Headlines about “teen takeovers” keep surfacing in New York and cities across the U.S. In the first day of classes this year in Brooklyn, large crowds of teens rushed the Barclays Center and the Atlantic Terminal Mall, prompting many city and community leaders to call for more after-school programs. Last spring in Chicago, the city was forced to renew curfews and warnings as large youth gatherings were organized online.
Commentators cite falling test scores, rising loneliness, and these kinds of viral clips of crowding downtown streets as proof that teens—and especially boys and young men—are angry, detached, and in decline.
But that framing misses the mark. Boys are not inherently in crisis, they are responding to one. The real issue is that there are too few systems and spaces intentionally created for them to engage, learn, and grow. The crisis is not boys. The crisis is belonging.
When institutions fail to offer developmentally attuned “third spaces” with caring adults, boys don’t simply retreat into apathy. They go looking for community on their own. Sociologist Ray Oldenburg described “third places” as the informal, low-barrier environments outside home and school where people form connection and identity.
Those spaces have largely vanished, replaced by screens, commercial venues, or programs that prioritize structure over self-expression. Cities need accessible, teen-affirming environments that don’t require spending money, scoring points, or earning entry.
– Stephen Tosh, CEO and executive director of The Boys’ Club of New York.