Dayna Wichhart — Staff Writer

Here’s the deal. Every year, the boys on campus play Humans v. Zombies. For an entire week, they look over their shoulders in fear while “zombies” camp outside of buildings, halls, and doorways, leaving the campus littered with socks.

And every year, I hear the girls on campus talking.

“Why don’t we get to do fun things like this?”

“We only ever do lame events.”

“Why can’t we do fun stuff like they do?”

I’ve got a couple issues with people that say these things. First of all, men and women are different. It’s true whether you believe it or not. Men and women are going to be interested in different activities.

Think about the Bloom Bar, one of the highest attended women’s activities on campus. It’s nothing like Humans v. Zombies or capture the flag, but countless girls attend the Bloom Bar. Naturally, events that are well attended and participated in are going to be repeated, and events are going to be planned that are similar and might draw a similar crowd.

My second issue with these complaints is that the reality is, we do have events like the boys. Maybe in the past they haven’t had events like that, but I believe that Dordt listens to the feedback we give them. Last year was the first time we had a women’s broomball event. I went. It was worlds of fun.

The Hunt, an event created to mimic the boys’ Humans v. Zombies game, was also under-attended. It was a week of challenges both individually and collectively as a wing. My wing won The Hunt last year. Out of the 40-ish girls on my wing, I think there were a solid eight to 10 people who showed up to complete the nightly challenges. Compared to many of the other wings I talked to, that was a lot more girls than they had attending. A game of Humans v. Zombies will not be very successful with participation of a few girls from each wing.

Whenever I ask people if they are going to an event, I hear way too often that they aren’t because their friends aren’t or that they are not sure what the event will be so they aren’t going to go. Here’s the thing about us girls: We spend a lot of our time worrying about doing things by ourselves, embarrassing ourselves in front of others, and stressing about what other people might think about us.

It’s ridiculous. Boys are far more willing to go all in for an event. They’ll go to Walmart and buy packages of socks just to leave them in the grass, all to win a singular pair of socks they’re most likely not going to wear. They’re willing to wake up at 4 a.m. to head to the classroom building before the campus wakes up in order to be safe through the day. But why? Because going all in and putting effort into the pointless, stupid, college event can be so much fun.

Girls don’t attend or participate in events like Humans v. Zombies the way boys do. So why should Dordt Student Activities, RAs, CDAs, or Student Services put work into planning events that you won’t show up to?

Here’s my advice. If you’re like me and you love the idea of having games like the boys’ play, there are things that we can do to help make that happen. Maybe you want a game like Humans v. Zombies to start for the girls on campus. Maybe you want to play capture the flag against other wings.

My first advice is to talk to your friends and the other girls on your wing. Help get them excited about the idea. Tell your RA and suggest events that you would be interested in participating in. In a simple way, make a change by showing up to the events that are currently available to you.

Go. Even if your friends aren’t. Go. Even if it’s something that’s outside of your comfort zone. The reality is, at one point everything was outside of our comfort zone, and if we never try something new, we will miss out on the chance to participate in the next Humans v. Zombies.

Girls can be zombies too; we just refuse to.