Responding to Male Allies UK’s “Voice of the Boys” report
Recent headlines often tell a simple story about boys: either they are in crisis, or they are the cause of crisis. The recently-released Voice of the Boys report reveals something much more layered: a generation growing up in profound uncertainty about identity, belonging and the future, and are turning to the online world to make sense of it.
This blog, co-written by Rupert James Alison from the Art of Consent and the Reimagining RSE team, explores what the report’s findings tell us about boys’ relationships with uncertainty and why our response needs to go beyond quick fixes and risk messaging. As Josh Sargent – the teenage author of The Guardian piece accompanying the Voice of the Boys report – writes, “we need to reframe how we talk about these issues: not as innately evil flaws in the young male demographic, but as an expression of uncertainty.” He asks, “can society expect anything other than uncertainty when masculinity… is almost always presented as toxic?” His words capture the confusion articulated by many boys in the report and speak directly to the relational and interpretive gaps that our Safe Uncertainty framework seeks to address.
The Safe Uncertainty framework thus offers a constructive direction for responding to the report’s findings. We suggest that while adults often respond with either certainty or paralysis, the framework gives both adults and young people the structure and support they need to co-navigate uncertainty relationally, by creating spaces to listen to and talk with young people, not at them. This approach offers a practical answer to what the report surfaces: boys do not need more certainty imposed on them; instead, they need more opportunities to make sense of uncertainty with others.
(For those unfamiliar with the Safe Uncertainty framework, here is a brief introduction).
Rupert James Alison designs and delivers consent training for university students through his organisation the Art of Consent. He is also a facilitator of the Wheel of Consent and has been facilitating consent workshops for adults of all ages for over 15 years.
Uncertain spaces
The report makes clear that many boys perceive that they lack places – physical, emotional and relational – where they can simply be themselves. Eighty-one per cent say there are not enough spaces to “be a boy” today, and almost three-quarters report having no more than one person who knows them “really well.” One boy’s heartbreaking reflection, “I don’t know myself well enough for others to know me,” captures both a sense of isolation and the difficulty of forming identity without supportive environments in which to explore it. These findings suggest that boys are navigating questions of selfhood largely on their own, caught between personal expectations of masculinity and the absence of relational spaces where those expectations can be unpacked.
What emerges here is not a lack of willingness to connect, but a lack of places where connection feels possible or safe. Boys want to talk about who they are and what matters to them, yet they often do not know where such conversations can happen without judgement or risk. In this context, uncertainty becomes more of an isolating force, rather than an ordinary part of growing up, which boys experience without the relational scaffolding needed to make sense of it. This isolation, the report shows, becomes a point of vulnerability: a space where loneliness, confusion and unmet emotional needs can take hold.
Uncertain relationships
The report shows that many boys are turning to digital environments to fill relational gaps they experience offline. Online gaming and social platforms are described as vital for maintaining friendships, with one boy remarking, “Online is the only place I can meet people who like what I like.” Yet, these spaces are shaped by performance, judgement and surveillance: they offer connection, but often in forms that make boys feel watched or observed rather than genuinely seen. In these contexts, boys can maintain contact without necessarily experiencing the mutuality, trust or depth that support emotional development.
AI companions extend this dynamic further. An increasing number of boys report using chatbots as friends, therapists or even romantic partners. As one boy puts it, “I talk to an AI app, it makes me feel like I’m not on my own.” These systems provide responsiveness and validation, but without the friction, difference or boundary-setting that characterise real relationships. The report warns that “AI companions can have a seriously negative effect on boys’ ability to socialise, develop relational skills, and learn to recognise and respect boundaries”, highlighting the risk that boys may gravitate towards interactions that feel safe precisely because they demand nothing in return.
What becomes visible is a pattern in which boys seek out forms of connection that minimise uncertainty and vulnerability. AI chatbots, in particular, offer a simulation of relational safety: emotionally available, non-judgmental and endlessly accommodating. They mirror some conditions of Safe Uncertainty – responsiveness, openness, attentiveness – but without the relational foundations that allow learning, repair or accountability. They thus offer the appearance of safety while removing the very dynamics through which relational skills develop.
In this sense, boys’ turn to AI does not signal indifference to relationships; it reveals a desire for reassurance when human support feels unavailable or difficult to trust. Here, the challenge for adults is not to compete with technology but to create relational spaces where boys can practise doing uncertainty with others and where connection is possible even when experiences, emotions or expectations do not neatly align.
Uncertain masculinity and the search for guidance
The report shows that many boys are growing up without a clear sense of what masculinity means or where they fit within it. Seventy-nine per cent say they are uncertain about what masculinity is, and the messages they do receive are often framed in the negative: “It’s toxic, that’s all I ever hear.” Rather than offering boys a language for exploring identity, dominant cultural discourses frequently position masculinity itself as suspect. This leaves boys navigating their own questions about identity without sufficient guidance, permission or nuance.
Into this vacuum step a diverse range of online figures connected to boys’ interests: cars, fitness, business, sport, pranks, gaming. Some of these figures use shared interests as an entry point for promoting sexist or misogynistic ideas. Yet the report makes clear that boys are not simply absorbing a monolithic ‘manosphere’. Sixty-two per cent say they do not trust the “sexist voices” listed in the survey. This matters, in that it shows that boys are not passive recipients of online ideology but active seekers of motivation, belonging and direction in a cultural landscape that offers few grounded alternatives.
What many influencers provide is a form of, what we term, safe certainty: clear rules about how to be a man, a formula for confidence and success, and a reassuring escape from the discomfort of ambiguity. When boys lack spaces to explore emotion, vulnerability or relational complexity – and when such qualities are coded as feminine or unmanly – certainty can feel like stability, through offering the promise of identity without the risk of exposure.
But this form of certainty has limits. It becomes unsafe certainty when masculine scripts are rigid, policed or tied to dominance and achievement; when boys feel they must hide or disown aspects of themselves to fit in; or when deviation from the script invites ridicule or exclusion. Instead of helping boys navigate uncertainty, it intensifies the pressure to perform a narrow version of masculinity that many do not identify with.
As the report reminds us, “there are billions of different ways to be a man, and men and boys deserve to step into every section of who they are.” A Safe Uncertainty approach aligns directly with this principle. It supports boys to explore masculinities not as a fixed identity to achieve, but as a relational and developmental process. By offering boundaries alongside openness and structure alongside genuine curiosity, it enables boys to experiment with who they are becoming without fear of judgement or loss of belonging.
What is missing, therefore, is not conviction about who boys should be, but relational spaces where masculinity can be explored as plural, dynamic and emotionally grounded. Safe Uncertainty provides a framework for creating such spaces where boys can question, reflect and imagine different ways of being without being pushed prematurely toward certainty or performance.
Uncertain futures
A broader sense of hopelessness shapes boys’ orientations to the future. The report shows that two-thirds of boys feel that school is not preparing them for what comes next, and 82% say they do not trust politicians. These perceptions feed into a wider emotional landscape in which boys are trying to make sense of adulthood with few assurances that the world ahead is stable or navigable. Many describe a daily pressure to cope: “I’m not even thinking about the future, just focusing on getting by each day.” Their uncertainty is not abstract; it sits alongside tangible concerns about housing, employment and global conflict, with boys as young as thirteen already worried about whether they will ever be able to afford a home, find secure work or live in a peaceful world.
It is unsurprising, then, that some boys want the school curriculum to reflect futures they can actually envision. Calls for “entrepreneurship and content creation” to be taught instead of “RE and useless subjects” speak to a desire for education to feel relevant, empowering and connected to the worlds they inhabit. The recently reviewed curriculum in England may begin to respond to these concerns, but the underlying issue persists, insofar as when future-oriented uncertainty is not held or explored with boys, it becomes a source of pressure and resignation.
These findings mirror other patterns described in the report: boys are not rejecting the future, but they lack relational and institutional spaces where questions about adulthood, purpose and direction can be worked through. Safe Uncertainty offers a way to keep these conversations open; not by promising certainty where none exists, but by helping boys face the unknown with adults who can tolerate ambiguity alongside them.
Adults are navigating uncertainty too
A striking theme in the report is boys’ sense that safe adults in their lives are physically present but not deeply connected. Many boys describe parents as busy, distracted or absorbed in work and their phones, and only 28% say they have more than one person who knows them “really well.” This relational thinness mirrors boys’ own struggles with uncertainty: adults, too, are finding it hard to make sense of boys’ digital lives, and their responses often reflect the same anxieties and pressures that boys themselves are trying to navigate.
These responses frequently take recognisable forms that map onto the Safe Uncertainty model. They are not signs of indifference or incompetence, but understandable reactions to a rapidly changing landscape in which adults feel responsible for boys’ wellbeing while also feeling overwhelmed by the scale and speed of digital influence.
One common pattern is unsafe certainty, where adults respond to boys’ concerns with judgement or dismissal; for example, attributing worries to “toxic masculinity” or implying that boys themselves are the source of the problem. Even when motivated by a desire to challenge harmful attitudes, this approach can easily fracture trust. Boys who feel blamed or caricatured are less likely to share their uncertainties with adults and more likely to turn to online voices that appear to offer recognition or belonging.
A second pattern is safe certainty, expressed through attempts to control, monitor or restrict boys’ online activity. Strict rules, bans and surveillance allow for short-term compliance, but without opportunities for joint meaning-making, boys often experience such measures as mistrustful or punitive. The report suggests that when boys feel controlled rather than understood, some seek out influencers or online communities that validate their frustration.
At the other end of the spectrum lies unsafe uncertainty, where adults feel overwhelmed or hopeless about boys’ digital worlds. This can lead to withdrawal, whether due to anxiety, fatigue or a belief that the terrain is simply too difficult to engage with. When adults step back in this way, boys are left to interpret digital content alone, guided instead by algorithms or peer cultures that may offer certainty but not relational or ethical grounding.
The alternative is safe uncertainty, in which adults create relational spaces that are boundaried, reflective and non-judgemental. Rather than providing definitive answers or avoiding difficult topics, adults stay engaged, ask questions and help boys think critically about what they encounter. Boys describe feeling more recognised, supported and able to articulate complexity in these environments. They also begin developing the emotional and interpretive skills that neither control nor withdrawal can cultivate.
Taken together, these patterns highlight our central argument: the problem is not boys’ uncertainty, but the absence of relational spaces in which that uncertainty can be explored with adults. Certainty – whether expressed as blame, restriction or despair – tends to close dialogue down. Safe Uncertainty keeps dialogue open while maintaining safety, modelling how to approach complexity rather than retreating from it.
Where does this leave us?
Across the report, a consistent pattern emerges: the issue is not that boys avoid uncertainty, but that they are often left to manage it alone. In the absence of spaces where uncertainty can be explored relationally, boys gravitate toward digital systems that offer clarity, responsiveness and the appearance of emotional safety. These systems are endlessly available, affirming and uncomplicated, but what feels safe in the moment can become isolating when there is no one alongside them to help interpret, challenge or contextualise what they encounter.
This is why the report points toward a practical task for schools, families and the wider network of adults in boys’ lives, which is rebuilding the relational and interpretive spaces that allow boys to do uncertainty with others. While we cannot out-shout or outpace the influencers who populate boys’ social feeds, we can reshape the environments boys rely on for meaning and belonging. This work need not fall on schools alone. Specialist organisations that deliver relational, consent-focused or gender-reflective programmes – like the Art of Consent does in universities – can play an important role in creating these spaces, modelling the collaborative and reflective practice that Safe Uncertainty depends on. Partnering with such initiatives enables schools to draw on external expertise while signalling to boys that uncertainty is something adults are willing to engage with, rather than pass back to them.
What the report ultimately makes visible is a collective responsibility to ensure that boys are not navigating uncertainty in isolation. By building spaces where they can bring questions, discomforts and mixed feelings into dialogue, and where adults remain present, boundaried and curious, we begin to replace the isolating certainty of digital systems with the kinds of relational safety that supports genuine growth.
A Safe Uncertainty approach
The report repeatedly emphasises the importance of safety, openness and non-judgement, precisely the conditions that Safe Uncertainty seeks to create. Contributors such as Lee Chambers speak of “creating safety” and “listening without judgement”, while initiatives like Progressive Masculinity highlight the need for “safe, non-judgemental spaces” where boys can explore who they are. The report’s own recommendations call for environments where boys are “listened to, heard, and feel safe to explore and express themselves.” Safe Uncertainty provides a practical framework for turning these aspirations into everyday practice in homes, classrooms and youth settings.
At its core, Safe Uncertainty rests on two commitments. The first is safety, whereby adults establish clear boundaries, ethical containment and role-modelled respect. Safety is not treated as an absolute state but as something co-created – best understood as safe enough or safe(r) – so that openness, curiosity and, indeed, discomfort can be navigated without compromising trust. The second commitment is to uncertainty, with adults supporting boys to explore ambiguity, complexity and conflicting values without rushing toward premature or overly simplistic answers. Safe Uncertainty is therefore neither a permissive ‘anything goes’ approach nor a delivery of fixed truths. It is scaffolded exploration, grounded in relationship.
This approach aligns with the principles of trauma-informed and relational practice, where safety is understood not as the elimination of risk but as the provision of tools, skills and relational support for navigating uncertain terrain. Instead of attempting to remove all ambiguity from boys’ lives, Safe Uncertainty helps adults create settings in which ambiguity can be thought about, reflected on and shared.
In doing so, the framework responds directly to what the report identifies: boys do not need more certainty imposed upon them, but more opportunities to make sense of uncertainty with adults who can tolerate complexity themselves. Safe Uncertainty is, in this sense, not a new idea but a way of naming and organising what the report’s voices already describe. It is a relational stance that helps boys develop agency, confidence and connection in the midst of uncertainty.
Practical moves for classrooms and homes
Safe Uncertainty becomes meaningful only when translated into everyday practice. The report suggests that boys want adults who can stay present with complexity, rather than defaulting to reassurance, control or avoidance. In practical terms, this means adopting approaches that open up space for reflection while still holding boundaries.
One useful step is to name uncertainty explicitly. When adults say, “this is complicated”, they legitimise confusion and model a way of engaging with questions that have no straightforward answers. Mapping out what feels unclear – whether it relates to desire, status, fear, peer dynamics or platform logics – helps boys understand that uncertainty is both normal and workable.
A second move involves exercising authoritative doubt. This does not mean abandoning authority, but holding it with humility. Adults can lead with confidence while remaining open to questions, showing boys how to weigh claims, evaluate sources and consider impact. This stance models critical thinking without collapsing into either rigid certainty or helplessness.
It is also crucial to adopt a relational stance, grounding digital literacy and conversations about online life in trust rather than suspicion. When boys feel connected to adults, they are more willing to share what they are encountering and less inclined to retreat into secrecy or defensive certainty.
Finally, adults can shift from scripted messaging to guided reflection. Instead of teaching boys the ‘right answers’ about masculinity, sexuality or relationships, educators and parents can facilitate conversations about care, consent, friendship, conflict and accountability. This approach helps boys move from rehearsing normative scripts to exploring what these ideas mean for them personally and relationally.
Together, these practices reframe masculinity as a process of becoming, not a fixed identity that boys must master in advance. They send a clear message that boys do not need all the answers and do not have to work them out alone. Safe Uncertainty offers the structure and relational support to make that message real.
Safe uncertainty as a shared developmental project
Despite the challenges highlighted in the report, its data also reveal something hopeful: many boys are actively striving to care for others, to be fair, and to seek support when they need it. They express a desire for peace and equality in the world and articulate a wish for boys to be free from restrictive emotional expectations, articulated through refrains such as: “boys don’t always have to be seen as strong and not allowed to cry or show emotion.” These reflections challenge dominant narratives that paint boys as disengaged or resistant. Instead, they show boys asking for spaces where they can develop emotionally and ethically, without fear of judgement or contradiction.
Safe Uncertainty offers a developmental framework that aligns with these aspirations. It supports boys to cultivate the skills needed to navigate ambiguity rather than avoid it. This includes emotional literacy, which helps boys name and reflect on complex feelings without shame; self-awareness, which allows them to recognise motivations, vulnerabilities and relational patterns; critical reflexivity, enabling them to question messages, assess sources and observe power dynamics; and relational security, grounded in the knowledge that they can ask questions, express confusion and still belong.
These competencies are not simply individual traits but relational achievements and skills that grow through dialogue, responsiveness and shared exploration. Safe Uncertainty recognises that ambiguity in gender, intimacy and identity is developmentally typical, particularly for adolescent boys navigating pressures from peers, family and digital cultures. Instead of trying to eliminate that ambiguity, the framework provides both boys and adults with ways to stay in conversation when things feel unclear.
In this sense, Safe Uncertainty is not only a strategy for RSE or safeguarding but a shared developmental project. It invites boys and adults to learn alongside one another, through creating environments where uncertainty can be held rather than feared, and where relationships become the grounds through which boys can grow into more expansive, confident and connected versions of themselves.
Moving forward
The Voice of the Boys report is not a call to panic about boys; it is a call to listen to them. Boys are telling us clearly that they want space, trust and meaningful dialogue. They want opportunities to explore who they are, who they hope to become, and how they matter to others. These desires do not stem from fragility or indifference, but from the challenges of growing up in a world where identity, intimacy and the future feel increasingly uncertain.
Meeting this ask requires a shift in how adults engage with boys’ uncertainty. Rather than offering premature certainty or stepping back when things feel overwhelming, adults can work alongside boys to make uncertainty a shared practice. Safe Uncertainty provides a way to hold this stance: it supports adults to stay present, curious and boundaried, and, in turn, helps boys bring their questions, doubts and hopes into relational dialogue rather than navigating them alone.
The report and the Safe Uncertainty framework both point toward a simple but powerful shift from trying to control how boys navigate uncertainty to ensuring they do not have to navigate it in isolation. Boys are already telling us what they need. Safe Uncertainty provides the tools, structures and relational practices to hear them, respond thoughtfully and build the kinds of environments in which boys can thrive.