Olivia: Jackson, quick question. What percentage of college men, when surveyed, admit to coercing a woman into a sexual activity? Jackson: Oh, wow. That's a heavy start. I don't know... that feels like a number that should be low, but I'm guessing it's depressingly high. Maybe 10%? 15%? Olivia: Try over 50 percent. More than half. Jackson: No way. That can't be right. More than half? That's... staggering. What is going on? Olivia: That's the central question Peggy Orenstein tackles in her incredibly timely and widely acclaimed book, Boys & Sex: Young Men on Hookups, Love, Porn, Consent, and Navigating the New Masculinity. After her groundbreaking work on girls, she realized the conversation was dangerously incomplete. She spent two years interviewing over a hundred young men, and what she found was a world of confusion, pressure, and a desperate hunger for guidance. Jackson: So she's not just pointing fingers; she's trying to understand the source code of the problem. I'm in. Because a number like that doesn't just happen. It's manufactured. Olivia: Exactly. And the manufacturing plant, as Orenstein frames it, is a place she calls 'Dick School.'

Jackson: 'Dick School.' Okay, that's a term that gets your attention. It sounds like a boot camp for emotional detachment you never even signed up for. Olivia: That’s a perfect way to put it. It’s this invisible curriculum that teaches boys what it means to be a man. And the core syllabus is what researchers call the 'man box.' It’s a rigid set of rules: Don't show emotion, except anger. Be dominant. Be a player. Never be weak. Never be 'like a girl.' And above all, your problems are your own. You have to deal with it. Jackson: I can almost hear a drill sergeant yelling that. But is this 'man box' really that powerful? Are boys actually policing each other this intensely? Olivia: It's relentless. And the consequences for stepping outside the box are severe. Orenstein tells this powerful story about a young man named Cole, an 18-year-old getting ready for a military academy. He describes himself as a 'typical tall, white athlete guy.' Jackson: So, a guy who, on the surface, has a lot of social power. Olivia: Precisely. But he feels completely trapped by it. He's on the crew team, and one day, a senior is bragging in a really vile way about manipulating a female classmate. Cole and another sophomore, a friend of his, actually speak up. They confront the senior. Jackson: Wow, good for them. That takes guts. Olivia: It does. But what happens next is the lesson. Cole notices that his friend, who also spoke up, sees his social standing just plummet. He's ostracized. He's on the outside. And Cole, watching this, has this chilling realization. He says he was afraid to 'spend' his social currency by speaking out again. He wanted to fight the good fight, but he concludes, "I could try to be a social justice warrior here, but I don’t think anyone would listen to me. And I’d have no friends." Jackson: That's just heartbreaking. It’s like high school is this brutal social economy and being a decent human being can bankrupt you. He has to choose between his conscience and his community. Olivia: And that choice is enforced with brutal efficiency. The primary policing tool is language. Homophobic slurs are used constantly, not always out of actual homophobia, but as a way to keep every boy in line. Any sign of sensitivity, vulnerability, or deviation from the norm gets you labeled. You 'act like a girl,' or you get hit with a slur. Jackson: So it’s a constant performance of toughness, because the alternative is social death. Olivia: Exactly. And this has devastating effects on boys' mental health. Orenstein cites a national survey where a third of boys felt they had to hide their feelings when they were sad or scared. Another third felt pressure to just 'be a man' and 'suck it up.' And when they feel angry, over 40 percent say society expects them to be aggressive. Jackson: It's a pressure cooker with only one valve: anger. And what happens when that pressure cooker is put into situations involving intimacy and sex? It sounds like a recipe for disaster. Olivia: It's a disaster that often plays out on three fronts: porn, hookups, and consent.

Jackson: Okay, so they're trapped in this emotional box. I can't imagine that prepares them well for the complexities of a real relationship. Olivia: It doesn't. In fact, for many boys, their first and most consistent sex educator isn't a parent or a teacher. It's the internet. Specifically, pornography. Orenstein tells the story of Mason, a 19-year-old college sophomore. His parents were emotionally distant, never talked about sex. So, naturally, he turned to the internet. Jackson: As millions of kids do. Olivia: And he describes his porn use as being as integral to his life as brushing his teeth. It started in seventh grade and just escalated. But it warped his perception of everything. He developed body image issues, unrealistic expectations about what sex was, and a complete inability to connect emotionally. The women in porn weren't people; they were objects, props in a fantasy. Jackson: And that fantasy becomes the script for reality. Olivia: Until reality hits back. Mason meets a girl, Jeannie. And for the first time, he has intercourse. But what’s profound is what happened before. They talked. For an hour. They shared their anxieties, their histories. It was vulnerable and real. And afterwards, Mason has this epiphany. He says, "The naked body, that's a very vulnerable thing, you know?" He realized that true intimacy wasn't something he could find on a screen. Jackson: Wow. So he had to unlearn the entire 'Dick School' curriculum to have one real moment of connection. But what about the guys who don't unlearn it? The ones who get good at playing the game? Olivia: That's where we meet one of the most fascinating and troubling figures in the book: the 'Feminist Fuckboy.' Jackson: I'm sorry, the what? A feminist... fuckboy? That sounds like a walking contradiction. Olivia: It is. Orenstein introduces us to Wyatt, a handsome, popular dance major at a liberal arts college. He's the kind of guy who can talk eloquently about consent, respect, and gender dynamics. He says all the right things. But his actions are purely about conquest. He uses his 'woke' vocabulary as a tool to get what he wants, racking up partners to brag about later. Jackson: How can a guy like Wyatt be so self-aware yet so... damaging? It's like his brain and his behavior are in two different solar systems. Olivia: Because there's a huge gap between intellectual understanding and deeply ingrained cultural programming. He knows the words, but he's still playing the game for status. He's performing feminism the same way he performs masculinity. It's all about the win. And this performance-based approach to sex has real, measurable consequences. Jackson: You're talking about the 'orgasm gap,' aren't you? Olivia: Exactly. The data is stark. In hookups, studies show that while a high percentage of boys climax, the number for girls is drastically lower—sometimes less than half the rate of boys. Because when sex is a performance of masculinity, the goal isn't mutual pleasure. It's a successful performance for the man. It's not about connection; it's about conquest. Jackson: So the hookup culture that's supposed to be so 'liberating' is actually just reinforcing the oldest, most tired gender roles imaginable. The man conquers, the woman is... the territory. Olivia: Precisely. And Wyatt, the 'feminist fuckboy,' eventually has a crisis of conscience. After a particularly empty encounter, a friend calls him out, and he realizes, in his own words, "I was becoming... the kind of guy who says all the right things, but still treats women badly. And that feels horrible." Jackson: So even the guy who seems to be winning the game feels like he's losing. Olivia: Because the game itself is rigged to make everyone lose. And that leads to the most difficult part of the book: what happens when the performance causes real harm, and the performer still thinks he's a 'good guy'?

Jackson: The 'I'm a good guy' defense. I've heard that one before. It's the shield that comes up right before the denial. Olivia: It's a shield almost every young man Orenstein interviewed used. "I think of myself as a good guy. I am a good guy. But..." And that 'but' is where so much harm lives. Because as one boy astutely observes, "Everyone thinks they’re a good guy... So no one thinks they’re a rapist except maybe in the worst situations. And you know what? Most of the time, not even then." Jackson: That's terrifying. Because if everyone is a 'good guy' in their own story, then accountability becomes impossible. Olivia: It becomes nearly impossible within our current systems. Which is why Orenstein explores a different, more challenging path through the story of Sameer and Anwen. They were college students. One night after a party, they had a sexual encounter. From Sameer's perspective at the time, it was a success. From Anwen's perspective, it was sexual assault. She felt pressured, coerced, and violated. Jackson: And what happened when she confronted him? Olivia: Initially, his reaction was pure self-preservation. Fear. What would happen to him? But Anwen said something that changed everything. She told him, "I want you to name it." She wanted him to acknowledge what he did. And this started a long, painful, and ultimately transformative journey for both of them. Jackson: What did that journey look like? Olivia: Sameer started educating himself. He took consent workshops, read books, and for the first time, really listened to his female friends' experiences. He and Anwen started a dialogue, facilitated by the school's director of student conduct, who was interested in restorative justice. Jackson: Hold on. Restorative justice for rape? That's a huge ask. My first instinct, and I bet a lot of listeners feel this way, is that this lets him off the hook. Where's the punishment? Olivia: And that's the critical question. It's why this approach is so controversial. But Anwen's perspective was profound. She said the traditional system, the formal hearing, "creates resentment because the verdict is just handed down by someone. There’s never a point where you get to understand the other person as a human being." She didn't want him just punished; she wanted him to understand. Jackson: She wanted him to see the full scope of the harm he caused. Olivia: Yes. And through this long process, he did. He had to read her written accounts of the night, to sit with her pain. It wasn't about excusing his behavior; it was about forcing him to confront it in a way a simple guilty verdict never could. The process culminated in him taking public responsibility, writing an article for a campus magazine and co-writing a spoken-word piece with Anwen that they performed together. Jackson: That's... unbelievable. That takes a level of courage from both of them that's hard to fathom. Olivia: It's an extraordinary story. And Sameer himself says it best. He reflects, "Nights like the one with Anwen are so common. That’s how guys learn to operate... our level of understanding of how to communicate and navigate sexual relationships is so infinitesimally small." He realized he wasn't a monster. He was a product of a system, of 'Dick School,' and he had a responsibility to unlearn it and help others do the same.

Jackson: So after all this... the 'man box,' the porn, the messy hookups... what's the takeaway? Is there hope? Because a lot of this feels incredibly bleak. Olivia: The hope, Orenstein argues, lies in moving beyond just 'consent' as a legal baseline. Consent is the floor, not the ceiling. The real work is in teaching emotional literacy. It's about building a new kind of masculinity, one that values vulnerability, communication, and empathy as strengths, not weaknesses. Jackson: It's about raising better people, not just 'better men.' Olivia: Exactly. And Orenstein leaves us with a really powerful thought. She asks, "If guys are supposed to deny their own violation, how can they feel compassion for a girl’s? If they can’t say no, how are they supposed to hear it?" Jackson: Wow. That puts it all in perspective. It's like we're only teaching one half of the equation. We're telling girls to find their voice and say no, but we're not teaching boys how to listen, or even how to understand their own feelings enough to respect someone else's. Olivia: And that's a conversation that needs to happen everywhere—in families, in schools, between friends. It's not about blame; it's about building something better, together. We'd love to hear what you think. What conversations did you need to have growing up that never happened? Let us know on our social channels. Jackson: This is Aibrary, signing off.