Yes, and also I think some of it has to do with the gendering of collaborative and creative play. Boys seem less likely to respond positively to a peer member writing fanfic, because they aren't taught how to play collaboratively as much as girls are. https://twitter.com/xiranjayzhao/status/1264315439246540800

When I was five, I made up stories about equally with my friends of all genders. Somewhere around 7-8, the boys quit wanting to play that way: it became about fighting and winning, and I wasn't interested in those vestigial stories.

I wanted to play "Pony Congress Sends Representative To Barbie Parliament To Negotiate Trade Agreement", or "Star-Crossed Ponies Reunite Feuding Herds", or "Ponies Seek Out New Grazing, Accidentally Make First Contact With Cat People"

I quickly learned that boys were being taught to play by hurting each other, either directly or by proxy. They didn't have any mental tools for play that was about creating things together.

I think that fed into who was easily integrated into the fandom spaces of my youth, which were very much of the "two cakes" variety: everyone gets encouragement and support, and together we tell stories. Boys could and did join—but I think many found it weird and alien.

And I think it made them less equipped to tell fandom stories in general. Girls got toys that explicitly valued storytelling in someone else's world. What else is a Barbie Dreamhouse for?? Why have Felicity's desk if Felicity doesn't go to school?

Boys … got things for telling stories about fighting. Which is a type of story, to be sure! But it's a type that is very, very easily represented in video games, and all over comics … which ties back into OP's point. They *got* their stories.

But they also weren't encouraged to think about or make up the kind of stories that girls were. You can tell hundreds of stories about going to school, and there will always be more to tell, because there's always "but what happened next?"

When you tell a story about fighting, it's over when someone wins. Boys were never encouraged to look beyond that. You fight, you win, it's over.

And yes, this thread is very binary and very much about my own childhood. So not all boys, things are changing, gender is complicated, etc, all the caveats.

But for where we are *today*, the fandoms we have *now*, I think it's worth thinking about.