More thoughts on “Their Dangerous Swagger”

In Maureen Dowd’s Op-Ed Column at The NY Times titled Their Dangerous Swagger she brings to light the abhorrent behavior of a group of boys who all attend an elite private school in Maryland called Landon. The reader will learn that collectively the boys gathered together and formed a “Fantasy Football Style Draft” in what turns out to be a predatory game targeting entering high school freshman girls.

Girls ages 14 and 15 targets of a predatory game? Has the world gone mad? The purpose of the game was to select girls that fit a particular description, draft them to a fantasy team, and later invite them to a party where the individual boys would manipulate them emotionally in order to have their way sexually-which depending on what they managed sexually-would earn them points.

Based on the article it is clear that these boys spent time mapping out the details of this highly offensive game. Details from how many points for each base they landed to “schmoozing” with the parents. From where I sit that is pre-meditated sexual assault of the worst kind.

Let’s look at the school. Landon is an elite school for boys whose “ABOUT US” tab on their website states the following:

“Landon School is an independent, non-sectarian day school for boys in Grades 3-12, that prepares talented boys for productive lives as accomplished, responsible and caring men whose actions are guided by the principles of perseverance, teamwork, honor and fair play.”

“Actions,” interesting choice of words given the age old axiom; “Actions Speak Louder than Words.” Apparently the actions of these boys are not fostered by the “honor” and “fair play” portions of the description but they certainly have the “teamwork” component down. Their team that is, which leads me to the murky waters of the “Good Old Boys Club”

The good old boys club, we have all heard of it, many of us have experienced it… that houseless fraternity and yuck it up bond that exists between certain men. The “I’ll scratch your back if you scratch mine” sort of behavior that for years has run boardrooms, governments, and homes. It is high time that the men who do not subscribe to this reprehensible mentality stand up and say, “ I do not belong to your macho culture.” The only way we can begin to stop horrific acts of violence against women, is to spotlight men and boys who are wedded to a different perspective. An outlook that embraces women as equals and looks to collaborate rather than tear down.

There are plenty of them out there too…we need to begin highlighting boys who truly understand ethics and character. We need to spotlight men who are disgusted by this macho mentality that only serves small mindedness. And for goodness sake we have got to start saying as a society that people may not hide behind a code of silence that is spurred on by gender based cardinal rules. Rules whose actions lead to a silence is golden mentality.

The Landon school has words all over their website that claim they are feeding the minds of boys to “work together to eliminate all forms of disrespect.” Really? The world is watching and candidly the cop-out response of the administration to protect their elite class of boys and fall back on their curriculum which boasts of “an extensive ethics and character education program which includes as its key tenets respect and honesty.,“ is a joke. Furthermore when Jean Erstling, the director of communications at Landon, is quoted in Maureen Dowd’s article she states; “Civility toward women is definitely part of that education program.”

Well Ms. Erstling I’d say your school is failing because what these boys did is anything but civil. If the consequences for the boys who created their fantasy game did not include expulsion then one could surmise that Landon is harboring the opposite of what you claim.

Hats off to Maureen Dowd who closes with “Young men everywhere must be taught, beyond platitudes, that young women are not prey.”

What a sad testimony that something as basic as a girls right to be seen as a human being worthy of respect, needs to be taught.