June 16, 2014

The Roundup contains information about all of the latest news, commentary, reports, surveys, issue briefs, charts, and fact sheets related to boys' issues collected by our staff during the preceding week.

News Clips

  • The friendship crisis: Why are boys so lonely and violent?
    While there's a lot of talk about the need for tighter gun control and better treatment of the mentally ill, the roots of this horrifying trend go much deeper. Our culture prizes independence over human connection. It devalues and even discourages close friendships, particularly among boys and men. And our definitions of manhood emphasize aggression, toughness and rugged individualism at the expense of girls, women and relationships.
    Washington Post
    June 13, 2014

  • Why teenage boys do stupid things
    An 18-year-old boy in Georgia drowns after he is tied to a shopping cart and pushed into a lake while horsing around with friends after his high school graduation. A young man, 19, causes a multi-car accident when he faints from holding his breath while driving through a tunnel in Portland, Ore. New data from the National Youth Risk Behavior Survey, released today by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, shows just how many teens engage in hazardous behavior.
    CBS News
    June 12, 2013

  • Centers for Disease Control and Prevention Release Health Risk Behavioral Surveillance 2013 Report
    The Youth Risk Behavior Surveillance System (YRBSS) monitors six types of health-risk behaviors that contribute to the leading causes of death and disability among youth and adults, including�

    • Behaviors that contribute to unintentional injuries and violence
    • Sexual behaviors that contribute to unintended pregnancy and sexually transmitted diseases, including HIV infection
    • Alcohol and other drug use
    • Tobacco use
    • Unhealthy dietary behaviors
    • Inadequate physical activity

YRBSS also measures the prevalence of obesity and asthma among youth and young adults.

YRBSS includes a national school-based survey conducted by CDC and state, territorial, tribal, and local surveys conducted by state, territorial, and local education and health agencies and tribal governments.
Centers for Disease Control and Prevention
June 12, 2014

  • New grants coming for My Brother's Keeper initiative
    W.K. Kellogg Foundation joins 10 other funders
    The W.K. Kellogg Foundation is part of the effort to change the dynamic for boys and young men of color in the United States. In all, 11 foundations are backing the effort, which has identified four key areas for collective action by the public and private sectors to make a significant difference � health, education, careers and justice.
    Battle Creek Enquirer
    June 7, 2014

International News

AUSTRALIA

  • Circumcision on the rise despite hospital ban
    Circumcision rates for newborn boys in NSW have jumped by more than 30 per cent in the past two decades, and there is now a call for the procedure to be reintroduced in public hospitals. Sydney University professor of medicine Brian Morris claims the latest evidence shows the operation is ''equivalent to childhood vaccination'' and it is ''unethical'' not to offer the procedure to all parents as a matter of routine.
    The Sydney Morning Herald
    June 7, 2014

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The Boys Initiative is a groundbreaking national nonprofit campaign to shed light on documented trends in recent years pertaining to boys' underachievement and young men's failure to launch. For more information about The Boys Initiative, visit www.theboysinitiative.org.