Dear Smart Boys,

Let me start with the obvious. You’re smart. We all know this, and I don’t think anyone is disputing it. You get high grades, you participate in class, and you clearly take pride in both of those things. You don’t have the same swagger as your Sports Boy peers, but you’ve got a kind of swagger, for sure.

You probably also like to hear yourself talk. And you probably feel a bit superior to your classmates, if you’re being completely honest—even if you would never, of course, say something like that out loud.

I know these things because I am a Smart Girl.

We’re not such a different breed from Smart Boys. We have the same glamorous GPAs and annoying tendency to interrupt other people during class discussions. We share a history of glowing teacher praise and inflated egos. Deep down—as deep as we can push it down, which sometimes isn’t as far as we’d like—we think of ourselves as better than everyone else because we have fast minds and faster mouths and we like showing them off.

And that’s a problem.

But that’s not why I’m writing to you, Smart Boys.

I’m writing to you because I am, even by your standards, your equal. I’m not the kid falling asleep in the back of the classroom or the one who hasn’t read the book before trying to discuss it. I’m not the kid who asks questions the teacher just answered, and I’m not the poor kid who tries hard but just doesn’t get it. (All of whom do deserve respect, too. But as I said, that’s a different article.)

No, I’m just like you. I did all the work, and I’m more than capable of analyzing it. I operate on your level, at your speed. But you don’t treat me that way. You don’t treat my Smart Girlfriends that way.

They’ve noticed. I’ve noticed.

We talked about it, once you were out of earshot, congratulating yourself on putting more words into the conversation you just finished than anyone else did. And we all agreed: you don’t recognize Smart Girls as your fellows.

In your mind, there is a very big difference between a Smart Boy and a Smart Girl. And don’t get me wrong, there is. Smart Boys don’t get called bossy or bitchy for asserting themselves. Smart Boys are complimented for playing devil’s advocate, and Smart Girls are the devil for advocating.

There is always going to be someone—probably many someones—in any classroom who automatically assumes my opinions are invalid and yours are facts. I have to prove myself every time I open my mouth, and you can throw all the words you know at the wall and see what sticks in everyone’s minds as brilliant. (And you do.)

That is a pretty big difference between us. But it’s not the one you see. The one you see is due to the same tired sexist mistake men have been making for millennia.

In your mind, whether you realize it or not, boys are smart until proven dumb, and girls are dumb until proven smart. And you, by your lofty standards, do not accept proof easily. Which is why you treat me and my fellow Smart Girls exactly the same as our Average Boy classmates.

You expect the boys' intelligence to emerge any second, given the right conditions and coaxing, but you do not see that the girls' has been there all along. You are patronizing to both groups. But to those of us who have presented you with nothing but the proof of our mental equality or even superiority—the credentials that should, all things being fair, unlock your respect in this conversation—this is especially infuriating.

Stop explaining what I just said to me. Stop making elaborate shows of just how much you’re humoring me when you agree with me. Stop talking over me.

Stop presenting my ideas as your own. Stop challenging every point I make just to assert your dominance. Stop assuming your gender makes your better than me and start realizing that your gender makes you assume you’re better than me.

And like any good Smart Person, start drawing conclusions based on evidence instead of assumptions.

Best,

A Smart Girl, your equal