There was a reason why for the last 8 years I did not have a TV at home, watching television depresses me. The TV and everything on it is designed to make you feel really bad about yourself, one way or the other.Like the ads that show women with lustrous, beautiful hair that bounce more than their boobs do when they walk or run. (Majority hair ads have women playing, jumping, running, why?) Or ads where men are ALWAYS gifting expensive jewellery to their girls and looking happy about it, ads where Papas have loads of time to sit and chill with the family or ads that show how women with pimples/acne don’t get boyfriends. Or stupider TV shows…
I just got up after watching this series on Discovery Travel & Living called, How To Find A Husband (also shown on UKTV). It’s a pre-recorded show about Sally Gray (reporter and TV presenter for last 15 years) who dates 50 men in 10 weeks to find herself a husband. The promo for the show goes, “I am 37 and still single. There is nothing wrong with being single…but now I want a husband…blah…and I don’t want to be stuck wearing this fucking SINGLE ring for the rest of my life.” She wears a silver ring with SINGLE engraved on it. Nice start to finding The One.
I was watching the original 1978 Don when a young Amitabh Bachchan’s collagen injected lips and Zeenat Aman’s pointy bras (why did women in the 70s think that boobs were supposed to be conical?) got to me and I switched channels to end up on Sally’s show where the first thing I heard was, “If you want a husband, don’t sleep with a man on the first date, or the second or the third.” (How about fixing the hymen instead so that each prospective husband-material thinks you’re a virgin, eh?)
Then the various date gurus go on to tell Sally that she should be “demure” with her dates and not be hyperactive. Then she was advised to keep the first date a coffee-date and not a drinking one and if at all there was to be drinking to keep it to two glasses of champagne. “Remember, less is more” advised the guru. Funnily enough the same dating guru who had so far advocated ‘demure’ advised Sally to be sassy and bold with her online profile, even if it meant fabricating stuff.
As an example the dating guru said how her profile said she liked wearing men’s shirts (how chweet no?) and at the same time was open for a threesome. Sally’s response was a shocked, “But that’s not true…” The dating guru responded with a quick, “How do you know?” Basically Sally is an honest person while the dating guru is a fraud. And that’s what finding a husband is all about isn’t it? Making a/the guy believe he is getting himself a wife while you hide your true self – could be hideous, hyperactive, bold, fun-loving, smart, witty, whatever – behind this mask of what is supposed to be Acceptable Behaviour for Marriageable Girls.
Of course that rule applies to women like Sally – and an increasing number of you girls out there – who are smart, sassy, independent, usually smarter than the dumb jocks around and DON’T want to settle for just anyone with a bit of flesh between his legs. Strangely there is no Acceptable Behaviour list for what makes a man ‘marriageable’. All it takes for a guy – even if he’s passably ‘good’ – to classify as marriage material is “He should want to marry”.
A guy can want sex on the first date because “He’s a man, men always want sex” and of course women’s hormones are only meant for the period, they don’t make us horny. A guy can drink on the first date because testosterone and caffeine don’t go together, do they? A guy doesn’t have to be ‘demure’ and can laugh loudly and crack the funnies because if a woman does that, frankly the man will be threatened by her wit. A guy can spill his drink, burp, fart and be a clumsy clod and everything is acceptable because of course his mommy cleaned up after him. But a woman doing any of that is not-marriage-material because honey, you are showing that you will not be the Perfect Wife. Because only women want marriage, right? Fuck you.
What if the woman does not want marriage? If a woman is quite happy NOT being a Mrs Somebody… Can the guys handle that? (She’d most probably be called a slut)
PS: Anyone out there who slept on the first date and is (still) married to/dating the person: Write in, even if anonymously. I REALLY want to prove this shit-myth wrong. Why should only a woman’s character be judged for sleeping on the first date?
PS2: IF there are men out there who don’t believe in a woman following a list of Acceptable Behaviour, don’t fucking fight with me and write in saying I am man-bashing; write in to show you DO exist: Apparently there are many really nice ladies single out there because they couldn’t be bothered marrying an arsehole.
8 comments:
I enjoy reading your blog for the sole reason that here is a woman who can speak her mind out (in most cases) & end up talking about a few uncomfortable truths. Let me clarify this… itz not that I don’t enjoy your man-bashing, but I prefer it when both the sex get bashed. Kinda balances nature. So “Fuck You TV and How to Find A Husband” was fine until you decided to end with a man-killing act. Men (so does women/kids/oldies) throw tantrums (demands for a list of Acceptable Behaviour) only cozs they are allowed to do so. Instead of dwelling tooo much into this, I would like to conclude with your line… Get them by the balls and their hearts and minds will follow. And it ain't gender specific. ;) & thatz the ultimate truth. It kinda answers it all.
To answer your Q
YES, I’m married to the woman I slept with on my first date… 5 yrs and a baby.
Yes, I was caught by the collar & taken to bed (not that I was complaining).
Nope, she wasn’t the first woman I slept with.
The Acceptable Behavior was that, I met a woman who knew exactly what she wanted!
PS: Here is a few more clarification for your WOMAN HEAD
1. We married 2 yrs after the 1st date
2. We had our baby 2 yrs after our marriage.
PS2: Live by your tag line
Get them by the balls and their hearts and minds will follow. And it ain't gender specific. ;)
Hallelujah! There IS hope and men AND women do marry each other even if it's against the Rules of Dating and they slept with each other on the first date (breathes sigh of relief).
Will try and keep the balance. :)
Holds the balls (flag) and marches off...
i'm still confused if sleeping is a part of whole DATING process :D
n ya, about those jumping things, well that is wat sells the most !
Amitabh Bachchan’s collagen injected lip...really? I never noticed that!But yea he did have weird lip.haha.
why did women in the 70s think that boobs were supposed to be conical?
Because it was an era of point and shoot.
Ok..marriage.hmm.Pinch me if am dreaming.Marry the one you would want to spend your old age with.In fun and laughter.That love you can feel even in a look.The shared belief that no matter what,love remains.The trust that no matter what ,both will not cross certain boundaries, with words and deeds.And looking back and laughing at sleeping on your first date or the fifth or waiting until marriage or whatever.If both are content and happy with the things they have done and do together,that I think is the real success.
hmm..out of topic am I.
Well…Anonymous, I wont agree completely with you! Yes I do agree that both men and women throw tantrums all the time…but there is no way that a woman could ever compete with a man and his way of looking out for SEX on the first date. We talk about the “liberated woman”, but when it comes to playing by man’s rules, I guess she does it, only to keep pace with him. It’s a MAN’s WORLD out there honey. EITHER you are IN or you get left behind.
And yes…… if I find a good looking interesting man , who I think I can spend the rest of my life with, then YES I would go ahead and sleep with him, not because that I want to get him fixed on to me, BUT because I wanted to.. This is how I think…But this FUNDA is not universal; there are women out there who feel that having SEX on their first date is the only way out to get him on to the road of matrimony.
Im happy that you got married to the woman you slept with on the first date…. But if this was the universal truth then I should have been married to a whole lot of men by now :) .
Are you happy now? or do you feel that you could have been happier?
I dont know if this counts but during our courtship, my then boyfriend wasnt very sure if I was the one he wanted to loose his virginity with, while I was dying to sleep with him. It took him about 6 months to decide to sleep with me and another 2 years to decide that I was marriage material.
Oh boy! A week or two of absence and so many posts to ponder over! Good going. Keep it up :).
The dating game seems to work on first impressions than facts. Little wonder that both men and women have rules of acceptable behaviour just to get the first imp right! Unfortunately, it is facts that rule the long term :(. As human beings - male or female - we all fart (sorry, pass the wind ;) ) and burp etc.! Oops ... I also smell when I work up a sweat when I run to reach that first date on time :(. But then TV tells me that deos will save me :), and my first imp will smell fine. And once married, the deo is useful when we meet others as a "couple" ;). By then, we've realised that we do not "wake up fresh" as they portray on TV ;), and can give up the deo in private :).
The real question is: how do we judge long term potentials from a short "well designed" presentation (as advised by some "date guru") on a date? I wish I knew :(.
Going out with someone - first time or not - is "hot gossip" :). And then, a girl who "dates" many men before "marrying the husband material guy" has a "reputation" built through the gossip. Long term reputations are built on short term, and partial information via gossip. (groan :( ). But then, is there any correlation between the dating-many-men reputation and being a long term material? I am not sure if there is.
A small correction, though. Life has some symmetry too. There are "acceptability rules" for men too. For instance, they must be "successful", "stable in career" and "be interested in marriage only/time passers please excuse" etc. (the degree-naukri-chokri rule ). There's a local "wisdom about marriage" in Maharashtra: look at a boy's achievements, and a girl's beauty. A female does not have to be "successful", "stable" etc. to be marriage material. She can play with those and still be fine just as a guy need not be demure etc. :).
The long term characteristics like "successful" ("demure" for women) are judged by "well designed" presentation of "confidence", "strength" ("beautiful" for women) etc. :). Using a mask to create a good first impression will not be a lasting impression, for sooner or later mask would give away. Ironically, women do seem to fall for the "brat" who has the bravado/confidence/strength (and then "repent" at leisure) - just like men who fall for the "is-marriageable" mask that may hide the true self. Despite the lack of solid correlation between the short term and the long term, the short term does seem to win and dating gurus become gurus :(.
I feel that the number of men and women who accept that a woman may not want marriage is on the rise and the number of men and women who cannot is falling. Courtesy patriarchal values, such women would indeed be called as sluts :( :( :(. BTW, that's just a feeling, not a fact that I know :).
Take care.
PS: I do not see this post as "man bashing" :). I do see it as a woman's point of view one. I am as curious to see women who don't believe in men following a list of "acceptability rules" coming out :).
I have been seeing my boyfriend for the last 3 years, we had some tipsy and amazing sex before we went for our first date.
If sex with a man is good, i would like to get to know him better.
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