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Father’s Day approaches and with it the opportunity to consider the importance of fathers to their children.

It is difficult to overstate both the positive effects of growing up with a father and the negative effects of father absence, especially for boys. These myriad benefits and perils are on record, undisputed and easily accessible. But in this gynocentric era, what is good or bad for boys does not seem to attract the interest of our cultural elites.

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Boys are in crisis everywhere. They are falling behind academically in 60 of the most developed nations. Boys are 50 per cent less likely than girls to meet basic proficiency standards in reading, math and science. Rates of ADHD among them are escalating. Since the Great Depression, the gap between male and female suicides has tripled in the U.S.

What is good or bad for boys does not seem to attract the interest of our cultural elites

The common denominator behind many of these trends is fatherlessness. When all other variants of race, socio-economic status, health and other obvious metrics are accounted for, fatherlessness is the single biggest predictor for many negative outcomes among boys. Male prison inmates are 85 per cent fatherless. Juvenile detention centres are likewise full of dad-deprived boys. Male violence and fatherlessness are strongly linked, even in violence-promoting political movements. Fiyaz Mughal, a radicalization specialist with the Faith Matters Network, says, “All of these (young ISIL recruits), they have an absent father … the kids fought police, fought at school, rebelled against every power structure at every opportunity.”