gender, dating, alienation (sorry sorry sorry for essay posting)
Sorry to thinkpost but the dating app discourse post and recent experiences have gotten me thinking, and this is as close as I will get in my life to going Article Mode
EDIT 1: holy shit I am not saying men have it worse in life generally, I'm just saying that there are certain things that as a society we can recognize make life uniquely alienating and lonely for men
Edit 1.5: obviously sometimes catcalling is creepy and horrible and scary. sometimes, it's not. things can be different
EDIT 2: if you are a hot tall guy obviously this is gonna be different for you
Edit 3: apparently I am using the term "catcalling" more broadly than a lot of people. I used it to mean any random street commentary. Some use it to mean specifically over-sexual and threatening/misogynistic street attention. plz understand that for the below I am using the term very broadly.
Context from my life: I am a woman happily engaged to another woman, so this is no longer my ballgame, but I have dated men in the past, and my friends are mostly (60-70%) straight men.
It’s getting nice out in NYC and I’ve been walking around a lot more lately. I’d say I’m a very normal-looking cis white woman in her late 20s. Not ugly, not crazy hot. If you’re a decent looking young woman, you just get constant attention, most of which is positive. Most of it is just looks, smiles. Often people just say hi. Sometimes there are catcalls that are creepy or overly sexual, but to be honest, it’s a positive experience for me when (on a street with plenty of people on it, in the daytime) someone says “hey, beautiful” while driving by. You are just always noticed. People want to ask you for help and give you assistance if you need it. Men, women, young, old. If I choose to smile at another woman, it’s reciprocated. I can stop and talk to kids. Everyone sees you, and has generally goodwill towards you. It feels good. Connectivity feels good.
But it’s been making me sad lately, because I know it will go away. As I age I will become more and more invisible. Having multiple people tell you you’re gorgeous or beautiful or pretty every day is very nice, and I think it’s a little disingenuous when women say all catcalling is threatening. (I suppose I should note I am about 6 ft tall, and I guess for short women it’s understandably scarier. But an old Puerto Rican guy who is 5’ 1” telling me I look pretty will simply never be threatening). I will be sad when I no longer have strangers telling me how gorgeous I am every day. At least my wife will do so, I hope.
And of course when I think about aging out of it, I think about men, who never get to experience this fundamentally more socially-engaged way of life. It seems, frankly, awful. And then I read through almost every comment on that post about dating apps, and I wanted to offer some perspective.
First: dating apps are unquestionably terrible for straight people. They make all of us crueler and more shallow about the opposite sex. For women it can be a cheap ego-boost, but in a way that I think really isn’t healthy for us. (Gay guys: keep having an awesome time. Fellow gay women: you can message first, you will be ok). But dating apps are fundamentally tools of evil billionaires WHO HATE YOU AND DO NOT WANT YOU TO BE HAPPY.
But some people in the comments were talking about cold-approaching women in cafes or bars. Under most circumstances this is a Very Bad Idea. When this has happened to me I try to be empathetic because I realize it’s probably just a guy following boomer advice, and I really try to be nice, but I totally understand why most women just go “fuck off and die” mode because it is a horrible experience. Sometimes I am not strong enough to not be a bitch. You just feel trapped immediately; the fight-or-flight is so powerful. Even if my rational brain says this is probably just a decent guy trying to find love, my monkey brain starts going Navy SEAL mode and figuring out exit points. Again, I want to be nice, but empathizing with men in this situation means staring into a deep void of loneliness so sucking and depressing that I really understand why most women revert to anger or fear -- it's self-preserving. Unless a woman is staring at you, do not do this. It’s not morally wrong; it just won’t work, I’m sorry.
I guess one thing I am trying to say is, yes, men: the deck is stacked against you. It just is, it isn’t fair, and I am sorry. It’s not our (women’s) fault (we’re acting in our own romantic interests, same as you); it’s just how it is, and capitalist alienation + internet are to blame. I think that we (women) need to accept this, if we can move past the incel/Clavicular/Tate/manosphere/WHATEVER ideology that is rotting the brains of young men. Teenage boys are becoming misogynistic pyschos and nagging and lecturing them about our own issues as women (as real as they are) just won’t fix it.
And so what should guys do? Unfortunately I think the answer is exactly what the structure of our society selects against: friendship networks. Living in a big (walkable!) city helps a lot. Having platonic female friends is probably the best thing any straight guy can do to make his love life better (not least for extremely harsh advice on grooming/clothing/styling etc). Anything you can do to be online less and around other people more is good. Yes, the volunteering advice is good; so would be taking a cooking or wine-tasting class. Hell, taking classes at community college is good. I know all of it involves spending money. But it’s also true that if you don’t have a job or other income source, you will probably not be a viable romantic candidate for women. (Incels say you need to be rich; no, you just need to not make women afraid that you will become a dependent worm.)
A final thought. My fiancee, like me, presents as a normal (in her case very pretty) straight-ish woman. She, however, long before I knew her, did not do so (she is trans). She’s very “passy” and beautiful now, but I have seen pictures of her from before transition, and frankly, I would never have glanced down at her for a second then. She has corroborated many of my suspicions about what living as a guy is like, though. So I feel pretty confident about my analysis. Also, there’s always estrogen… jk… unless?