kathsue some are saying that one of the reasons for the lawlessness and gang culture in cities is down to boys not having a father. I think there are lots of reasons and that is only one of them.
The reason I thought a role model would help in this case is because it sounds like his father was not a good example. How does a child decide how to behave if it has no one to set a standard? Ideally they need to see a spectrum of behaviour - both male and female, which happens in extended families who meet often, amongst people they share worship with, school teachers, or adults at a sports or other interest club they may belong too.
If the child lives with one parent and most of its other examples of adults are from books, tv, films etc then the virtual reality characters they see may have a particularly large influence on them, and too often, many of these characters are violent and/or abusive - because most teenage boys would choose to watch that over the akternatives. Yet how many families control what their children watch, or the computer games they play in the living room let alone their bedroom? ( Apart from Helen in the Archers! ). As well as today, many children in the past were brought up by a single parent, usually mothers, for example after the major wars, but usually there was more input from family and community. Today this is often missing, and although small children may be naturally caring and unselfish, all too often, and thanks to the media all around them, if left unchecked, they end up the opposite. ( As secret life of 4/5/6 yr old has shown us). Parenting is very hard for two parents, let alone one - and if they don’t have decent values themselves, where else will a child get a sense of right or wrong from? But the particular issue with a boy is, that at a certain age there is a lot of pressure to be a daredevil, macho and often, to ridicule and be abusive to women - including sisters and mothers and also to what they see as weaker, boys. That is where a decent, non violent male role model can make all the difference and why, without them, or enough of them, we can very quickly end up in a dangerous, violent society.