against the hormones and stuff. But so we kind of like tried to sweep away that problem in a way, but like, but we would talk about it too. Like, everybody, you know, everybody goes through this and stuff like that. know, boys are taught that, and this is part of the boy code, like you can't be sad, right? Never cry at school, on the court, on the field, et cetera. Never. You don't cry in public.

Kyle Wester (20:11.924)
Yeah.

Dr. Katie (20:36.578)
but at all, matter what happens, right? No matter how bad it is. So just, yeah, don't be sad. Don't ever show that kind of vulnerability in public. Yeah, they will, absolutely. You're done. And that still holds. That has always been a thing and that still holds, which is alarming to me, because we're always like, I feel like our generation is fighting so hard to make things better for everybody coming up behind us. And it's like, why is that still happening?

Kyle Wester (20:38.634)
You're right. Yeah, yeah, because they'll take advantage of yeah, they'll take advantage of yeah.

Kyle Wester (21:03.71)
Yeah.

Dr. Katie (21:06.081)
But, and they're not allowed to like really show much of anything. Like if you watch a group of boys, first of all, middle school boys are my absolute favorite because they're just so funny. They say the most like off the book things and they like laugh a lot and whatever, but get to play school and you'll see even excitement, they try to moderate the tone. Like, so they're like excited and they'll laugh and stuff, but it's like they're blowing it off and like trying to be cool and trying to, you know, take everything in stride.

Kyle Wester (21:19.784)
Yes.

Kyle Wester (21:26.654)
Yeah.

Dr. Katie (21:34.732)
because that's what boys are just trained to do, you know? So they're always tempering. They're always trying to like show a little bit, but not too much. The thing that's acceptable always is anger. So you're allowed to be angry. You're allowed to be aggressive. You're allowed, like if someone pisses you off, you are allowed to throw a punch or push or just say hideous things, right? According to the boy code. Yep. Yes.

Kyle Wester (21:36.67)
Yeah.

Kyle Wester (21:44.52)
Yeah.

Kyle Wester (21:54.378)
Or even at sports events, we hear them yelling at refs all the time and yelling at their kids. Our daughters play soccer, she's 10 years old, and you'll hear parents yelling at their own 10 year old daughters and like screaming at them. Yeah.

Dr. Katie (22:07.424)
Mm-hmm. But you know, something I've noticed that is a difference in young boys playing sports today, they'll backtalk refs all day every day. And it's like, you never did that. You know, that was like, no, adults, don't do that, right? You don't even do it to your own parents, but you definitely don't do it to an adult who's reffing a game or teaching a class. That is something that has changed. And so with that, like, fueling of anger is okay.

Kyle Wester (22:15.432)
Yeah, yeah.

Kyle Wester (22:22.322)
Yeah.

Yeah, it's right. Yeah.

Dr. Katie (22:35.224)
comes this like, can bite back, I can talk back, can, you whatever. And boys all accept that, that anger is like the catchall for everything. That's the one thing that they can show. And it's, you know, it's harming all of them. And so I always say we have to talk more about emotional granularity, which is the fancy way of saying like, there are feelings underneath feelings. So if anger is the expression at the top or, you know, on the mask, right.

We got to peel away the mask and figure out what else is under there. And it could be worry, it could be loneliness, it could be sadness, it could be shame, it could be guilt, could be, you know, any number of things. But what men and young men are socialized to do is to just toughen up and they can express anger, everything else stays in. And so we're seeing this sort of like generation of angry boys right now. They're also being shown that, you know,

So many times it's like, my son's a basketball player. it's like, ooh, that's a whole thing. you know, so many coaches that scream at these boys, that shame them, that cut them off at the knees, like in front of everybody in the middle of games. And it's like, my God, like, can I point you to the Positive Coaching Alliance? Like it's, there's so many ways to mentor boys. That ain't it. But it's happening across sports. It happens in, you know, all kinds of things. And people have also...

Kyle Wester (23:39.774)
Yep, yep, yep, yep.

Kyle Wester (23:50.346)
That's right, yes.

Dr. Katie (24:00.684)
made everything so competitive. know, kids sports alone is a $40 billion industry, right? Dick's Sporting Goods is raking in $14 million of that a year. We're giving it to them because we need the best bat. You know, all that stuff, right? We've all bought in, they formed it and we bought in and it is happening. But because of that, everything's high pressure intense. There's no fun in sports. But then also people have made everything like music.

Kyle Wester (24:07.838)
Yeah.

Kyle Wester (24:12.852)
Yeah. Yeah. Yeah.

Dr. Katie (24:30.476)
Did you know there's competitive piano? Like who conceptualized competitive piano, right? So then you put music teachers in the position of being jerks to make sure the kids perform, to make them win these competitions, which is like, well, you played the fastest? I don't understand. it's everything though. It's like, there's nothing, and boys will say that. It's like, nothing is just for fun. They're not allowed to have a hobby because if robotic, know, if like STEM, robotics, well, then you go in, yep.

Kyle Wester (24:37.298)
Yeah. my god. Yeah.

Kyle Wester (24:56.798)
Yep. You got to Competitions. Yes. Yeah.

Dr. Katie (24:59.948)
go compete. It's Yeah, so everything's just high octane. And that's why they're angry because they don't get to be boys anymore. Little boys don't get to grow up being little boys. They don't they have to be performing, they have to be something they have to have a special interest and they have to win. And then they get into these, you know, higher stakes situations with friends with coaches with whatever and it's it comes out as anger because that's the only acceptable emotion. So, you know, we have to like

Kyle Wester (25:07.678)
Yeah.

Yeah.

Dr. Katie (25:26.964)
make a social contract. I keep saying this. like, we all got to get on board. Dads, uncles, brothers, friends, whoever the mentor, male mentor in your boy's life is, they have got to express vulnerability. They have got to talk about feelings, things they go through that are hard, how they cope with their stress, you know, what they do, because boys are going to keep looking up to men and until men decide.

Kyle Wester (25:30.324)
Yeah. Yeah. Yep.

Dr. Katie (25:52.28)
that they're gonna do this, even if it's hard, that they're gonna do this and they're gonna talk about these things without being angry all the time. That's what they're gonna learn.

Kyle Wester (25:59.23)
Yeah. Well, and so that's what I need your help with. And so I'm thinking about several families I'm helping who the men in particular, the dads feel like they're boys when they're being, you know, they're, 11, 12, 13 years old and they're being aggressive sometimes physically, but many times verbally that, and I can totally relate to these dads, you know, like in my home, my brain goes back to my memories in my home. If that happened, like you were probably going to get slapped.

You were probably, there'd be some kind of threat given. Like I do remember a time where my brother bowed up to my dad and my dad said, you hit me, I will hit you with the closest thing next to me. And we both were like, dang, I think dad's crazy enough to do that. I think he will. And it was always like my dad, my dad in my mind, and this is where obviously, because we parent differently than our parents did, but still my mind does go back to, wow, that kind of worked. My dad just upped the crazy. My dad just upped the aggression.

Dr. Katie (26:43.97)
Yeah.

Kyle Wester (26:58.034)
And then that quote unquote kept us in check. And it seems like these other parents, like, what do we do when they're doing it? If you're telling us not to threaten them, if you're telling us not to do these things, then what is the steps they can take to help reverse this boy code thing that's happening in their sons?

Dr. Katie (27:17.358)
So first of all, expectations. Expectations need to be clear. I remember when my daughter was in middle school and she's like, I get made fun of all the time, I'm the only one who doesn't swear. And I was like, you know, and I would meet her with empathy. I know that's really hard. People think it's cool to swear, blah, blah, blah. I just, don't like that language. I don't like the way it sounds. I feel hurt when I hear people swear. It brings me to a place of like, ooh, this person is having really big feelings.

Kyle Wester (27:36.628)
Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm.

Kyle Wester (27:42.366)
Yeah. Yeah.

Dr. Katie (27:45.059)
And so we would talk about it, but in my own brain, like my response in my own brain would be like, you know, I don't like, if that's the worst thing that people can say about you, then you're all right, you know? But so, you know, but the expectation was like, you're not gonna, I don't like that talk. I don't like the way it makes me or other people in the house feel. So we're not gonna do that in our family. That's not how we treat each other in our family. Now, if you go off into the world and you're swearing, cause you're being cool with your friends and what, like, if I'm not hearing it and.

Kyle Wester (27:52.66)
Yeah.

Kyle Wester (28:06.218)
Yeah.

Dr. Katie (28:13.856)
you're sure you're being appropriate and it's never in front of a teacher and it's never to an adult and it's, know, fine, so be it. But in our home, the way that we're going to talk is this. really having very clear expectations and being willing to hold those expectations. So like, if you've got a kid coming in who's like talking down to you and like the misogynist talk is coming in the first time you're going to say, Hey, I heard you say, you know, blah, blah, blah.

Kyle Wester (28:22.772)
Yeah. Yeah.

Dr. Katie (28:40.526)
let me tell you about why I don't like that and why we're not going to talk that way in our house and lay it out for them. The second time you're going to say, Hey, we already had this conversation. you know, here's what I think is the appropriate, you know, first of all, you need to apologize to your mom. Second of all, and your, and your sisters, like anyone you hurt with your words, even if it's not right directed to them, you need to apologize to. So, you know, but also like, so what I did with my own son is just like,

Kyle Wester (28:42.964)
Yeah. Yeah.

Kyle Wester (28:51.305)
Yeah.

Kyle Wester (28:54.59)
Yeah. Yeah.

Kyle Wester (29:01.492)
Yeah.

Dr. Katie (29:08.206)
raise the kind of kid who will be the person in the room who says, No, don't talk like that. Right. So I know he swears, whatever, you know, with his friends, they listen to their music, they do the thing, I'm sure he talks in a certain way with his buddies that does not, you know, it's fine in his group, right. But when he hears boys say things about women, you know, about LGBTQ kids about, you know, people of color, whatever.

Kyle Wester (29:11.722)
Yep. Yep. Yep.

Kyle Wester (29:22.772)
Yes.

Dr. Katie (29:36.566)
He is the first one to be like, not cool. Nope, not cool. Right. And he doesn't like give anybody a lecture. Just like, no, man, that's not cool. Why are you saying that? Like he does it in a boy way of like, make them feel that shame a little bit. Cause like, oops. I crossed the line. So, and he's practiced that, but in your own home, when kids are coming at you with aggression, it's like, I, just call it. I don't feel safe right now. You don't seem safe right now. We need a break. I'm going to go to my room. You're to go to your room. We'll talk about this later.

Kyle Wester (29:42.666)
Sure.

Kyle Wester (29:48.65)
Yeah.

Dr. Katie (30:06.254)
give everybody a break, right? You know, if they're aggressing siblings, if they're aggressing a parent, like it's a hard no. And if they can't stop, you know, like if it keeps repeating, you do need to reach out for help because there's something underneath that. And I can almost 99.9 say it's going to be depression. you boys exhibit depression through irritability, anger, and aggression because that's what they know.

Kyle Wester (30:32.446)
Yeah. Yeah.

Dr. Katie (30:34.186)
It's how they know how to say, I am really struggling. So behaviors, communication, it's scary when kids come in with this really negative and heated and anger and all that stuff. But also like our job as parents is to look at it and say, if they're not responding to limits that I'm setting in my house and expectations that I'm setting in my house, then I gotta get help.

because something's going on beneath the surface and I'm not, you your parents are not supposed to have to be able to figure that stuff out. Like I'm 28 years deep in clinical work, you know, so I can spot it a mile away, nobody, people who are not like trained like me can't and that's okay. That's why we need help and we reach out to people.

Kyle Wester (31:18.934)
When I think that's the shift that you're talking about with a lot of these families, that's what we get to. Like, what is the real problem? I know we want this to change and this change, but really, once again, we write depression, we write anxiety, right? These things are all fueling that behavior. So what are we doing to solve that, right? And then immediately, that's where many of these, the moms, unfortunately, are the ones that first come to this, and it's harder for dads to get there, is moms would be like, I think I need to be connecting with him more.

I need to be spending time enjoying him more. Whenever I do that, then he opens up, right? But instead what happens with a lot of the dads is like the cycle starts happening where the dad feels like he's got to be more and more of like a prison warden. He's got to be serious all the time. He's got to be watching and clamping down on all of the things that we do not want you doing. And then the kid just ends up spending less and less time with that very person.

who needs to be an influential force. So I try to tell the parents when you feel like, if you think your words don't matter, like everything that you just said, Katie, someone will say, well, I've said that and then he does it anyway. So you're telling me you think your words don't matter. If you wanna know your words matter, go home and just say a bunch of negative stuff. Go home and say a lot of really mean things and you will see how much your words matter. And you've got to believe when you invite him into a healthier relationship with you, he cares about that and he wants that. Like there's something in him that says the stuff I'm seeing online is not good for me.

There's got to be another answer, but nobody's offering the other other answer to.

Dr. Katie (32:44.238)
Yeah, they know.

Dr. Katie (32:48.674)
So I always say the three C's and you probably say this too, I'm gonna guess, but calm, consistent, connected. That's what parents can do that is the absolute best. it's, here's the thing, it is never an overnight success. So I've done it two times, I've done it three times, I've done it four times, he's still doing it. Of course he is, the world is imploding around him and he doesn't know how to process that and he's struggling and he is scared. Underneath all that, having these kinds of feelings is very, very scary.

Kyle Wester (33:02.28)
Yes.

Dr. Katie (33:18.338)
you have to keep showing up with the three C's, you you have to keep practicing it. And yes, you have to set limits and you have to say, that's not okay in my house. And here's what we do. I mean, for me, it's like, I say, let's talk about it and apologize to whoever you harmed with your words. I think that's really important practice inside of families because we have a tendency to like, okay, separate corners, know, was my dad, separate corners, everyone, you know, and like, and then we just move on and that doesn't repair hurt, right?

Kyle Wester (33:27.87)
Yeah, yeah, yeah.

Kyle Wester (33:33.736)
Yeah.

Mm-hmm.

Kyle Wester (33:42.696)
Yeah, exactly. Nope.

Dr. Katie (33:47.48)
So if people are being hurt, now if there's a safety issue, like the aggression is physical, mom, sibling, somebody's in danger, that's a different issue, right? That's an entirely different issue. But if you're talking about words, then we gotta do the repair work. And we have to be able to talk to each other. And I'm really sorry I said that, didn't mean it. I don't know why I said it. I just, I was wanting to feel powerful. I was wanting to feel in control. School was awful today, you know, like.

Kyle Wester (33:53.96)
Yeah. Sure.

Kyle Wester (34:05.887)
Yeah.

Dr. Katie (34:12.738)
Boys experience, know, when a girl comes home and says, everybody's mean to me, you know, we go into mama bear mode and it's like, how do we fix this problem? Like, we can get these girls in line. Boys don't even feel like they can say that. They don't feel like they can say everybody's mean to me because they're gonna be a failure because to be a man is to not struggle with social connections. So we have to remember that the internal rules are different for boys.

Kyle Wester (34:18.132)
Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah.

Yeah.

Kyle Wester (34:31.636)
Yeah. That's good. Yeah. Yeah.

Yeah, well, Katie, we want to thank you so much for the work you're doing. You know, really, like it is, it is so important right now. I do believe this is a pivotal time in what we're seeing happen in our culture, especially with boys. I know we are very passionate about how we're doing it with our son and really trying to do what you're saying and connecting him. Like I tried, I want to hear if there's any dads listening to this, that this is important. I know I'm limited somewhat in the ways in which I can teach my son this.

Dr. Katie (34:43.118)
Thank you.

Dr. Katie (34:50.83)
Absolutely.

Kyle Wester (35:07.852)
there's ways that my wiring goes back to his tears make me uncomfortable. It's like, I want to see him be my, there's still ways, even all the years, like you're saying, I've been working clinically with kids. There's still that wiring goes back to me of like, I'll tell Sarah, like there's certain things he needs to know. Like there's certain things he needs to, and some of it is good. And some of it's just bull crap, but it's still in my head. But, what I've done as he's growing up from 13 into 14,

is connected him with a bunch of other men in my life who do this better than me, who do or do it at least different than me.

Dr. Katie (35:39.298)
Yes.

Dr. Katie (35:42.776)
differently.

Kyle Wester (35:43.562)
Yeah. And he just does. And so it's really been fun for him. Like he just, we talk a lot about friends and one of my friend who was a great friend, he was just on a zoom call with him the other day and there's some questions I'm having him ask each of these men. And one of them is like, Hey, what was friendships like for you? Did you have a hard time with friends? And like, uh, my friend, he, he works in a library and he loves books. And so he said, he jokingly said, Oh, I always saw that not having friends wasn't a problem. It just gave me more time to read. So like it was fun for my son to

kind of hear that as opposed to yeah, he's like, I mean, so much friends could just waste your time because you can't read during that time. So it was so I'm really I've been really excited about this journey he's been on as he's talked to just different men that some friends were friendships were easy, because they were just naturally outgoing and talkative other ones, it was hard. And so he's been able to see that and we're just kind of normalize guys. So anybody listening this I would encourage you

Dr. Katie (36:14.094)
I feel that.

Dr. Katie (36:25.39)
Yeah.

Kyle Wester (36:35.668)
to get some of those mentors in your kid's life, have these conversations about what it's like to be vulnerable. And it's like they're all crying and they're all, but it's like they're just talking about important things in a way that's fun. Like you said, it could be over sports, it could be playing basketball or over video games, but you're being intentional about these conversations. So I wanna thank you for having that. And this book is fantastic. Where can our listeners find you and find out more about the work you're doing?

Dr. Katie (37:01.666)
The best place to find me is on Instagram, Dr. Katie Hurley, LCSW. That's where I spend probably the most social media time. And yeah, the book is available everywhere. I would love you to go to your indie bookstore and ask them to order it and get it for you. But also, you know, the big box stores that I don't like to name all have it in stock. So please purchase.

Kyle Wester (37:22.225)
Yeah, also you've got a book before this that was really big about Mean Girls as well, right? And so if they're interested, and hopefully for all the listeners, we hope to have Katie on in the future to talk more about that and to talk specifically about the challenges girls go through. But once again, we want to thank you for taking the time and sharing your wisdom with all the listeners. So we really appreciate it.

Dr. Katie (37:27.777)
Yes, no more me girls, yep.

Dr. Katie (37:41.698)
Thank you, this was such a great chat.