Great cartoon/ zine on why girls want to be boys.

[FriendofJoanne]

Saw this courtesy of Glinner and think it sums up issues very well. I'm going to share on my FB along with the stats of UK referrals to GIDS up 4000% for girls in recent years.

realitygirlzine.substack.com/p/october-zine-update

It does sum it up rather well. I'm sure some people will have many many many problems with it though. Mainly because it's all true.

I guess this begs the question with regards to what changes re parents being able to keep their kids grounded in reality.

This is how its always been. And many if us went to school in times where there was different PE for girls akd boys. Where the girls PE lit was pe knickers. ( nightmare for any primary school girl who got her period) where girls couldn't wear trousers to school.

Where porn wasn't an Internet search but a magazine left in every den kids played in and in bushes on the way to school.

Where bra fittings weren't a private event in a cubicle but done in the middle of a shop floor in M&S in front of everyone

Where you were asked for blow jobs in art class.

And where girls couldn't go to scouts.

Why, despite much of that changing. Despite the idea of not wearing trousers to school sends kids into shock now things are the way they are.

Can it really all just be the Internet?

I remember arguing with my mum as a kid because she thought computer games were part of the reason my brother was so aggressive to me at times. But I have neen watching horrors since I was 9/10 and I've never once attacked anyone with a flame thrower or slashed someone in their sleep.

I always said to ny mum of someone is so easily influenced by this stuff you had problems before that anyway.

Why are kids so much more easily influenced. And what changed with parents?

And sorry for another post but I also just thought about something else.

How it seems to be fairly standard for each generation as teens I guess to make out you have it worse some how. That despite grandparents who worked from 13 while raising siblings whole parents worked long hours. Despite water heat and food not being a regular occourance for them. That some how kids who get to go to school, be kids, not have responsibilities of jobs and siblings and each generation being more and more able to access what they need more and more instantly ( before we hit this current cost of living crisis anyway) that somehow they find a way to make out they have things worse. Until we have reached the point where having a mum.and dad and everything you need is not something to be grateful for but something that stands in the way of the high school race to the bottom. Theres something wrong with you if there's nothing wrong with you.

When did we go from rolling our eyes at the sheer entitlement and immaturity of the victim mentality. To indulging it and allowing our kids to create these self fulfilling prophecies. And enabling/creating these medical quick fixes for what are essentially proveliged first world problems.

I think it's a combination of the internet and changes in society - I grew up in the 70s/80s so even kids tv was only on for a limited time each day. We had to make our own entertainment. I either played by myself or with my brothers. Other kids would play out and meet up with each other but it wasn't encouraged by my parents and we didn't live in a road where kids did that.

With girls social contagion is a big aspect of it - there have been mass outbreaks of other mental health issues among girls before such as anorexia and self harm. I've read this and heard it discussed on podcasts but can't remember which to link to. I think Stella and Sasha (psychoherapists) have an episode on it in their Gender A Wider Lens podcast.

The internet makes it easier to spread ideas both among those children who are spending more time on social media and less time socialising in real life. That's why there's a strong link to kids on the autistic spectrum, because socialising in real life is harder for them. It also makes is easier for adults to share ideas and has made it easier for paedophiles and other fetishists to link up with each other and normalise their behaviour.

On top of that you have the social justice warriors who believe they are doing the right thing is 'supporting' children to be their 'authentic selves', also accessing children via the internet, but also in schools. Our society has become more individualised too, it's all about personal fulfillment instead of working together, that links to the rise of capitalism.

But schools were aware of social contagions. They ignored the goths and the orange people and let them get on with it for the most part. Cutters amd anorexic etc were dealt with .

They didn't indulge it like they do with gender.

In the 80s and perhaps before you'd have been told to shut up and stop being ridiculous and wear your uniform/put on the dress granny gave you for 2 hours at her party etc. This idea everything had ti validate your identity just didn't exist.

I get that the Internet makes things worse. But I do wonder if there is an element of the fact that as we now have so much instant gratification , 24 hour supermarkets, amazon prime, Netflix box sets ( no waiting a week for an episode ), that we have created a need to find a "problem" elsewhere. And parents having a need to " fix it" and that becomes the parents identity

Excellent piece.

This is great. As someone who was anorexic and bulimic as a teen in the 90s this all resonates so much with me.

This is really very good.