EDITORIAL: Change boys' lives, change the world

According to the Centers for Disease Control, males account for 79 percent of all suicides in this country. Seventy-nine percent.

That is a significant imbalance.

What have we done to our men and boys?

It's difficult not to ask yourself this, both historically, as we continue to reel from #metoo revelations, as well as currently, with each school shooting, fraternity hazing death and suicide that makes the news cycle or devastates a community.

Culturally, we seem to be at a crossroads. And we can either choose the easy path, turn a blind eye and convince ourselves that "boys will be boys" and there is nothing to be done. That this is "normal."

Or, we can choose the path of change and hard work, and see that we, as a society, have failed our boys — and while we can also argue that we also failed our girls, in the paper this week we have written about Journeymen, an organization focused on supporting and mentoring young men on the island. Something we believe is not only important, but necessary.

Why? Because the statistics are stark:

• One in three young men has no positive male figure;

• Boys with no role model are two times as likely to turn to crime;

• One out of three boys says he lacks a sense of identity;

• Boys are nearly four times more likely to die by suicide than girls;

• Boys are less likely to apply to, attend and graduate from college than their female peers.

What if we changed our male paradigm? Changed the cultural notion of what it means to "be a man?"

Vashon's Journeymen is an organization that is working on that change. Nicki Wilks and Alex Craighead are leading the charge with thoughtful and intuitive school- and community-based programs focused on support, engagement and the development of a strong sense of self.

And mentoring is the key.

Yes, there are generalizations here. We all know wonderful, well adjusted, healthy, happy men, both young and old. But on the whole, we have to stop throwing up our hands in futility at the endless headlines of horror. We can do something. We can recognize and change our own destructive attitudes. We can support groups like Journeymen who are working for change. We can be there for our boys and young men as they work to negotiate through the minefield of societal and peer expectations. We can be role models.

We can be mentors.