Girls Have Cooties - Television Tropes & Idioms

"EEEEE! You have girl hair!"

—Gabriel, Charby the Vampirate

An absolutely mandatory law (especially prevalent in Sit Coms): If you're male and under 11 years old, you have to automatically think romance and females are gross. No exceptions are allowed. (Except Kid Anova, cause that's funny.)

For those of you who were wondering, there are such things as cooties, and they're not limited to girls. "Cooties" just happens to be another word for "lice."

Arguably becoming a Discredited Trope as in Real Life young boys are just as likely to boast about their "girlfriends". This may or may not be due to the increased prominence—compared to a generation ago—of romance and sexuality in entertainment media aimed at or enjoyed by kids.

If the boy does NOT get over his dislike of women when he grows up, he might be a He Man Woman Hater.

Examples:

Anime and Manga

Negi Springfield, the main character of Mahou Sensei Negima, is an aversion. He actually likes girls in general (probably influenced by his Cool Big Sis cousin). Of course, since he's smart, more mature than most older boys, well-talented for someone twice his age and adorable as all get out, most girls like him back. A lot.
- Negi's friend Kotaro, on the other hand, plays this fairly straight (especially the romance thing), with a few exceptions in his adoptive sisters and girls who can fight.
Averted with most anime, especially those aimed at actual 10-year-olds (and especially if it's aimed at 10-year-old girls).
- Card Captor Sakura is such an anime.
Garu from Pucca. Oh, so damn much. Specially after he goes through Character Exaggeration in the TV series.

Comic Books

Franklin Richards, Son of A Genius (who must be six or something) initially rejects Katie Power (same age) specifically because she has cooties. In a different universe of the multiverse (I think), Katie Power from the future tells Katie Power that Franklin Richards was her first boyfriend; young Katie insists that "boys are gross" but future herself calmly tells her that, in a few years, she'll change her mind.
Being a small puppy, Scamp usually doesn't like girls (especially not his sisters), although this varies depending on the writer.

Film

Ur-Example: The Little Rascals and their "He-Man Woman Haters Club".
In the Live Action Adaptation of Speed Racer, Speed's kid brother Spritle and his pet chimp Chim-Chim break the fourth wall to give a "cooties warning" when Speed and Trixie are about to kiss.
- Earlier they interupted a kissing scene in and followed up with the classic cootie shot.
Fred Savages' character in The Princess Bride starts out objecting to all of the "mushy stuff' but eventually tells his grandfather that "a little kissing is OK.''

Literature

William Brown in the Just William books can be quite the Kid Anova with his chivalrous pining for Girl Next Door Joan and susceptibility to pretty actresses. But Violet Elizabeth Bott's leaves him shaken to the core:
I'm not going to have anything to do with any old girl ever again,' said William.
'It's all very well saying that,' said Douglas, who had been deeply impressed that morning by the inevitableness and deadly persistence of the sex, 'it's them what has to do with you.'
'Well I'm never going to marry any old girl," said William.
'It's all very well saying that,' said Douglas. 'But some old girl is prob'ly going to marry you.'
In Artemis Fowl and The Time Paradox, 10-year-old Artemis says of Holly and 14-year-old Artemis kissing that you wouldn't catch him wasting time like that. Not as vehement as some of the other examples, but does contain built-in proof he'll grow out of it: less than three years later, back in the second book (or at least non-US editions thereof), he's consciously aware that he'll be attracted to Holly when he's older.
- Erm... did I just read you correctly? The U.S. market required censoring out an internal momentary thought about a hypothetical future physical attraction? Wow.
  - Well, the US publisher, I doubt the actual market would have cared, seeing as how the bit in the spoiler tag happened and the book sold well, but yes, that bit really was removed in US editions of that book. Apparently it made it into the US version of the graphic novel, but the graphic novel version of Holly isn't brown-skinned.

Newspaper Comics

Calvin's GROSS (Get Rid Of Slimy girlS) club.
- "I know that's redundant but otherwise it doesn't spell anything. Now go away."
  - But "Get Rid Of Girls" does spell something. Just not something he should be thinking about.
  - Calvin also notably attempts to see movies like "Vampire Sorority Babes." He might just be overacting to shut Hobbes up about Susie.
  - Calvin wants to see the movies solely because he knows they are considered "grownup" and "naughty"; he never displays any understanding of why those sorts of movies are considered "grownup" or "naughty".
Dennis the Menace was once called on this in a late 2007/early 2008 strip, and admits it ... except that he's fine with his mother, Mrs Wilson and the local tomboy.
Jason from Foxtrot is an odd example. He started out firmly in this trope, but a couple of decades of extremely subtle Character Development due to his sorta-friendly relationship with Eileen seems to be weaning him off it. Jason still would rather be caught dead than be known at large as being her friend, but he's not quite so adamantly paranoid about it recently.
- Marcus, on the other hand, started firmly in the trope, but seems to have thrown it off completely.
Averted in the comic strip Heart of the City, where Dean is Heart's best friend and frequent partner-in-crime. He's generally more befuddled by girls than disgusted. (Heart's occasional declarations that Dean's her boyfriend draw a bemused "Um... okay" as often as not.) One New Year's Eve, he actually dressed up in a tux and and announced that to celebrate, "I thought I might hang out with the prettiest girl in Philadelphia." Making it clear that, yes, he meant her.

Real Life

Truth In Television for both sexes (remember the cootie shots?), but the behavior tends to disappear around fourth grade.
- This cootie thing seems to be purely an US thing, causing stupor to this Troper when she watched US fictions and tried to understand what was this cootie thing - that no fiction even tried to explain, assuming everybody knew this.
  - From This Troper's (Australian) memory of childhood, there were 'boy germs' and 'girl germs', and 'cooties' were obviously the American word for them, like calling 'nappies' 'diapers'.
  - Perhaps it is an primarily-English-speaking-country thing? This troper (Filipino) has no memory of childhood where any boy or girl acted this way.
  - In this Danish tropers childhood there was 'pigelus' ('girl lice') and 'drengelus' ('boy lice'), so ...
  - Originally, it was literally "head lice", and obviously girls tend to be more susceptible to them. Now it's just "girls are icky!" in a vague sense.
- Though the mindset disappears during adolescence, the idea of cooties can have grounds in the adult world: STDs.
- Subverted now 'adays. Children rarely think of "cooties". They either (mostly) are friendly toward the opposite gender or are interested in romance.
This Troper (who actually is a parent) would like to point out that most childrens' attitudes about the opposite sex fluctuates constantly, largely based on their perception of the social environment. Both Boys and Girls are more likely to display this behaviour in groups and less likely one on one.

Webcomics

Thog from Order Of The Stick. Probably an adult, but with the mind of a child.
- The Monster in the Darkness acts like this as well.
  Monster: Great! We can start a "No-Eating-Babies" Club! And Tsukiko can't join!
  O-Chul: Tsukiko eats babies?!?
  Monster: No, silly! She's a girl!
Even demons have fear of cooties in Charby the Vampirate.
Played straight as a laser here in Original Life.
Surprised this Perry Bible Fellowship comic◊ hasn't been mentioned yet.
Original Life did a whole storyline about cooties, starting here, and it's monstrously over the top.

Western Animation

Ben from Ben 10 believes this throughout most of the original series (as he's a teenager in Alien Force, he's outgrown it). He does make an exception for Kai, an Indian girl seen in one episode... but Kai takes his attention and runs with it... to creepy, creepy places.
Cooties actually appear as girly, flowery, insects which inhabit DeeDee's bedroom in Dexters Laboratory. Dexter himself greatly fears them.
Inverted in the Powerpuff Girls episode "Cootie Gras" where our kindergartner heroines are terrified of a boy said to have Cooties. A fact villain Mojo Jojo uses to keep them at bay until they get over it. Once they do, however, they leave him Covered In Kisses, then go kick Mojo's butt.
- Also, used in the first episode featuring the Rowdyruff Boys - the girls's key to defeat them is to look prettily at them and actually kiss them... and it works so well the guys explode in horror. Lampshaded right after this, when Bubbles and Blossom think kissing isn't that bad, but Buttercup is shown coughing and almost throwing up in disgust.
The Simpsons, primarily due to negative continuity is all over the place with this one. Bart will go from apparently genuinely thinking girls have cooties, to making out with one, and then right back to thinking they have cooties.
Subverted on an episode of King Of The Hill, when Bobby is invited to a sleepover at a girl (note the space) friend's house:
Hank: Hey there, Bobby. I guess they found a cure for the cooties, huh? Heh heh heh.
Bobby: I dunno. What're "cooties"?
Hank: Well, when I was a boy, that's what we called the germs you get from girls.
Bobby: Oh, you mean like chlamydia?
Hank: Huh?
In the Codename Kids Next Door episode "Operation OUTBREAK", Sector V is sent to decontaminate the organization's underwater research center from the feared C.O.O.T.I.E.S. They don't exist, but all Kids Next Door scientists are boys, so ...