Customer Reviews

Real Boys' Voices

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A great, brand new 224 page book that is a real eye opener regarding the males in everyone's life. Psychologist Bill Pollack spent much time and effort interviewing boys and young men all across the country to get them to open up about all of the important things in their lives. Topics range from drugs, sex, sports, violence, ambition, school, parents, girls, pressures, addictions, how they see the lives of the men they know, importance of their parents, spirituality, friendships, being gay, coping with divorce and other losses, and death. WOW ! The authors found that the boys were anxious to talk about their experiences, but needed someone to listen to them. The reader will learn the confusions and fears of the boys, and what haunts them at home, school, work, and play. You'll learn how to get the boys to talk. This alone is worth the price of the book and the reading time. The tremendous pressures put on boys is explored. Many boys are crying out to be heard and understood, but the listeners are lacking, and they're afraid to open up. Readers will have a much better understanding of ALL of their male relatives, contacts and associates (not just young boys). Well worth reading. It can help you understand what goes on in the minds of all of the men around you, and improve your relationships with them.

This book touched me in a way I never thought a book could. As a 15 year-old unathletic boy, I thought that I was alone in feeling the things I felt (and feel). Yesterday I found this book by accident, and I could not put it down. I read the entire thing last night, and I cried. In this country, boys and men are not supposed to show any kind of emotion, talk about their feelings, least of all cry. This is a serious problem that is leading to the stereotype that men are incapable of talking and are emotionless. This is NOT true. This pressure to bottle up our emotions drives us to suicide, drug abuse, drinking, and homocide. This pressure is killing us. And, finally, someone has had the courage to go around the country, listening, in an effort to defeat this horrible stereotype, which he calls the "Boy Code." Dr. Pollack, I commend you, and I urge you to keep fighting for us; we really need help.

This is a jarring and eye-opening collection of voices often unheard in our culture. It is highly recommended that this book NOT be read until one has looked at his first REAL BOYS offering. The first work povides the theorectcal context within which these testimonies are most powerful. This is valuable reading not only for counselors and parents, but for pastors, teachers, and all who work with or care about boys and their lives.

Psychologist William Pollack has done an important service in talking with and listening to boys 10-20 across the country about what is important to them and what causes them pain. And they have a lot of pain. In a recent book, Undoing Depression, I learned that there is an epidemic of depression in young people, and these stories certainly underscore that observation. The sources are many: Not being able to share their emotions with others; not wanting to live up to the macho code of the strong, silent type; uncertainties about sex; teasing and being teased; homophobia; pressure to succeed; a lack of spirituality in every day life; being unsure of what kind of man they want to become; fear of causing or experiencing violence; abuse; concerns about body image; addictions; loss; divorce; bigotry; and the lack of creative outlets that are deemed socially appropriate.

I found the stories so painful to read that I could seldom do more than 60 pages in a sitting. Then I would have to take a day or two off. I feel very sad for all of these boys and young men. I do hope you will read this book and follow its lessons. Adults can make a big difference.

The good news is that the boys and young men do want to share their feelings, and they do want advice. But adults have to relate differently to them in order to get them to open up and absorb the new information. Pollack has lots of good advice along that line, and the boys themselves tell about when and how they feel comfortable talking. And talking is important to healing all of this pain, because the boys and young men don't realize that almost every other young person is in pain, as well. So they feel doubly bad by seeing themselves as deficient in some way that others don't experience.

The solutions seem to relate to reducing the stress on the young people and helping them to communicate their feelings. Then, they need to adopt a new ideal of being who they are, not what they think everyone wants them to be. "They want to find people who love them just the way they are."

Some of the many important suggestions include:

(1) Creating many accessible "shame-free" zones. These are places where mentoring can take place where a boy can "unwind, let loose, and be his real self." They need this at home as well as at school. Whenever the emotions overwhelm the young person, he has a place to go for help.

(2) The boy needs an at-home and an at-school mentor who will provide guidance, love, and support. These do not have to be men.

(3) Learn how to help the young person describe what he is feeling.

(4) Share your own doubts about the gender code of being a strong, silent type.

(5) Share you own observations about different ways that it is okay to be a real man.

(6) Build trust.

(7) Mentoring should include physical activities, especially sports, as well as talking.

(8) Help boys and young men to become mentors for others.

(9) Create effective programs to "bully-proof" your neighborhood and schools. The author does not think that zero tolerance programs and expecting the kids to work it out themselves are effective. Here's a good reason to read the book, so that you'll find out how to relieve the pressure of physical and verbal bullying -- it's what makes life a nightmare for so many of these young people.

(10) Encourage spiritual and creative epressions that a meaningful to the young person.

Although this book is about boys and young men, I think that those who are concerned about girls and young women should read it too. Basically, these boys and young men don't sound a lot different than what young women have to say, except they aren't as concerned about being unable to express their feelings and having unwanted sex being forced on them. You'll get a lot of insight into helping females deal with the young males in their families, lives, and schools. I suspect that there are parenting clues here also for parents of daughters. I certainly picked up some pointers that I think would help my relationship with my younger daughter.

Whatever you do, overcome your denial that because your son or grandson doesn't complain, that he is not in pain. Only if you and he can talk openly about his feelings can you check to see if he needs pain relief. I suggest that you assume that he does need help in this area, until proven otherwise.

A real eye opener for any parent who is trying to find what their son is thinking, feeling and doing when their not looking. Boys are not always what we try to create by the way we treat them, the toys we give them and the ideals we teach them. Boys need love and understanding just like girls do. Dr. Polock identifies who boys really are from the inside out. He then gives parents insight on nurturing boys into healthy well adjusted men. As the author of The Voucher System Behavior Management Program I recomend this book to any parent raising a son.

As the Ophelia Speaks of the opposite sex, this book gives great in sight to what our young men must go through in our society today. After reading this in conjunction with Real Boys, I was encouraged to think about what we could do as a community not to protect our children, but to help them go through their journeys of adolesence in a healthy and growing manner. I believe it is important to understand our children's individual experiences- along with their thoughts and concerns; all of which older generations have not dealt with before. This is vital in raising intelligent, respectful, confident men and women.

I'm not sure what the person who did the first reader review was thinking, but as the father of a son I found this to be the best book I've read in years on raising boys. It's true that we do not nurture our boys but instead expect them to be little men and force them into a curbed emotional life where they're not supposed to exhibit vulnerability or fear or anything else considered "unmanly." So, instead we develop emotionally stunted kids who feel shame if they feel physically or psychically threatened because boys "aren't supposed to feel or act that way." Or we discourage tender, nurturing behavior in boys while expecting it from girls. Hopefully this book will wake some parents up.

Real Boys' Voices is a powerful journey into the minds of guys who have been raised to `hold it in' `be a man' `don't show how you really feel' and this sad list has haunted growing boys well into their painful adult years.
Pollack offers EXCEPTIONAL guidance to show us all, parents, peers, teachers, colleagues, and society as a whole to change the paradigm and start to allow boys to be REAL HUMAN BEINGS.
MEN HAVE FEELINGS! One topic that is touched on is that guys are actually being manipulated, and molded to follow, rather than to BE who they authentically are. It is imperative that boys, teen age guys, and all men are honored and ACCEPTED for who they really are, and not what others want them to be. This book brings pivotal advice to anyone who is in the presence of a young man to honor that man, for who he is.
It is a well known fact in psychology that either a person is going to talk it out, or act it out.
We owe it to the guys in our society to allow them the freedom and acceptance of honoring their own truth, and allowing them to express it, even if we may not agree.
By giving guys unconditional love, acceptance, and support on all levels, they WILL grow into men who are whole and complete, and will thus have the capacity to express that in the outer world, which includes being able to be authentic in intimate relationships. If boys are taught to hide their real feelings, how can they EVER know how to be REAL?
This book plays a crucial role in our society for males of all ages. It gets to the heart of the matter, and that is being loved and accepted for who they are. Only then will they know HOW to express their authenticity in their outer life.
BUY THIS BOOK! Highly recommended from my heart, Barbara Rose, author of "Stop Being the String Along: A Relationship Guide to Being THE ONE" and 'If God Was Like Man'
Editor of inspire! magazine

Dr. William S. Pollack has done a masterful job in constructing a book which allows us to hear boys' testimonies on well over a dozen topics....their accounts tell us about pressures which stare boys straight in the eye every day and demand their responses. In "Real Boys' Voices" we see the flip side of the often uncommunicative teenage boy and Pollack helps us to see how boys regard themselves (and others) when asked to express their thoughts freely and candidly. As a private one-to-one teacher, I agree with, and have acted upon for many years, his main theme....that boys need a shame-free, comfort-free zone in which to open up. The remarkable entries in this book are sometimes very troubling, often warm, and always genuine. I would suggest that one read Pollack's book slowly and carefully. The emotional depth conveyed is well worth the time. The last chapter offers sound advice in content and tone on how to deal with boys, recapping the advice he peppers throughout the book. My hope is that it should be read especially by men who continue to propagate the "Boy Code"....a code that keeps boys' true feelings stifled and their lives wrapped up in straitjackets.

Voices Ring True in these pages. I watched Mr. Pollack on Oprah and his compassion left me puzzled. What many parents had felt but society denied us for years was - it's ok for little boys to show emotion and grow up with a better understanding of life, so why didn't we follow through? It's puzzling in a big part because we just want them to be a "man." Not to cry and run to us with problems............who made this pathetic rule in the first place? It gives me great pleasure to hope this book will change many male voices towards a better and more accepting view of REAL VOICES from boys. Listen and learn something, put it down, pick it up, read it over and over............it's there. Please allow me to suggest another grand book which instills simple, but thoughtful words into parenting, "Mommy-CEO," by Jodie Lynn as she tells us why we need 5 Golden Rules for both girls and boys. Similar to Mr. Pollack - the message is - "Treat Children The Way You Want To Be Treated." Think about this message, and do it as both authors suggest. Do it as much for yourself as your children. Stop the insanity of blowing off the feelings of your sons. Allow them to feel important when they come to us for help and treat them with respect. No problem or conversation should be too small for us to listen to. Maybe we don't have an answer for everything, but to listen is a beginning.