LISTEN NOW
I’m going to start this with a bitch-slap. This statement, so often heard in women’s circles, is entirely wrong. All men are different just as all women are, but why and when did women start seeing themselves as a victim of “they all want the same”?
Let’s look at an everyday situation: she is hurt because he paid more attention to the football game instead of having time with her and refused to listen to her problems. She calls her friends (worst case scenario her mum) and cries. The comfort she gets is: “they are all the same”, “you could do way better”, “all they want is to bang you and scratch their balls all day”, “just go out and have some fun”, “find somebody else”, “throw him a tantrum”, “make him choose – football or you, drinking a pint with friends after work or you, working 16 hours a day or you”.
You don’t see it yet, do you?
Firstly, all human beings are unique, and so is the boyfriend/ husband. What made men “the same” comes down to one thing – at one point women stopped letting men into their lives, stopped opening the space where they can step in and feel their worth.
Women grew stronger than men, capable of anything, independent I-can-do-it- alone individuals. I’m going to open a big can of worms here, but in my opinion the current feminist movements went too far, almost to the extreme, turning a woman into a man, depriving the man of his masculinity and adding it to her female tenderness, took his worth and purpose and by bossing him about many women ended up with yet another child at home to look after.
And then we complain and go “moan-moan-moan”, but we still believe in: “Yeah, I want to drive that tractor, I don’t want to have him doing it for me. I am a woman, I can do it better.” Surely, there are women who can drive a tractor better, as there are men who can be better at working in a kindergarten – everyone has something they are good at, no matter the gender, but, please, don’t get on that tractor just to make a point.
Nothing scares a man off more than the statement: “I am a fully independent woman, I can do it all by myself.” You know why? Because he does not see that space where he can step in and be wanted and helpful. And to be honest, many men don’t want to anymore, because they are afraid of being thrown out.
A man perceives his role in a relationship as having the room to be helpful, to be desired, and welcome. Just as a woman does. If a woman does not allow for these basic male needs, she’d better take a dog for company, or several cats, or both.
What women do not understand is that you cannot turn a Harley Davidson into a caravan for picnics. Just like no man should try to turn that shy, nerdy woman into a pin-up girl. Women should either accept the man as he is, or never lead him on, to begin with. Same goes for men, by the way, but about that, later. A woman should be at ease with her female side.
I can open the car door alone. I can carry those 20 kilos of shopping alone. I know better, because I am a woman. I can use a vibrator, I don’t need sex now – it makes me sweat.
Do you see when and how we, ladies, became the masculine party in the relationship? Right here, by rejecting his attempt to look after us, to spoil us, to cater for our needs, to be what nature made him – a provider.
I have to work, so you cook that dinner, take the kids, wash them, read them a bed-time story, do the washing and the ironing – all is good as long as both parties have agreed on their roles in the family. These roles are interchangeable and can be adjusted through TALKING and understanding. Neither should start a relationship with the idea of their expectations. Instead of building up those expectations, each party should take time to know the person better and never, ever base their expectations on past bitterness and disappointments. Because… look at the beginning – all humans are different.
Ladies, open that space in your life where he is accepted for what he can do best. Let him open that car door for you, hammer that nail, put up that picture on the wall, drive you to work, pay for the cinema tickets, buy you dinner, tell you about the football game, open up for his weaknesses and strengths.
Let him cook that meal (even if he hasn’t been around the stove a lot), let him try. Enjoy the effort. If you don’t, then the statement “all men are the same” will eventually come true – we are all going to have someone in the house to share the TV screen with and, as I said, if that is what you want, take a pet, or you will drive him elsewhere, where he will try to regain his crushed self-esteem and will cheat on you. And then he is “a swine”, “an asshole”, “a douchebag”, “an idiot” and here the statement “they are all the same” steps in.
Secondly, and this one is addressed to the male readers – stop telling the lie “Looks don’t matter.” Whether that should be so, or not, is a whole different story, but fact is that in our society looks matter. It has been a fundamental notion for ages, is now, and probably, if nothing changes, it will be in the future. Stop selling the lie. Girls, stop telling yourself it isn’t true. If it weren’t true, then why the boob jobs, the plastic surgeries, the tons of cosmetics, the diets, the new wardrobe for every season?
Because, I, as a woman, have been brought up with the idea that some girls are pretty and some are… well… “They’ll do”. From my personal experience I can definitely argue that at the beginning men are physically attracted, and there is nothing wrong with that, but instead of trying to open our personality and show them what we are, to see if they’ll have us as for who we truly are without the looks, we march on to fit into the unspoken truth that looks do matter.
Women are torn between doing that same thing, which they absolutely hate – having to look good in order to be noticed, and then, just then appreciated for what they have to offer apart from a body and a face. A woman does not want to be appreciated only for her looks more a man does. Besides, when men label a woman as “she’ll do” or ugly, have you looked in the mirror lately? And I am not joking, not really. If we are sexy and beautiful and all dolled up, we are whores. If we are not, we are ugly and also boring. I am and always have been confused. What is it you really want? Oh, I got it – a Sharon Stone with her immensely high IQ, but you know… younger.
What is it many women want – I want him to be home, but to leave me alone, and to bloody go out and maybe put the kids to bed, but he can’t read that story as nicely as I do, so I’d better do it myself, and why do I have to do everything alone?
We hate men for what we’ve made them become and we hate them for what society stereotypes made us be. We love them for what they could have been or we hope them to be.
Yet, there are people who live together in harmony and love. Those people have managed to take the time to get to know each other deeper than on a physical level, agreed on the roles in the relationship, accepted that beauty is in the imperfection, opened about what troubles them, shared what makes them happy, set space boundaries – you don’t need to go to the toilet together to feel closer, not if you don’t want to. These people have accepted they have different tastes and hobbies and everyone respects one’s needs to dedicate time to those hobbies, as long as they don’t put the other person on the bench at the football pitch.
All men are the same, all women are the same in one thing only – the pursuit for being taken as part of someone’s life, in other words – loved.
Next time, when you have a row with your partner, don’t rush to the phone. Sit with yourself, blame him as much as you need to, but (there is always a “but”) maybe there is something you did not do as your heart told you to. Maybe you blindly followed the accusing finger of the whole female kingdom. Accept your mistakes with the same ease as you accept them and work on them together. You don’t need your mum to start with: “Your dad and I…”
Gentlemen, she is not your mum and if your mum wants the best for you, don’t let her interfere. – Text by Gery Decheva
. More on the topic on…. Diamonds Production January Issue
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