boys will be boys

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boys will be boys

1. It is hard, often fruitless, to attempt to curb the natural playfulness and tendency to mischief of most growing boys.
   • 1922, James Joyce, chapter 13, in Ulysses:

     But just then there was a slight altercation between Master Tommy and Master Jacky. Boys will be boys and our two twins were no exception to this golden rule.

2. Even grown men usually remain somewhat boyish at heart.

   Boys will be boys, grinned Grandpa as he watched his adult son playing with the fancy train-set he had given his grandson for Christmas.

3. (informal, offensive) Predatory behavior of suitors should be viewed as excusable because it comes naturally to many boys and men.
   • 2018 September 27, Mary Kilpatrick, “Why the 'boys will be boys' justification of sexual violence doesn't fly: Comparing Kavanaugh to Steubenville”, in Shatter on Cleveland.com‎, published 2019 January 29, retrieved 2021-03-19:

     It's not hard to see the parallels between the sexual assault accusations against Supreme Court nominee Brett Kavanaugh and the 2012 Steubenville rape case. Three decades apart, there is one central difference: Kavanaugh has denied the allegations, and has never been criminally charged. In the Steubenville case, two star football players were convicted of raping a girl, and sentenced to prison. But amid the outrage in both cases, there has been a chorus of "boys will be boys," the excuse of youth, of teenage brains that can't control themselves and the victim shaming that accompanies that perception.

• Gregory Y. Titelman, Random House Dictionary of Popular Proverbs and Sayings, 1996, →ISBN, p. 33.