The double standard she lives by: she dates to marry, he dates to play
We’ve all seen fan–favorite teen dramas right? The rebellious teen girl is forbidden from having a boyfriend per parents wishes. She sneaks out to house parties, doing things and meeting people too old for her age. She has a bad-boy boyfriend against their wishes. When her parents find out… Chaos erupts! Meanwhile, the dashing teen guy has met the girl of his dreams and is showered with praise and affection. He gets a slap on the back, and is quickly welcomed into the adolescent dating pool.
Why is that? What do guys have freedoms that girls can only dream of? In this article we will dive into the facts and the intimate 7 reasons why parents are keen on sheltering their daughters while they let their sons go wild.
1. Girls Get Protected, Boys Get Permission
Girls are preserved and guarded for long-term relationships, while guys need to learn how to be in one.
When it comes to relationships, society as well as many religions have a specific mold that men and women have to fit into in order to eventually be a perfect spouse. For girls it’s keeping your purity and staying innocent. You have to focus on a good career and maintaining a stable lifestyle. You have stricter curfews, your parents keep an eye on all the clothes you wear — nothing too short or exposing! — so you aren’t drawing in the wrong crowd. For girls, growing older is about waiting for your turn to blossom for the perfect man.
For a boy, from the moment your born life is about one day settling down and being a good husband and father to your wife and beautiful children. This is the reason that oftentimes there is so much freedom when it comes to boys dating in their adolescent years. They need to have fun, to have experience, in order to one day take care of a wife of their own. Parents and belief systems push this burden onto men, which is why boys date first and girls are a little more reluctant to the possibility of a relationship leading to a vicious cycle in the media and in teens today. There’s also many of the consequences girls face when they do decide to take that leap of faith in their first relationships…
2. Reputation vs. Responsibility
Teen pregnancies are a lot more common than you think. Girls are forced to face difficult daily decisions while boys learn to hold no accountability.
Teen pregnancies have always been a difficult topic. Who is to blame? What’s next? Are you now young parents? One thing to know is that the phenomenon of teen pregnancies is what makes parents even more unlikely to allow their children to date, specifically daughters, since they are biologically able to bear children.
Boys do face a consequence for teen pregnancy, but it’s not as heavy a weight for them as it is when a young girl finds out she’s pregnant. She must make an important decision that will ultimately change the course of her life. On the other hand boys are not held to the same accountability as girls are, since they have that freedom to date at a much earlier age than girls are able to without any natural consequences.
3. Not Talking = Fear and Control
Parents and schools avoid the important conversations of sexual safety because there is a sense of uncomfortability and not wanting to break the innocence of youth.
Parents often avoid the importance of sex education, handing it off to schools, who never teach all the sides of the issue. Sex ed in schools teaches things like: ‘don’t ‘do it,’ but if you do end up having sex, just use a condom.’ This hand off and the improper teaching of sex education has led to a sort of unspoken rule to not talk about it around teens for the reason that it’s too uncomfortable.
Parents as well as educational institutions need to learn that we can no longer disassociate ourselves from sex using logic and science. There are so many sides to sex, some beautiful and some ugly, that are so important. Unfortunately, teens never learn about all of this because the adults in their lives don’t take that extra step and bring in the emotional side of being in a relationship and potentially having sex. There are so many teens who would’ve done so well with these conversations. They probably could have gone about dating a lot differently if they learned not to be so uncomfortable with the many concepts of sex.
4. Dating Is A Distraction But Only For Girls
Relationships are merely distractions for girls that sway them from important milestones.
In the world’s eyes, relationships may be too much to handle for a girl in her adolescence where hormones are high and she simply can’t help herself. They are distractions that will only wind them up in places that will make them undesirable. Parents often encourage their daughters to date later in life when they are emotionally ready, and believe dating will only be a waste of time with no real depth, unlike the relationships you have when you’re an adult.
There are no distractions for boys, who go full force into dating whenever they can. Parents encourage dating for boys because there is no consequence for their dating history. It is assumed that boys can only develop the emotional readiness and mindset of men if they experience dating earlier in life.
5. Parents Mean Well But It Hurts
Parents only want the best life for their children but it only solidifies our struggle for sex equality.
When you have a child, no matter if you’re a mother or father, there is always an unspoken duty to devote your life to the child that you have brought into the world, and hope that you’ve done all you can to make them the best adult they can be. However, this precious duty parents hold dear often hurts their children in the long run, continuing to solidify a divide that so many have tried to break free from.
Overprotectiveness can backfire. When teens feel constantly monitored, they don’t become obedient, they get sneakier. They lie, hide relationships, and do exactly what their parents are trying to prevent. Parents may feel they’re doing what’s best, but sometimes overprotection builds more fear, shame, and resentment than it does trust. And if that pressure wasn’t enough, the media just makes everything worse by turning dating and sex into entertainment.
6. Love is A Game on TV / The Horrible Habits We Need To Break IRL
It’s time to get our heads out of the screens and away from superficial couples. Let’s cherish the relationships that shows have made us long forget.
Reality TV glamorizes male dating behavior by turning it into a game of wooing girls. Shows like “Bachelor,” “Jerry Springer,” or even “Love Island” feature a dissociation between men and women. This reinforces the belief that relationships are challenges for men to win, not partnerships of mutual responsibility. When teen boys are shown dating in this way they are less likely to develop any type of emotional responsibility, especially when something as serious as pregnancies happen.
While these shows are lovable, they disassociate us from the relationships we care for most. Before we even had the idea of romance we had our parents and our friends, which did not suddenly give us the belief we’d be alone. We have developed the idea that if we don’t have a romantic or sexual partner we are alone, or even worse that there is no possibility of someone looking our way. We need to recognize that we have already lived with love. Our friends and family — they were there before any partner in life, they are our love. We need to learn to not take that for granted. Partners are not our missing piece, but a bonus that compliments our lives. Once we learn this, not being in a relationship won’t make us feel so alone in this world.
7. Boys Feel Pressure Too
Patriarchy is to blame for the dating double standard between young men and women. Not all boys fit this patriarchal mold that was made for them, they find hardship in their own rules.
A good stigma doesn’t mean it still doesn’t hurt. Boys in much of the media and in life are praised for their accomplishments when it comes to ‘getting the girl.’ Boys are told to grow up too fast without restriction or accountability. While there is this sense of boundless freedom, this expectation to date early hurts. Boys are told from the start that if you aren’t able to get a girl you are worth less. You are pushed constantly to start dating, to have that dashing smile and sweetheart personality that attracts girls.
Boys go into relationships infatuated with the reality T.V. idea of a relationship and lacking the emotional maturity a relationship requires. This results in the more likelihood of abusive relationships; hurting themselves and their partner. This is why boys can grow up to act arrogant and careless in adult relationships, hurting everyone overall.
