Can Tomboys End The Cold War Between the Sexes?

My coming of age was during backyard football. One boy in particular was trash talking nonstop, so when I got the chance, I trucked him over. We were around 10 at the time, so gender differences weren't so pronounced yet. Afterwards, the male brain revealed itself to me. The other boys hooted and hollered at me for holding the line against him. They never let that loud-mouthed bully forget he got beat by a girl. But the days of outside rough-and-tumble are slowly dying. Today's kids are playing outside less . Half of all teens spend at least four hours a day on social media, and the average teen spends 4.8. At the same time, kids are stepping into a period where a cold war between the sexes continues to escalate. This gender war leaves boys and girls to cultivate lives in different ideological worlds as marriage rates continuously decline. There's less playing together and more separation in their own incubated social media corners. There will always be gender qualities that separate the sexes, yet this shift has made things even more polarizing. Men and women just don't understand one another . Boys and girls really do feel like the opposite sex is from Jupiter. Yet, bridging the gender gap won't be solved just by getting off social media. The next generation of screenagers needs to relearn the art of play, and the girls can help do that by using the age-old tradition of being a tomboy. What is a tomboy? A tomboy is a wild, spirited girl who enjoys things that are typically associated with boys: wrestling, seeking adventure, taking risks, playing outside, throwing a football, collecting cars, and getting dirty. It's the girl who never stuck with dolls and never wanted to stay in a dress for too long. At the core of a tomboy is an adventurous spirit, one that complements boys'. Little girls should have permission to climb trees and get dirty outside without being told they're actually born in the wrong body. A growing " trans war on tomboys " has made it more difficult for little girls to be rambunctious without being pathologized for their normal childlike behavior. Girls who just want to play outside with boys aren't gender nonconforming , as some recent studies suggest; they just want to keep up with their playmates. The relieving part about the term "tomboy" is that it acknowledges that there are differences between boys and girls, and that is good. Little girls should have permission to climb trees and get dirty outside without being told they're actually born in the wrong body. Puberty will naturally take over and soften them out. In fact, letting girls lean into more boyish behaviors might help balance the oversaturation of chronically online kids, especially since girls today get roped into womanhood prematurely. Accelerated sexualization There's a lot of pressure on young girls to conform to a stereotype on social media. Girls are spending the most time on social media . Videos of young girls putting on full faces of makeup, wearing revealing clothes, having perfectly curled hair, and polished acrylic nails flood the internet and their malleable brains. Only 55% of children play outdoors for at least an hour during the weekday. As playing outdoors decreases, social media use increases, with 70% of 11- to 15-year-olds having at least one social media account; TikTok is the most common. A study found that girls exposed to sexualized media internalized the sexualization and had far greater negative body image issues, grooming young girls to mature well beyond their years. Revealing clothes, makeup, lavish skin care routines, the latest materialistic trends, and calorie counting are pillars of their childhood before they get to enjoy the freedom of what it means to play. These miniwomen skip out on a vital lesson of beauty: childlike whimsy. Tomboy days toughen a girl's skin while holding fast to the pure nature of girlhood. They don't need beauty products to build their castles in the skies; they'd rather build them on the trees. It also purifies their sense of identity by forcing them to wrestle with their differences. 70% of 11- to 15-year-olds have at least one social media account; TikTok is the most common. Tomboys skip out on the comparative and drama-filled girlhood days where insecurities and jealousy over materialistic goods bury a girl's creative childlike spirit. They live in the pure world outside, full of adventure, away from technology. They don't quite fit in with the girly girls or the boys, so they learn to survive on the playground. This innocent sense of wonder gets magnified when playing alongside boys, shoulder to shoulder. Studies show that children who wrestle are associated with greater social competence, better interpersonal problem-solving, and greater emotional regulation. Learning to play with the opposite sex helps children to understand the strengths of each gender early on. Through rough-and-tumble play, girls begin to understand that boys are strong and think more logically. Boys soon learn how girls are more sensitive and verbally expressive. As a result of the process, boys learn what makes girls cry, and girls learn what makes boys feel encouraged. And most importantly, boys and girls get a taste of what it means to experience a shared adventure. Tomboys end the cold war When children learn social cues through rough-and-tumble play and risk-seeking adventures, they become adults who understand that flirting is a grown-up version of play. But as kids continue to spend more time online than in real life, the drought in the dating world will continue to make marriage rates decline, increasing male loneliness and declining birth rates . In 1967, about 85% of 25-year-old women had ever married, along with 75% of 25-year-old men. Almost 60 years later, only 23% of 25-year-old women and 20% of 25-year-old men have been married, the Institute for Family Studies found . By 2050, one-third of American men and women who are 45 years old will likely be single. This "cold war" is mainly a diverging political one, Caroline Downey writes for National Review . Young men are growing more conservative as more young women grow liberal, with 38% of Gen Z men identifying as Republican and only 20% of Gen Z women , making it the widest gap among any other previous generation. This brings major division on larger questions of fundamental morals that are necessary not only to couple up, but to stay coupled up. "Men and women of older generations, even when their political registrations differed, were cut from a similar cloth and shared a mutual respect that's lost among today's young adults," Downey writes. Today's kids are cut from different corners of the internet instead of the same playground. And when kids stop knowing how to play together, the grown-up version of play, flirting and romance, will continue to be a struggle. Adult playfulness is a direct contribution to relationship satisfaction. With girls being naturally more relational, the encouragement of tomboys can help rekindle what it means for boys and girls to socially interact with one another. It also helps them understand the opposite sex. Being a tomboy helps girls go behind enemy lines and understand the importance of an adventurous, boyish spirit. It helps boys and girls grow to understand what makes women and men complement one another. Adult playfulness is a direct contribution to relationship satisfaction. A hunger for this playful romance can even be seen in women's desire for a "yearning man." "Entire generations of romance were built on a single, unshakable premise: When a man really wanted a woman, nothing on earth could stop him from making sure she knew it," Brea O'Donnell writes for Evie . #MenWhoYearn edits have been going viral on social media recently, focused on characters like Noah Calhoun from The Notebook , Mr. Darcy from Pride and Prejudice , and even Conrad Fisher from The Summer I Turned Pretty . To a certain extent, men written by women are commonly feminized and distorted from masculine attributes. The obsession with these types of men shows a lack of realistic understanding women have toward men. Yet, the hope women have to be pursued by a man with a boyish, whimsical nature is something to encourage. To have a man pursue a woman despite the risks because a woman is a worthy adventure is something both sexes should desire. Dating today has warped into excluding risk. There will always be risks and the inability to fully understand the opposite sex. But what if encouraging girls to throw a football with the neighborhood boy could help decrease challenges we see today? Being able to draw upon shared experiences of danger and adventure could help the sexes understand each other and encourage future men to be more inclined to pursue such experiences. And what better way to fight the Cold War than to go back to our roots at the playground?