( CNN ) -- My son had barely taken his first breath when the people in the hospital started telling me how lucky I was . Not because he was healthy , mind you , but because he was a he . `` It 's easier to raise boys , '' I was told . And for a while I actually believed them . Then I started paying attention . Did you know boys are more likely to drop out of high school than girls ? Or that there are more female college students than male ? And did you know the imprisonment rate for men is roughly 15 times higher than the rate for women ? If this is what boys being easier to raise than girls looks like , coul ` d you imagine how many men would be in jail if raising girls got any harder ? We worry so much about girls getting hurt -- and justifiably so -- but interestingly enough , the stats show it 's our boys who are more likely to get robbed , attacked or even murdered . We see girls as fragile orchids and boys as plastic plants . But let 's face it : At the core of this line of thinking is n't safety -- it 's sex . When someone offers this piece of advice , it 's with the thinking that girls have to be protected from boys who will say and do just about anything to get in their pants . What 's typically missing from this discussion is the challenge to parents -- particularly fathers -- not to raise a liar and a cheat . True , parents of boys do not have to worry about them coming home pregnant , but does that mean an unplanned pregnancy can be considered `` the girl 's problem '' ? After all , a boy 's girlfriend did not get pregnant asexually . That 's why I 'm Tebowing day and night , hoping my 15-year-old has the will to stay away from sex -- even though the world all around him tells him there 's something wrong with him if he does . Easier ? Ha . Try different . A little girl who likes to play sports is called a tomboy . A little boy who does n't like to play sports is called weird . A teen girl who says `` no '' is called a good girl . A teen boy who says `` no '' is called a sissy . A lot of words describe what it 's like for parents who are trying to teach their teenage son how to be his own man in a high school setting that demands conformity , but `` easy '' is not one of them . I know , I know , `` boys will be boys '' is the accepted rule of thumb . But given that we have a federal department that hunts down and sometimes arrests deadbeat fathers , does n't that raise the question : What kind of boys are we raising ? And if they 're dropping out of high school at a faster clip than girls , why do we think raising them is easier ? Last year , I wrote a piece with the headline `` Parents , do n't dress your girls like tramps . '' I received a lot of e-mails from offended readers who told me I had no idea how hard it was to avoid buying sexy clothing for their little princesses . I usually responded by reminding them I never said it was n't hard . And then I asked if they 've ever seen the words on many of the T-shirts aimed at young men . They may not be blatantly inappropriate , like a cut-off shirt that reveals their bellybuttons , but if I had a dollar for every T-shirt I 've read that sexualizes the words `` balls , '' `` sticks '' or `` size , '' I could retire . I guess if parents do n't care if their son thinks being a man begins and ends with his penis , then yes , I can see how some would think raising a boy is easier . But if you 're actually trying to raise a gentleman , and you hear LMFAO rap `` I 'm running through these hos like Drano '' -- as they do in `` Party Rock Anthem , '' the second most popular song of 2011 -- then you 're not breathing a sigh of relief because it 's so much easier to raise a boy . Instead you 're wondering how much of what you 're trying to teach him soaks in , versus what our culture says is OK. We 've made so many advances as a society in terms of gender equity , and yet we still hold on to this nonsensical double standard that celebrates sexually active boys while demonizing their female counterparts , as if we can have a lot of one without the other . This kind of thinking is handed down from generation to generation almost as soon as the umbilical cord is cut . But how can we continue to believe boys are easier to raise than girls , when only 42 % of custodial moms received all of their child support payments in 2009 ? Some see loose women in that statistic . I see some men who are punks . Perhaps if we stopped viewing raising our boys as easier , we would n't have to deal with so many men who still behave like boys later in life . Follow CNN Opinion on Twitter . Join the conversation on Facebook . The opinions expressed in this commentary are solely those of LZ Granderson .
When his son was born , people told LZ Granderson it was easier to raise a boy . Boys are more likely to be dropouts and go to jail , he says , less likely to go to college . The problem is that the same thing happens with women who have children out of wedlock - they're not as good at raising them or making sure their kids get an education than men are. Girls can be tomboys , he writes , but boys are bullied if they are n't `` male '' enough .