As a kid, there was no room for sooks or cry babies. We played in the mud, we dropped food on the floor and picked it up and ate it.

And, if we got hurt, our mother would shove some iodine on it, tell us to stop our moaning and go outside to play.

I remember when I was told, when having a tantrum or a hissy fit “ if you want to cry, I’ll give you something to cry about. “

We weren’t tougher back then. We just weren’t allowed to get away with crap.

So it brought me back to something I wrote a while ago about burping, farting and scratching balls.

 Boys need to learn how to be men and not be told to apologise for sweating, swearing, being “ gross” and saying that girls are stupid. Heavens, ., I have brothers and I know what boys are like. They need to learn about male bonding, not being lectured about their sweaty palms, smelly feet or preoccupation with “ what’s for dinner? “

Having known a number of boys in my younger years; my older years as a mother and even older days as a grandmother, I have learned a thing or two about boys.

" He "  will sit quietly and politely when in the presence of she who holds the keys to the pantry and the lock on her bank account. He will smile sweetly and compliment her on how young and pretty she looks and know, that with luck, this is the key to open the kingdom to her “ good books. “

An extra few bucks in the holiday spending account and an extra dollop of ice cream on his pudding or a new skateboard never go amiss, particularly if Grandma or Mum are the ones dishing out the goodies.

When he reaches manhood, this well brought up fellow will become a good husband. He will assure his wife or girlfriend that she is the prettiest girl he has ever met and he will equally sit down at ease with her parents and offer diplomatic lip service to them.

He will be able to go out to the shed or man cave and join the menfolk with such ease that he is soon one of them.

Does this make him a fraud? No. It makes him smart. Clever. He will be a man. Not some man bun wearing, vegan wimp who can’t change a tyre or feed his family or stand up to fight off a mob of raving leftie luvvies throwing avocadoes at him.

This brings me back to the lad I am thinking of when I write that I remember when kids were tough.

This particular young man has been brought up by his Mum.

He hasn’t been allowed to get away with crap.

When he is with his Mum, he plays tennis, plays a musical instrument, works hard at school and is very diligent with emails to his family members from throughout the world. He is a good lad.

He is polite, dutiful and respectful.

And he spent 3 weeks with his Dad in another country, in a male environment and no one cared if he made his bed each day or burped, farted or scratched his balls.

His vacation was spent camping on the shores of a lake. He was surrounded by men. They went boating, fishing and hiking. They swam. They laughed. They told jokes. Each night, they would sit around a campfire and eat. A LOT.

I saw a photo of him. He was standing beside a river, looking very pleased with himself, smiling a broad smile and he had the shrug of a bloke in his stance. This was not a young kid: this was a young man about town: someone who had self confidence.

This was a photo of a young man who knew who he was and was quite happy with what he had become and was becoming.

He had been initiated into a club. The club of blokemanship. 

He looked COMPLETE.

Yes, that was it. He seemed to have found himself and was very happy in that discovery.

Young lads need to have some blokey time and, while I am not much of a fan, I have to be fair: burping, farting and scratching their balls is as important to young men as giggling, plucking eyebrows and not farting is to young women.

 Can we please get off their backs and allow them to be young men? To grow up and discover their rites of passage into adulthood without the lectures and apologies for being born the wrong colour or the wrong sex?

These are the young men who will grow up to be fine husbands and fine members of our society. They may be called on to fight to protect their nations in some hell hole; or these days, even on the shores of their own countries.

We have to stop traumatizing our young lads with kids propaganda by Climate Change alarmists, virus fear mongers and rabid leftists who have twisted and tormented kids minds for political ends.

Let our children be children. Let our boys be boys and let them, please, burp, fart and scratch their balls.

Because we may need some men with balls. And it could be sooner rather than later.

Harry and Boris and few others around the world need to remember this.