When I was little, I remember being chased around the playground and harassed by this one particular little boy. I tried not to let it bother me, but one day I was left in tears and ran to tell a teacher all that had been happening. She sat me down and called the boy in from the playground to make him apologize. After she said he could go, I was about to leave as well, but she had some parting words for me. She told me that it wasn’t that big of a deal, and he probably just liked me— boys will be boys.
I didn’t understand, so I went home and asked my mother. She agreed that there’s not much to do, because that’s just the way they are. As I got older, the boys exchanged playground antics for inappropriate jokes and bra snapping. I remember commiserating with a friend about it, but by the end of all of our complaining about the injustice of it all, she just shrugged it off. I remember her telling me to just let it go, there was nothing we could do about it—boys will be boys.
A few years later, when I was about to leave for college, my dad sat me down and said, “Remember, boys only want one thing, and they will do or say anything to get it.” He told me I needed to always be careful, never go out at night alone and make sure I never set down my drink at a party. At the time, I stayed quiet and nodded along, this was good advice. But the more I thought about it, the more I began to wonder why this advice was necessary. I asked him, and he said the same thing that I had been hearing all of my life; that’s just the way things are—boys will be boys.
This is not an uncommon story, ask any girl you know, and she will be able to come up with an instance of this sort of behavior. We know it’s wrong, but nobody seems to be doing anything about it. But when is the moment that it goes from cute playground antics to something much more frightening? When we let these things slide because that’s how it’s always been, then we are all at fault. Boys can be boys, but I also expect them to respect others.
