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"Haidt identifies a range of 'push and pull' factors acting on boys and young men: 'The digital world brought more ways for boys to do the agency-building activities they craved, such as exploring, competing, playing at war, mastering skills, and watching increasingly hardcore pornography.' "

Correction: "The digital world brought more ways for STRAIGHT boys to do the agency-building activities they craved . . ."

As a gay man, I am sick to death of heteronormative "what ails boys today" explainers such as Haidt. I do not see younger self or many other gay people I know who've described their childhoods to me in the standard list of boy attributes.

Let's take "Playing at war." I threw away my cap guns because of their associations with violence sometime around 1963, and it wasn't because I grew up in a Quaker household. Instead of playing at war I liked gardening and playing with my Barbie doll. I could go on, but I think I've made my point.

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Subscribers here might be interested in the upcoming documentary on trans widows by Vaishnavi Sundar, Indian film auteur cancelled after finishing her film about girls ideating a male persona to escape sexual harassment and violence. The trans widow documentary, profiling me and 17 other women who divorced suddenly demanding crossdressing men also includes an interview with Emma Brynn, daughter of a flamboyant AGP in Britain:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_3Tu3hrvLhI

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