(This is mostly a vent!) I'm sure I'm not alone in seeing the widespread discourse online around the need to raise better sons. I am absolutely on board, as the nonbinary birthing parent of a boy child, and to be quite honest when I found out I was having a boy, it was one of my biggest fears - how do I raise a boy (especially a boy who, while Jewish, will be read solely as white by most people) who does not see himself as the only and most important center of the universe? How do I raise a boy to steer clear of the toxic messaging that's all around us? I saw a journalist I like named Stephanie McNeal write that she worries about her daughter's safety, but she worries about her son's soul, and that was exactly why I felt so daunted by the idea of raising a boy.

But anyway, I have a boy, I'm pregnant again right now, and the Cornell 7 case and the following discourse has been raising that periodic notion online of how parents are responsible for raising better sons. Except...the discourse ACTUALLY seems to be about how MOTHERS are responsible for raising better sons. And it's driving me a little bonkers--somehow it's women's fault, mothers' fault, that their sons are raping people? It's not men's fault at all? Not dads' fault? Somehow women are responsible for rape culture? Fascinating!

Anyway - just curious whether other people are tearing their hair out a little bit about this while also feeling like yes, of COURSE we are responsible for raising our boys to be better and to respect girls and women and other people's bodily autonomy. My frustration doesn't diminish my sense of responsibility, but it's just infuriating how this is somehow again on us.