Mom & Dad: Is My Son’s Play Becoming Toxic Masculinity?

Note: This episode contains discussions of murder and grief.
Listener discretion is advised between 6:30 and 12:00 of this
episode. You can read more about Sam Woll, a close friend of Zak’s
family, here. On this episode: Jamilah Lemieux, Elizabeth Newcamp,
and Zak Rosen help a listener who’s worried that her son’s play is
skewing a little too much toward good guys, bad guys, and violence.
What’s the difference between normal play and a red flag – and how
can we make sure boys want to include girls? Zak found two great
resources for this listener that we want to share: an article about
violent play from Parents.com, and a book called Under Deadman's
Skin: Discovering the Meaning of Children's Violent Play. We also
go over our week in triumphs and fails — and then, if you’re
sticking around for Slate Plus, we discuss an episode of RadioLab
that got us thinking about how kids change our perception of time.
Join us on Facebook and email us at momanddad@slate.com to ask us
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us ideas about what we should talk about in future episodes. You
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to help support our work. Podcast produced by Maura Currie. Learn
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