> The Problem with 'Boys Will Be Boys'

For months, every morning when my daughter was in preschool, I watched her construct an elaborate castle out of blocks, colorful plastic discs, bits of rope, ribbons and feathers, only to have the same little boy gleefully destroy it within seconds of its completion.

No matter how many times he did it, his parents never swooped in BEFORE the morning’s live 3-D reenactment of “Invasion of AstroMonster.” This is what they’d say repeatedly:

“You know! Boys will be boys!” 

“He’s just going through a phase!”

“He’s such a boy! He LOVES destroying things!”

“Oh my god! Girls and boys are SO different!”

“He. Just. Can’t. Help himself!”

I tried to teach my daughter how to stop this from happening. She asked him politely not to do it. We talked about some things she might do. She moved where she built. She stood in his way. She built a stronger foundation to the castle, so that, if he did get to it, she wouldn’t have to rebuild the whole thing. In the meantime, I imagine his parents thinking, “What red-blooded boy wouldn’t knock it down?”

She built a beautiful, glittery castle in a public space.

It was so tempting.

He just couldn’t control himself and, being a boy, had violent inclinations.

She had to keep her building safe.

Her consent didn’t matter. Besides, it’s not like she made a big fuss when he knocked it down. It wasn’t a “legitimate” knocking over if she didn’t throw a tantrum.

His desire — for power, destruction, control, whatever- - was understandable.

Maybe she “shouldn’t have gone to preschool” at all. OR, better if she just kept her building activities to home.

I know it’s a lurid metaphor, but I taught my daughter the preschool block precursor of don’t “get raped” and this child, Boy #1, did not learn the preschool equivalent of “don’t rape.”

Not once did his parents talk to him about invading another person’s space and claiming for his own purposes something that was not his to claim. Respect for her and her work and words was not something he was learning.  How much of the boy’s behavior in coming years would be excused in these ways, be calibrated to meet these expectations and enforce the “rules” his parents kept repeating?

There was another boy who, similarly, decided to knock down her castle one day. When he did it his mother took him in hand, explained to him that it was not his to destroy, asked him how he thought my daughter felt after working so hard on her building and walked over with him so he could apologize. That probably wasn’t much fun for him, but he did not do it again.

There was a third child. He was really smart. He asked if he could knock her building down. She, beneficent ruler of all pre-circle-time castle construction, said yes… but only after she was done building it and said it was OK. They worked out a plan together and eventually he started building things with her and they would both knock the thing down with unadulterated joy. You can’t make this stuff up.

Take each of these three boys and consider what he might do when he’s older, say, at college, drunk at a party, mad at an ex-girlfriend who rebuffs him and uses words that she expects will be meaningful and respecte, “No, I don’t want to. Stop. Leave.”

The “overarching attitudinal characteristic” of abusive men is entitlement

paintdoktahwho:

fatwink:

alternateperfection:

fatwink:

“i know right?” is one of the most satisfying things to hear

I know right ?

psilentasincjelli:

If I ever tell you I’m going to sleep and then you see me posting or liking things online for about an hour immediately after that, I promise I wasn’t lying to you, I’m just bad at going to sleep and it is usually a long process that begins with disengaging from any sort of immediate contact with people (chats, for example) and ends when everything on my screen is blurry and I’m hallucinating plot points I haven’t written yet

weedrichards:

YOU KNOW THAT FEELING WHEN YOU FIND A NEW FAVORITE CHARACTER AND YOU CAN FEEL YOUR SANITY SLIPPING AWAY FROM YOU AS YOUR HEART BURSTS FROM YOUR CHEST AND YOU SCREAM THEIR NAME TO THE HEAVENS

roncheg:

it seems, i’m back home=D

quick Thor+Loki sketch)

 dedicated to a new <younger and cuter:3> version of ChrisHemsworth-without-a-beard*_*

bonertouch:

i want to write a highschool au of avatar: the last airbender and all it will be about is how zuko gets upset that he’s not in honors classes

bluekulele:

missivywinters:

Girl Talk with Ivy Winters and Michelle Visage - Drag Race finale Party (5/6) (by rockmetalinc)

Ivy Winters is wearing rubber ducky earrings I cannot