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And I can understand that attitude on the part of the girls; they had sex for the first time with their boyfriend because that's what you're supposed to do when you're In Love (as well as the other social attitudes dinned into us about sex and freedom and the rest of it); it probably wasn't that great for her because inexperience and a guy who is more interested in getting off himself; she thinks "well I don't know what is supposed to be so great about this" and then they break up. And the boys who replace him are, as you say, 16-18 and clearly aching for the chance to get sex, which is why they want a girlfriend. And it's clear to the girl that they primarily see her as a route to sexual access. And if she isn't that keen on having sex, and the boy isn't that impressive, then "sorry but no, Horace, I can only think of you as a brother".
Nobody is being deliberately bad, the boys are boys at that age and Nature is having its way with them, the girls are being girls. The boys will want sex a lot more than the girls and be less interested in the girls as persons, conversely the girls will be socialised into putting huge emphasis onto the personal element and be turned off by "he only has one thing on his mind". There isn't really a cure for it, it does no good to be brutally honest and tell 16-18 year old boys "you will want sex much, much more strongly, and want it more frequently, than the girls will, and unless they really like you there is little chance you'll get it" and tell 16-18 year old girls "basically all you are is a warm body to him so if you don't put out he'll dump you". The boys are not being mean or horrible on purpose, but neither are the girls. It's evolutionary drives all the way down, with the layers of civilisation on top!
The common attitude among single women and girls is that you shouldn't ever do or reveal anything that might give the impression to any man who's a long-term prospect / boyfriend material that you're promiscuous and easy. Engaging in desire sex (for lack of a better word) and kinky sex acts in general is only advisable with other types of guys. Again, this is rather understandable from an evo psych point of view, but let's not pretend it doesn't exist, and that it doesn't play a big role in this.
For a long time, it's been a tricky balancing act. Don't put out? You're a frigid bitch. Do put out? You're a slut. Men seem to want (and I'm emphasising "seem" here because this is all gross generalisation) women to be agreeable to have sex with them, but never to have had sex with previous partners, or only a couple of previous partners. If you think about it, it's not really doable; if you dump/break up with the girlfriend and both of you move on to new relationships, after a while you're both going to have a past history. If Joe has had more relationships than Annie, that's great. If Joe and Annie have the same number, that may be a problem: too high for Annie, too low for Joe even on the same numbers. If Annie has had more relationships than Joe, that's bad because that means she's promiscuous.
The double standard hurts men and women both because men are supposed to rack up more experience, but women are not, which means how do you do that? If the guy is always dating a new girlfriend who had only one or two boyfriends before him, then a small number of men are getting all the 'good' girls and leaving 'sullied' girls after them for the rest of the guys.
So women have an incentive to report lower numbers, and men to report higher numbers, of previous partners than they really have had.
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I think there's a lot of work you're just leaving on the table on the part of both boys and girls and assuming they won't do it and just be "boys be boys and girls be girls". 16 is old enough for boys to try and put in more effort into connecting with the girl on a personal level (and getting good at sex), and for girls to be a bit more forgiving about initial unimpressiveness (while also learning that the more physically impressive the boy is, the less incentive there is for him to stick with her and learn her preferences).
You've provided examples of destructive rather than constructive "brutal honesty", but it doesn't have to be.
The problem is that that is the age most sensitive, and most under the cosh of brutal honesty. It may well be that you will have to wait four years to grow out of the awkward, shy, spotty stage (for both boys and girls) but that is cold comfort to be told that "jam tomorrow but not jam today" when you see (as you think you see) 'everyone else is dating and having sex but not me'.
Resentments do seed themselves at that time, and come to bloom in later years. There is no way around the realities of nature, but we try and wrap it up in cotton wool for good reasons. But some people will never find anyone, and it's not anybody's fault in particular. And state-mandated girlfriends are no solution there, neither are the AI waifus (though for some very bruised psyches, the perfect girlfriend or boyfriend you can tailor to your exact tastes who will never leave you and always love you will be an aid, the way spectacles or a wheelchair is a necessary aid for physical lack of abilities).
I don't and never cared, which saved me from the worst of it. But my God, had I wanted romance and love and sex in my teens and twenties, I'd probably genuinely have tried killing myself because of the need that could never be assuaged, because I'm too weird, too ugly, too wrong to get someone who loves me. Whatever flaw of nature means I don't feel the want of that really was a lucky one.
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