In October 2024, a 20-year-old Cornell University student in New York, identified in media reports as Jane Doe, attended a party at the Chi Phi fraternity house. She alleges that she became heavily intoxicated, was pressured to take ketamine and was subsequently raped by several fraternity members over the course of several hours while she was incapable of giving consent.
As the allegations made headlines, my social media feed filled with questions about our boys: How should we talk to them about what happened? What should we say? At what age? And how can we make sure that if they ever find themselves in a similar situation, they won't simply stand by?
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Screenshot of messages exchanged among Cornell University students during the alleged gang rape
(Photo: AP Photo/Heather Ainsworth)
I understand why parents react this way. Cases like this are deeply disturbing and naturally stir fear about their own children. But sex education driven by shocking headlines is neither effective nor consistent. It begins in a moment of alarm and often fades as public attention moves on.
Teenage boys already know this pattern. Every time a sexual assault case makes headlines, even halfway around the world, adults sit them down once again to remind them that rape is wrong.
Of course, we can and should discuss incidents that boys encounter in the news. The question is what attitude we bring to those conversations and what kind of relationship we maintain with them the rest of the time.
When a boy's primary conversations with adults about sexuality happen in response to sexual violence, he may come away believing that sexuality itself is dangerous, and that simply being male makes him someone adults regard with suspicion. That is hardly a foundation for an open and honest conversation.
A boy who refuses to stand by during a horrific incident won't become that person simply because someone sat him down at age 12 and told him that if he ever witnesses a rape, he must intervene.
He will learn these skills over years of recognizing and responding to others' pain, facing discomfort without hiding behind cynicism or denial, standing up to his friends and accepting that they may not always like what he has to say.
He will also need to develop a deeper understanding that intimacy, sexuality and power always involve responsibility toward the person on the other side.
To understand what might interfere with that development, we should examine how adults respond to boys' emerging sexuality.
What happens when their curiosity becomes apparent, when they ask a question, begin experimenting or do something that requires us to establish a boundary? Can we talk to them about what happened and explain that boundary, or do our embarrassment and alarm leave them feeling that something is fundamentally wrong with them?
Through these responses, boys also learn how to relate to themselves, their bodies and their emerging desires.
The Chi Phi fraternity house at Cornell University
(Photo: AP Photo/Heather Ainsworth)
Our silence plays a role in that learning, too. Many boys grow up without the adults closest to them, especially their fathers, taking an active role in their sexual development through open, thoughtful conversations that encourage questions and make them feel heard.
Sometimes adults are present mainly when there is something to prohibit, warn against or criticize. A boy may know perfectly well what he is not allowed to do while remaining entirely alone with everything he feels and wants.
The role of shame, guilt and fear in adolescence
When a boy is left to navigate his sexuality alone, met mainly with fear, criticism or silence, he may begin to associate it with shame, guilt and anxiety. To understand why, we need to look at where those feelings come from.
A boy may feel ashamed of his body, his lack of experience, his curiosity or his desire for closeness. He may feel ashamed of wanting something intensely, or of not wanting something that he believes everyone else wants.
In a peer group where boys are expected to be constantly interested in sex, even hesitation or refusal can become something they feel compelled to hide.
Matan Livneh
(Photo: Private album)
He may feel guilty about masturbating, watching pornography or experiencing attractions he doesn't know whether to consider normal, yet feel too embarrassed to ask. Sometimes he has genuinely hurt someone.
Other times, he has done nothing wrong but has learned to see his own desires as something shameful. These are very different situations, and we need to help him understand the difference.
Fear isn't just about punishment. A boy may be afraid of being mocked, upsetting or disappointing his parents, or losing his place among friends. He may worry that if he opens up about something that happened, the adults in his life will judge him entirely by that one experience. And beneath it all may lie an even deeper fear: that if the parts of himself he has learned to hide are exposed, he will no longer be worthy of love.
My experience working with boys on sexuality and relationships has repeatedly shown me that a conversation about sexual harm can sound like an accusation to a teenager before it has even begun.
He becomes preoccupied with what adults think of him and with proving that he is a good person. Sometimes that defensiveness leaves very little room to listen to what happened to some girl.
Many boys grow up without meaningful conversations about their sexual development ”
(Photo: Shutterstock/Ground Picture)
To help boys develop empathy and take responsibility for others, we first need to break down that defensiveness. Feeling guilty is not the same as taking responsibility. A boy can feel terrible about himself without truly understanding the harm someone else has suffered or taking steps to change his behavior.
Working with him effectively can help him recognize how his actions affect others, what he can do to prevent harm and how he can make amends when he has hurt someone. He can also take responsibility for what happens around him and intervene without being personally responsible for another person's wrongdoing.
The connection between sensitivity and strength
I believe the key to raising emotionally mature boys who treat others with care and respect lies in combining sensitivity with strength. Too often, we fail to nurture that connection.
The ability to stand my ground, tell another man he has crossed a line or step in when something feels wrong begins with empathy. When I can recognize another person's pain, fear or humiliation, it becomes much harder to look away and tell myself it's none of my business.
We should treat that sensitivity as something precious that needs protecting. We need to recognize where it begins to disappear and develop the ability to identify it even when it is concealed beneath intense emotions such as anger, hurt, frustration or withdrawal.
In her book Deep Secrets, researcher Niobe Way draws on interviews with hundreds of adolescent boys to describe the deep closeness they seek and find in their friendships. She also describes the tension between that need for connection and gender expectations that make it increasingly difficult for boys to express it.
This is an important perspective for parents. When a boy rarely opens up or responds with cynicism, we should ask what he has learned about the risks of showing vulnerability or seeking closeness, and where those lessons came from.
Often, we may find that throughout his childhood, he was repeatedly taught to hide feelings that could be seen as signs of weakness, because expressing them would be met with disapproval.
But sensitivity alone is not enough. A boy may recognize that something terrible is happening and still say nothing. To intervene, he must be able to face the discomfort and consequences of speaking up: the fear of being mocked, the tension of confronting others, the possibility of angering a friend or finding himself standing alone.
That is the strength he needs to develop: the ability to face those fears and remain true to what he knows is right.
If we want to raise boys who can stand up for what is right, we need to let them practice standing up for themselves long before they encounter abuse or violence. That means allowing them to say no, even to us, and even when they are rejecting things boys are supposedly expected to want.
How much freedom do we really give boys to challenge expectations about what they should desire, what they should enjoy and how they are allowed to feel?
Many parents want to teach their children to be polite, considerate and respectful. But in the process, they often teach them to put other people's wishes ahead of their own. Don't make a fuss. Don't upset anyone. Go along with the group. Give in. Avoid conflict. They learn to sacrifice their own needs to fit in and be accepted.
Then, at 20, we expect those same young men to stand up to a group of friends and say, “Enough. This has gone too far.” But that takes a kind of inner strength that boys raised to constantly please others may never have had the chance to develop.
Researcher Niobe Way describes the deep emotional closeness boys seek and find in their friendships
(Photo: Shutterstock/NewJadsada)
If every time a boy expressed discomfort he was told he was exaggerating, he may learn to distrust his own instincts. If every disagreement ended with adults demanding that he give in to keep the peace, where exactly was he supposed to learn that some things are worth standing up for, even when doing so is uncomfortable?
To understand an essential part of sex education, we need to look closely at the pressure to please others. It can make it difficult for boys to recognize what they want, what they don't want and what feels right to them, let alone stand by those feelings when doing so comes at a social cost.
Learning to resist that pressure is crucial both to protecting their own boundaries and to standing up for someone else. In either case, a boy may have to disappoint someone he cares about, refuse to go along with the group or risk losing his sense of belonging.
As parents, we too must tolerate discomfort throughout this process. A boy who develops his own opinions will express them to us as well. He will not always agree with us, want what we believe is best for him or respond as we expect.
Sometimes he will tell us that something we are doing hurts him. Our response in those moments is itself part of how we teach him to stand up for himself.
After discussing the pressure to please others, we need to address our own responsibility as fathers. Our first responsibility is to educate ourselves about sexuality before attempting to educate our sons.
That means more than learning how to talk to boys about sex. It means examining our own relationships with sexuality, boundaries, rejection, pornography, intimacy, other men, women and power.
What do we do when someone doesn't want us? How do we talk about women when we're with friends? How capable are we of admitting that we've been hurt without turning that hurt into anger directed at someone else?
Our children learn all of this from us years before we sit them down for “the talk.”
Above all, we must stop leaving boys to navigate these experiences alone. I suspect that at least some of those involved in the Cornell case, whether they were accused of harming others, knew what was happening, remained silent or were afraid to speak up, may have struggled with feelings of shame.
This is a hypothesis based on my experience working with boys, including those who have harmed others, not a conclusion about the individuals involved in the Cornell case.
I wonder what they felt they needed to hide, what they feared others would think of them and whether there was anyone in their lives they could have turned to even after becoming involved in something deeply troubling.
None of this diminishes anyone's responsibility for their actions. But asking these questions can help us understand what kind of guidance and support the boys we are raising need.
Boys are left alone with so many overwhelming experiences: their first exposure to pornography, large WhatsApp groups, overt and subtle peer pressure, questions about their bodies and sexual identity, their first sexual experiences and things they have seen but do not know how to process.
Often, they believe that if they share what is happening to them, they will be judged. Through shame, they are taught silence and isolation. When they truly need help, all they may have to rely on are the social codes of other boys. They have no one to turn to.
Our sons need to know they can come to us even with things we may find difficult to hear: confusion, shame, mistakes, feelings of helplessness, or even situations in which they themselves acted in ways we would not approve of.
If a boy tells us he remained silent while a friend hurt someone, we need to be able to listen to the entire story, understand what happened and help him determine what he can and should do now.
He will need to confront his responsibility. Our willingness to remain by his side and support him can be precisely what helps him accept that responsibility.
This means trying less to mold our sons into the people we want them to be and focusing more on supporting them as they develop their own understanding of sexuality and masculinity. We need to stay curious, respect their need for space and avoid reacting with alarm or disgust.
We must accept that they may grow up to think, feel and want things differently from what we imagined, while remaining close enough that they can turn to us even when they struggle to find the words.
Then, perhaps, when they one day find themselves in a genuinely difficult situation, they will be able to listen to their inner voice and know there is someone they can turn to. They may recognize that something is wrong, tolerate the discomfort of that realization and find a way to act.
Sometimes that will mean confronting a friend and telling him he has crossed a line. Sometimes it will mean asking someone else for help. Even asking for help requires a boy to let go of part of what he has learned about the things he is supposed to be capable of handling on his own.
Meaningful sex education begins in childhood, through ongoing conversations about bodies, sexuality, relationships, desires, boundaries, people-pleasing, pain, intimacy and friendship.
That is how we raise boys who can stand up for others without losing themselves, and stand up for themselves without losing their sensitivity.
It is work that needs to be nurtured throughout the year, not something we return to only when another horrifying case makes the headlines.
Matan Livneh is an educator, group facilitator and lecturer specializing in healthy sexuality education. He works with children, adolescents, educational staff, parents and young men on emotional maturity and personal autonomy. He is a board member of the Israel Association for Sex Education and one of the administrators of the Facebook group “Positive Sexuality Education.”