Cootie Catcher
It took only one word to destroy my playground reign in elementary school: cooties. Heck, that shiz was real and every boy feared being isolated in the all too physical prison that came with having “cooties.” And let me tell you, that was no momentary condemnation, the recovery process could take anywhere from hours to years to wear-off. Phrases like, “John has cooties! EWWWW!!!” dripped liked venom from countless girl’s fangs all too often. But let’s face it… John was a nice kid; just because he sneezed a lot and liked to eat his cookies with his backpack over his head didn’t give the girls the right to banish him to “cootie land.” And there was no taking it back either; one girl found you slightly repulsive and before you knew it all the playground girls crawled away from you like ants. However, we were promised hope: Cooties couldn’t last more than the seven years of grade school and afterwards everything between boys, girls, and relationships calmed down-HAHA!-Not. If you thought cooties were bad, it’s a cake-walk compared to the pubescent stages that came in junior high. Even if during this time you managed to get close to a girl, most normal conversational brain functions were flooded with thoughts of clothes, urges, and… “Oh my God dude! I can totally see down her shirt!” Girls grew in more ways than one, and this was on the minds of most teenage boys; but OH JESUS! DON’T LOOK AT THEM! God forbid someone think of you as a “Pervert.”
“Oh did you hear John? He was talking about sex and just being so disgusting!” Welcome to junior high, the awkward years that everyone looks back on and thinks, “What the hell was I wearing? Did I really let my hair get that long? Braces, I can’t believe I thought those were cool!” And as I stated above, a lot of things changed in the transition from grade school to junior high; however, the only thing that changed about us guys-to-girls situation was that our “cootie cells” became a “pervy prison.” We went from one damnation to another. If a girl heard you even mention the “S” word then you underwent the very painful evolution from cootie to perve! And your chances of encountering a wild girl decreased to about zero (Pokémon references). I guess the point of these depressing recounts of many boys’ childhood is to point out that growing up through school, boys in general were looked upon as disgusting and perverted. And then when we hit high-school and college there is a complete 180¬¬¬o and girls suddenly desired the perverted d*bag who gets s***-faced every weekend. But this is a completely logical result simply because our peers created this situation by condemning us boys into these “classes” in which the main focus is breaking rules and having sex.
Looking back on my life I have seen too many guys that just make me want to hypothetically strangle a baby. Guys that are so cocky about themselves that they have just accepted this stereotype of “being a guy.”
“Oh no baby, I’m not drunk… I’m just intoxicated by you!!! Let’s bang.”
We all know one of these guys, or we are one of these guys, but this common presence of these guys just means that this behavior is fairly commonplace; and sadly, today’s society openly accepts this as okay.
“Oh, so John totally asked me for nudes last night, and I was like, ‘Um, no you perve! You have a girlfriend.’ But I didn’t say anything to his girlfriend because you know, he’s totally just being a guy.”
This conversation would not surprise a whole lot of teenagers or high-school students. You present this exact situation to a junior high, high school, or college student and this isn’t a conversation that would shock or surprise John’s fellow peers
(Disclaimer: John is an entirely fictional character. Any similarities or resemblances of an actual person are merely coincidental and should be disregarded.)
Growing up I made declaration to myself that I wouldn’t allow myself to get this way. In eighth grade I joined a mentoring program in which I was partnered up with a few guys my age and a mentor who was in his early twenties. Most of our days consisted of video-games, food, and lounging around the house. Now this guy had a great sense of humor and I can’t count the number of hilarious experiences we have had: ultimate wedgies, turkey runs, and ultimate pushups, all of which ended in absolute embarrassment for someone. However, he taught me much more than just simple pranks; he taught me that there is more to being a man in today’s society than being vulgar, disgusting, and offensive to others. He taught me that there are goals to strive for in order to be a role model. There are numerous texts, such as the Bible, The Canterbury Tales, and Thousand and One Nights just to name a few, that date back to the earliest times of history that in great detail describe a very specific role for men and women to play in their society. Sadly, today’s generation has not even come close to how a man or woman is portrayed in these texts—especially men. Trying to compare the average day “man” to these people of earlier times is like trying to compare penguins to pineapples- it just doesn’t work!
Now while this paper does focus loosely on teenage awkwardness and sexual urges, it is meant to point out that our society has come to allow the guy who is irresponsible and outright just plain stupid to be a role model for a generation. I cannot count the number of articles and papers I have read that have analyzed the effects of societal pressures on impressionable teens. In the end, the conclusion is that women are practically forced to conform to the 34-26-34 standards, and that guys are conforming to the image of ginormous pectorals and miniscule minds. But the sad truth is that our society does not place enough pressure on men and that the societal standards that men specifically have come to represent are the wrong ones. No longer are people concerned about courtship or respectfulness, but rather what we can get from each other and not what we can give to others.