While the rest of the world talked about Will Smith from the lens of a celebrity meltdown, I’m reflecting on what our young boys are taking away from this situation. If you are unclear of the situation that I am referencing, I am speaking about Will Smith slapping Chris Rock at the Oscars for insulting his wife, Jada Pinkett. In my work I regularly engage and educate others around the experiences of black boys, and how caring adults need to leverage their understanding of social emotional learning in interacting with them. Social emotional learning (SEL) is an educational construct that helps students learn the competencies of self and social awareness, decision-making, and relationships. However, what we don’t talk about enough with boys is the competency of self management.
In our world there are daily experiences that serve as lessons for boys to develop into mature, responsible adults. The learning comes during, and after, being faced with situations and reflecting on how they choose to respond to it. What people need to understand is that boys regularly measure their growth and development up to a mirror of their peers. “I bet you I can run faster than you”, “I bet you I’m stronger than you”, I bet you I can beat you in [insert any game here], etc. I’m sure you’ve heard this verbal exchange before. Some days they win, and they feel on course in their development. Some days they lose, and they realize that there is a lot to learn and do to become better than the next person.
In situations that feel more threatening, there is a part of the brain called the amygdala which monitors our response to that situation. The amygdala’s function is to regulate emotions. Often, our responses can be instinctual and manifest in two ways: fight or flight. For example, when faced with the threat (ex. verbally attacking a loved one in a public setting), Will Smith chose to confront the threat. That’s an example of fight (or conflict) to resolve how he was feeling. Because this was so out of character for him, some may say his amygdala was hijacked. In the moment, he likely thought that his man/personhood was more respected with that response. Let’s note that he also had the opportunity to take flight meaning that he could have paused, avoided, or averted the threat. At that moment, he was obviously unable to do so.
If you recall, I mentioned that self management is an underutilized SEL competency, particularly with male learners. Engaging in self management, or emotion talk as I like to describe it, can help boys situate themselves when confronted with a threat. In many challenging instances, boys don’t utilize the language of “I’m concerned, fearful, depressed, scared, stressed, frustrated, or anxious” to name a few. I don’t encourage that they live in that space, but they do need to learn to acknowledge the feelings associated with those words. If they don’t recognize that feeling, they believe that they only have the options of fight or flight leaving little room to process other potential responses to a situation. This is why harmful mistakes happen because many boys have only learned one way to respond to an uncomfortable feeling.
Now this issue is not just something that Will Smith has introduced in this moment, but it is part of the societal culture that we live in. Without self management, boys can be drawn in and consumed by some of the toxic expectations of manhood. As an educator, I’m always thinking about how to help my boys navigate the thinking, feeling, and potential toxicity of a given situation. My thoughts are always with Black boys as they have the most to lose with every situation as they will be scrutinized and consequenced to a greater degree should they respond inappropriately. It is a must that this conversation complement any teaching or mentoring on leadership, success, or manhood.
My course of action is simple: I help boys to learn how to reset. It’s the most important thing I can teach them. They must learn to operate with patience, process the situation, recognize how it makes them feel, and then determine how to remedy the situation. Will Smith put his thirty year legacy on the line with one swift action. Although many are disappointed in him, Will will have the opportunity to reset. He’s too smart and brilliant not to. Plus he’s rich, so it makes his situation possible to mend. As educators we need to get in front of as many boys as possible with this type of thinking, feeling and learning. We need to make sure they know how to think through situations and reset before they lose all opportunities to do so. Unfortunately, we know many won’t get a second chance.
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