GENDER CHAOS
Chaos Theory is one of the better blogs out there, posting on topics from the comic strip "For Better or for Worse" to celebrity gossip to gender issues. It's one of my daily reads (even if I don't like FBOFW), and gender topics are particularly interesting to me.
So, since I don't have a lot of time here, I'd like to comment on a couple of gender-related posts.
First, this one, which links to an article about a new study. In part, the article says: "Even when they're seated across a table from each other in a first-time, five-minute conversation, a man tends to sexualize a woman and incorrectly assume sexual interest on her part, new research finds."
The Chaos Queen responds: "It's kinda like, why should I be even blandly friendly to someone with a penis if he's just going to decide I want him sexually very badly, regardless of whether or not I show interest? Ugh. Ugh. Ugh."
I've actually dealt with this question in an earlier post. My advice to women? Don't be nice.
Cultivate an air of withering scorn, and wrap it around you like a suit of armor. Seriously. All it takes is the slightest hint of a smile, and before you know it, some dude thinks you're hot for him. Some men will take the fact that you haven't punched them in the throat as evidence that you want to have sex with them. Believe me. I'm a dude after all: I'm a member of the gender that coined the phrase, "That stripper's totally into me!"
Not that every guy is going to sexualize every woman he meets. (I have questions about the methodology of the study, frankly.) But, surely it's acceptable to alienate "innocent" men in the interest of shutting down the super-freaks. At least, I don't see a problem with men walking around in confusion, with hurt feelings, after being treated with the utmost contempt by every woman they meet in a given day. Who cares?
In a related (to my thinking, anyway) post, she quotes this song lyric:
The response: "I'm one of the ones that ignores you, or at least won't look at you even if I like you. Wanna know why? It's because I may like you, but I've decided NOT to pursue you. You might be taken, or have an irritating personality trait that I don't want to deal with even if you're hot, or I like being single too much to take on a boyfriend, whatever. Either way, I'm ignoring you because I won't be making a play for you, and whether or not I like you isn't going to matter because I don't plan on trying to boink you. That clear it up any?"
I don't know anything about song-writer Dan Bern's personal life, or the context of the lyrics per se, but this particular verse is the sort of thing that would have resonated with me, back when I was a thirteen year old boy.
How are these two posts related? Well, they both have to do with the way in which men think the women around them perceive them (uh, the men). It doesn't look good for the guys, I'm afraid.
I would like to offer a defense of a very, very small segment of the male community, however. They are men that hold a realistic idea of how they are seen by other people. They know that, unappealing and mis-shapen as they are, there is no hope for them. They do not believe that the woman that's speaking to (or, in the case of the Dan Bern song not looking at) them is the slightest bit interested in them. Before any such thoughts could take root in their brains, they shoot them down with the certain knowledge that, because of their faults, their hideousness, their poor sentence construction, they will never be anyone's object of desire, or even a second glance.
They have "... given up, lonely and overwhelmed by the weight of their own ugliness." Instead, they turn to watching Star Trek, or programming computers, or compiling baseball statistics, or writing Dr. Who fan fiction, or any of a million other hobbies. Yes, some of them become twisted and bitter, but very few of that group go on to become mass-murderers; let the rest of the sorry bastards kill themselves. They are useless to other men as friends, and they are useless to women in all respects; they are the epitome of the un-missable, the un-mournable.
They've got no right to complain. Even in aged isolation, these men are granted titles of at least some little respect: eccentric; weird; long-time bachelor; creepy. Are older, single, childless women held in the same esteem? Not in this society.
I'll say all this because these men won't say it for themselves. No whiney blog posts will ever leave their train-set building fingers. Some men know there place. Even if I don't.
So, since I don't have a lot of time here, I'd like to comment on a couple of gender-related posts.
First, this one, which links to an article about a new study. In part, the article says: "Even when they're seated across a table from each other in a first-time, five-minute conversation, a man tends to sexualize a woman and incorrectly assume sexual interest on her part, new research finds."
The Chaos Queen responds: "It's kinda like, why should I be even blandly friendly to someone with a penis if he's just going to decide I want him sexually very badly, regardless of whether or not I show interest? Ugh. Ugh. Ugh."
I've actually dealt with this question in an earlier post. My advice to women? Don't be nice.
Cultivate an air of withering scorn, and wrap it around you like a suit of armor. Seriously. All it takes is the slightest hint of a smile, and before you know it, some dude thinks you're hot for him. Some men will take the fact that you haven't punched them in the throat as evidence that you want to have sex with them. Believe me. I'm a dude after all: I'm a member of the gender that coined the phrase, "That stripper's totally into me!"
Not that every guy is going to sexualize every woman he meets. (I have questions about the methodology of the study, frankly.) But, surely it's acceptable to alienate "innocent" men in the interest of shutting down the super-freaks. At least, I don't see a problem with men walking around in confusion, with hurt feelings, after being treated with the utmost contempt by every woman they meet in a given day. Who cares?
In a related (to my thinking, anyway) post, she quotes this song lyric:
If certain girls don't look at you
It means that they like you a lot
If other girls don't look at you
It just means they're ignoring you
How can you know, how can you know?
Which is which, who's doing what?
I guess that you can ask 'em
Which one are you baby?
Do you like me or are you ignoring me?
The response: "I'm one of the ones that ignores you, or at least won't look at you even if I like you. Wanna know why? It's because I may like you, but I've decided NOT to pursue you. You might be taken, or have an irritating personality trait that I don't want to deal with even if you're hot, or I like being single too much to take on a boyfriend, whatever. Either way, I'm ignoring you because I won't be making a play for you, and whether or not I like you isn't going to matter because I don't plan on trying to boink you. That clear it up any?"
I don't know anything about song-writer Dan Bern's personal life, or the context of the lyrics per se, but this particular verse is the sort of thing that would have resonated with me, back when I was a thirteen year old boy.
How are these two posts related? Well, they both have to do with the way in which men think the women around them perceive them (uh, the men). It doesn't look good for the guys, I'm afraid.
I would like to offer a defense of a very, very small segment of the male community, however. They are men that hold a realistic idea of how they are seen by other people. They know that, unappealing and mis-shapen as they are, there is no hope for them. They do not believe that the woman that's speaking to (or, in the case of the Dan Bern song not looking at) them is the slightest bit interested in them. Before any such thoughts could take root in their brains, they shoot them down with the certain knowledge that, because of their faults, their hideousness, their poor sentence construction, they will never be anyone's object of desire, or even a second glance.
They have "... given up, lonely and overwhelmed by the weight of their own ugliness." Instead, they turn to watching Star Trek, or programming computers, or compiling baseball statistics, or writing Dr. Who fan fiction, or any of a million other hobbies. Yes, some of them become twisted and bitter, but very few of that group go on to become mass-murderers; let the rest of the sorry bastards kill themselves. They are useless to other men as friends, and they are useless to women in all respects; they are the epitome of the un-missable, the un-mournable.
They've got no right to complain. Even in aged isolation, these men are granted titles of at least some little respect: eccentric; weird; long-time bachelor; creepy. Are older, single, childless women held in the same esteem? Not in this society.
I'll say all this because these men won't say it for themselves. No whiney blog posts will ever leave their train-set building fingers. Some men know there place. Even if I don't.
