Joke I saw that made me laugh out loud:
Adam: Let's have sex
Eve: I have a boyfriend
Adam: You do realise we are the only 2 people on earth, right?
Eve: Look, you're my best friend
I'd like to know from both sexes what their first reactions to this are, as well as what later thoughts come to mind. Is this in any way not at all humorous to some?
And what sparked me to laugh out loud was a recollection of witnessed irony. There has been a worrying rise in domestic violence, especially in countries like USA which we'd otherwise consider fairly evolved on women's rights front. One American friend I knew had shared this at a deep sharing session once : She found a disturbing trend in herself and could not explain it : In three consecutive relationships the men she was with became routine abusers, had started to beat her up regularly.
At the same time there seems to be a distinct separation between "friend" and "boyfriend" : going back all the way to a possibility that the "recruitment policy" (sorry for the jargon) itself might be flawed. I see a systemic flaw here : shaped by the abusive society we've been brought up in, for some reason women's romantic choices have tended to skip candidates who would n.e.v.e.r indulge in something like beating a love partner, and instead gone in favour of men having abusive tendencies.
And haven't we seen a very similar flaw in recruitment policies of businesses and governments in their leaders, CEOs and managers? Haven't we been talking about the abuse and greed and narcissism and psycopathy of these classes and how they're taking the world down with them? It's an abusive culture manifesting itself on all fronts, macro level and personal level.Adam: Let's have sex
Eve: I have a boyfriend
Adam: You do realise we are the only 2 people on earth, right?
Eve: Look, you're my best friend
I'd like to know from both sexes what their first reactions to this are, as well as what later thoughts come to mind. Is this in any way not at all humorous to some?
And what sparked me to laugh out loud was a recollection of witnessed irony. There has been a worrying rise in domestic violence, especially in countries like USA which we'd otherwise consider fairly evolved on women's rights front. One American friend I knew had shared this at a deep sharing session once : She found a disturbing trend in herself and could not explain it : In three consecutive relationships the men she was with became routine abusers, had started to beat her up regularly.
At the same time there seems to be a distinct separation between "friend" and "boyfriend" : going back all the way to a possibility that the "recruitment policy" (sorry for the jargon) itself might be flawed. I see a systemic flaw here : shaped by the abusive society we've been brought up in, for some reason women's romantic choices have tended to skip candidates who would n.e.v.e.r indulge in something like beating a love partner, and instead gone in favour of men having abusive tendencies.
"Look, you're my best friend"
Would you ever have been best friends with a man who has a tendency to beat up women? Doesn't the process of becoming best friends with a man automatically weed out men with those tendencies? Would you be best friends with a man who considers women as property? Wouldn't you have found something wrong with the guy early on and stopped being friends long back? Unlike romance, friendship happens over a much longer timescale and so is a lot more resilient at detecting and removing the wrong people. Not entirely of course, but dude, people aren't as split-personality-separate as our murder drama movies want us to believe.
I know there are several other factors, but shouldn't clear deal breakers on the negative side, as well as a more generous allowance of possible attractability on the positive side, factor into the equation? What about trustworthiness, the ability to keep a secret, caring and looking out for you? What about being able to talk at length about life? Could it be possible that our culture has downplayed more important characteristics and exaggerated less important ones?
Ladies, I know I'm over-generalizing, but even you know that this IS true for a lot of women and many whom you know and are worried for yourself. Coming back to my side of the world, we're only just starting to get over the very restrictive extremes of only parents/grandparents deciding everything for us. But what we're bringing in its place might turn out to be just as bad in another sense if we're not careful, if we don't take a pause, reflect and analyze like my friend did. After realizing her pattern, she was able to get a much better grip over herself, and has since been in a happy relationship with a longtime friend.
Might it be time to re-evaluate the recruitment policy?
PS: Please do not see this as any kind of escape excuse for the despicable behaviour of many men. Guys, we need to get out of our Man Box (http://www.ted.com/talks/tony_porter_a_call_to_men?language=en) if we want to to give up doing the most cowardly and ridiculous things imaginable to those we love. It's only a temporary aberration that is permitting violent men to get women to take them for partners : it is very quickly going to sel-correct so do not go to the losing side.
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