[JBotAlan]

I think we have two camps misunderstanding each other. I could be wrong, it's happened once or twice before, but...

I don't think anyone on this thread is taking the position that the behavior I've described (borderline stalking) is acceptable and nothing should be done about it, at least that isn't how I'm reading what's happening in this thread.

To put it into my own terms, I was a social outcast coming into FIRST, and really my peers, mentors, other students' parents and my teachers did a very good job of forming me, teaching me norms, dos and don'ts, and correcting misbehavior along the way. I made folks uncomfortable completely unintentionally. I said some nasty things that I had no clue were nasty until I saw the reactions on peoples' faces. And this was all in the process of learning the norms that my classmates had long picked up by this point in life. This social formation is singlehandedly the best element of what FIRST did for me along the way to graduation and college.

I think what the posters have tried to express is not "boys will be boys" but rather that this is an ugly, messy, painful, screwed up process in which mistakes are going to be made and people are going to need correction and help understanding and getting through.

I figured I would get called out on specifying that the female is on the receiving end of male misbehavior. I'm sure it does happen in the reverse, I'd never claim it doesn't, but the examples I've had at hand have all been male misconduct. I don't mean to make a statement of fact about either gender and I am genuinely sorry if my remarks came across to the contrary.

Jacob