Sorry to confirm your observations and be a first-commenter female here, but you're right.

The men are not around and I think the women carry part of the guilt.

Oftentimes, we tend to push them away from everyday activities and often have the (wrong) feeling that if they can't do something as well as we do it, they shouldn't do it at all.

I think the absence of males from all these social environments is particularly affecting the young boys who could take tremendous advantage of having male role models to look up to.