The War on Tomboys: How Both the Right & the Left are Threatening a Beloved American Archetype

In this thought-provoking episode, Malcolm and Simone Collins explore the growing threats to the tomboy archetype from both the political left and right. They discuss how the left's push for gender conformity through the trans movement is leading to the medicalization and erasure of tomboyish girls, while the right's embrace of a narrow, hyper-feminine ideal is alienating those who don't fit the mold. The couple also delves into the cultural roots of American tomboy femininity, contrasting it with the more prissy and fragile ideals found in Eastern European and Muslim cultures. Throughout the conversation, Malcolm and Simone highlight the value of strong, industrious women and the importance of preserving the tomboy spirit in the face of mounting pressures.

Malcolm Collins: [00:00:00] So both the left and the right have in their own way declared war on tomboys. So the left has done this in the trans movement. So the trans movement says, if you are a girl, but you like a boy, like things like dressing like a boy and you like, you're not a tomboy.

You're a boy.

Good morning, y'all. Quick update on the house, because I've been pretty terrible about giving y'all these. This went viral on Twitter with the caption, This accent needs to be illegal, and women should be banned from doing manual labor like this. Lebanese women are literally perfect. And they're actually feminine, unlike estrogen deficient American women who hold the record for the highest testosterone levels in the world.

Malcolm Collins: Which is interesting because it shows that she doesn't seem to understand what testosterone does in women. They're there, the rate to which they are sexually interested.

It increases how prominent their cheekbones are. It decreases their weight. Pretty much everything that your average American man finds attractive in a woman. You're not like a guy, like [00:01:00] high cheekbones, get rid of those cheekbones.

I like a girl with a formless doughy face. But so this woman is explicitly arguing for a, Eastern European slash Muslim iteration of femininity, which is very different from the form of femininity, which is traditional within American culture.

Some people look down on me, but I don't give a rep. I stand there footed in my own front yard with a baby on my back.

Cause I'm

Would you like to know more?

Malcolm Collins: So we're doing the tomboy episode right now, right? And the tomboy apocalypse that our species is currently facing.

What? We'll talk about the tomboy apocalypse. Tomboy. So for people who don't know this term, it's a, it's an American term. It means a girl who is predisposed to acting like a guy and dressing like a guy. So in my generation, it's a [00:02:00] bit different from this generation because now most Tom girls have been depleted and we'll explain what happened there.

Tomboys. Tomboys. But in my generation, this would have been the girl with the, ponytail through the baseball cap, who was a little bit sporty. Yeah. The freckles from being out in the sun a little too much like hunting, like fishing playing outdoors a lot. And it was a little more masculine than other girls, like to wear when my thing, Oh God.

And I just drool over this when I see it, like my classic tomboy trope is when they go out And they would go swimming with us. There was one that I had a big crush on. , the board shorts was bikini. Oh, I did that.

Maybe you would have liked me. Oh, I would have. Oh, that was so cute. You did the board shorts cause the bikini, come on, that is peak hot. Tom girl was the, oh, and I've seen your body back then. You were pretty

Simone Collins: ripped. It was nice. No, I looked terrible. Like a linebacker sometimes. But

Malcolm Collins: as a linebacker and not like a tomboy, come on that is.

Simone Collins: Yeah, I would. Yeah. [00:03:00] To simply define tomboyism. It is for a young woman to show a higher than average number. of male gender dimorphic behavioral traits. So playing sports, being more physically active, being more physically aggressive, being more assertive, those were all tomboy traits and often more dressing like a boy.

So I had some friends when I was little who weren't actually that tomboyish in behavior, but they were often seen as a tomboy because they had older siblings that were all boys. So of course they were tomboyish. Male clothing as a hand me down kind of thing. So they came across as tomboys like in, in there's this picture of me with one of my friends on our first day of kindergarten, and she's wearing this like old pair of overalls.

She has her hair in a ponytail. It's got like a shirt and I'm wearing the frilliest dress you have ever seen. And we look completely mismatched. So I think that's something that also comes up to outfit choices and who's dressing you can influence whether or not you're perceived as a tomboy.

But what's this apocalypse or are we running out of [00:04:00] tomboys? I didn't think. Oh,

Malcolm Collins: yes. In a huge way. So both the left and the right have in their own way declared war on tomboys. So the left has done this in the trans movement. So the trans movement says, if you are a girl, but you like a boy, like things like dressing like a boy and you like, you're not a tomboy.

You're a boy. You're a girl. Your boy. Yeah. Yeah. Because they're gender essentialists, right? So they look at these girls who prefer, playing video games and doing boy like hobbies, their anime and stuff like that. And they go you're not a girl. You're a boy that explains why you like boy like things.

Simone Collins: Essentially. So people in especially certain circles of society are not being allowed.

Malcolm Collins: I don't know if you say allowed if you're talking about permanently chemically castrated, having their breasts removed surgically while they are preteens [00:05:00] and yeah, sorry, it's a bit more than allowed like they are Surgically mutilating tomboys because they do not gender conform to the left's binary gender ideology.

And if you're going to say here, nobody ever transitions because they were socially pressured to, this is just an obviously untrue statement. Otherwise, D transitioners wouldn't exist. Or I guess you could say all D transitioners or faking it. You can invalidate somebody's lived experience when it goes against your ideology, but you must affirm it.

If it goes along with your ideology, instead of admitting that maybe both sides are true, maybe there are real trans people, but there are also people who are socially pressured to transition when it.

wasn't the right decision for them. And what I can tell you is every young tomboy girl I have met. In the past, maybe five years or so has confided in me that they have [00:06:00] felt enormous social pressure to transition. And some have even reported incidences to me, of individuals calling them transphobic for presenting masculine traits, but not transitioning or not adopting. , male, gender pronouns. Or at least non binary gender pronouns.

And if you think I am. Exaggerating here are the comments under that random image of a tomboy. I found the very top one.

Is encouraging them to think of themselves as gender non-binary or trans and letting them know that they will receive social affirmation. If they do that.

Simone Collins: Doesn't this mean that I would be a really wonderful dystopian national leader? Because I just have so many diplomatic ways to word things.

Malcolm Collins: What do you mean by that?

Simone Collins: That I, I don't say things like that. I'm just like they're not allowed to be tomboys.

Malc