Sexism and Men's Issues

very true.

In general, I think women haven't quite learned how to compliment men in social situations. I think this could be due to women being strongly discouraged to even comment on a man's attractiveness be it clothes, cars, looks, etc. Of course we have the puritanical history of women not being alowed to enjoy sex, think about sex, and be only cloistered baby makers who only come out in the company of a male relative.

But in this age, women are the majority pressuring other women in this regard, and men seem to be (in general) confused or oblivious to these conflicts.

For example, go to a club and see that one girl who is accepting drinks, looks good, and is just having a good time dancing with multiple partners or chatting it up with a crowd. Men will most likely have a myriad of responses to this girl with good, bad, and indifferent to many degrees.

Women on the other hand or more likely to be polarized into the "you get it girl" club or "oh my god, look at that slut!". I think this attitude is very common with women. They're constantly judging each other from their clothes, walk, disposition, etc. And if another girl compliments their man, all hell breaks loose.

So women become more polarized in how they outwardly express themselves. Women who are more brazen in their calls or attitudes towards men are subconciously toying with that pressure among other sociatal pressures. She's already breaking the rules in getting your attention, might as well break them hard. This doesn't make it right or okay; I'm just trying to present where some women maybe coming from.

"Psssh. Even if you could catch a miracle on a picture any person would probably delete it to make space for more porn." - Aszur

Tonight I was linked to this video, which is by some guy named Foldable Human that I haven't fully looked into yet.

Anyway, I feel like it and the previous episode in the series touch on some interesting ideas. Why is it that so many movies made for and by men seem to portray men as lazy, selfish, stupid, or ruled by their base desires?

Be not afraid...

Because demonizing men in general allows specific men either the creators or in the audience to feel superior by comparison. And partly because it reflects cultural attitudes.

edited 17th Oct '12 6:14:12 AM by Kzickas

It's particularly worth noting that those stories often tend to be by and for men. Whilst I don't claim it's the whole story by a long shot, one interesting spin on things I've heard is that it's sometimes a divorce of responsibility - I'm a Man; I Can't Help It. If men are 'just like that' - dumb, lecherous, and adrenaline-fuelled - there's no sense in expecting them to change for anyone else, and no sense in blaming any individual man for being a dumb, lecherous adrenaline-junkie.

Another thing is that that sort of thing is common in comedies, where the characters' flaws are what make things funny (for instance, Homer and Bart's antics in The Simpsons form the comedic heart of the show). If male actors are getting more roles and screentime... well, you can see where I'm going with this, yes?

Another thing is the power-fantasy element - you, the dumb, schlubbish everyman can also attain great power, kick ass, and have all the hot, unattainable women you could possibly want. In this light, creators tend to aim low - it's the Viewers Are Morons concept at work. Observe how childrens' books can be condescending towards children, romance novels don't have a great view of women, and so on. There's a fair dose of contempt inherent to aiming for the lowest common denominator.

edited 17th Oct '12 6:24:30 AM by Iaculus

What's precedent ever done for us?

No, both men and women portray men like that. Even Lifetime or studios created or aimed specifically at women portray men as dumb, apathetic, horny, rude, brutish, hormonal, and immature. It still comes down to the argument that Women Are Delicate. Even women stereotype themselves as more nurturing, thorough, precise and generally wiser than their counterparts. A man who acts like childish and/or simple-minded, but still means well is someone who needs a woman to keep him honest. And being needed fulfills every person's (whether male or female or other) most basic desire.

Anyway, speaking again on my person thoughts, my personal thoughts about gender relations is that it revolves two factors that drive every person's actions:

• Fault
• Competition

If anyone's interested, I can elaborate.

edited 17th Oct '12 6:40:25 AM by KingZeal

I think Sam Witwicky and similar characters are all about setting the bar low for both men and women.

For men, if Sam Witwicky is the hero, that means they are the hero, no matter how lazy, incompetent, brutish, or schlubby they are. The world revolves around them and they get the hot chick at the end. And if they're not lazy, incompetent, brutish, and schlubby, then they're better than the hero—they're a god on Earth!

For women, if Sam Witwicky represents men, then it doesn't take much to be better than men. This can cause some discontent—why are men still in charge if women (as represented by me, since female protagonists are still rare enough that most women use themselves as a model) are so much better?—but on the whole, women are already conditioned to take satisfaction in working quietly behind the scenes, not seeking any personal acclaim. "He may control society, but I control him." That sort of thing.

Both sexes feel flattered by This (Male) Loser Is You (Or Your Boyfriend) because it keeps expectations low for both of them. It's smugness-enabling.

And it's also worth noting that even to the extent that people of both sexes are getting sick of Sam Witwicky and his clones, they're everywhere. Especially in the big cool blockbusters. If you want to see big movies, you have to cast your vote for Sam. The theater and the filmmakers don't know or care that you were Just Here for Godzilla—they just know which ticket you bought and treat it like a package "More of this!" statement.

edited 17th Oct '12 6:52:14 AM by Karalora

Stuff what I do.

Karalora I think you have some awesome points there.

You can't look at just Sam in that movie, because it's not just Sam who is just awful. Megan Fox's character is the female Sam in a lot of ways. Rosie Huntington is even worse! She is bankrolling this guy and tolerating his immaturity to an asinine degree. What can a former British Government official, even just a clerk, see in such a dopey loser?

I know they were trying to play up the whole, hot girl likes a cute guy who can make her laugh thing, but if you want that to be believble, don't get a damn Victoria Secret Angel. It's not working.

I wonder if without the recession with everyone wanting a mindless escape more than usual, would the Transformer series have gone so well?

"Psssh. Even if you could catch a miracle on a picture any person would probably delete it to make space for more porn." - Aszur

To be fair, he saved the world twice. "Loser" or not, that invokes some respect.

I take offense to this. Why not? The ability to make them laugh is often one of the main things that attracts women to a guy while physical hotness is one of the things that attracts the inverse. Though this is an anecdotal account, I personally know several guys who are fat, unkempt, poor, or otherwise flawed but are exceptionally charismatic, charming or funny and enjoy the company of extremely beautiful girlfriend(s).

The problem isn't that these girls are hot. The problem is that they're nothing but a hero reward. There's no personal foundation or build-up for these relationships. It goes from shallow physical attraction to TWOO WUV™ for no reason other than heroes are supposed to get laid.

edited 17th Oct '12 10:05:39 AM by KingZeal

Zeal, what good is him saving the world, twice, when she hates he was a solider. Remember her brother who was killed, Chris? Remember when she says that she loved his stories only because they were stories not to be repeated and that part was over? Him being a "hero" wasn't important to her.

And go ahead and take offense to my remark even though you have no reason to. The girl is out of Sam's league. She's smarter, more gorgeous, and making damn good money. Why would any girl in reality with that much going for her, insist on being with a whiney, selfish, lazy, jealous, and just completely disagreeable jerk?

Because it's a Michael Bay film, that's why. If I saw a real life Sam/Carley couple, my first thought would be that girl has some severe mental and emotional issues to be with a jerk like that.

Especially, and I'm willing to give men in general props here, if an average guy scores a successful, gorgeous lady who's willing to foot the bills and walk around the house half naked, they're not going to be a whiny, hateful emo. They'll be appreciative and productive in the relationship.

"Psssh. Even if you could catch a miracle on a picture any person would probably delete it to make space for more porn." - Aszur

I'm just pointing out the fact that even as an Unlucky Everydude, Sam is more brave than the norm. It's something worthy of respect. I'm not defending him as a character.

Weakness Turns Her On?

No, in Real Life, your first thought should be, "it's not my business to judge people".

No, people will be people. Doesn't matter how hot your significant other is or how supportive they are; people will find a reason to bitch. There is no relationship without conflict, and I find the implications that a guy who is "out of his league" needs to shut up and not dare be flawed to be a Double Standard.

edited 17th Oct '12 10:33:02 AM by KingZeal

When did I say anyone in a relationship out of their league needs to just shut up? I didn't. All I said was that I'm willing to give the average person credit that they are going to be quite different from Sam Whitwicky.

It's annoying when you insist on taking a nitpick of an entire statement instead of looking at it as a whole which is what most people intend them as.

"Psssh. Even if you could catch a miracle on a picture any person would probably delete it to make space for more porn." - Aszur

But that wasn't what you said. If I'm objecting to something that's misunderstood, then just elaborate. I had a problem with the way you voiced it, not specifically your critique of the character. More to the point, I was against the apparent argument that sexiness had to be treated like something precious and exceptional.

edited 17th Oct '12 11:17:41 AM by KingZeal

"Zeal, what good is him saving the world, twice, when she hates he was a solider. Remember her brother who was killed, Chris? Remember when she says that she loved his stories only because they were stories not to be repeated and that part was over? Him being a "hero" wasn't important to her."

I saw that more as her liking the idea of being with a war hero more than she liked the actual person she used to fill that role. One of the reasons that, despite her being the most relateable character in the movie, I thought she was an exploitive jerk.

"Because it's a Michael Bay film, that's why. If I saw a real life Sam/Carley couple, my first thought would be that girl has some severe mental and emotional issues to be with a jerk like that."

I pretty much thought they deserved one another.

edited 17th Oct '12 11:11:55 AM by Kzickas

Again, I know what I said and it wasn't that. I also never put sexiness as something special either.

This isn't the first time you've totally misconstrued what I said.

"Psssh. Even if you could catch a miracle on a picture any person would probably delete it to make space for more porn." - Aszur

Okay, here's what I primarily objected to, in chronological order :

What this basically amounts to is: "if you're a flawed, needy, unsuccessful guy who winds up with a girl who can do better than you, you need to change yourself to keep them".

Let's reverse that to:

"If you're a flawed, needy, unsuccessful girl who winds up with a guy who can do better than you, you need to change yourself to keep them".

edited 17th Oct '12 11:48:54 AM by KingZeal

Again, you're cherry picking out of context in order to come up with something counter to what I have said.

If you have to twist and nitpick quote blocks, you're probably not understanding someone.

"Psssh. Even if you could catch a miracle on a picture any person would probably delete it to make space for more porn." - Aszur

I'm not going to argue with you. You didn't mean to imply what you seemed to imply, so that's basically that.

I notice that it shows up a lot in Wodehouse's early romances*

. The hero is usually a not-very-bright but good-hearted young man in a relationship with a gorgeous, more intelligent (and often nastier) woman, and eventually wins the heart of another beautiful, intelligent and capricious woman. Even Bertie Wooster is essentially childlike in nature, even if he has more depth. The phenomenon is even lampshaded: "I once consulted a knowledgeable pal and his theory was that the sight of me hanging around like a looney sheep awoke the maternal instinct in Woman."

I think I'm now destined for some awful Hell for analysing Wodehouse. His works are splendid perfection.

edited 17th Oct '12 1:57:24 PM by Yuanchosaan

"Doctor Who means never having to say you're kidding." - Bocaj

Though given that Wodehouse's stuff was chiefly built around satirising the bubble-headed Edwardian aristocracy, his cast tends to be a bit on the dim side in general, usually with some very sensible people (of both genders) on the sidelines, trying to point them in something loosely approximating the right direction. In fact, I didn't notice a huge amount of gender bias in intellect there - for every Bertie, there is a Jeeves, and the women can be just as vapid as the men.

What's precedent ever done for us?

To take it back several posts, I think a massive problem at looking at issues like these things are that we tend to see them as gender conflicts and not gender tropes. All too often we see it as things that men are doing to women or women are doing to men and not the result of the little boxes that people want to put other people in to make things easy.

Democracy is the process in which we determine the government that we deserve

What exactly are you referring to?

I don't deny Wodehouse moved away from it - see Psmith, Ukridge, Mr Mulliner. But those two archetypes are very prominent in the early romances. You rightfully point out that everyone (minus Jeeves, who is more like a natural force in the shape of a valet ) in the Jeeves books is an idiot, but I think there's a definite difference in how their idiocy is portrayed. Stiffy, Aunt Travers, Honoria and her identical cousin, Bobby, Florence et. al. tend to be relatively intelligent, but with a self-centred worldview that makes them capricious and entirely lacking in common sense. The men tend to be bumbling, naive idiots of various degrees of niceness. The odd one out is probably Madeline in this respect. I can see how you might interpret as just parodying the general idea of the Edwardian Upper-Class Twit across both genders, though.

edited 17th Oct '12 2:24:38 PM by Yuanchosaan

"Doctor Who means never having to say you're kidding." - Bocaj

The first post on this page and the last few on the last page. Sorry, I should have made that more clear.

Democracy is the process in which we determine the government that we deserve

Here's another good point that should be changed,....why is it we never think more on positive traits of masculinity? Because they are there.

More articles like this we need

It's hard to keep up with this thread,alright? The last subject was about the [[Film/Transformers Sam Withwicky/Carley thing]],if whatever Drunkie was talking about happened before,I missed it.

edited 18th Oct '12 2:39:13 PM by terlwyth

Luminous beings are we, not this crude matter

Have you not been paying attention to Drunkie's posts?

edited 18th Oct '12 11:28:06 AM by Euodiachloris