Oh
Sex and the City! If any single cultural icon demonstrates how the tables have turned, that show does. Watch
Sex and the City back to back with Mad Men to see where we
think we are and where we
think we were. The girls of
Sex and the City leaf through men as if they were browsing through GQ. They can pick and choose, need not worry about becoming pregnant (even when Miranda does), make oodles of their own money, have satisfying sex lives, and casually dump any man who doesn't hold their interest. They make men the limiting resource because they find so few of who meet their standards. Particularly intriguing is Samantha because she is written as a man and it is through Samantha that we see how women view men in their sexual lives. And who does Samantha end up with in the end? The intellectual-equal billionaire? Nope. She took the trophy boytoy.
One other cultural icon gets me thinking too and that's Abercrombie & Fitch. I wrote here about going into their flagship store here in Manhattan and the reason I went was to experience what made them so popular because, in my head, A&F is very definitely a product of its time. Why? Because it displays men as the limiting resource, virtually tells them that they must be beautiful, coiffed, manscaped, buff, and have an ass that won't quit.
Men are the new women.
A&F has been noted to be an exceedingly gay store but until now, it has only been within gay society that men have been limiting resources. Gay men have to work to get chosen by other men whereas, in the straight world, it has always been women who were pursued by men. In those days, it was the women who cared about fashion, who had to look great, who had to display to attract men who basically only had to have a modicum of grooming and reasonably neat attire. Now that the tables are turned, our notion of women's beauty has changed to fit their role in society. They can have short hair, be fit, and wear far more practical clothing than ever before. Heavy makeup is out. In contrast, men are far more body conscious than they have ever been. I suspect that as the ratio of women to men in the position of top earners and leaders continues to skew more in favor of women that men will become more competitive amongst each other in order to sexually attract the right woman.
A&F is the tip of that iceberg. LPSG also reflects that trend. When I was young, men were hairy Burt Reynolds-ish things and a man was supposed to not care how big his dick is because all he should care about is having a good time for himself and any size dick can have a good time. To make the penis even less of an issue, men invented such myths that if women didn't get off during sex then it was her problem. And that's actually an improvement from the Victorian myth that women didn't enjoy sex at all! Now however, look at how many guys, many young, are all over this site worrying no end about their penis size. They're concerned about their sexual performance, how their genitals look, taste, smell, and perform. Most interesting is that they want to know how they compare to other males and how to perform well for women in all aspects from dressing to what to say. There is a self-consciousness to their questions and whereas many older guys say to the younger, "just learn to use it well and be happy," and whereas that answer may have sufficed when I was young, these days that's not enough. Men are now becoming as sexually objectified as women have been for a very long time and that is because women have more parity than ever. Women will soon be the majority of the power holders in this country and most other western countries as well; particularly Russia where the disparity between educated men and women resembles that of black America.
I think men of my age and older are completely unprepared to usher in younger men to adulthood in this new gender paradigm. It wasn't something we planned for. I think many younger men feel today, "Why bother taking a traditional male role if women are going to do it for us?" I know there are studies taking issue with the purported feminization of education, making classrooms hostile to boys in general, but if that really is an issue, I think it's just a symptom of a larger problem defined, as I think men see it, that we don't know what it is to be a man these days. It's not defined for men by any ritual rite of passage, not something fathers can convey to sons, not something you can read about in books or see on TV. Women don't seem to know what they want in a man either. For men, women seem contradictory in so many ways that to satisfy one requirement is to not provide another. As was pointed out, women say they want one thing but frequently take another.
Maybe straight men are all doomed to be househusbands, but I kinda doubt that. What concerns me is the same thing that Naughty mentioned about the black community. Men who feel disenfranchised and purposeless get into trouble and always have. Men need purpose, need to be needed, need to provide. When women can earn enough to support themselves and kids, then what use are men other than walking sperm packets? Even that doesn't matter much. If a woman doesn't care for her selection of men, she can just order a straw full of genius or Olympian sperm over the internet. If that sounds a bit ridiculous to women, keep in mind men highly prize that which is useful and women have never had to face that problem because men needed women to bear and raise children. When it comes to reproduction, 99% of the effort is the mother's even if the child is half of the father. Women are enormously useful to men whereas men in our society aren't all that useful to women and are becoming less so.
Where that leaves men I don't know. Will boys born today be expected to earn less, have a glass ceiling, raise children at home, lie in bed hoping a girl calls, worrying so much about their appearance or sexual prowess they become sick about it?
Maybe they should be worrying. When news outlets carry such alarming stories as
The End of Men, we men have to wonder if women aren't going to start building Stepford husbands in the basement in their spare time.
That hard working woman may not think you are good enough for her. :wink: On paper, a lot of guys are a catch, but when you try to talk to them you find out they are experts in their field/career and can't talk about anything else. :12: They can't all have Asperger's Syndrome or be socially retarded yet this trend seems to be reaching epidemic proportions worldwide. :frown1: At least if a man approaches me in a bar or wherever, I know he's got a pair even if he isn't my type.
