Life's tough for teenagers, but particularly tough, it seems, for tomorrow's young men.
Last Sunday, columnist Will Hutton wrote on the bafflement of parents of boys today; their violence, their arguments and their surly refusal to tackle anything approaching a decent level of school work.
It is, he wrote, 'as if this generation of boy teenagers has been infected by a new collective disaffection, a refusal to settle and periods of sometimes uncontrollable anger'.
But this sudden aggression, he believes, is not a sign of poor parenting or an appetite for the macho.
It's more an expression of boys' inability to live up to today's highly managed demands. They have an extremely low threshold of emotional pain, and without the capacity to articulate and confront their anxiety or sadness, they lash out.
Is this typical of your experience as parent? Do you agree with his analysis? Or are you a teenage boy who feels this rage against the world around you?
