Re “Rape culture activism may encourage girls to feel trauma’’ (Opinion, July 24): I’ve always liked Wendy Kaminer’s work. However, while there’s plenty to be said regarding resilience, different levels of assault, and the unfair sex offender registry, we should not forget that bad behavior, criminal or not, unless nipped in the bud, leads to worse behavior — probably with multiple victims.

Just because a boy might molest a girl only once, and she might not remember it the following week, does not mean she shouldn’t report it at least to a parent or teacher, and fast. Otherwise, the boy might not think twice before doing worse. There are reasons, after all, why even bad LANGUAGE in schools used to be nearly unthinkable.

Finally, can you imagine the uproar if anyone suggested that racist violence, even the “relatively minor’’ kind, is just a normal part of life, like theft, and that a black person who managed to shrug it off instead of retaliating was, at least emotionally, just “lucky’’? Or that the perpetrators deserved to be “lucky’’ enough to avoid penalties?

Kira Barnum

Somerville