The last decade has boy pupils educational achievements, educational practices and position in school in relation to girl pupils been discussed in many countries. The Boy Crisis, to paraphrase a report by Michael Kimmel (2010), has in Sweden as in many other countries been highlighted as a gender equality problem and a masculinity question. Although, trans-national discourses flows presenting boy pupils as a failing group and masculinity as a cause not are new, some interesting changes can be noticed. For example are boy pupils today not only pointed out as marginalised group, but also described as a problematic group and thereby in need of special treatment and change (Nordberg 2008). In this paper are theoretical and methodological questions raised with relevance for the development of critical research on men and masculinities. The analyse is grounded in a deconstruction of how theories and findings generated in critical Northern masculinity research have been repeated, taken up and articulated together with failing boys discourses and other discourse flows in the contemporary knowledge production on boys, masculinity and schooling in three Nordic educational settings Sweden, Norway and Denmark. The deconstruction has been made as a part of my GEXcel research. Three dominant practices are highlighted and discussed: the fixing of masculinity as a main cause, the drive for generalisation and the focus on specific individuals and groups of individuals. Further is it described how the research practices discussed have come to shape and restrict the masculinity analyses and the knowledge produced on boys and schooling in settings studied.