Maybe He Just Likes You

In 2017, the #MeToo movement swept across social media as a response to sexual assault allegations made against Hollywood director Harvey Weinstein. Although the hashtag was originally used in 2006 by American activist Tarana Burke, it regained popularity and became a viral phenomenon when the women Weinstein assaulted took to Twitter to share their stories. The purpose of the hashtag was to allow survivors of sexual assault to find community with one another and share their stories free of judgment, and over time, the hashtag came to represent the collective experiences of all survivors of sexual harassment, abuse, and assault.

An alarming trend emerged as the #MeToo movement spread in popularity and more survivors shared their stories. In September 2017, over 3,000 British women were polled and asked if they had ever experienced sexual harassment. According to the YouGov survey published on Statista.com, over 50% of respondents aged 18-24 reported experiencing some level of sexual harassment in the last five years, which would make some of them as young as 13-19 years old when the harassment took place. While these numbers might sound shocking, numerous studies have confirmed this trend of higher rates of harassment among young teenage girls. According to the American Association of University Women, public schools grossly underreport sexual harassment. In the 2015-2016 school year, 79% of public schools servicing grades 7-12 reported no incidents of sexual harassment. However, approximately half of students reported experiencing sexual harassment during that school year. Sexual harassment is not strictly an adult problem: It is happening to children in schools worldwide, and when the perpetrator is a child themself, a bigger question arises about social conditioning and harmful traditions.

While the characters in Maybe He Just Likes You are fictional, the backlash from Mila’s friends and bullies is all too real. Like Mila, survivors of sexual harassment can face a barrage of criticism, and it often begins inside one’s own head. Mila convinces herself that the teasing will stop if she covers up more of her body. Zara tells Mila she must be doing something to warrant the boys’ attention. Victim-blaming can be internalized or come from outside sources, but the result is always the same: Victim-blaming focuses on shaming someone for being harassed while allowing the harasser to get off scot-free without criticism. Survivors of sexual assault are often asked to describe “what they were wearing” when an assault took place, and the question often implies that they did something wrong, wore the wrong outfit, or showed too much of their body. Since then, art installations such as “What Were You Wearing” have sought to highlight the outfits that survivors of sexual assault wore when they were attacked, and the clothing ranges from everyday workout gear to wedding dresses, sweatshirts, and even Sunday school dresses. The trend is obvious: Clothing has no bearing on sexual assault, and the suggestion that it does is simply a method of victim-blaming. The #MeToo movement goes beyond acts of aggression and focuses on intimidation tactics used to silence survivors. In Maybe He Just Likes You, Mila’s clothing choices cause her intense anxiety, and when Callum tells her that he can see through her shirt right before the band concert, he fills her with dread, shame, and helplessness. Mila feels like all of her accomplishments in life will boil down to what she wears, and even though Callum is only a seventh-grade boy, he is already speaking the language of abusers.

Although Maybe He Just Likes You is written for middle-school students, it opens up a necessary conversation. Mila’s story is disturbing, especially considering how young she is, but sexual abuse and harassment do not wait for children to reach age 18. As Dee points out in Maybe He Just Likes You, it is never too early to talk with children about consent and healthy boundaries because the numbers don’t lie. The #MeToo movement exists not to demonize a group of people but to get to the root of this problem, begin the healing process, and plan for a better future Where children like Mila are heard, seen, and protected from the horrors of sexual abuse.