You came into the classroom early, and at first you were quiet. You let me talk to the teacher about the SAT, and how many questions I could miss and still get a good score. It wasn’t really an open conversation because neither of us were looking at you, but you still felt compelled to enlighten with your intellect.” I can miss five questions and still get a perfect score” I said to the teacher. The teacher nodded and was about to reply when you interrupted and said “Actually…”.  I don’t understand where the burning desire to correct me comes from. You must be really confident in what you know, and it makes me wonder how far people who know what they’re talking about could go if they had that kind of confidence. Or maybe you just love hearing the sound of your own voice. That distinct, robotic puberty stricken weasel tenor that a lot of guys our age have. I don’t know why you are under the impression that everyone wants to hear it so badly. 

It’d be one thing if you were about to say “Actually…” and correct me with actual correct information, but when you told me I could actually miss 30 questions and get a perfect score I just had to ask you if you had actually taken the test yourself. And guess what you said. In case you forgot, your answer went something like this. “Well my dad told me I could miss 30 problems, so even though I haven’t taken it yet I know I can miss 30”. My jaw has dropped due to a few things like seeing the illustrated version of Harry Potter and hearing Kamala Harris speak. But aside from twitter posts, I have not had my jaw drop because of exposure to sheer ignorance. Not only did you think your comment was so important it warranted you interrupting a private conversation, you were shameless enough to cite your dad as your source. I don’t know who your dad is but unless he took the test recently, I can’t help but doubt his credibility. Also, I didn’t mean to hurt your feelings when I said “Just because your dad said it doesn’t mean it’s true”. But it’s true.

I had heard of people complaining about mansplaining, where males cut off females in order to condescendingly explain something. But I expected it to only apply to adults, you know like men. I guess I was wrong because there is such thing as boysplaining. So someone call National Geographic and tell them the Dodo bird hasn’t gone extinct, it’s alive and I just got a chance to hear him speak. But make sure you also tell them that he isn’t the only one, because they’re actually everywhere. When they say they wish girls liked sports, but the second you say you do they explain the whole game to you like you didn’t already know. Or when they talk about how they are feminists and explain to you what feminism is. I’m actually just going to be honest and tell them that just because they have two sisters, it doesn’t make them a feminist. Everyone is related to a female even President Trump.

To prevent another boysplainer from becoming a mansplainer, there’s a lot we can do. I’m not saying we don’t want to hear from guys. Everyone deserves to be heard. But because everyone deserves to be heard, guys, you need to let people finish what they’re saying and actually listen to what they’re saying.