OK, so I probably won't kill off ALL of the misconceptions people have about women (and by people, I mean mostly blokes). I just want to bust the balls of a couple, and have a rant about the difference between bikinis and underwear - of which there is zero difference; we just make a difference because of where we want to wear them.
Numero uno misconception is that women are either total whores or more uptight than nuns when it comes to sex. But then, are men so different? The problem here is that men and women are held to two polar opposite standards, when really, we all have the same kind of libido sex drivey thing.
Not all men go out and have sex with every single woman in sight, or everything that has a pulse, and some women are exactly the same. Women are just as happy to be involved in their own seduction, or they wouldn't spend the entire day getting ready for a Friday night out! Plus, the top bestselling genre of books is ROMANCE - yes, that kind with the impossibly good-looking hunk on the front!
Take the hint people - women enjoy sex just as much as men. It's just the perceptions that men have of women who say "yes" as being whores and the ones who say "no" as chastity-belt-wearing prudes, when it's not necessarily vice versa. It's a case of mixed messages and an inability to communicate in the same value way.
Number two: Men can just ask what women want in a relationship or a potential boyfriend. OH DEAR GOD, HOW WRONG COULD YOU BE???????????? Women will almost always give the same laundry list of good looking, funny, super smart, willing to save a puppy here or a kitten there, but this is all off the top of our heads.
Women want this on a conscious level and will spout this until the end of time because WE DON'T KNOW WHAT WE WANT. Besides an entirely new wardrobe, but that's beside the point. You'll know she's considering getting pretty serious when we get to the following...
3: Women always play bitchy mind-games. Nope. Nope. NOPE. On the whole, this is mostly biological hard-wiring. Women are "bio-programmed" to test potential mates, hence the flirting, the mind-games, the boundary pushing. It's the exact same thing when men try flirting, muscle-flexing and basically ogling women with Nicki Minaj's boobs and an arse to do J-Lo proud.
The testing is her way of making sure you're worthy of being with her. Plus, and this is something worth taking note of, women are, out of sheer evolution, determined to find a protector - a man with confidence, assertiveness, and strength. Any man who sets a boundary in a relationship and lets it slide when she breaks it, is doomed to fail at that relationship.
Misconception number 4: Women are to blame for failed relationships. Granted, when she's cheated, lied, or stolen from you or done something equally unforgivable, then it really is her fault. But when a guy talks about himself, escalates the relationship sexually too quickly, or is too scared to do that or approach a girl "out of his league", then it's on you, buster!
Unless she's a lesbian, a 12 year old in love with those horrific beings known as Edward Cullen and Justin Bieber, then the chances are she's got a crush on George Clooney, Brad Pitt or Johnny Depp. I, for one, am mad about Tom Hiddleston, and he shares something in common with all bar Bieber - THEY'RE ALL OLDER!!! Chances are, the girl you're after is younger than all of them except Bieber, and I'd be worried if she was.
Even in realistic relationships, women shack up with older "uglier", broke men all the time. You're just as likely to get the woman as the next Tom, Dick, or Harry! Women just want a guy to make them laugh, make them feel good and get them a pint of ice cream when Mother Nature's being a bitch!
Five: Women eat like rabbits. Shut. Up. There are PLENTY of women out there who can easily pack away a pizza, hot wings, and most of the garlic bread, and I don't just mean the women who are overweight, massively or otherwise. We've got stomachs too, you know, and we're just as likely to crave steak and chips or a kebab as you!
And then there's the famous thing about women: once a month, we WILL pig out on chocolate and junk food. Any man who's up for a junk-food-fest and his lady's favourite movie will keep her around for a long, LONG time.
Six: Women are gold-diggers. True, some women are out to get you to spend your cash on them, or just nick it and run. But most women aren't like that. Sadly, this is just a very poor, and in some cases insulting excuse some, if not most men use to cover up their own incompetence with women.
98% of the time, women are not looking for a man with money dribbling out of his pockets - the other 2% being women who are specifically looking for that out of their own taste or the archetypal gold digger. Most women can actually support themselves, and just find a man with a steady job and the money and means to take care of them as a bonus to a good relationship.
Now, to be absolutely fair, there are misconceptions that women have about men, like how they supposedly think about sex every five nanoseconds, run from commitment like it's the plague, and only want women with the face of an angel and the body of Marilyn Monroe.
But misconceptions can only lead to two things: Failed relationships and broken hearts, and I can't help but think that they're all born from a kind of fear. A fear that Eleanor Roosevelt sums up wonderfully:
"We are afraid to care too much, for fear that the other person does not care at all."
And this is part of the reason I don't really understand flirting. Mostly because I'm a "seduce you with my awkwardness" kind of person, but I also think that flirting's just a nicer way of lying.
Monday 13 July 2015
Thursday 2 July 2015
Pack Mentality: I love my loopy family!
My family's mad. I don't mean the "I just got abducted by aliens" kind of mad (although I'm not sure about my little brother, - joking, Tiddles!), I mean the kind of madness that, every so often, comes out with absolute gems that leave us all choking with laughter.
An up and coming classic is the pigeon story where, travelling down to our grandparents, a pigeon flies up from the middle of the road, and smacks into the windshield. Before anyone else, my little brother comes out with "Ten points to Gryffindor!"
Bear in mind, this is the same little brother who repeatedly has problems with glass of any shape or form - on a holiday to Turkey, he managed to walk into a floor-to-ceiling window, a foot to the left of the actual door. On a trip to France, when asked to pay at the toll-booth, he forgot to roll down the window and smacked his head. Twice.
My sister managed to give the best evils I've ever seen to an elephant rider in India, only for her to turn around and realise, via me, that it wasn't the man who flicked her cap, but actually a monkey pooping on her hat.
My eldest brother is renowned for grumpy, expletive-filled rants against politicians, banks, the BBC, and just about the entire world that leaves us all crying with fits of the giggles, and I, during a discussion about holidays, managed to ask what there is for terrorists to do in Boston. I genuinely meant to say tourists, considering that Boston has like all others, reluctantly joined the list of cities hit by terrorism with its marathon bombings.
But my family's not just amazing for the laugh-out-loud moments it has. There's also all the family jokes, like the chicken noises at stupid moments - my big brother pulled this off in a monumental fashion when, just after I'd said to my sister, "I say this with all of my control and mastery of the English language", he looks at me, cocks his head to one side and clucked. Now, I'd meant to say "Swivel" - again, another family joke - but it still worked!
And then there's the family insult, complete with interchangeable words. The basic form is just "you're an idiot", with the comeback "your face is an idiot", although idiot has gone from... well, idiot, to panini, to fridge, to turd, to melon, and so on.
Granted, my family still has arguments. I managed to argue with my little brother Eduardo* over Jurassic World and whether or not they could actually bring back dinosaurs; I've argued with my sister Flora* countless times about my fashion choices; apparently backpacks aren't always useful.
But families are far more important than most people today realise. Today it's all about kids having kids, as Jeremy Kyle would say, and they think it's meaningless until they get the consequences of kids - no more schooling, no more socialising at all hours. Friends go from hundreds to a few who don't mind that there's a baby.
My point is, we've gone from Medieval family values, where there used to be an entire family plus servants sharing one bedroom to parents becoming grandparents before they've had their first job!
Granted romance has gone forwards and then had a reversal between Medieval times and now - it's gone from political marriages to marriages for love to not even getting married at all. But now, the togetherness of the family is slowly disappearing. There's very little stability for children, if any, when it used to be that families had to stay together, no matter what.
We've lost, as Jodi Picoult points out, the role each family member has:
"I woke up one morning thinking about wolves and realized that wolf packs function as families. Everyone has a role, and if you act within the parameters of your role, the whole pack succeeds, and when that falls apart, so does the pack."
But I think it's not just the role each person has within a family. Strong relationships mean a strong family. Strong families mean a strong society, and that all translates up. It will take strong families to improve this world, and Will Durant has, I think, summed this up brilliantly:
"The family is the nucleus of civilization."
It took one family millions of years ago to lead to over 7 billion people today. So my peers can keep their family values and opinions, thanks. I love my family just the way it is, warts and all, and I couldn't be prouder or happier to be a part of it.
*Names have been changed.
An up and coming classic is the pigeon story where, travelling down to our grandparents, a pigeon flies up from the middle of the road, and smacks into the windshield. Before anyone else, my little brother comes out with "Ten points to Gryffindor!"
Bear in mind, this is the same little brother who repeatedly has problems with glass of any shape or form - on a holiday to Turkey, he managed to walk into a floor-to-ceiling window, a foot to the left of the actual door. On a trip to France, when asked to pay at the toll-booth, he forgot to roll down the window and smacked his head. Twice.
My sister managed to give the best evils I've ever seen to an elephant rider in India, only for her to turn around and realise, via me, that it wasn't the man who flicked her cap, but actually a monkey pooping on her hat.
My eldest brother is renowned for grumpy, expletive-filled rants against politicians, banks, the BBC, and just about the entire world that leaves us all crying with fits of the giggles, and I, during a discussion about holidays, managed to ask what there is for terrorists to do in Boston. I genuinely meant to say tourists, considering that Boston has like all others, reluctantly joined the list of cities hit by terrorism with its marathon bombings.
But my family's not just amazing for the laugh-out-loud moments it has. There's also all the family jokes, like the chicken noises at stupid moments - my big brother pulled this off in a monumental fashion when, just after I'd said to my sister, "I say this with all of my control and mastery of the English language", he looks at me, cocks his head to one side and clucked. Now, I'd meant to say "Swivel" - again, another family joke - but it still worked!
And then there's the family insult, complete with interchangeable words. The basic form is just "you're an idiot", with the comeback "your face is an idiot", although idiot has gone from... well, idiot, to panini, to fridge, to turd, to melon, and so on.
Granted, my family still has arguments. I managed to argue with my little brother Eduardo* over Jurassic World and whether or not they could actually bring back dinosaurs; I've argued with my sister Flora* countless times about my fashion choices; apparently backpacks aren't always useful.
But families are far more important than most people today realise. Today it's all about kids having kids, as Jeremy Kyle would say, and they think it's meaningless until they get the consequences of kids - no more schooling, no more socialising at all hours. Friends go from hundreds to a few who don't mind that there's a baby.
My point is, we've gone from Medieval family values, where there used to be an entire family plus servants sharing one bedroom to parents becoming grandparents before they've had their first job!
Granted romance has gone forwards and then had a reversal between Medieval times and now - it's gone from political marriages to marriages for love to not even getting married at all. But now, the togetherness of the family is slowly disappearing. There's very little stability for children, if any, when it used to be that families had to stay together, no matter what.
We've lost, as Jodi Picoult points out, the role each family member has:
"I woke up one morning thinking about wolves and realized that wolf packs function as families. Everyone has a role, and if you act within the parameters of your role, the whole pack succeeds, and when that falls apart, so does the pack."
But I think it's not just the role each person has within a family. Strong relationships mean a strong family. Strong families mean a strong society, and that all translates up. It will take strong families to improve this world, and Will Durant has, I think, summed this up brilliantly:
"The family is the nucleus of civilization."
It took one family millions of years ago to lead to over 7 billion people today. So my peers can keep their family values and opinions, thanks. I love my family just the way it is, warts and all, and I couldn't be prouder or happier to be a part of it.
*Names have been changed.
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