Significance Contest

A Study of Bad Flirtation

2011-09-24T10:28:00.000-07:00

To be perfectly honest, I'm completely apathetic about dating right now as I'm taking time to figure out my own life. But I've been hitting the bars almost nightly for almost two weeks now in what is assuredly uncharacteristic behavior to play wingwoman for an assorted cast of characters. And of course, precisely because I'm not interested in meeting anyone, I've collected a pretty impressive list of crap from men in the Cambridge/Somerville area. A sampling:

Me: "What's your dream?" Dude: "Um, I'm shooting blanks."
Mary: "What do you do for fun?" Dude: "I don't like fun."
Me: "So what do you do for fun around here?" Dude: "I work at a bank!"
Dude: "What do you study?" Me: "People." Dude: "For real? Doesn't that get boring?"
Dude: "I think I've seen you before. Do you have a dog?" Me: "Nope." Dude: "Do you walk dogs?" Me: "Nope." Dude: "Are you sure? I swear to God I've seen a girl look just like you walk a dog around here." Me: "Totally not me." Dude: "No, I think it's you. You're trying to mess with me." Me: "Nope. Promise you I'm not."

In Which Holly Abuses the Humanities

2010-12-23T22:08:00.000-08:00

I made a striking finding today using the Google Ngram viewer.

What to Fear (and What Not to Fear) about Online Dating

2010-11-21T15:41:00.000-08:00

My roommate (also a PhD student at Harvard) reads the The Atlantic. Me being the whitetrash wunderkind, I kinda avoid the Atlantic. Today, I was reminded of why when reading the "What's Your Problem?" section (the magazine's backmatter), some New Yorker writes in complaining that his kids want to adorn his Land Rover (or Volvo!) with stickers from their yearly vacation destination, Martha's Vineyard. He feels this is "bragging." The fact that a reader of The Atlantic would write in with such a ridiculous question speaks volumes to me about its readership base and I'm really going on a rampage here, aren't I? I need to stop.

It's not all trash, of course. But there's enough trash in The Atlantic that makes me not want to bother sifting through it on a monthly basis. But this month's issue had a kinda thought-provoking piece on online dating data, the kind being collected by OkCupid as we speak. More and more people are pouring out things into an online dating website than they'd ever be comfortable sharing in public (or private). OkCupid, for example, has a sign-up quiz which is used to match you with other users on the site on the basis of your dating profile. The quiz asks you pretty intimate stuff that other dating websites sort of ignore, such as how many partners have you had relations with, do you have a STI, are you into kinky shit, etc. In addition to volunteered information collected by quizzes, the site is constantly collecting more "passive" usage statistics such as search queries, how long you visit profiles, what pictures you're looking at, who you're messaging (and who you're not messaging), and how you respond to instant messages.

As a social scientist, I can tell you that people are freely giving up what we researchers pay literally millions of dollars a year to collect. As someone who is primed as an academic to think constantly about protecting the rights and privacy of the people I study and who is in many ways constrained by the weight of just how far we must go to protect confidentiality, it's always amazing to me that sites like Google, Facebook and OkCupid just have this incredibly intimate data basically just compiling itself. People sign away a lot for the privilege of using these sites and it's actually at the benevolence of the site founders that their privacy isn't even more encroached, honestly, since we know most people have no idea how their data is used or what, exactly, they're signing away when they sign up for a site or click through a waiver. But still, from where I sit professionally, this is amazing stuff that we social scientists are only just starting to wrap our heads around. Most of us aren't trained to understand it as data yet and right now that's basically the only thing holding us back from moving further into telling you, for example, how your search queries predict on average how many more years you'd have of dating before you marry your first spouse, when compared to other users who match your dating profile. How terrifying is that? Marketers and academics do this kind of shit with the expensive and limited data we have at our disposal now. Imagine if we had more of it.

Personally, I'm fascinated with OkTrends which is at least some attempt to make use of the ridiculous amount of data the site is collecting and convey it back to users in a way that is both approachable and informative. In fact, quite recently, OkCupid's team of datacrunchers came out with a pretty neat finding showing that gay men, for example, virtually never try to search for or contact straight users and are no more sexually promiscuous than are straight users. These kind of findings are not only interesting, but they are changing how we understand social behavior (while also debunking stupid myths that have never had data behind them one way or another).

The piece in the Atlantic brought up one way for understanding how this exponentially increasing store of data can have negative consequences. Algorithms are used by OkCupid to better set you up with a potential match. Most dating sites do this on a pretty superficial level. If you're devoutly Christian, most are going to veer you away from singles who list Atheism as their religious view. OkCupid is a little more advanced in that it's using far, far more data to construct its algorithms than Match.com. It's not perfect, not by a long shot, but it is moving in a direction where it knows better than you do what you want to find in a date. It knows how others whose site activity looks like yours are doing in their dating trajectory and it's going to start using algorithms to shape your site usage to ensure you a slightly better batting average.

What does that really mean, exactly? OkCupid site founder, Sam Yagan, notes that the sites' main goal is largely just to get people get a conversation going with other users. It wants you to message and connect with another user. Whether or not you have a successful date out in the real world is not really something it considers because the site itself can't control real world interactions (yet). But it can try to tailor the site to ensure that more of its users are connecting with other users who will be receptive. One of the problems OkCupid's data team has found is that black women, for instance, have a really hard time getting men of all races to reply to their messages.

Now comes the interesting stuff: the moral questioning. Does Yagan start using algorithms to limit the users black women can see to mostly only those men--based on statistical evidence--who are most likely to respond to messages from black women to better ensure a successful match? If he did, to what extent would users even be aware that it was even going on?

It gets more complex when you start thinking about other variables of interest and what responsibilities a dating site has to its user base. Online dating is getting more and more sophisticated and the questions sites ask are getting more probing. You are torn, as a user, from revealing the data because the reason you're on this site in the first place is to find a match; if you withhold data, are you hurting your chances of being matched with someone perfect for you?

Even though most of the site's quizzes are useless distractions telling you which Harry Potter character you're most like, some of them are actually not too dissimilar from instruments we use as social scientists to screen people for things as important as depression, suicide, and domestic abuse. From the site founder's perspective, if you have questions being answered on your site that can serve as predictors of mental instability and social dysfunction, do you have a moral obligation as a dating site to weed those users out of the dating pool? What about infidelity? Do you steer cheaters towards other cheaters? Or what about health predictors such as eating and exercise habits? Do you factor in predictors for impotence, obesity, diabetes, cancer or heart disease into your matching calculus? What about social class? Do you match the rich with the rich? Poor with the poor? Again, what are your obligations once you have that data? Do you do anything? What can you do? What's to stop you from doing anything?

I think these questions are important to ask because we know more and more people in America are turning to the internet for dating. Because online dating presents far more data than you could ever process on your own and because more and more people are signing on, algorithms are increasingly necessary to help you find a compatible partner. It's difficult to think websites such as Facebook and OkCupid might have this much influence in shaping social networks, but the reality is they already do. So long as we enjoy this data for our personal consumptive needs, it's still important for us to start thinking critically about what implications this could have on the shape of contemporary society.

Every Online Dating Profile Ever

2010-10-16T19:49:00.000-07:00

Sometimes the Reddit comments sections are just some of the best things on the internet. Here, SlvrEagle23, describes just about every online dating profile ever:

About Me:

I don't even know what to write here! I'm not normally the type to get on these dating sites, but I figured I'd try it out, so here goes.

I'm a really complex person, who tries to always be "real" and true to myself. I like all kinds of music, and I enjoy having lots of friends and doing things with them. I try to be happy most of the time and avoid things that don't make me happy. There's so much more to know about me that I could never fit it in here!

Anyway, I'm always looking forward to the future and finding the good and fun parts of it. I'm extremely confident but I know my shortcomings.

If you want to know anything else, just ask!

About You:

I guess I'm pretty flexible really! You could be any kind of person, as long as you have a great personality!

You should be confident in yourself, though. Also, not too stocky or short, but not too tall either. You shouldn't be too tan, but definitely don't be pasty. I'd really like it if you were attractive, too.

Even better, LeakyWeeks adds:

I've magically reworded this to be just the exact opposite and ended up with a kind of realistic description of a person:

I know exactly what to write here. I am totally the type who would try out online dating. I'm not a very complex person and I am always surreal about myself. I don't like all kinds of music and I don't have tons of friends I like to do stuff with. I don't have to try to be happy most of the time and I also won't avoid things that make me unhappy. There's not too much else to say about me that I haven't already said. I live in the moment and never look toward the future and I never have to try and find the good things in life. I'm not the world's most confident man and I have no shortcomings that I know of. There's nothing else that you want to know because I already told you everything, but ask if there is.

Oh, internet. I loves you.

Holly’s Dating Tips for Guys Part 10: Social Invisibility and all of its Manifestations

2010-07-13T09:58:00.000-07:00

One of the biggest complaints in modern times is “I don’t know where to meet people.” I’m guilty of this one myself, ever since I wandered under the Misty Mountains one day and now only venture out into the daylight in pursuit of that hairy little bastard who stole my ring. But this is something I’ve been looking forward to dissecting because my thoughts on this problem are more sociological than anything else I’ve thrown at you before. And as such, here’s the best part of today’s blog entry: it’s not (entirely) your fault if you’re finding it impossible to meet anyone (be they friends or lovers). But here’s the worst part: there’s probably not much you can do about the situation you’re not already doing.

Way back in college when I was but a wee baby, I wrote a paper on the decline of public space and the social criticism implied by New Urbanism. I remember it fondly since unlike a paper, it was actually an entry for my political sociology class blog. Now, I’m fortunate to have gone to one of those tiny colleges where class discussion was a spectator sport and I was anticipating some pretty informed commentary on the subject. Unfortunately for all of us, most of the comments were of the hopeless variety: “Damn, this is really depressing. What should we do about it?”

So why do I think this is important to make significant to my audience of twenty-somethings? Let’s start off with a fact: public space is increasingly and counter-intuitively privately owned. Let me explain. Recall all the places you go during the course of the week when you’re not at home or at work. How many of those places are spaces not specifically designed for consumption? Your life since college, I’ll wager, has become defined by your consumptive power. The result of which has led urban planners everywhere to rightfully complain constantly that we as a consuming public really suck at creating public spaces which would foster both civic and social engagement.

Sociologically, what I imagine this has done over time is erode opportunities where we can be seen by others as a public person. What does this mean? Well, when you walk into a store or a coffee shop, you are not seeing other people because what you are seeing are other consumers. People could have thousands of different motivations being where they are at any given time. Consumers, however, are defined as such because their presence in that space is motivated solely by consumption. So naturally, you presume that they did not walk into this joint to be bothered by other consumers. Consumption is an interaction between the consumer and the retailer. The retailer rarely invests in overhead to provide a place for social interaction unrelated to consumption of their product.

So what has resulted from this increased privatization of space is what I’d call a norm of social invisibility—where we literally try to pretend that we can’t see or be seen in public. And woe to he who tries to break this norm because we are all guilty of enforcing this one. Who can’t recall a time when you felt unduly burdened by a stranger trying to engage you in a conversation when all you wanted to do was get a cup of coffee? Yeah, it’s that pervasive. We all suck.

You’re probably asking why life isn’t more like college, where making friends was comparatively easier. The answer is because colleges are what we sociologists refer to as total institutions, where all aspects of your life are catered to by the institution itself—eating, sleeping, socializing and whatever meaningful purpose has brought you all to union (presumably education). And because everyone assumes individuals are attending your college to meet these varied needs, it’s far easier to approach strangers knowing 1) your interests and motivations are likely similar and 2) it’s encouraged and expected by the institution. From an organizational standpoint, the college's motivation is just to persist and, for a few, get ahead in the almighty Newsweek rankings. Many colleges "bank" on you forming an emotional attachment to your alma mater based largely on the relationships you formed in college and reflecting on these friendships, you will continue to support the institution for the rest of your life. However, now, most of our life outside of college is being spent in spaces supplied by corporate entities and geared primarily towards a specific, antisocial purpose: profit. This is what makes “real life” so much harder than college.

Now, I usually try to keep this blog clear of the kind of paranoid/conspiratorial ranting I inflict only upon loved ones, but this one’s important. There’s seemingly no escape from this kind of mindfuck since what we have here is basically an equal-opportunity buzzkill on everyone’s lives. And we as a consuming society have allowed this mentality to invade every speck of social life we have created for ourselves—you don’t bother other people at a beach because they are trying to consume the ocean. You don’t bother people at the park because they are trying to consume the green space. You don’t bother people on the subway because they are trying to consume their transportation. Yep, there is actually very little time in your life anymore where you can talk to a stranger without feeling like you are encroaching upon their consumption. And personal technology in the form of iPods and netbooks is making it easier and easier to make sure we never have to so much look at a stranger when we’re out in public ever again. From where I sit, this is one of the greatest tragedies of modernity and the stuff of futurist dystopian novels. Catch me with a good beer some time and I could go on and on about this until I pass out from lack of oxygen, but the bottom line here is that it’s also killing your mojo.

Right now, there’s an AT&T commercial airing on TV constantly. You’ve probably seen it. A man is standing across the tracks staring at a woman seated inside a train. In a moment, his whole future with this woman flashes before his eyes from backwards to forwards, from his son’s inauguration as President to his wedding to his first date sharing a bucket of popcorn at the movies. Quickly, he pounces on his smartphone to change his tickets and races to board her train, slumping into the seat across from her. And she smiles knowingly from across the aisle.

Yeah.

Ok.

Whenever my brother and I see this, we call it that “creeper commercial,” because we imagine how in real life, this would play out entirely differently if a guy tried to pull this kind of stunt. First, the woman would not be smiling knowingly because she’d be wide-eyed and scared as shit the second she starts seeing this guy sprint towards her train. Secondly, she wouldn’t be there anymore because she’d have gathered all her things and checked into the next car before he got there. Poor schmuck.

I know, what gives? And you’re probably thinking, “God, I wish women weren’t so prude! She should have given him a chance!” Yeah, ok, except we all need to realize that the social acceptance of engaging strangers in even casual conversation is struggling to survive. It’s so rare anymore that it’s unnatural and off-putting. This is why we wear earbuds on the sidewalk. This is why we young ones are rushing to the self-check-out lines at the grocery stores to avoid making small talk with cashiers or—God forbid—the person behind us. This is why all mothers view any man over the age of 16 who approaches her young children as a potential pedophile. And ultimately, this is why normal women spurn most of the advances of even the most well-meaning men. Social relations of all kinds are strained and we are failing as a social species. Dating and courtship, I’m afraid, are just victims of a much greater social disaster.

But it gets a little complicated when we talk about how you can approach women, because I know some guy out there is going to say, “Hey, that’s not true—I approached a woman once in public and she shot me down.” Let me stress there are two kinds of women and based on the odds I’m going to guess you’re in the camp of guys who continually approach the first kind. On one hand, there are the really, really beautiful women making up approximately 10% of the female population who can anticipate being approached by men multiple times a day and then there are the 90% who can anticipate being approached by men in a serious, non-alcohol-related manner maybe once or twice a calendar season. (Seriously. Ask your friends.)

Indulge me while I refuse to empathize with the hopelessly beautiful and explain what happens when a “normal” girl is approached: she just can’t take it seriously. She watches equally “normal” men trashtalk virtually perfect women such as Megan Fox for having thumb-toes and hit on her super-attractive peers like gnats on a bug-zapper while she’s lucky enough to swat away the random barfly. From this, she has internalized an idea at this point that she’s not terribly attractive and is crazily suspicious of the motives of any guy who would approach her on the basis of her looks alone (because, like I said, she doesn’t think she’s terribly attractive). And though a lot of men interpret her icy demeanor as arrogance or disgust, the emotional undercurrent in this situation is insecurity. Given the infrequency that even objectively very pretty girls are ever approached in public by anyone and the ulterior motives of men who do far too much approaching in public, she’s got her walls up 24/7 and they’re getting thicker and thicker every year. And so it goes, the line that has been dividing us since grade school lives on to see another day.

So back to this AT&T commercial. It’s a cute commercial, don’t get me wrong. It’s what little girls grow up hoping for, but those hopes are dashed by the time they’re my age and stand on subway platforms and in coffee shops day after day watching all the sane-looking men stare down at their iPhones. Today, it’s virtually impossible to make friends outside of our institutional playpens let alone meet Prince Charming. And I’d argue we’ve all now developed a mentality that everyone we meet would rather not be disturbed in their bubbles of social invisibility, guarded heavily by our electronic fences in the forms of Kindles and Blackberries.

What’s the solution? Honestly, I’m not terribly optimistic that this is going to change. We’ve developed a mass-consumer mentality and are now increasingly seeing each other as consumable objects—numbers on a Facebook page, followers on twitter, and too often, “single serving friends” who can be unloaded when the mutual demands of friendship become too inconvenient. You can count me among those ironic individuals now preaching on a virtual corner that my generation is losing its ability to make relationships work, despite the thousands of ways the internet is supposedly keeping our social networks tighter than ever.

If my problem is with modernity, then my solution is obviously archaic. It’s probably going to take something as stupid as a cheap metal pin you can stick on your shirt that says: “Hey, I’m Friendly! Talk to me!” Seriously. Of course, this wouldn’t work without a crazy ironic internet meme campaign to make people understand what it is. But you understand my point, right? That you literally need an invitation to feel comfortable approaching a stranger for friendly social exchange, even if all you want to do is pay them a compliment?

My best advice for this is to ignore this feeling. Yes, prepare yourself for a lot of rejection but rest assured that it's typically not personal. If you approach a girl at a coffee shop and ask her how she's enjoying that book she's reading, she may dump a one-word response on you--or maybe she won't. I don't recommend complimenting her appearance in any way, but neutral hooks are perfectly acceptable. If you're sitting next to each other on the subway you could probably break the ice pretty well by saying, "Isn't it weird how no one ever, ever talks to each other on the subway?" Again, she might be super uncomfortable in you breaking her bubble, or she may be game for what at worst could be a ten minute conversation about diverted gazes. All that you have to keep in mind is what I've stated before: this norm of social invisibility is a societal problem and as such, you can't blame yourself when others (even females) abide by it. Nevertheless, the potential payoff makes it always worth breaking.

Holly’s Dating Tips for Guys Part 9: Four Girls You're Going to Meet at Your Next Party

2010-06-26T12:14:00.000-07:00

Hey there, fellas. You ever been to a party? Yeah? Well, I've been to enough to know I meet the same people over and over again. Oh, yeah, they have different names and jobs and sometimes even different clothes, but being the horribly cynical sociologist that I am, all social activities are opportunities to categorize people and put them into boxes according to their social behavior. Seriously, it's more annoying for me than for anyone else so spare me the lectures about snowflakes.

Anyway, here I present to you four girls you're almost guaranteed to meet at your next party. There are other types I'm missing, but here are the four who are basically fixtures at any given social engagement.

The Mathematician

See that girl over there? The hot one in the pink halter-top? She’s on her fourth drink, right? Oh, you’ve been keeping count, don’t pretend you haven’t been. Yeah, you guys were talking for a while, right? About what you guys learned in intro philosophy at your respective colleges. Kierkegaard, man, yeah, deep shit. Man, she’s, like, deep. And smart, right? Dude, that chick, she’s frikkin’ awesome! Where is she? Oh, she left to go talk to her friend. But she said she’d be back. Yeah, you know what? Maybe.

Right now, she’s over there with that friend doing a kind of mental calculus you’ll just never understand, but rest assured you’re being sized up against every other man in this room. Oh, you thought you were special? Well, for one thing, the only reason she came to this party was because she heard he guy she’s had a thing for the last nine months was going to be at this thing and turns out he’s a no-show. Two points for you. And you don’t smell like Axe. One point you! But that guy over there, the one with a brick for a chin? Yeah, he’s been eyeing her up the whole night, too, and guess what? He doesn’t have a roommate. Four points for him. Oh, and he’s got one of those six-figure jobs that’ll eventually teach him to loathe himself and whatever offspring he creates but right now, he doesn’t worry about paying back his student loans and he’s thinking of using some of his saved-up sick-time to go windsurfing next week. Ten points him.
And oh, shit, he’s made eye contact with her and he didn’t even try to make it seem like an accident and look immediately down at his feet! Fifteen points him! Shit, bro, right now he’s going to stuff all that self-hatred into that bottle of Sam Adams he’s got there and he’s going to nail that chick in pink halter-top, bro. Oh shit, bro, your girl and her girl are walking ever-so-casually to the stack of Maxims that just so happens to be piled by brickchin over there. And as she bends over to pick one up and giggle at a random page, he picks up his cue…and forget it. You’re done, bro.

Taken, but…

You know that girl at the office who giggles at everything you say and finds eight reasons a day to touch your arm? Oh man, she’s totally into you. Everyone knows it. Nothing’s happened, though, because she’s got a boyfriend. But she’s here, dude! And she’s got her head weighing heavy on your shoulder tonight after that second rum and coke. She’s got her hand on your chest and her boyfriend’s nowhere in sight. Maybe tonight you should tell her how you feel, huh?

Yeah, maybe, except when you ask any female in the office and you find out she’s like that to every guy in the office. Ok, maybe not every guy—she’s got standards, you know. She’s got her eyes on the ones who would be next in case her current boyfriend fails. She’s making sure you’re safe—you’re gonna take her out for coffee when her mascara works its way down her face onto your desk to talk about what a big, fat jerk he was, aren’t you? You’re gonna be there to pick up the pieces, aren’t you? Good ol’ dependable you! You’re such a nice guy, man. And funny, too! So sweet. I wish my boyfriend was as sweet as you.

Yeah, let’s face it, she’s a serial monogamist and this is the essential prepwork that goes into never being single for less than a menstrual cycle. Oh, you didn’t realize that, huh? You think serial monogamists are just really lucky? That they just stumble in and out of relationships with about a week’s worth of breathing room in between? No, the second the commitment starts is the second she starts planning the next one—just in case.

The Limelight

Dude, check her out. You see her? The one playing Beirut? Yeah, she’s single. You wanna know why I know she’s single? A law previously stated, guys don’t typically let a girl into the male circle-jerk activity unless one of them wants to bang her. This means some other guy has already put in the legwork—he’s talked to this girl, deduced her dating status, and wants to bang her. But secondly, and most importantly, her willingness to participate in games where she might be in the center of attention, where guys will have to look at her is usually a sign she’s willing to at least talk to you. Oh, you don’t think that makes any sense, do you? You’re full of shit, Holly. Why would that mean that?

Because, silly, girls who put themselves out there know what they’re doing. Limelights are in more control than you’d think and her strategy tonight is to have a good time. If that includes meeting a guy who wants to ask her out for dinner some night this week, then awesome, but she’s not banking on it. She knows she’s going to get hit on by creeps, she’s not stupid, but maybe one of these guys are going to ask her something disarming, for once. Maybe. But too many nice guys pass over the limelight at a party thinking she’s that awful “s” word and don’t realize she’s trying to be one of the guys, because she’s not about to slink quietly off into a corner tonight. I’ll be damned if she’s not the only girl at this party who is going to smile broadly at every guy who approaches her, even if she walked in knowing full well she’s going home alone tonight. She’s not easy—but she’s probably easy to talk to, at least tonight.

Girl-Next-Apartment

That one? Her? You mean the one who was talking to the host just a minute ago and is standing next to the kitchen counter with her cup held strategically up in front of her face? Oh yeah, she’s the girl next door. Having nothing else to do tonight, she figured she’d hit up her neighbor’s party, what the hell, right? And man did it take a lot for her to come, because she doesn’t know anyone here besides her neighbors. Despite what everyone and their mom believes, it’s once in a blue moon you meet someone in their mid-twenties anymore capable of introducing themselves at a party without immediately following it with a drunk come-on. Yeah, she’s scared. Right now, she’s thinking of finishing this drink and going home to find something on her instant Netflix queue. She’s been here for twenty minutes and hasn’t met a soul. This was a mistake.

Yeah, you know why she’s the best girl to talk to at this party? There are several reasons. First, she doesn’t know anyone else here, which means she’s from a social circle outside your own making her a valuable node for learning new things, networking and meeting new people. Second, the very fact she’s here is that she’s hoping to socialize at least a little bit tonight and probably hoping to meet new people. Third, if you strike out, no one will know, since no one else at this party bothered talking to this girl besides you. Fourth, there’s very little chance she’s going to get to play mathematician tonight, since, well, no one else is talking to her. Lastly, it’s just polite so long as you don’t hit on her in an offensive, horrible, obvious way. “Hi there! You’re a new face. You friends with[one of the roommates]?”

Holly’s Dating Tips for Guys Part 8: The Do’s and Don’ts of a Planning a First Date

2010-06-02T09:54:00.000-07:00

DON’T plan to break a sweat. You may think you’re doing her a favor by choosing something action-oriented on a first date—especially if you’ve gotten a vibe from her that she’s outdoorsy and/or athletic—but girls more often than not want to use the first date to evaluate you as a potential mate. Oh, sure, you could totally go ahead and think you can show off your manliness by climbing Mt. Doom as she admirably looks on, but imagine your humiliation when you find out she’s a frikkin’ mountain goat and has to wait for you to catch up every couple of minutes.
But even more of a concern is what to wear. A girl has so rarely an occasion in her life when she can dress up nice in anticipation of it being appreciated. Don’t rob her of the opportunity. Even if you’re planning to go to a hole-in-the-wall Chinese carry-out (don’t plan on this), she’s still going to try to look nice. If you tell her in advance, “Hey we’re going white-water rafting,” my guess is her first reaction will be to contact her friends and tally their opinions on the subject, and after being told by seven of them how stupid you are for suggesting this as a first date, she will sit in her room and stare blankly at her closet and ask herself, “What the hell does one wear white-water rafting but still says, ‘Hey, I’m adorable…adorably waterproof?’” Don’t put her in that position.

DO bank on the knowledge that you’re at your best side by side, not eye to eye. It’s actually a fact that a man is a better communicator when he’s sitting side by side with a partner both facing the same direction than he is looking his partner dead in the eyes. Anthropologist Helen Fisher, author of Anatomy of Love, thinks this is largely due to evolutionary differences—men, in hunting parties, used to sit starting at vast expanses for hours on end waiting for prey to hop out of the bushes while women used to sit and have inane, unending staring contests with their progeny (I guess?). From this division of labor developed two different communication styles.

Women, for their part, obsess over facial expressions and this is why they will incessantly ask you during periods of silences, “What are you thinking?” Especially when they are first getting to know you, they will do their best to analyze your facial vernacular as to best understand what you are feeling even when you aren’t actually saying anything. While some of us are experts at this, we are all pretty decent. And if you’re lucky enough to get into a relationship with one, she’ll probably learn to read your face better than you’d ever imagine. This is partly the reason why women prefer face-to-face communication, because its intimacy betrays a lot more than you’d think.

But men, who are not generally keen on sharing emotions, prefer side-by-side communication, which allows for greater exchange of thoughts rather than feelings. This is probably true for you and you’re not exactly sure why; you sit with your dad on a couch watching a game and during the commercials start opening up about shit for no reason or you’re driving in a car with your mom and you talk about stuff you’d feel horrified to discuss face-to-face. Though almost every dating guru in the world wants to tell you to make eye contact with your date (and you shouldn’t necessarily ignore that advice), there’s something to be said about the bonding intimacy of actually talking to one another. But then, I’m of the persuasion that a healthy conversation is worth substantially more than a night of staring across a table from one another with nothing to say (which always seems to beg for the rambling of utter crap by the party made most uncomfortable by the awkward silences).

For this reason, I suggest some dating strategies that incorporate this bit of knowledge. Technically, you sit side by side at a movie theatre, which is comfortable, but you can’t actually talk to one another. However, walking in a park is a side-by-side activity as is sitting side by side by a pond. Museums are always interesting and offer a constant stream of conversation fodder, which takes the focus off of staring at each other. Zoos and aquariums achieve this, much to the same effect. Though dorky in theory, pottery-painting in practice is one of those activities that is just mindless enough to talk through. And though

DO avoid competition. I’m not a big fan of advising couples to do competitive things which pit them against one another in any way. I guess because the couple-thing to me implies unity and competition implies the exact opposite of that. If your hope is to maybe kindle a relationship, then you need to be on the same team, or, well, at least not start off things by being on opposing teams. And, just so we’re on the same page here, you never know (as hinted at above) if you’ll be the weaker sex in any proposed activity (I mean, are you 100% sure you’re a better bowler than she is? Are you emotionally stable enough to power through facing that defeat?).

DON’T do a group date, unless… both of you are absolutely on the same page that the purpose of the evening, as far as you two are concerned, is to get better acquainted with one another. Oh boy. Ok, story time. Once upon a time, I had two guy friends who went on a group date with three girl friends. First, this was a stupid idea. Second, I was not one of these three girl friends. Instead, I was the one three out of these five friends decided to call to clear up confusion about who was with whom and who had legitimate “dibs” on whom. This was a mess. I don’t exactly remember how this happened, but both guys were convinced they were on a date with the same girl, leaving the other two girls feeling rejected and angry, never mind the awkward tension between the two guy friends. Needless to say, this was not a successful date and so I don’t recommend group dates as first dates in any shape or form. Too many things can go wrong. And, most importantly, it violates one of my most important rules…

DON’T lose control. This is important because it covers a lot of dating territory. As far as I’m concerned, and I’ve said this plenty of times in the past, men pursue, women choose. Both possess agency, just in very different ways. That being said, the first date should be seen as an opportunity for a man to demonstrate his efficacy and that means NOT asking her what she wants to do. “Hey, you wanna go out sometime?” “Sure.” “I dunno…What do you wanna do?” is seen as wimpy. Better would be: “Hey, do you wanna go play mini-golf on Saturday with me?” Seriously. One of these is a flaccid way to ask a girl out. The other is proactive and confident. Guess which one girls prefer.

But “don’t lose control” also means avoiding situations that would take you out of the driver’s seat, so to speak. You don’t want to give off the impression that you’re not a studly, desirable male by being seen as anything less than independent. It’s hard for me to think of all the tiny ways you can be seen as less than efficacious on a first date, but keep in mind that most women need to see you as at least self-sufficient to feel secure around you, if not powerful and mountain-moving (I exaggerate, but it’s mostly true). I don’t mean beat her over the head with oozing machismo (especially weird, artificial shows of chivalry, like saying “Milady” and bowing) because you’ll make her feel uncomfortable. But it’s nice to know the only thing she needs to worry about in the date is getting better acquainted with you, not where to eat, what movie to watch, etc. I think too many men are scared to plan a date because they’re afraid of offending someone. But seeing as we as a generation of twenty-somethings generally royally suck at dating anyway, I’ll tell you there’s no rulebook about how to do this. There are only things that will make you attractive to a female and things that will make you seem wimpy. Planning a date is probably one of the least offensive ways to prove you’re a take-charge kind of guy.

Jane Austen's Dating Tips for Guys Part One: What I Learned about Love from Pride and Prejudice

2010-05-30T20:49:00.000-07:00

Oh, what? Seriously? Holly, what? You were doing so good there with the Bowerbirds and your one-sided hatefest for Judd Apatow. But yeah, I'm busting out the Jane Austen. As with many other girls you probably interact with daily, Pride and Prejudice was my first brush with romance. (Ok, that's not exactly true, I'll admit my first brush with "romance" was the weird relationship between Leia and Han in the original Star Wars trilogy that, from a female point of view, was entirely one-dimensional and devoid of emotion. But more on how that messed me up as a child another time.) Before Twilight, before The Notebook, and I guess right around the time Titanic came out, for me, there was Pride and Prejudice. And like the kiss between Wesley and Buttercup in the Princess Bride, oh, Pride and Prejudice blew them all away.

Oh, please let me explain Pride and Prejudice to you, male readers, because if you're like any of the other men in my life, you have made it to your mid-to-late twenties and have made a pretty solid effort up to now of avoiding letting this book into your life. I'm about to ruin that.

Pride and Prejudice is the Rosetta Stone for understanding the female mind when it comes to courtship. Everyone knows there's the seemingly peerless Mr. Darcy contained in its pages, and many men seem to think him some kind of Edward Cullen-esque paragon of sensitive masculinity that like moths to a candle, is the reason why the book is so loved by women the world over. You'll be shocked to learn that's not true. Mr. Darcy is made out to be a boorish bastard. Of course, his asshole behavior is nothing when compared to Bronte's Heathcliff, but he's not exactly Prince Charming, either. He is, as the title suggests, a proud son of a bitch. His flaws are made achingly apparent in the first half of the novel, and Elizabeth, the heroine, is utterly repulsed by him, never mind sexy square jaw or his fortune.

Personally, the reason I think the novel is so popular with women--especially when read as a young, developing girl--is that it disabuses us of the jejune notions we develop as children of what love is. Elizabeth is not a Disney princess and unlike many Disney movies where the female heroine only actually converses with the hero five minutes before the happy ending, P&P documents the entire back and forth of what is a messy, almost-tragic courtship. In a word, it's textured in every way a Disney movie is silk.

Like I said, it's literally how thousands of women the world over learn to appreciate love as something complicated. Reading the book is, for its 14-year-old reader, an emotional awakening. Ironically, it was a book about love that made me retreat from dating altogether. Too many young girls grow up thinking, be it because of Disney movies or shitty sitcoms like Everybody Loves Raymond, that the endgame of life is marriage. And too often, shitty romantic comedies make it seem like marriage is literally something you trip and fall into when the planets align or some junk like that. After reading it, P&P won't let you think that way anymore. You start to think about how much more growing up you need to do before you can find yourself even contemplating the idea of love, let alone marriage. That it's not a game of house you play into perpetuity, but something richly dynamic and powerful--you don't mess with it until you're ready.

I'm not going to say that P&P is a treatise on the suffering, ups and downs of an actual long-term relationship (spoiler alert: the book ends after the marriage of Mr. and Mrs. Darcy). It doesn't contain the priceless heirloom vase-throwing fits Elizabeth probably would have about Darcy's need to intellectualize even the most trivial, mindless observations she makes about the servants' whistling or Darcy's retreats into the study every time Elizabeth's sisters come over and want to gossip about bonnets or whatever the hell the zeitgeist comparable to Sex and the City would have been back then. I mean, let's be real here: actual relationships with real, flesh and blood people have their moments of sheer pain, which is why I always commend movies like Eternal Sunshine for the Spotless Mind or 500 Days of Summer because they succeed in portraying balance instead of glossing over rough patches in favor of Disney velvet. But I digress.

To reiterate, P&P is the way many women are introduced to love. The reader falls in love with Darcy in the same way, at the same time Elizabeth falls in love with him. In so doing, the reader, along with Elizabeth, learns to accept a flawed man for who he is, and comes to love his strengths more than she hates his defects. She forgives him his mistakes and readies herself for their future problems. It sounds incredibly straight-forward if you've ever fallen yourself into a flesh-and-blood relationship and have experienced this first-hand, but for a little girl raised to think love is easy once you find the right person, this is a lot to take in.

But even more than that, there are tidbits and hints along the way--introduced by other characters (namely all other female characters in the book)--that offer insight into the female mind even when she herself is not in the process of falling in love. Jane's many failed courtships illustrate the accumulated effect that half-ass male affection has on a woman's self-esteem and ergo, her extreme guardedness with the next suitor, in the form of kind-hearted, but love-stupid Mr. Bingley. Lydia's and Kitty's--and in a way even their mother, Mrs. Bennet's--manic obsession with men and male attention illustrates exactly the kind naivete towards love many girls and young women carry with them about love until they are eventually disabused of it (either through the safety of good literature or through the harshness of reality). And even poor Charlotte Lucas, Elizabeth's homely best friend, has to come to terms that her childhood dreams will never pan out, because as a woman, she is judged not on the basis of her character or the warmth in her heart, but on her sexual appeal.

In this way, P&P is thick with lessons about the female experience. It's long been "discovered" anew by each successive generation of young women since its publication and is timeless precisely because of its insight--not, as is often assumed, because of the Colin Firth fantasies its BBC adaptation inspires. Besides, the movies can only capture a fraction of the education Austen packed into its pages. It's like having a much older friend sit down next to you and explain to you the many horrible things men will do to you as you grow up but never takes away your hope that one day you're going to find one that makes putting up with all those assholes worth it. But it's also careful not to let you slip into a Disney fantasy, instead putting you on your guard that Mr. Darcy could be almost anyone, as even the plainest men become handsome with affection.

It's a lesson in reality, and it's remarkable fiction in the sense that it has intergenerational staying power. For this reason, I so highly, highly recommend at least giving this book a shot as a male and not writing it off as a Regency-era predecessor to Twilight. Honestly, I'm getting sick and tired of the horribly unfair comparison.

Holly's Uncomfortable Life Lessons #1: Relationships and the 20-Something Myth of Adulthood

2010-05-05T13:34:00.000-07:00

One of the most anticlimactic experiences of your life will be the moment you graduate from college. Actually, to be fair, it’ll be the ride home after graduation, with all your dorm shit packed in the car and your mini-fridge left in the hands of a capable rising senior.

Though technically, you probably became an adult your senior year of high school and did what all 18-year-olds do on their birthdays in America—walk into a sex-shop and giggle—graduating from college is the actual moment many young Americans are forced to come to terms with their mortality…maturity. Oh, trust me, I had plenty of friends from high school getting married and having babies (not necessarily in that order) while I was in college who loved to tell me how mature they’ve become as a function of getting married and having babies.

I didn’t buy it.

Now, though, I’m 24 years old and watching the next batch of my intra-generational colleagues take their vows and procreate, and again, I’m told how mature they’ve become as a function of cohabitation, engagement, marriage, spawning, learning how to poach an egg correctly, etc.

Yeah, I still don’t buy it.

There are new skills that accompany each of these supposed linear life stages which individuals use to announce to the world, “Hey, look, I’m an adult now!” Mostly, from what I can tell based on my extensive research of facebook statuses, these skills revolve around doing things as a couple. You know, shopping for furniture as a couple, throwing couples-only dinner parties, attending the weddings of your friends as a couple, vacationing as a couple, coming down with gastroenteritis as a couple, so on and so forth. Retreating into coupledom is the definitive mark of having “grown up.”

Apparently.

Call me bitter, call me inexperienced, call me immature (that’s exactly where I’m going with this, by the way), but the idea of coupledom defining adulthood is for me a charade. In fact, I’m of the camp who believes adulthood is a made-up concept used to sell shave gel and lawn mowers. Now, living in what is now primarily a middle-class, 20-something world, I’m a minority in this camp. There are many women only a few years older than myself who love to tell me how it is. That with age will come wisdom. Or—my favorite—you’ll understand when you meet that someone special (as if by being single in the present, I’ve never been in a meaningful, long-term relationship). I am honestly one of these people who if you tell me any of these things, I’m inclined to play out scenes in my head where I’m spraying your face with a high-pressure hose . It’s not that I don’t appreciate the “I’m just trying to help” sentiment, but at 24, I’ve lived a pretty—I’ll use the word “rich” because that’s more flattering than “bat-shit crazy”—life. I didn’t come from a sheltered home in any sense of the word and I’ve experienced a rigorous gamut of, let’s call them “interesting,” life experiences. I dare not say that I’m an A+ student of life here nor would I say I haven’t in recent years made serious efforts to live in a bombshelter of my own design, but I’ll say that I would never consider myself naïve or ignorant of how the world works.

That said, when someone touts out their relationship status to me as an indication of maturity, I don’t buy it. Instead, I’m of the opinion that the need to play house is the need to legitimate to one’s self that they’ve grown up. It’s an incredibly powerful legitimation, especially since so many other 20-somethings believe in the exact same thing. And even after that first relationship more often than not fails, many will go back and try it again, because, like I said, so many 20-somethings really believe in it. And these are typically the women who love finding a girl just a few years younger than herself and tell her that she will someday know what it’s like to finally grow up once she follows her in making life choices. Why? Because the boundaries drawn between one’s coupled-up self and the poor, pitiful single girl are the socially-significant boundaries. These are the women who love having their coupled-up girlfriends over to complain about the woes of 20-something domesticity like picking up socks and taking care of sick boyfriends. Why? Because the ongoing performance is necessary if one is to fend off the feelings of insecurity, to stifle the question, “Am I a grown-up, yet?”

But there are others who learn their lesson from that first failed cohabitation that a relationship can’t define adulthood for you. There are even some, like me, who don’t believe in adulthood. Oh, don’t get me wrong, I believe in maturity. I do believe there will come a time in my life when I will feel settled and stable enough in my crazy to decide that it’s time to spawn. But never for a second would I say that acting of spawning makes the adult. And I certainly wouldn’t say that sharing a toothbrush cup and staring red-eyed at each other over watery coffee makes an adult, either.

The hard part to disentangle from all of this is that cohabitation isn’t necessarily a bad thing, at least not in my mind. There’s something to be said about loving someone enough that his late-night Taco Bell farts are something to laugh at rather than something to yell at them about. There’s something to be said loving someone so much that you bite the bullet to make small talk with his mother when she calls because he’s too hungover on Sunday to talk to her. There’s something to be said about loving someone so much that you put up with her apparent inability to keep her clothes off the floor of the closet. Cohabitation is a growing process, and as such comes with its own set of growing pains. The sooner you realize there’s no one “right” way to live, the sooner you realize there’s no one “right” way to be an adult. And as such, I’ve come to appreciate that there are a lot of life lessons that can be learned in cohabitation. There are a lot of lessons learned from loving someone that can only be learned in caring for them. And there’s a lot to be learned about yourself, who you are and what you need and want from a partner when that relationship fails.

My problem with so much of 20-something relationships is that they aren’t seen as legitimate until you’re literally on top of one another 24/7, because you can’t imagine adulthood any other way. Cohabitation in this scenario becomes the gauntlet you throw down to the world and say, “See, motherfuckers?! We’re real adults now!” And the hard part is pulling apart how much of that desire is genuine love and how much of that desire is insecurity. I watch so many people jump stages so quickly in their first serious relationship outside of college and sometimes I wonder how much of each is actually going on.

For women, I think the need for such legitimation is stronger. Women are held to higher standards for maturity and I’ve said in the past, women are evaluated largely on not only the men they can attract, but also on the men they can make commit. The committed woman crosses a status boundary that is—in many ways—made socially real by the shared belief amongst many women that the “chosen” woman is “better” than the single woman, reinforced endlessly by media tabloids and grandmothers the world over. For men, this need is less palpable and more confusing to understand. There are warm feelings that one derives from being in a relationship, but men rarely have their social statuses pegged to their girlfriend’s affections. To explain to men why men and women value relationship stages differently—especially ones that require public acknowledgement like cohabitation and engagement—is to explain exactly how the worth of women is largely being evaluated by her relations vis-à-vis men. Which is why, ultimately, this essay is categorized as one of my unfortunate life lessons and less about dating as a social phenomenon in general.

Holly's Dating Tips for Guys Part 7: Phone Etiquette

2010-04-17T15:36:00.000-07:00

Weirdly enough, socially appropriate phone behavior is something we as a society have not standardized. My roommate and I, in the last two years of our heterosexual roomance, have often joked about our different phone behaviors. My roommate is a bit of a texter. To say that the majority of her social communication occurs through text messages probably isn't too much of an over-statement. For me, texting is something I avoid. I hate texting. I've been referred to in the past as the black hole of text messages, since I rarely even respond to the ones I get. I'm also notoriously bad with voicemail, since my box is almost always full and rather than listen to the messages I do receive, I just call the person back. I imagine it's pretty annoying.

Anyway, I think part of this comes from being raised at a very odd time during the advent of cellphones. I did not have a cell phone growing up and got my first flip phone the summer before college. You know, the free one that came with a plan. I still remember how weird it was to have one at all and seriously, for at least two months, freaked out at the idea that I could...receive calls...at the grocery store. In the cereal aisle. Bizarre.

Now, just six years later, they're completely ubiquitous. You can't function without one and now that they've moved beyond the choice architecture of "Do you want one that can play snake or not?" to include cameras, mp3 players, video projectors (seriously?) and whatever, I'm done. I accept that at 24, I've become a complete technological luddite and have given up on trying to keep up.

But what's fun is realizing that your potential partner may relate to his or her cellphone in ways that are completely alien to you. I can't tell you how many awkward moments in dates have started out with, "So let me show you this new app I downloaded." Hey, hold up, holmes. How about we save that excitement for the third date, huh? Oh, yes, you can look down at my blackberry and call me a hypocrite, but I'm not about to pull that sucker out and start showing off my Pandora stations (they're all pretty much embarrassing, anyway). I actually only pull my cellphone out in social situations if I'm bored. And unfortunately, I interpret the same behavior in others as boredom, too.

Anyway, let's move beyond microsociological shifts in social behavior and move towards date behavior. Like I stated above, my roommate and I relate to our phones in completely different ways. She's a texter. I'm not. I have no social equipment with which to interpret most texts I receive as it is, but I really don't have a clue in how to interpret texts I have received from men in the last two years. "Hey what's up?" is not you asking me out again. It's not telling me you had fun on the last date. Actually, "Hey what's up"--depending on when it's sent--could be sending the message, "Hey, so my date with some other chick fell through, and you're decent enough, so what are you doing RIGHT NOW." Or could just be you asking me what's up. Who knows. But I don't like it. You might as well be sending texts to your grandma for all the good it's going to do you.

But I'm inclined to say this actually will get you a response from plenty of other women. I have no way of knowing. In fact, I have no idea if you can tell how a person relates to their phone without asking and I'm actually clueless as to how you would ascertain such information. I sometimes only realize someone I thought I've known well for years is a serial texter when I'm locked in a room with them for hours, much to my personal horror.

Or, or, or--this is my favorite solution--you stick with calling. You know, when you dial the numbers and hit send and answer when she says, "Hello?" It's old-fashioned, I know, but rarely are your words misinterpreted by the crazy that is female. I mean, I assume you've been reading tips 1-6 now and have gotten the sense that one of the biggest forces men underestimate in dating is the female proclivity to over-analyze every possible gesture (or non-gesture) of men they are interested in. Texts are--whether she's a texter or not--going to be misinterpreted, for good or for bad (well, unless you're texting something like, "you, me, naked, in twenty" which I guess is pretty straight-forward, but hardly recommended). It's hard to misinterpret phone calls. Especially if you say why you're calling. "Hello?" "Hey, it's ___. So I've wanted to know if you're doing anything Thursday? Do you want to see ______ with me?" which is a lot more effective in procuring a date than, "Hey what's up?" Guaranteed.

If I had to dissect this further, the text is less of a clear signal of interest than a call. It's pretty easy to text multiple women all at once and see which one responds, and thus not have to face the prospect of rejection. It's not a bad strategy on your end, but from her end, that's no fun. Moreover, quite a few of my female friends have admitted a double standard in how they relate to texting, thinking male texting to be juvenile and unattractive--and no woman I know over the age of 18 enjoys receiving texts like "LOLROFLCUSOON!"

I'm not against all texting. Sometimes is so gosh darn convenient. "Hey, so the train is late, I'll be there in 20. Sorry!" Texting is useful in conveying information. But it's horrible for conveying interest and feelings. It's abysmal for flirting. It's terrible, especially, for asking women out.

Of course, it *can* work, I'm not saying it can't. But I don't have a texter-mindset. But I'm thinking since you can't tell whether a girl is a texter or not at first glance, or even by the second date, you might want to stick with the old-fashioned way of saying hello.

Holly's Uncomfortable Dating Lessons for Women Part #1: Be Nurturing. Period.

2010-04-11T11:52:00.000-07:00

Here's an attempt to boil down something I've learned from dating for women as told though the lens of me being a pretty honest pro-humanist, down-to-earth heterosexual female. The reason I've refrained from doing this, despite the requests, in the past is that the things I've learned about dating-as-female are uncomfortable, unsettling and troubling for someone like me. A lot of the things I've learned have hurt. If you've figured out anything from reading my blog, it's that I'm pretty perceptive and sometimes the things you perceive are wholly unfair. To this end, I'm going to dedicate Holly's Unfair Dating Tips for Women to throwing out my thoughts on subjects, reflecting on how they make me feel and opening them up for discussion. As a male friend of mine suggested, one thing I should do is open this blog up to the male point of view and let them get their voice in. Maybe this will be a way for that to happen, who knows. You let me know how it goes, Will.

Anyway, so one of the things you get out of an Apatow movie if you're a female is the message that men fucking love schoolteachers. In fact, surveys show over and over again that men think schoolteachers to be the #1 most preferable occupation a date can have. Do you think they really mean like a 12th grade AP Calculus teacher? No, probably not. When men think schoolteacher, I think, given the prevalence in movies (Bruce Almighty; Billy Madison), they mean kindergarten teacher.

The reasons are probably because early education schoolteachers, as a stereotype, are seen as women who wear soft white cotton sweaters and don't raise their voice when kids stick glue in each other's hair. In a word, they are nurturing. Or at least, they're perceived to be nurturing. There are other things contained in the stereotype: intellectually nonthreatening, noncompetitive, etc. In another way, they are seen to be excellent mothers and women who, since they put up with it for eight hours a day at school, can put up with taking care of a manbaby at home, too.

I'm not trying to dump on schoolteachers as a profession. Not at all. I have lots of friends who are now schoolteachers, especially through programs like Teach for America. But it's something I've never given a whole lot of thought to until I found myself single post-college.

Rationally, it's difficult for anyone to accept the idea that in 2010 that women need to be caregivers in order to be attractive to men, especially men who profess to be liberal and espouse views on equal rights. But you watch these same men "rank" women on scales of 1 to 10 and talk about unattractive women as if they've no right to breathe air. And on top of having to be super attractive, she need also be free of any "masculine" behavior. She need to be "nice," which is not "nice" in the considerate, generous and thoughtful kind of way. By nice, most guys I know mean quiet, soft-spoken and non-combative. Women I know who are described to be as nice by guy friends are often women who refrain from dominating conversations and answer shyly, "I don't know," when asked for an opinion. She can't be loud. She can't crack jokes. She most certainly cannot engage in a debate. These are, I am told, masculine and therefore unattractive behaviors. Though many men say they love this in women, it's rare I've ever seen a man pick the loud, center-of-attention girl over the quiet, doting one.

The early education schoolteacher stereotype often contains many of these desirable traits men want women to have. She spends her days taking care of children. Her mastery is in a subject area most men, having graduated kindergarten themselves, feel themselves unthreatened by. There's no competition she can engage in. There's no ladder she can climb. In many ways, as far as her career goes, once she gets a position, she remains in relative stasis in his eyes.

For me, being a PhD student at Harvard, I'm never going to be able to fit this stereotype in the eyes of a date, and I'm well aware of that fact. My job will never have me work with cute little children, instead, I actively engage with other intellectuals who, you know, sometimes end up on CNN and change social policy. In my professional life, I'm expected to always be growing, learning new things, and getting better at presenting my ideas and arguments to a public audience. By virtue of even being at a place like Harvard, I've already been labeled as, well, objectively, one of those east-coast ivory tower smarty-heads. There's a lot of social weight that comes with what I am. And when I talk to professors, when I discuss things in class, I am that. I expect that of *all* my peers. I expect a kind of intellectual rigor here from everyone. It should be an intense place. I'm actually sorta disappointed when it isn't.

But outside of my professional career, I'm not always like that. I'm actually, despite myself, one of those nurturing schoolteacher types who likes to bake brownies and talk about feelings. I like to wear soft cotton dresses and walk barefoot through dewy grass. I'm actually awesome with children and teenagers. But these are all hypothetical realities now. Because when the hell do I, as a single 24-year old PhD student at Harvard, have opportunities to demonstrate how nurturing, cute and adorable I am.

But none of that matters, really, because despite my occupation often being confused as that of a social worker, I'm basically masculine all over. I'm loud. I crack jokes. I like beer. I love debate. It also probably doesn't help that I'm square-jawed and broad-shouldered. I'm sure that doesn't help. But on the surface, I'm not a schoolteacher type.

So on dates, I have to make an effort to "tell, not show" which totally inverts one of my cardinal rules of life. If I like a guy on a date, I have to push all the things I do most of the time to the backburner and bring out the things I maybe only get to do sometimes, to demonstrate that "Hey, I'm actually adorable." It actually sucks, because it's not natural. Most guys on a date ask you what you do. What I do is universally seen as unfeminine and un-nuturing. It's cold. It's hard. It's, well, threatening. So I can't talk about what I do, or he won't like me enough to ask me out on a second date to learn that I'm such a horribly bad mini-golf player that it's hilarious. Instead, I'm stuck sitting across a dinner table with a guy who is trained to ask me questions which would greatly advantage a schoolteacher and disadvantage any high power woman.

In sociology, we call this impression management. The idea is that I have to bracket what constitutes 90% of my life to highlight the 10% of my life that men will find attractive. Even if he's a fellow PhD student at Harvard, I still have to be seen as caring, sensitive and feminine. It's actually pretty hard. While I am, in actuality, these things in real life, I do spend most of my days not being these things because I spend most of my days sitting in front of PDF articles and digging through interview transcripts. I don't get to coo over puppies and give hugs to adorable children. I have many a day where I don't talk to a single person.

So this is actually something I've learned I have to do on dates. When I first started, I was so excited to talk about what I do. All of the men I date are smart men. I figured they, of all people, would understand what it's like to be excited about one's intellectual pursuits. But no. The faces, oh the faces they made. I always felt I was failing an interview, on these dates. And so, in the course of the two years I've been dating, I've found myself toning down any talk about what I think about all day, what I do all day, what I hope for my future. Basically, I evade every question most guys ask on dates. Instead, I redirect conversations to him. I ask about him. I ask about the temperature of his food. I don't lie, but man, I'm now in a position where I'm absolutely uncomfortable talking about almost anything. And fuck if I don't always get asked out again, which tells me this is working. It's mindblowingly frustrating.

The lesson here isn't very good. It's uncomfortable, especially for me since what I think what most men find attractive will never be me. And since what I am outwardly doesn't even wholly match up with what I actually am, I have to face the uncomfortable reality that dating is designed to fail me. But the uncomfortable, unfair truth is that no matter how far you as a sex advance in your professional life, no matter how many ceilings you smash through, men still in 2010 want the schoolteacher. If you happen to be nurturing but employed in something seemingly unfeminine, you have the burden of demonstrating your femininity on a date, which can be difficult if you work all day being nongendered.

It's something I'm still working at. It's something that sorta makes my gut ache on dates. It's something that is hard to reconcile. But it's my unfair lesson from dating #1.

Reversing Gender

2010-04-05T18:51:00.000-07:00

Harvard Sailing Team brings you their take on opposite gender socializing.

Girls doing Boys:

Boys do the Girls:

Holly's Dating Tips for Guys Part 6: Half the Battle is in the Asking

2010-04-01T03:26:00.000-07:00

My most pressing request: Holly, your dating tips for guys are awesome--why not dating tips for girls. Well, for one, like I said, the reason I started writing about dating in the first place was because my experience dating post-college has been absurd. Though I've dated quite a few guys now, I've never gone out with a guy and wanted to date him a second time, which is really horrible. So I'm not doing terribly well in this regard, either.

Oh, but I give most guys a chance. In my mind, a first date isn't really too much to ask for. It's a few hours of time spent in the company of someone you presumably find interesting or who presumably finds you interesting (flattering!). It’s a chance to see if you have chemistry and if there’s any romantic potential. Unfortunately, there are two ways to mess this up: in the asking and in the doing.

So this post is about the asking. I’ve obviously been asked out by more men than I have actually dated. I’m clearly discerning and one of the easiest ways for me to weed men out is by how they ask me out. And I mean it. If you want to date me, you’re going to have to actually ask me out.

The thing I learned really quickly in life is that women cannot differentiate friendship from romantic disinterest. How many times have you been friends with a woman you’re attracted to and have remarked, “Why doesn’t she see me that way?” The answer is fucking simple: romantic interest should be obvious. It should not be obscured under guises of friendship, because god damn, it’s 2010 and we’re allowed to have LOTS of guy friends and it’d be uncommonly stupid to assume they all are in love with us and you’re no different.

Unless you make it obvious. Oh, I know! It’s SCARY. You might get rejected! Oh noes! I know so many men from elite schools who have *never* been rejected from anything in their whole lives and the thought of being rejected by a girl is just so debilitating that they literally don’t do anything. But really, let’s face it, she’s not going to ask you out. I actually tell my girl friends not to ask men out. You might think I’m contradictory, because I’m pretty pro-gender equality, but we certainly didn’t grow up in a gender-neutral world. Women who ask men out are socially pegged as desperate or easy, and that’s enough of a reason for women to abstain from it.

But even women who recognize that such labels are baseless and stupid are not going to ask you out. Why? Since I’m in this camp, I’ll give you my reasons. Asking someone out is an obvious sign of interest. So much so, it’s disarming. Going back to my animal behavior class, biologically, women keep up their defenses around a man until they have sufficient indication that he’s not going to abandon her soon after copulation, leaving both her and their offspring to fend for themselves. Naturally, though it’s not nearly so explicit, women are looking for evidence that you’re into her and her alone. If she asks you out, she’s losing an opportunity to actually discern you’re really interested in her (and aren’t just being polite, or worse, “meh—nothing else to do and maybe I’ll get laid”). Evolutionarily speaking, women have a lot more to lose by pursuing a man than she does being pursued.

So let's assume she's not going to ask you out. That said, how you ask a girl out also matters. Lethargic gestures like “Hey you wanna hang out sometime?” do not tell me you’re into me. Like I said, it’s 2010, I have lots of guy friends and they all wanna hang out with me, too. You're not making any effort to pursue me. Worst still, that method involves negotiation, which makes me complicit in the asking out process. I’m not going to let down my defenses until I’m sure you’re into me, and this gesture is pretty half-ass. It does not make me feel special. It does not make me feel particularly desired. And in fact, it makes me think you’re a bit of a wimp. My response is probably going to be equally as half-ass, “Uh…maybe?”

Compare this to how a guy asked me out last year, with a hand-written note sent to my office mailbox. It read: “I think you’re absolutely incredible and I’m dying to take you out for dinner this weekend. Say yes.” Huge difference. It made me feel special and wanted, because he went out of his way to make me feel that way. It demonstrated assertion and confidence. Before this, I had an idea this guy was into me. (You know that moment when you're speaking to a girl and you suddenly realize she's out of the ordinary? I actually saw that happen in this guy.) But this was a sure indication and so I felt way more comfortable saying yes. (Ok, so it didn’t work out after the first date, but that’s the next lesson! How not to act on a first date when your date’s a perceptive sociologist!)

I’m not saying you have to hire a marching band, but asking a girl out on a date should be treated differently than asking your buddies out for a beer. It should make her feel good about herself and maybe a little flattered. And this goes without saying, but you should actually ask her out. The friends-cum-lovers thing doesn’t happen much after college given people don’t seem to “hang out” one-on-one enough for that to evolve naturally. So if you want to spend time with a girl, asking her out is the only way to do it. Yes, you may face rejection, but damn if that isn’t more efficient than spending seven months pining over her, only to watch her get into a relationship with someone who actually asked her out.

How Women Read Your Books

2010-03-30T16:03:00.000-07:00

I have a book turnoff. Actually, I have several. In fact, I've noted in passing to friends that I can read a guy by his favorite books. To which they said they ALSO read men by their lists of favorite books. Usually, Ayn Rand and Salinger top the list as red flags. I assume anyone who likes The Catcher in the Rye identifies with Holden and god damn if that's pretty much exactly what I don't want to be around. Or someone tells me they like Rand, it's because they think they'd be a fucking John Galt (as if). Lots of feelings about this. Lots of them.

Anyway, I need proof that this is an actual thing that other women do this.

So I asked a bunch of my twenty-something female friends what *their* instant book turnoffs were. Here's what they told me:

Katie: I can't think of the specific name for the book, but a friend's boyfriend used a book for techniques on how to pick-up women. If a guy were to say this, or something along those lines, was his "favorite book", I think I would be looking for an escape pretty quickly. I'm sure some guys turn to these types of "self-help" books for advice (just as many women turn to them), but I think I would be too skeptical that I was being manipulated and that the guy was masking his true personality. Ultimately, if anything tips me off from the start that the guy may be untrustworthy, I won't likely be looking to move forward with a potential relationship.

Anon: For me, it has more to do with *why* the guy likes the book than what book it is he likes. I mean, if he can wax philosophical on Harry Potter, rock on; it's better than having nothing to say about Crime and Punishment. But then, I'm dating a guy who will read the occasional Star Wars novel...Oh, and Twilight is a deal-breaker. I don't care if you're fascinated by it as Mormon propaganda or think it's interesting sociologically because of it's popularity, if that's your favorite book ever, we can never be.

Brandi: I read a ton of stuff, including some pretty ridiculous non-fiction books. I'm turned off by people who say they don't read. Not "I don't read anymore because I've been really busy with school" but just "I don't read" or they say they don't like to read books as though are a genre of music.

Also, anyone who says "Dan Brown" and nothing else. If someone has recently read Dan Brown, that doesn't count because that's just a random snapshot in time and, honestly, I've read some weird/awful shit just because. But beyond that, I don't even care who or what they read. Oh, yeah and professing to *like* Coulter, Limbaugh, Beck and their ilk for non-hilarity reasons is also my cue to peace out on that dude.

Laurenellen: Now, what would turn me off? Probably citing Dan Brown as a favorite author. Call me a literature elitist, but if either Angels and Demons or (worse?) The Da Vinci Code remotely come to mind when I ask you what your favorite book is, you're not trying hard enough. I think reading is a wonderful way to grow the mind and a great escape from "real life," but citing anything by Brown as your fav means that really, you don't read. I'd rather you cite something from your childhood that could actually stir up some passion -- because Hatchet /was/ great -- than to admit in some sort of backwards way that you can only make it 10 feet inside a bookstore before you get bored or scared and buy the nearest book in the biggest display. The least you could have done was pick up The Secret or, like, The Mermaid Chair. Then we could have a conversation about /why/ you were so struck by the text. But Dan Brown's progeny? Nah. You are lazy, semi-allergic to books, and think that your fake knowledge of fake history will impress me (hint: it won't). Worst of all, as a date you reveal that you're not even dorky enough to realize you could have better spent your time watching Indiana Jones.

Anon: I don't know that there are any books that would do this to me, but the following in a profile has: "Books? Hate them, try not to read them. I sometimes read magazines." This was on eHarmony. Not that I doubt the power of Dr. Neil's 29 Dimensions for Everlasting Bliss to overcome nearly every obstacle. But if the man actively *tries* not to read books? Dealbreaker.

Anon:
1) I know not everyone likes a bad joke as much as I do, but how has
nobody said "Mein Kampf"?!

2) "The Stranger" - and other books where the protagonist is a total shit
and they don't care.

3) "On the Road" - that book was stupid

4) "Cunt" by Inga Muscio - that book was stupid AND you're probably lying
Amanda: Agreed on Ayn Rand, Catcher in the Rye (god I hate Holden Caulfield), Dan Brown, Twilight, and not reading at all.

It almost goes without saying, but if the guy's favorite book is the bible, or The Purpose-Driven Life, or any of Dobson's books, etc. - in other words, books indicating that he has beliefs or values that I wildly disagree with - then he's out.

Honestly, if the guy's favorite book isn't sci-fi/fantasy-related, classical literature, or some kind of interesting non-fiction, then I would probably wonder about our compatibility.

Anon: Alice's Adventures in Wonderland or anything by Lewis Carroll. They are, in my experience, loved solely by:
--Children under the age of 10
--Angsty teen girls who post heavily photoshopped digicam self-portraits in their livejournals (Hello, me circa 2005)
--Pervy 40 year old men with family issues who are really into being "whimsical".
Yolanda: For me, it's Lolita by Vladimir Nabokov. I understand it was "beautifully written" but it's child molestation/rape described in sweet words, which some how makes it okay. If a guy said this was his favorite, it would be a definite deal breaker.

Mad: If they name a favorite book that is "fun" but not at all intelligent without a caveat, that's a red flag. Like, if they say Ender's Game or Harry Potter is their favorite book because "it's just fun! I know it's not the most literary answer, but I just couldn't put it down," that's OK. But if they seriously and legitimately say they think Dan Brown's books are the best thing they've ever read, it's just not going to happen between us.

Also, The Catcher in the Rye and other similar books that we read in early high school... I don't know. It's certainly not as bad as Dan Brown, and I wouldn't dismiss them off the bat, but they've gotta show they're capable of original intelligent thought.

Anon: [I]f all their favorite books are "popular" titles like Harry Potter, John Grisham, Twilight, etc. I lose some respect for them.

The biggest turn-off for me, though, is when they say they don't read much and don't list any books at all - or obviously list a few books they read in English in high school and liked okay. For me, not reading at all is worse than reading trash.

Lola: If the dude considers himself "well-read" but doesn't include a single female or poc author in his listing of what that means, it's a big danger sign to me. "Oh, you know, all the greats...Hemingway, Fitzgerald, philosophers like Wittgeinstein..."

I'm not sure how women outside my life or the liberal elite think about books, though. Maybe you should ask some conservative friends. I don't think I have any.

Girls and Gaming

2010-03-27T09:29:00.001-07:00

One of the most famous Ted Talks of all time is Malcolm Gladwell on Spaghetti Sauce. In it, he discusses how Prego dominated the spaghetti sauce market with a very basic idea: instead of creating one sauce that would appeal to the most people, Prego would create many sauces that would appeal to many people. The idea was so profitable that all saucemakers have adopted the model. And today, when you walk down the spaghetti sauce aisle, you're met with literally dozens of choices.

The idea has absolutely not caught on in the video game industry. Yesterday, at PAX East, I sat in on a panel, Girls and Gaming: The Growing Role of Women in the Game Industry. And many of the questions asked by audience members cannot be answered by anyone in the gaming industry because they basically asked variants on the theme: why aren't more women going into technology careers? Sociologists and Social Psychologists spend a lot of time trying to answer this question and since its effects go beyond simply the video game industry, I think it's fair to say the video games industry isn't necessarily causing it.

Unfortunately, no one asked the question why the industry does such a poor job of making games that appeal to women. Oh, they make plenty of games they think appeal to little girls (Imagine Babyz! Imaginze Babyz Fashion! Imagine Salon Stylist? ...Imagine Interior Designer?). Takeaway being: Industry insiders know that access to the youth market is guarded by parents, and it's parents, who when buying games for children, probably steer their girls away from titles boys want like Halo in part because they think it "unladylike" to spend hours shooting at grunts and spending their carpool time talking about how superior a weapon the plasma rifle is to all other weaponry. And for the same reasons they don't buy toy guns and toy swords for girls, you're seeing parents refrain from buying titles with guns and swords on the cover for their daughters.

Obviously, this has ramifications as those girls grow up into young women and refrain themselves from entering into the gamer demographic, since most games for adults have guns and swords on the cover (oh and usually a half-naked chick clinging to the muscle-bound dude holding them, but another time). To this end, there's no amount of pro-female marketing (i.e. Ubisoft's fragdolls) that is going to undo such socialization when it's met with a gaming market dominated by titles like Gears of War and God of War.

From where I sit, most games we see today are divided into two ultra-violent genres: first-person killing spree (Halo) or a more a free-range killing spree (Fallout 3). Games outside this dichotomy (Rockband 2; Mario Galaxy; Zelda Wind Waker) actually tend to secure a larger female audience. I imagine America's base for the Kingdom Hearts franchise is pretty evenly split down the gender divide. Seemingly "bizarre" games like Katamari and Viva Pinata come out of the blue, are told by other industry-makers that they'll fail, and yet reap huge profits selling to non-traditional markets--probably because they appeal to a lot of women!

And yet we continue ask: "How can we get more women into the gaming industry?"

But it's Nintendo, the company that basically brought video games into our homes, that gets shat on constantly by male gamers for doing exactly what it is all companies need to be doing: diversifying their product production. Liv Tyler playing Brain Age on the DS is a good example--she's not being sexualized, she's just being shown enjoying herself with a clever game (you know, in sharp contrast to Heidi Klum dancing to her underwear holding--not actually playing--Guitar Hero). Mario Galaxy is a stunningly beautiful title I'd want any kid to play. In this way, Nintendo works like Prego. It doesn't care about making one game that really, really appeals to the majority in a specific audience, but churns out new products all the time. It can do this, in part, because the games they make are cheaper to produce and they have more flexibility to try new things...

...but virtually all other game companies are operating a lot like Ragu. They put a lot of investment into one product and scratch their heads thinking, "Why can't we get those girls to like our product? The guys obviously like our product. What's wrong with those girls?" And so we see the Fragdolls teabagging their opponents in games and supporting what is an essentially one-size-fits-all model of gaming. And, er...I...er...don't want to teabag anyone.

So though, over the course of my 24 years, I've played pretty much every genre in the gaming world, I have at this point in my life cloistered myself into a segmented market. The titles I have loyalty towards (Final Fantasy, Kingdom Hearts, Fable, Zelda, etc) I can look forward to maybe once every few years. I fill up the time in between with Rock Band and Lego titles. The games I really, really like to play are not those games that are dominating the market month-in and month-out. Though I might get a little bit of fun from Dante's Inferno, I'm not likely to eat the opportunity cost of buying it given I could get equal enjoyment--in my world--from reading a $10 book.

The industry is pre-occupied with getting women who don't play games at all to make a ridiculously big jump into games they probably wouldn't want to play in the first place. (Probably because if they can figure that out, they won't need to divert any money towards gaming innovation.) But there are plenty of girls who approach the market perfectly willing to play and not finding anything. Those who aren't fans of the traditional sauce have very little alternative--and furthermore--are belittled by the industry, its marketing and its base for wanting anything else. Maybe this is the problem.

At Least My Dissertation is Always There...for me

2010-03-26T08:10:00.000-07:00

PlayDates

2010-03-23T15:30:00.000-07:00

Wow. So I actually am startled by how fast I started receiving emails asking my opinion on the new social network GameCrush. The concept behind GameCrush is you pay to play video games (mostly Xbox titles and Flash games but it promises to expand) with attractive girls over the video interface:

On GameCrush, guys are Players and girls are PlayDates. Players pay to play and PlayDates get paid to play. Guys can browse PlayDate profiles (there are currently around 1,200), view photos, and even chat with girls for free. Publicityhazard's turn ons include vibrating controllers, for instance, and is turned off by three red lights. Once you find a gal you fancy you send her a game invite and if she accepts you get six to ten minutes of one-on-one gaming time. PlayDates have the ability to block any guy they want for any reason. When the service launches tomorrow it will only support the Xbox 360 and a few casual games hosted on the GameCrush website, but there are plans to add PlayStation 3, Wii, and World of Warcraft support as soon as possible.

You must be 18 or over to create a GameCrush account -- it's being touted as the first social site for adult gamers. It's not an explicitly explicit service, but PlayDates set their gaming mood to either "flirty" or "dirty." What the two of you chat about is entirely up to you. Signing up is free, but you must purchase credits in order to get your game on. For $8.25 you get 500 credits, which is enough for one game (400 credits) and a 100 credit tip at the end. An Xbox Live game will last 10 minutes, while a casual Flash game will get you six minutes of face time with your PlayDate. That's literal face time, because you can video chat with your lady while playing a casual Flash game. Again, what goes on in that video chat is up to you and your PlayDate. GameCrush says it modeled its pricing structure after the cost of buying a girl a drink at a bar. In a bar, you're basically buying the opportunity to chat a girl up. GameCrush is hoping players will look at their service the same way.

Basically, it's chatroulette, except choose-your-own hot chick. Oh, and you pay for it. But then "after a session you can rate your PlayDate on her hotness, gaming skill, and flirtiness." Oh good. So unlike prostitution, men get to rate women on the basis of their hotness. Wouldn't want the men to seem pathetic or anything.

Such a site sounds ripe for exploitation, and the rankings themselves are inevitably setting up a system where women will be rated highly, I'm sure, for doing things on their camera probably wholly unrelated to playing Halo. And if the 14-year-old boys playing on XBox right now are any indication of the site's clientele, girls who are capable of beating guys will be penalized, surely with reviews containing more than a few choice words about her sexuality.

Ok, I'm being a bit unfair. The site does give women considerable agency to choose their ~~PlayJohns~~, sorry, Players. And since you can play Flash games, she doesn't even have to be capable of playing games to sign up!

I'm sorry! There's nothing poignant to say about this. It's absurd and leaning towards sad. It's banking on two things I already hate: 1) men's inability to approach women in *real* life and 2) most girls feeling so uncomfortable entering into this industry, men have to pay for their company. I can predict how the site will devolve into a pay-for-tits model and such a model will undoubtedly not do much for recruiting females into an industry they already feel alienated from. So without rehashing a pretty familiar argument, I'll leave you with a pretty good video rant about the schizophrenic marketing of games as it relates to females (especially towards the end when it discusses how many women are complicit with the objectification for personal gain):

The Omega Male and his Lack of Female Counterpart

2010-03-21T14:38:00.000-07:00

Terrific insight into the Omega Male trope pervading Hollywood is hitting the blogosphere this week. Biologists use the term Omega to "refer to the lowest caste of the hierarchical society. An omega is subordinated to all others in the community. The omega is commonly the last allowed to eat." Jessica Grose humanizes the term when she writes:

In human terms, if an executive or a warrior is an alpha male and a nice-guy middle manager like The Office's Jim Halpert is a beta male, then Greenberg and his brethren are omega males. While the alpha male wants to dominate and the beta male just wants to get by, the omega male has either opted out or, if he used to try, given up. Greenberg says of his somewhat stunted best friend, "We call each other 'man,' but it's a joke. It's like imitating other people." The omega male is not experiencing the tired trope of the midlife crisis. A midlife crisis implies agency, a man who has the job and the family and chooses to reject it. The omega male doesn't have the power to reject anything—he's the one who has been brushed off. He's generally unemployed, and his romantic relationships are in shambles—he's either single or, if he's married, not happy about it.

Grose offers a pretty amusing taxonomy of the Omega Male species. I've yet to meet her Mimbo in real life, but I've already discussed in my terms the Game Boy (the delusional nice guy) and the Beer Guy (the Apatow-ian Man-Boy). Nevertheless, I'm in love with what this movie trope conveys about society: misery experienced by adult men is evidently comical. Most of these men, as Grose observes, grow up with hegemonic conceptions of what it means to be a successful adult male and become miserable during the painful process of realizing they failed to hit the mark. Now, some of the plots of these movies climax as the man turns his life around and wins the game/changes his career/finds a ladyfriend/tells off his boss, whatever. But the trope is nevertheless pervasive, hitting both mainstream and indie films alike (seriously, I can't even name an indie film that did not have a male character depressed in some way for not living up to alpha or even beta standards of masculinity).

Now, Anna N. of Jezebel asks, can you name a movie where any mediocre female was allowed so much introspective camera time to wax on the ennui that has taken over her life? Nope. Not really, because the only flaw women in Apatowesque movies are allowed to have is being high-strung and ambitious (Katherine Heigl in Knocked Up). Or, even better, seemingly average women don't get to have or even develop dimension because they are only flat, lifeless accessories to male protagonists (Rashida Jones in I Love You, Man).

Anna thinks the reason for such a lack of Omega Female presence in movies is because Omega Females have absolutely no chance of resolving themselves the way men do:

In movies, when women's dreams are deferred — or downright destroyed — they tend to display either adorable pluck or quiet dignity (Adams, who doesn't do quiet, has a lock on the former). Part of this may be that audiences have more sympathy for directionlessness in men. A deadbeat dad can still redeem himself in the movies — but can you imagine if Adams's character didn't provide for her kid? But I think there's something else at work here, and I think it's about time. An omega male, no matter how low he's sunk, still has time to pull it out — for instance, 41-year-old Greenberg can date a 25-year-old. But everyone from Hollywood execs to Lori Gottlieb is always telling us how little leeway women have, how we'd better get it right pretty soon or we'll be screwed forever. If women were afforded a little more time to fuck up, more omega female movies would probably be the least of the benefits.

I found this interesting, because as perhaps best conveyed in Knocked Up or 40-Year-Old Virgin, the Omega Male redeems himself almost always by entering into a romantic relationship. In other words, he redeems himself through a female. I assume that Anna N. thinks that females would be redeemed in much the same way, but can't because they would be too old to find a redeeming man who would still find them attractive.

But interestingly, neither of these two articles asks how a woman becomes an Omega Female in the first place. For one, to fit the trope, she'd need to fail at achieving a hegemonic conception of what being a woman means. Generally, this means she'd have to be conventionally unnattractive and unmarried (or divorced, gasp!). I think this might best be embodied by, ironically enough, high-power business ladies who never end up getting married (I'm thinking Meryl Streep in The Devil Wears Prada). These women don't tend to be "losers" by life standards, only "losers" in not achieving the hegemonic female ideal (much like the Omega Male). But, unfortunately, they tend to be Alpha females.

But the authors are interested in finding an equitable "Loser female" trope to match the Omega male. The problem is women are rarely failing at being women through spineless inaction--in fact, failing to be a woman--as Streep shows--takes a whole lot of effort, what, becoming a gigantic fashion mogul or what have you. Instead, the loser female is usually a loser because of her dealings with a man--most frequently resulting in the birth of a child who, after the man inevitably leaves her, she will be left with on her own. Ergo, most "loser females" in films are portrayed as single-parent (Waitress, As Good as it Gets, Where the Heart Is) and most frequently are either teenagers or waitresses. In fact, in Waitress, "loser female" Keri Russel, a sad waitress stuck in a dead-end marriage, finds redemption when she meets a Nathan Fillion, a frikkin' doctor. These women aren't portrayed as pathetic--they're portrayed as victims abused at the hands of men who find redemption by meeting other men.

So, interesting commentary, but it's lacking that final point that the omega female (or whatever trope name we want to use) is saddled with consequences whereas the omega male rarely is forced to take responsibility for himself. I think that's the key difference and why the female omega is so much less comical.

A Case for Legalization

2010-03-21T12:45:00.001-07:00

Ivan Eland--last year--wrote about why we need to legalize marijuana to stop Mexican cartels from essentially doing what they're doing now. I have nothing new to add to the argument, but significance contest this is, right? Here's to making the argument significant:

The new Obama policy is analogous to an alcoholic admitting to a drinking problem, but then blaming beer distributors and trying to have them arrested. The analogy to alcohol can be taken a step further. According to the Justice Department, the biggest organized crime threat in the U.S. today is the presence of the Mexican drug cartels in 230 U.S. cities. Similarly, in the United States, organized crime got a huge boost by the prohibition of alcohol in the 1920s and 1930s.

So if there has been a failure working on both the supply side (even having a fortified border still results in tens of billion of dollars in annual drug imports) and demand side (drugs are illegal, yet many people still do them), then why not try a fresh, if counterintuitive, approach that many economists favor? Why not legalize drugs for adults 21 and over?

Sound radical? Even crazy? Here’s the logic. Such drugs are cheap to make. The reason they are so expensive is because producing, transporting, and selling the drugs risks arrest, jail time, and even injury or death. Crime results because the substances are illicit, people buy guns to protect themselves, and then use them to shoot at other drug cartels competing for the huge profits or to commit crimes to pay the steep prices because drugs are illegal.

Legalizing drugs for adults would turn it into a mainstream business and prices and profits would dramatically drop, thus resulting in far less crime among producers, traffickers, and users. If the price dropped, more people might try drugs, but money can better be spent on education campaigns and treatment than on stricter drug laws and penalties and government agents, gizmos, and improved border fences in what has been a multi-decade futile effort to stanch the flow of drugs into the United States. After all, since drugs are cheap to make, the drug producers simply estimate that 10 to 15 percent will be interdicted by law enforcement and simply produce that much more.
...
That is why Mexico is so important. About 90 percent of U.S. drug traffic flows through there because Mexico neighbors the United States, one of the biggest markets for illegal drugs in the world. Mexico is being destabilized by a draconian U.S. drug policy, and that instability is flowing back into the United States and causing a threat to national security in the form of imported crime. This is one area in which U.S. domestic policy is hurting its foreign and security policies. Legalizing drugs for adults at home would make Mexico, an important neighbor, more stable and the United States more secure.

3 of Holly's Incredibly Superficial Instant Turnoffs

2010-03-21T09:45:00.000-07:00

I was asked to detail my list of superficial turnoffs. As a social scientist, I'm inclined to admit some of these are purely psychological--that is, I can't explain why I'm so viscerally turned off by them and I'm sure some kind of psychotherapy will disclose that they are tied to some unpleasantness in my past. However, because I am a social scientist, I also admit that I'm not immune to having classist tendencies or a distaste for "out-group" or particular "subaltern" identity groups (we all do to some extent), despite coming from a working-poor background. Sexual attraction in the modern age is a funny thing and unfortunately, unlike who we choose as our friends and where we choose to live, is very much beyond our control. Tied to so much psychological baggage and biographical bullshit, sexual attraction is the final frontier for psychologists interested in studying fucked up mental behavior.

Anyway, without further bullshitting, A Short List of Holly's Incredibly Superficial Instant Turnoffs and what I think are their justifications.

1) Creatively using facial hair to define a jawline - It's a little more common in overweight men, but men lacking strong jaw lines also tend to do this. I'm sure that since a pronounced jaw is evolutionarily a powerful signal of masculinity, this practice has something to do with male-to-male status competition. But if the goal in grooming in this fashion is to attract women, such facial hair signals more than it does hide the fact that you lack such a jawline. My problem with this style isn't so much related to actual physical appearance so much as I imagine that this grooming style takes considerable time and effort and the only motivations I can think of for investing such effort would be to better engage in male-to-male status competition. This advertises insecurity to me, and that's a turnoff.

2) Bold Clothing Logos after College - Ok, so actually, realistically, I started believing this in high school. I've always thought that shirts that boldly advertise a clothing retailer (e.g. "ABERCROMBIE AND FITCH") are shirts for tools. The idea of paying money for a piece of clothing that uses you as a billboard is an absurd notion and one that sorta makes sense when you're exploiting adolescents who rely on external status markers to engage in status ranking. But outside of high school, when you can actually engage in real world practices to build status, those who continue to assess each other on the basis of clothing brands to me have not grown up. To then go ahead and choose to broadcast one's fashion choices in this way screams it. (Again, this is just how I read this.)

3) Blue-Tooth Headset - no one in the world is important enough to need one of these outside of operating a moving vehicle. Not even the president.

Holly's Dating Tips for Guys Part 5: Deconstructing "He's Just Not That Into You"

2010-03-19T20:07:00.001-07:00

So there’s a self-help book out there—you might have heard of it—called He’s Just Not That Into You. Apparently—and this I didn’t know before reading its Wikipedia page—it was inspired by an episode of Sex and the City. In said episode, Miranda (honestly, I don’t know which character is which) asks Carrie’s boyfriend to interpret a date’s behavior. Miranda apparently invited a date up to her apartment and he declined, leading Carrie’s boyfriend to conclude: he’s just not that into you.

Ok, so basically, that scenario really sums up the entirety of the book it inspired so you don’t really have to read it. Not convinced? Really? Ok, here’s how that book goes: He’s not asking you out? He’s just not that into you. He’s not buying you flowers? He’s just not that into you. He’s not dropping his coat into a rain puddle for you? He’s just not that into you. He’s not clubbing his ex-girlfriends with a meat tenderizer for you? God, woman, he’s just not that into you.

No, for real, the table of contents really gives you everything you need to know about this book. I mean, it doesn’t get any more explicit than Chapter 8: “He’s Just Not that into You if He’s Breaking Up With You.” (No shit, really? This kind of advice sells? Hey, book agents, my card.) Anyway, I’m not really going to dump that much grief on this book, because though it seems utterly obvious from every angle, a lot of women can and do spend a lot of their lives scrutinizing male behavior for any tiny hint that an attractive guy might just be a little, teeny bit interested. This said, a male author makes millions telling women what brutally-honest best friends have been saying for millennia when he says, “Lady, he’s just not that into you.”

Oh, you weren’t aware of that, were you. Allow me to graph virtually every conversation I’ve repeatedly had with girlfriends of mine since the moment our teachers separated the boys from the girls and made us watch that video about our soon-to-arrive monthly friends:

Ok, obviously, this is grossly unfair to all women everywhere, but my assholish sarcasm here is meant only to illustrate how much of female-to-female socialization is centered around such scrutiny. I would even say I’m a bit bitter about how much of my life, as a female, is taken up by being involved in these incredibly circular conversations. And, sadly, you can’t just end it all by saying, “he’s just not that into you,” because, damn if that’s not so horrifically shattering.

The absolute, horrible truth is our culture, the last time I checked, still measures the worth of a woman against the men she can attract. Oh, I know I’ll get some comments about how “Oh god, you’re so off-base, I’m an independent woman and I don’t val—“ Look, I’mmaletyoufinish but if you’re that strong, more power to you and congratulations. Seriously. I mean women like you absolutely no disrespect and in every way I envy you. But having spent a good portion of my life living and working among some of the most high-power, top-of-their-field women who by every single god damn standard in life should feel powerful, influential, important and fuck it, fabulous will still feel far too often that they are ignorable, marginal and flat-out worthless because they happen to also be single. Usually, if I think I’m making some kind of outlandish generalization, I’d be the first to call myself on it, but I can say with firm authority that this is far more common a phenomenon among young women than we’re allowed to admit out loud, lest we be labeled desperate or bitter as well.

And we’re up against a lot in fighting these feelings. I can’t tell you how many messages we receive on a daily basis telling us how flawed we are without Revlon, how naked we are without Banana Republic, how pitiful we are if we aren’t a size 4 and yes, how incredibly messed up we must be if we’re still single.

Anyway, it’s not really that surprising that the followup question any logical woman might have to “he’s just not that into you” is “Why not?!” Ah, the rub. If you’re to believe the authors of He’s Just Not That Into You, the reason is simple—he doesn’t want to have sex with you. Ah, you thought there was deeper insight in a self-help book directed towards women? Ha! No, they very directly say, over and over again, the primary reason a guy wouldn’t be into you is because he doesn’t find you sexually attractive. He’s not flirting with you? You’re ugly. He’s not asking you out? You’re ugly. And god, what’s the point of living, after all, Ms. JD/PHD/PhiBetaKappa/RhodesScholar/Forbes500/AcademyAwardWinner, if men think you unattractive? Isn’t the whole measure of a woman equivalent to the men she can attract?

So it’s not surprising that most consumer products targeted towards women in their mid-to-late twenties are advertised to us with images of smiling couples, as if to say, “Hey ugly, use our product, and you just might wind up with a boyfriend.” (Pick up a copy of Maxim or Esquire and compare its ads to those in a copy of Glamour if you don’t believe me.)

And if you don’t think women internalize this message as truth, that single women are something to be marginalized and condescended to, ask your coupled-up female friends how many single friends they still hang out with after they’re committed.

So a book like He’s Just Not That Into You is (if I evaluate it far more generously than it deserves) an attempt to stop this kind of circular, self-critical behavior by putting the agency of selection entirely on the shoulders of men. It’s saying to women, “Hey, look, don’t beat yourself up over it—he’s just not that into you—get over it.”

Like The Rules (the self-help book du jour that came before it), He’s Just Not That Into You reinforces an idea that most people suspect, but our politically correct dialogue obscures: men choose, women decide.

What do I mean by this? Though if you survey them, most guys say they would love to be asked out by a girl, generally it's only wishful thinking because by girl, they only mean Megan Fox. Most guys I know would be freaked out if an average-looking girl approached them on the subway and started flirting with them. Oh, for sure, their ego would be stroked and they might awkwardly trip and fall into a date out of sheer shellshock, but it’s definitely not an event most men actually anticipate in their realm of normal day-to-day existence. Nevertheless, this is exactly the expectation that girls are set up to have—if you’re not getting asked out by at least average-looking guys, they’re just not that into you because, obviously, you’re ugly.

Oh man, when you actually spell it out like that, it’s really depressing, isn’t it? Now ask all your guy friends how many girls they *actually* have asked out in real life. Oh man, what? They never ask girls out on the subway? They don’t approach girls reading in the park? They don’t do the fucking cute meet thing in every romantic comedy ever, run into a girl carrying a bunch of stuff and lock eyes as you stumble around picking up her dropped belongings?! What?! No! You’re kidding me. You mean all these girls go around thinking they’re ugly as sin and it’s all your fault?

Yeah, I realize I’m a rambler and it takes me about four days to get to my point, but here it is: girls are taught from puberty onward to feel like shit because of your inaction. They expend considerable energy shoring each other up just to get knocked down again. Every time we go out into the daylight sun and are not approached by men, we return to our empty holes in the ground (because we’re obviously trolls) and read self-help guides, watch romantic comedies and flip though magazines all telling us the same thing: if you’re not beating men off with a stick, you’re obviously flawed.

It’s a horrible way to live, honestly.

Now, what this is entirely missing is a male point of view explaining the mechanisms for why decent young men don’t approach women more frequently. I don’t pretend to know why they don’t, but I know enough single young men to know that they don’t. There are insecurities on both sides and having some fucking common sense, I won’t even entertain that lack of sexual attraction argued in He’s Just Not That Into You entirely explains why so few men are making advances. The problem I have is with how profitable it is a venture to make women feel bad about a phenomenon that doesn’t actually occur too frequently out in the wild.

And here’s the paradox. The girls who are most susceptible to these feelings and these messages are those who are actively trying to be seen as “good girls.” They have it built up in their minds that good girls attract prince charmings. They won’t dare be accused of demonstrating the kinds of behaviors that would attract copious amounts of male attention in public—because it’s been internalized that that’s deviant social behavior. In Boston, the city I live in, and in New York, it’s generally abnormal for women to make eye contact with men and smile at them in public. Now, obviously there are some girls here who smile and lock eyes with every guy they come across. Guess which one is going to receive more positive male attention? I know, it’s shocking; men prefer not be rejected, and the girl staring at her feet on the subway is less of a sure bet than smiley over there. Problem being? The girl staring at her feet thinks she’s being a good girl. (Remember Dating Tips #4? “It’s not ladylike to stare at strangers!”) And so it goes.

So the problem isn’t solved by “Hey men, man up and ask her out.” Just like women, guys are scrutinizing female behavior for signs of interest. Unfortunately, a lot of women are socialized to *never* show sexual interest in men in public and on this basis, a lot of men are being outwitted by this same system telling women how to behave and how to think about themselves. HJNTIY obscures this problem on the female side of the equation, by saying quite succinctly, any guy not asking you out thinks you’re unfuckable. Men, on their side, are so paralyzed by the fear of rejection, they only flirt with the girls who seem the flirtiest and actually set themselves up for rejection (because by demonstrating what is perceived by men to be flirtatious behavior indiscriminately, she’s going to have her pick). And like two ships passing in the night, men and women are completely misreading each other and both going home to empty holes in the ground. I’m not exactly sure what the male equivalent to Bridget Jones is, but I’m sure I don’t want to know.

Man-Boy Trope and All its Glory!

2010-03-18T18:45:00.000-07:00

The Man-boy trope! So fancying myself something of an amateur student of the comedic arts, there's nothing I hate more right now than the Jonah-Hilling of comedy. Ok, it's actually mostly Judd Apatow, but it's well known among peers I reserve a little space beside Judd for Jonah Hill and his late-model cousin Seth Rogen. Why? Hill and Rogen consistently play characters who make superbad (haha!) life choices, exude some kind of persistent, unexplainable arrogance, and oh, yeah, totally objectify women every chance they get. They live the man-boy existence, reveling in a life without consequences, responsibility and, god, civility. Women in Apatow movies serve no more purpose than garnish to the hot, steaming bowl of stupid Hill and Rogen always seem to be serving up to the protagonist. And given they're often paired with weak-willed buddies whose sudden growth of backbone often serves as the climax of the film, it's no wonder most of their bullshit goes completely unchecked.

Anyway, off my wagon, because seriously, I could talk about how much I hate this trope played out by Rogen/Hill in movies from now until doomsday. Point being is that for whatever reason, marketing has decided that all males must be like Jonah Hill. Young men, as a demographic are assumed to think it's perfectly reasonable to ignore women or treat them horribly because they're unattractive, that it's perfectly respectable to be a complete slob and subsist off of bacon-flavored potato chips in lieu of real food (because women cook, not REAL men). If one were to take advertisements like these seriously, one would think men spend their entire days viciously policing a commercially-produced definition of "real man" which centers mostly around consumer habits (Cool Adidas sneakers! High five, real man!). It'd be like joining a he-man-woman-haters club sponsored entirely by some horrible-sounding snack product I'm just going to make up right now: ranch-powder covered bacon cheese sticktwists.

Anyway, I guess I'm inclined to consider this kind of man-boy trope a sub-optimal form of humor. It's like, "Yes, I understand why the writer thinks I should be laughing at this, but it leaves me empty inside. Oh penis joke!" Adam Sandler may have played the exact same character in every movie he ever made, but I didn't see him fashioning a culture of weirdly perverse masculinity. I blame a lot of the troubles I see in young men on Jonah Hill. It's not at all fair and intellectually dishonest seeing as I am, actually, a sociologist, but still, seeing as gender isn't actually my speciality, I need a scapegoat to help me sleep at night.

Sexiest Woman Alive = Biggest Insult to Man Ever?

2010-03-15T15:52:00.000-07:00

I'm one of those women who cannot believe that it's 2010 and we still haven't as a society seriously considered how fucked up beauty pageants actually are. There's no shortage of reasons to hate them.

We put them in prime time TV-spots and makes sure they're "family-friendly" in case parents totally oblivious to how such programming might seriously fuck up their child (girl OR boy) with a pretty overt message, driving home how beauty is the paramount criterion in evaluating the whole of femalekind. Seriously, Miss USA contestants are scored in three categories: swimsuit, evening gown and interview. So basically, two-thirds of your evaluation are based on looks and the interview section is composed of softballs so you can smile big at the camera and continue mostly to be evaluated on your looks. Awesome. Way to go, America.

Anyway, since ranking women based on sexiness is literally a national past time, I was not surprised that Esquire has its own rankin g. What does surprise me is that this year, along with 63 other sexy women, they've decided it'd be hiiiiiilarious to include Lane Kiffin, USC's football coach. A dude. Apparently, people are pissed because he left his coachship at Tennessee to take the job at USC. And that's enough of a reason to make him a woman and not just any woman, one of the 64 sexiest women in America!

Haha! Get it? He's being objectified the way we objectify all the other women in this poll, except it's funny because he's man. Get it? Huh? Huh? Hilarious! Best insult ever! He's a girly man! A sexy girly man! Haha! Girls suck. Haha. ha. ha. ha.

Honestly, I don't give two shits about Lane Kiffin or football, but come on, self-professed liberal media. If you're going to report on the damn story at all, at least give me a sentence recognizing how this story highlights how ridiculous the entire ranking of women by looks is. Just a sentence. Just a nod. Something.

Pages from Sexually Switzerland

2010-03-15T07:24:00.000-07:00

Brandi Brown sends in a recommendation of a book which basically instructs us all on how to not write a personals ad. Pages from Sexually Switzerland by David Rose basically just lists all the most ridiculous ads in The London Review of Books, organized by theme. Based on what I read so far [pdf], it sounds like a must-read for me (and you, if you're enjoying this series).

Why waste time in the bath? M, 45, with secret to natural, water-free cleanliness—psychic showering, bathe in your own karma (patent pending). Seeks woman to 50 for invigorating wash-down in the fountain of the mind. Must be prepared to lose friends and never be allowed in restaurants again. Box no. 0217.

Tall, handsome, well-built, articulate, intelligent, sensitive, yet often grossly inaccurate man, 21. Cynics (and some cheap Brentwood psychiatrists) may say ‘pathological liar’, but I like to use ‘creative with reality’. Join me in my 36-bedroomed mansion on my Gloucestershire estate, set in 400 acres of wild-stag populated woodland. East Ham.12 Box no. 0620.

Drooling, toothless sociopath (M, 57) seeks F any age to help make this abandoned gas station kiosk feel more like home. Must bring shoes (size 10). Box no. 5310.

Meet the new face of indoor bowling! More or less the same as the old face, but less facial hair and better teeth. M, 28. Box no. 3377.

Nothing says ‘I love you’ in a more sincere way than being woken with champagne and pastries and roses. Apart from a dog with peanut butter on the roof of his mouth. Write, we’ll meet, sleep together and—in the morning, just before my friend’s wife tells me to get off their sofa and get out of their house—I’ll show you Winston’s trick. It’s hilarious. You’ll have to bring the peanut butter though—they’ve put locks on all the kitchen cupboards. Man, 26. Box no. 6433.

Holly's Dating Tips for Guys Part 4: What Bowerbirds Can Teach Us about Online Dating

2010-03-14T10:27:00.000-07:00

Throughout the animal kingdom, it’s pretty well established that males learn some special skill and learn it damn well if they ever want to get laid. Male bowerbirds in New Guinea build elaborate little houses, expending considerable energy scavenging their surroundings for the brightest colored objects with which to decorate their little home. They are notorious for stealthily stealing prized ornaments such as bits of broken glass from other nests to knock down the competition. Researchers have even found a few that have gone so far as to chew up flowers and grass to make a kind of paint they spit out to spruce up the place. When a female approaches to scrutinize his decorating prowess, he goes into a tizzy, flittering about the place, and tossing down to her his most prized possessions. (I took an animal behavior class in college—it was awesome.)

It’s argued that females reserve themselves since the costs borne to them in reproduction are obviously higher. The bowerbird who constructs the brightest, best-constructed little bower is going to get the girl because he’s proven himself in several fields apparently important to the survival bowerkind: scavenging, territorialism and color theory. His genes are demonstrated and the little female bowerbird rests easy knowing her offspring will likely demonstrate the same traits and in turn be able to pass on their genes when the time comes. S’all good in bowerland.

Unfortunately, we don’t live in bowerland. In fact, we live at a very interesting time when one’s biological sex no longer applies to two hermetically sealed categories of human existence. In many ways, it’s liberating and exciting to not inherit a rulebook for human sexual conduct at birth. In other ways, it can be horrifically frustrating as often times games without rules can and often do lead to complete player paralysis. Back when the rules were clear and gender norms brutally policed, women sorta had to consider the guy with the best prospects. I mean, the “best guy” was objectively known by a certain social calculus factoring in his family connections, his wealth, his career potential, his education and sometimes even his looks, but personality definitely not. The question “How do I get that girl to like me?”just didn’t exist.

So maybe one of the most confusing things to have come out of a gender equalizing revolution is just this question. How do I get that girl to like me? Now this is a topic I could probably spend days on and if I weren’t already spending my spring break mostly playing a ludicrous amount of Final Fantasy XIII (I'm on disk three already!), I might have time to go down that path, but for now, I’m going to limit today’s lesson to how to write an attention-getting online dating profile. Your online bower, if you will.

How I Met Your Mother ran an episode about Ted (the guy who is supposed to meet the mother) searching for her by creating an online dating profile. When Ted told his friends, he added, “Come on, there’s no stigma!” To which his friends bemoaned, “Of course there’s still a stigma, that’s why people say there’s no stigma!” Argh. Well, here’s me admitting that I use online dating, but also admitting that because so many great single guys under the age of 30 think online dating is stigmatized, the online dating pool for me is mostly slim pickings.

This could be the function of two things. First, there could just a dearth of twentysomething single men willing to sign up for online dating. Second, the men who do use online dating suck at writing online profiles.

The first, I can’t do much about. I can say that as a graduate student, I don’t seem to get to meet a whole lot of single men who aren’t other students in my immediate vicinity (and I’ll be perfectly honest, the whole introverted, socially-awkward academic thing dominating Harvard and MIT is really, unfortunately, not my bag—but if it were, oh man!). Anyway, whatever this is, it’s my problem and not wanting to be single forever, I did a seemingly rational thing: I turned to the internets.

I was not impressed.

So, why wasn’t I impressed? I’ll tell you what happens when you “search” for matches on any basic match site as a female. You’ll probably read the profiles of, oh, let’s say 100 guys living in a 25 mile radius of you. You won’t actually read all 100 profiles. What you’ll do is skim pictures, obviously, and see which ones you’re even remotely attracted to. You’ll eliminate ones that look like your little brother. You’ll eliminate the ones wearing gold chains or posing next to their cars. (Ok, I do this. My list of instant turnoffs another time, though.) And you’ll probably whittle down your selection to about 25 guys.

Then, you’ll sit down with a cup of tea and read over the first profile, and the second, and the third. And then you stop. Why do you stop? Because you read three profiles that all said, “I like the outdoors, but I like staying in, too.” Or, “I’m really just a normal guy who likes having fun.” Or, “I value my family and my friends.” Or something utterly banal like “I enjoy laughing” (for fuck’s sake, who doesn’t enjoy laughing?). And you’ll read this over. And over. And over.

So let me explain to you what’s wrong with this kind of writing the way I explain this to my students. I sometimes work on the side as a college admissions consultant. I read and edit personal statements, these documents seventeen-year-olds use to tell a stranger halfway across the country something appealing about themselves. There’s not a real trick to these things so much as really using 500 words to make yourself look as unique and interesting as possible. In my opinion, I consider the essay the biggest “gimme” of the process as it’s the only thing you can have any input on by your senior year of high school. Your academic record is set. Your SATs are done. Your letters of recommendation are completely out of your hands. And all they want out of these 500 words is a snapshot that humanizes you and makes you more than a list of numbers. That’s not that hard, really? Is it?

Now, no matter how hard I try to convey this to kids, I will still inevitably get an essay filled to the brim with platitudes and clichés. I quickly dispatch these with red pen and the words, “NO! NO! GOD NO!” scrawled in the margins. And then I remind myself that these are paying clients. I usually replace where I wrote, “NO! NO! GOD NO!,” with “Show, don’t tell.” What do I mean by that? Don’t tell me it felt spectacular to shoot the game-winning shot. That’s boring and when you say it out loud, even sounds kind of stupid. Describe for me the noise in the crowd, the sweat on your d’s face, your coach’s yelling at you, “SHOOT! SHOOT!” That’s the shit I want to read. So show me, don’t tell me. I want to be there, so take me there. Sometimes, this is all it takes for me to get back beautiful, tiny little essays that make me say, “Damn, kid, now even I want to get to know you.” And that’s exactly what you want an admissions counselor to say.

So back to online profiles. I think a lot of the general rules of college admissions apply. But unlike college admissions, the agency of selection is theoretically “two-way.” A woman can just as easily as a man contact a potential match. The problem is they don’t. Well, not entirely true. The problem is the ones they bother to contact are all the same guy. I’d imagine if you gave me Match.com’s data for any geographic radius, I could tell you exactly which handful of guys are getting virtually 80% of the female-initiated messages. But seeing as I don’t and won’t get my hands on this data, you’re just going to have to take my informed guess as good enough.

The men who get these messages may be pretty good looking, but the one thing they will all invariably have is a fantastic profile. But just as with admissions essays, they won’t be identical. These dudes understand that the goal in writing a profile is to distinguish themselves from every other male on the site. To build the prettiest, shiniest bower.

On every online dating service, there are more straight men than there are straight women. And for every message a man gets from a woman, she’s probably getting ten. That’s just the odds. And yet, so many persist on filling their profiles with platitudes and clichés, as if “I value my friends and my family” really tells me anything about you (well I guess I could assume from this that maybe you’re not a hermit living in a cave without any social contact whatsoever, but that’s a really low bar, honestly). If I had to edit men’s online profiles the way I edit college essays, it’d be a nightmare. If we were bowerbirds, these guys would be decorating their nests with dung and broken nutshells thinking they’ve gone and built the Taj Mahal.

So I’m going to try to list five of the biggest offenses I see and how you can correct them.

1) Show, don’t tell. Like I said, this is the biggest, most important thing I can tell anyone ever presented with an opportunity to sell yourself. Every time you write a sentence you think describes you, ask yourself, “Am I telling someone what I am, or am I showing them?” I can guarantee you will come across infinitely more interesting if you actually take a moment to describe something you love with a bit of detail rather than say, “I like hiking.”

2) Don’t leave blanks and don’t be lazy! Needless to say, the most dreaded thing I hate reading is the line: “I hate describing myself.” Ok, well, suck it up soldier! Sorry, this whole finding the love of your life thing is so much effort! Gosh! No, really, really, think about how this is read on the other end. Why would a self-respecting woman want to date a guy who can’t even put in the effort to fill out a paragraph or two on an online dating profile? It can only really be read negatively; either you’re lazy or you’ve really nothing interesting to say about yourself. It’s not going to be read as “Oh, he’s so modest!” the way I think guys think it will be.

Honestly, sometimes I wish guys put as much work into finding a girl as they do getting into college. Those seventeen year old boys I work with, on top of regular school commitments, put hours into studying for their SATs, captaining varsity sports teams and volunteering at food banks. The sheer effort that goes into an producing a seventeen-year-old college applicant is unmatched by any effort I ever see the average college-educated guy put into dating. Aside from the "They just want to get laid at this age" argument, I don't know why so many twentysomething men who actually want girlfriends are so cavalier about this dating thing. Another time, though. Back to my original train of thought.

3) Don’t describe what you want. Look, everyone’s on a dating site for a reason, but the “About me” section of your profile is not to be misread as the time to talk about what you want in a girl. I know what I’m like already, but I don’t have a single reason why I should want to be with you. More problematically, though you may think listing your desired attributes in the opposite sex wouldn’t reflect badly on yourself, you’re dead wrong. How can that be, you ask? Well, consider the following a “teaching moment” in female thinking:

First, don’t be an idiot and write something anywhere approaching the orbit of “no fatties!” Yes, I get it, you’re trying to be funny. Haha. But in all seriousness (no it’s still not funny), I have a guy friend who in his profile had for months basically had something that sounded like, “I want a thin, active girl.” Which is fine, right, to think you want that but the first problem is most girls—no matter *how* thin they objectively are—do not think of themselves as thin and thus will think you won’t want them, so why bother. And secondly, most girls wouldn’t want to date a guy who advertises how superficial he is. Because I knew the guy pretty well, I knew by “thin and active” he basically meant just anyone who wasn’t noticeably overweight, but he basically alienated like 90% of the female pool with that single sentence. I told him to take that sentence out and since then, he’s been way more successful in getting responses when he contacts girls.

The other peeve I have is when guys say they want a woman who “acts like a lady.” I don’t think many men without little sisters realize this, but the phrase “act like a lady” has always been a way for authority figures to tell little girls to stop doing whatever it is they’re doing (especially things they may enjoy doing but are seen as “masculine,” like cracking jokes or taking up more room while sitting than is “ladylike”). It’s a control thing. To say “I want a woman who acts like a lady” would be interpreted by a woman like me as you saying you want someone to be submissive, malleable and obedient. I’m absolutely sure that’s *exactly* what a lot of guys want but would never say as blatantly as this. But in my world, most of my guyfriends sincerely do want to meet women who are independent, opinionated and yes, even sometimes assertive. I'm not exactly sure if this would be read as a simply another throw-away platitude by other women, but for me, at least, this would be read as a turnoff.

In this way, I think it’s always potentially dangerous to describe what you want in a girl in your profile because the girl of your dreams may interpret your description as something wholly not her. Thus, I think it’s a better idea to not put what you’re looking for in your profile and decide for yourself after contact if she’s a good match for you or not.

4) Offer a neutral hook. One of the things I’ve learned about men is that they’re far, far more likely to approach me in Real Life if I’ve got a “prop.” What’s a prop? Usually, in my case, it’s a book (because it’s a rare moment that I don’t have one on my person) but sometimes it’s something like a brightly colored headband or my college hoodie. My theory behind why these things work is not because they make me more of an alluring person (please…) but that they offer neutral ground. They’re something a guy can innocently ask about without making it verbally obvious that he’s interested in me and thus he preserves his face should I rebuff his advance.

In this way, I suspect a lot of girls would be way more comfortable talking about something that both she and you would have equal footing talking about. That rules out talking about themselves, yourself or your obsession with fantasy water polo. So give some neutral ground. Match sites try to provide this with a list of favorite books or whatever, but you could make it a lot more obvious of a hook if you tried. Maybe a cute little observation about how the subway runs. Maybe a rumination about why you think travel is better in the winter than the summer. Opinions on neutral things here are ok, because opinions on things everyone has. But not everybody shares your enthusiasm for water polo. (And yes, you can actually learn a lot about a person by how they talk about the subway.)

5) Check out the competition. Seriously, look at what guys on the site are writing in their profiles. If your profile looks like theirs, change it. If you’re describing an interest you think makes you unique, but seven other guys in a 10 mile radius all share the same interest, it’s no longer a selling point. In fact, it’s a detriment. I think you’d be shocked at how not a special, unique snowflake you really are when you compare your profile to the 25 other guys living around you. That doesn’t mean you can’t still be exactly who you are and just put a little more effort into presenting yourself more colorfully.

Ok, so that’s five tips. Maybe I’ll make a list of five more another time. But that’s a lot, right? Right? Well, it’s enough for now because you’ve literally just read through what in Word has amounted to literally 10 pages of double-spaced text. Good show.

Holly's Dating Tips for Guys Part 3: The Delusional "Nice Guy" Trap

2010-03-09T20:10:00.001-08:00

There’s a really horrible National Lampoon movie called Stoned Age. It’s absolutely, hands-down one of the worst movies ever made and absolutely not worth a single minute of your time. Nevertheless, I admit I’ve actually seen it and since it's about two-dimensional cavemen I’m going to use it to illustrate an argument about the “dogged nice guy” rather than use real-life examples (who I might humiliate). Stoned Age follows a protagonist, Ishbo the caveman, as he pines away after Fardart who has told him since childhood she’s in love with his dimwit older brother, Thudnik.

Ishbo is an overweight, fairly unattractive male who believes he’s the smartest man in the tribe. Because the movie is told from his point of view, naturally we only see scenes in which he demonstrates in some way his mental superiority over his fellow man. In demonstrating what is basically his only redeeming quality, while the rest of the cavemen in the movie turn to clubbing women over the head for sex, Ishbo fancies himself something a romantic, preferring to wait until his dreamgirl, Fardart also wanted him back.

Who Is Fardart? A beautiful blue-eyed blond Ishbo has been in love with since childhood. What do we know about Fardart? She’s beautiful and blue-eyed. Oh, and in love with Ishbo’s older brother. During the entire movie, we learn only these three things about Fardart’s character. We know she’s beautiful. Blue-eyed. And blond. Oh, and totally not in any way in love with Ishbo.

Thudnik. Portrayed as the alpha male, Thudnik is muscular and athletic. A caveman jock, if you will. Thudnik demonstrates his apparent stupidity by constantly calling Ishbo’s inventions stupid. Nevertheless, he is beloved by the tribe and will grow up to be their leader, much to Ishbo’s dismay.

Alright, so here’s a cast of characters living out a plot obviously written by a Dogged Nice Guy. Meanwhile, since I can’t name a single nerdy guy in my life who at some point this didn’t honestly reflect his life, so I’ll also link it to another trope, Give Geeks a Chance.What’s usually the main problem in this scenario? Well, there’s more than one problem. There are actually three.

First, Fardart’s character is singled out as the best female in the tribe by both Ishbo and Thudnik. And like many movies with this trope, we have literally no idea what would make her the best woman in the tribe aside from the clear and obvious fact that she’s attractive. Maybe this makes complete sense to the male audience and I’m missing the point, but really, why is she the best? Now, in real life, I’ve asked this many times to friends who have confided in me their feelings for some female. Most often, said female is objectively a pretty great person with a lot going on in for her. However, subjectively when seen through the unreliable narration of my friend, she’s made out to be much, much more than that. She’s perfect. I say this knowing full well that no girl I have ever known is perfect, and yet, my god how many girls I’ve known to be described to me as perfect. How blind I must be.

In the moment, nerds who fall for a beautiful girl have this tendency to think her everything he has ever wanted in a woman as if being born with long eyelashes and blonde hair guaranteed her place among the gods. But part of this is pure halo effect, when infatuation goggles make men see things that aren’t really there and miss things that might be apparent to everyone else with eyes (see: bitch in sheep’s clothing). When I know the girl in question, it’s pretty frustrating for me to reconcile what I do know about a person (because they are real people) with what the guy sees her as.

Second, the audience is supposed to recognize Ishbo’s apparent unattractiveness and nevertheless, perhaps as an act of wishful thinking on the part of the writer, see past this (despite seeing nothing of value about Fardart except her beauty). Here, just as we have no reason to believe Fardart to be as perfect as Ishbo sees her, we have no reason to believe why Fardart—or any girl for that matter—should be with Ishbo. Instead, a careful viewer might start to suspect that Ishbo’s notion of himself as a “nice guy” may not be wholly accurate (Note: I promise, entry on this subject to come soon). In fact, the careful viewer may begin to see Ishbo’s justification for why Fardart should be with him and when seen from the outside of Ishbo's head, it’s scary. Ishbo believes Fardart to be so truly special, so truly unique that only *he*, being so specially, uniquely suited to her, can understand her. So inevitably, she will some day realize this and accept they’re destined to be together. Wait, what?

Third, we are meant to see Ishbo’s brother Thudnik as a boilerplate machomale meathead. Sure, I mean, for a movie about cavemen, he probably is an idiot. But I’m going to use this as an opportunity to explore my experience with the alpha-male/anti-alpha-male complex as a phenomenon in social experience. Anti-Alphas like Ishbo focus entirely on the negatives of popular males and in so doing, never realize what makes them attractive to females.This is almost tragic.

Popular males are, by definition, popular. They may be popular in some circles because they’re great at sports or can benchpress a baby elephant, but for the most part, popular males I have seen are popular because they’re charismatic and sociable. Adult men become popular by being gifted conversationalists, outgoing to strangers and yes, much to the disbelief of "nice guys" everywhere often kind to even to the unpopular or *gasp* not-so-hot girls. They are never wanting for someone to talk to when they walk into a room because they can talk to anyone there; they don’t stand in the corner by the drinks nervously guarding his body with his red solo cup, lest anyone even try to approach him (seriously, watch yourself next time at a party and see if you’re doing this. Your body language screams: DON’T TOUCH ME!!!!).

Anyway, Mr. Popular’s easy charm is what wins him the favor of ladies everywhere. I can’t tell you how many times I’ve watched friends fall for the guy who can walk into a party and introduce himself with confidence to people he’s never met. He doesn’t need an introduction. He doesn’t need an invitation. He’s not demonstrating insecurities by circling the wagons with a group of beta males and talking about sports or playing flip-cup. He’s not puppy-dogging a poor girl the entire night, scarily tiptoeing into creeper territory. He’s smiling, laughing and generally catching the curious eyes of every girl present. Why? Because he’s demonstrating his prowess and not advertising his flaws. If he’s a comedian, he's telling jokes. If he’s a listener, he excites his neighbors with thoughtful, engaging questions. If he’s an adventurer, he’s wowing an audience with his exploits. Really, if I had to simplify this anymore than I am, he’d be the songbird with the best damn mating call in the forest. But Ishbo will always see Thudnik as a meathead. And that’s the problem with unreliable narrators because we always see things as they want us to see them.

So we have three basic problems with this trope that play out over and over again in Real Life. The first is infatuation-goggles, most recently evidenced in 500 Days of Summer, when a beautiful female is misread into something she isn’t because a poor guy (or many poor guys) project a wish upon her rather than get to know the real thing. The second is the classic Dogged Nice Guy problem of men twisting logic so deftly to create justifications for why a girl caught in infatuation-goggles will someday right herself and fall for him, too. Finally, the last problem is the apparent denial on the part of the nice guy to really assess the social reasons which lead women to find popular guys romantically appealing.

I’m guessing if you pushed me, I could write an entire book about the subject given virtually all of my guy friends at some point have fallen into this trap. That, and the fact that I’ve seen basically every 80’s movie ever. Well, that said, what can be done? I’m not really sure. Having been the rational friend in these situations and spent what as of now must amount to days trying to talk my nerdy friends down from this heightened delusion, I can say I have about a 0% success rate. My theory, of course, is that the delusion is so strong, I must be seen as the stereotypical jealous female trying to sabotage true love because why else would I be snapping cupid’s arrow in two. I can say with the benefit of hindsight that I was never actually jealous female and have, honestly, never really been attracted to any of my nerdy friends (I know, it’s sad).

But I’ve tried asking other guys what they’d say to a friend showing signs of “nice guy” delusion. And they’re honestly just as clueless. One friend told me he associates this behavior only with men aged 14-22, “because lot of shut-in men get their ideas about romance and relationships from movies and TV instead of real life,” he adds. But I’m still witnessing this behavior in men well into their late twenties, so I know it’s still out there. I’m not sure what the cure is. I know movies like the upcoming She’s Out of My League and shows with the Ugly Guy Hot Wife trope aren’t helping. The unfortunate thing about nice guy delusion is that so many guys I know narrow their scope so small, they never see all the other women around them who are such better matches. They’ll never even meet them, lest in their minds cheat on their dream girl by allowing new females into their lives. In the end, though I haven't much to say about how to deal with this, this is one of the saddest things I ever see happen in the dating lives of men and I sorely wish something would put an end to it.

Holly's Dating Tips for Guys Part 2: Tips for Partying in the Presence of a Male Concentrating Activity

2010-03-07T10:00:00.000-08:00

Today's lesson is about not what goes on during a date, but what happens when you attend a party. Though I fondly recall parties which centered around college-aged men warming a keg with their awkward warmth, "grownup" parties are a new phenomenon for me. They aren't much different than the ones in undergrad, but the key differences are three. First, grownups live in apartments. Two, grownups tend not to get blackout drunk. And lastly, because this is likely the only party you will hear of happening tonight, there's no leaving a boring one lest you take your chances on going to a bar so crowded you'd be lucky to even wave at the bartender from the door.

One phenomenon I hinted at above is the male proverbial circle jerk. Parties with bad music and too much lighting are particularly prone to this. (Potential hosts: rap doesn't have nearly high enough BPM to be dance music, so why do you always insist on making it the entirety of your playlist?) Anyway, at most every party I think I've ever been to, rather than try to meet people they may not know, a group of men will devise some distracting game or ploy and spend the remainder of the party talking to the same four men the rest of the night. Now, thankfully, some intrepid pioneers of partying have already created most of these distractions and these men need not tax their brains developing new ones. I'm sure you've seen them, beirut, flipcup, quarters, whatever. And like moths to a flame, this activity draws the focus of at least 70% of the men at a party at some point in the night. Not quite the same appeal for most women, who largely feel uncomfortable standing in the midst of the heavy male presence. And rarely are women invited to play, lest one of the men in the circle jerk wants to bang her.

This isn't so terribly problematic, unless you're a guy whose goal at this party is to meet a nice girl. What the male circle jerk produces is a gender line you probably haven't seen since intermediate school. The girls end up circling each other creating small, seemingly impenetrable groups which I can imagine seem especially intimidating. So you're asking, how do I talk to the cute one?

Well, first, given the dynamics of the party, don't assume you'll get to talk to her alone. That's always the first mistake guys make. They wait and wait and wait. Really, no one likes to be alone at a party and girls in particular, if cut off from their support group, are vulnerable to every creeper in the room. It's a learned behavior, honestly. Once a creeper descends, it's difficult to extract yourself from the situation. Now, if you're an incredibly confident guy, you could rescue a girl who looks incredibly uncomfortable in the presence of a creeper with a line like, "Hey, sorry, so what were we talking about?" Creeper will get intimidated by your confidence and leave. And you can say, "Sorry, you looked really uncomfortable--and that guy's a creeper." AND YOU'RE IN.

Ok, but truth is very few guys have that kind of chutzpah. So I'll continue where I was going with this. Because of the gender dynamics at this party are altered due to the presence of a circle jerk, there is actually less gender-mingling than people thinks goes on. This means the chances of her group being broken up by, say, dancing or mingling are incredibly low. Don't fret! Game's not over. Talking to a group of girls can be fun, especially if your only other alternatives are watching guys throw ping pong balls into plastic cups for two hours or talking to four guys you already know about, well, the shit you already know.

What do I say, Holly, to this group of girls?

Say hi and introduce yourself. "Hi, my name's ______. You guys look like you're having a good time. What are you laughing about?" Sometimes this might fail, sometimes it might not. Most girls who are worth your salt will be able to respond to this. Unless they're being catty and talking about someone snidely behind their backs, most will let you in on the story and introduce themselves, even if only to be polite.
Once you're in, don't try to derail their conversation train, but don't be hesitant to ask questions. If they mention school, ask what school they go to. If you also go to school, mention you go to school. Chances are, if they're all together at a party and are already friends, they have some kind of institutional connection. You should try to figure out what that is.
Don't say something about their appearance or collective appearance. That's what creepers do.
Give each girl in the group equal attention or focus on addressing the entire group. Focusing only on one girl will create a number of enemies who will, as soon as your back is turned, bemoan your lack of manners and civility by essentially ignoring every other girl your target is with. I mean, it really is bad manners since you're interrupting their conversation and she's clearly in their company. I see this happen way too often and not only is it rude, it's just stupid.
Some good questions to ask girls at parties? Sure. "So what do you girls do for fun around here? I just moved to Boston x months ago, and I'm curious." "So the Oscars are tomorrow, do you guys have a favorite this year?"
Some conversation killing questions? Sure. "What do you do?" "Do you like school?" "Where are you from." The point is to AVOID any question that can be answered with one word. Huge, huge mistake and can kill a conversation dead. Ask only open-ended questions. And don't be afraid if your question gets them talking amongst themselves, "No way, Up in the Air was stupid! How can you like that movie!" They aren't kicking you out, that's what's called having a conversation.

The surprising thing about girls is if they start to think you might be interesting, they will find a way to be alone with you. They won't find a way to be alone with a perfect stranger, but once you do the leg work and introduce yourself to her group of friends, you're no longer a stranger. That's why circle jerks create opportunity. You are one of the only guys at the party demonstrating enough social skills to talk to girls. And by not talking to any single girl in particular, you are not closing yourself off to the rest of the girls in he room. Yes, it's true; girls do take notice when you talk to many girls one-on-one, and if they notice you going from one to the next it reads as: "He's scamming on all the girls in the room in succession AND he's getting rejected multiple times. Not for me."

In conclusion, the key at any party where men are pulled into a circle jerk is to talk to multiple girls--in groups. There are a number of benefits I could illustrate here, including meeting far more available women, asserting yourself as a non-creeper, and not closing yourself off to the rest of ladyfolk by being a clumsy scammer. But seriously, think about it for a few minutes.

Holly's Dating Tips for Guys Part 1: You are Not your Fucking Linux Code

2010-03-06T12:01:00.000-08:00

For the past few months, I've writing standup with a very basic routine--basically, I retell the sorry stories of bad dates I've gone on. I realized after two years of being single that these stories seem to really entertain, maybe through second-hand humilation, shadenfreude, or whatever. I'm not exactly sure what's going on, but the truth is, these stories are hilarious. Like that guy who insisted the entire time that my hair wasn't real. Good times.

Anyway, through suffering comes enlightenment and I've decided maybe instead of keeping my thoughts to myself, I should counsel heterosexual 20-something men on how dating works. Sure, they didn't ask for it, but I think they need it.

The first lesson: You are Not your Fucking Linux Code.

I am, by all measures, nerdy. Full Rock Band setup? Check. Use Star Wars references in common parlance? Check. Battlestar Gallactica? Check. I speak nerd. I can translate nerd. I am, as I said, nerdy. However, what is important to stress is that virtually all of these things that make nerds "nerdy" are consumer items. They are items you buy and bring into your home. You do not create them. You cannot change them. No iota of you as a person went into their production (unless you're actually Joss Whedon). To represent your entire identity via movies and video games is to do yourself a disservice. Think about it this way--how inclined are you to dig a girl who describes her personality by her consumer habits? Sex in the City and Reese Witherspoon movies. Oh god, right? What would we ever have to talk about? Well, that's my point.

You know those guys who obsess over sports? Are you asking yourself constantly how they seem to pull girlfriends and you can't seem to get a single girl interested in you? For one thing, they don't expect a girl to share that interest (they wouldn't hate it if she was, but it'd be unexpected). Instead, I've watched many of these men in action and they actually approach a girl with the assumption that they want to get to know her (gasp) as a person. Personality, for many them, is not expressed by taste the way it was when we were fourteen and so hopelessly insecure about being different, we gave ourselves chronic teenage personality constipation. True, personality for many of them isn't even the most important part of a girl (ahem), but nevertheless, these guys don't pretend that their interest in sports constitutes their entire personality. And they can put up with a girl who obsesses over Gossip Girl because they accept that that doesn't constitute the whole of her personality, either.

But I watch "nerdy" guys limit their scope of females two ways. In the first, like every guy, they gun for the hottest chick available and pine. At the extreme, they pull the "nice guy" routine and try to win her affections by weaseling themselves into her life at every opportunity (more on this phenomenon another time). But rarely does this work.

So option two (learned response to failure of option number one?): Narrow the field to girls who share your interests. Especially girls who profess to love the things you love (because obviously the girl who loves the things you love will love you, right?). Wait, get out of here, a girl who loves Clone Wars? No way. A girl who reads comics?! No way. A girl who gets Stargate Atlantis?! NO WAY. I could go on, but I won't. The problem with this scenario is that I watch men project a personality onto a girl on the basis of shared consumer interests. Would you do this with anything else?? Oh we both like hiking, ergo, she must also like getting up early in the morning and loves drinking beer? No, you wouldn't! And yet, I've gone out with many "nerdy" guys who have on the basis of learning one thing I like, create in their heads an entire personality for me that I in no way conform to.

For one thing, I'm not mousy. I'm not timid. I'm not shy. I'm not introverted. And yet, I feel very often that when I meet a guy for the first time and he learns I'm actually incredibly self-confident and outgoing, his image of me was shattered. Why? After the second time this seemed to happen, rather than waste the opportunity (I wasn't exactly interested in a second date, anyway) I politely asked my date about it. We met at an online dating site and he admitted that from my profile and my list of favorite books and movies, he had decided I must be like him: introverted, quiet and more of a homebody.

I'm sure this happens all the time for a lot of different reasons, but I see this most often with "nerdy" guys. They get excited by the prospect of dating someone who is like them and they derive that targetgirl's personality must be a match on the basis of shared consumer interests.

So what's my advice? Don't choose your dates on the basis of shared buying habits. Don't walk into a date and grill her for her Netflix queue. The idea here is that you're trying to get to know a person, not look in a mirror. To this end, let me illustrate how dates I've been on could have gone better had the guy gone this route. Let's use an interest that is very often shared among me and my dates: Ender's Game. I'm just going to explore for a bit how you can use this piece of knowledge as a tool to get to know someone better, rather than just a checkmark on some invisible list.

"So one of your favorite books is Ender's Game, huh?" "Yeah." "When did you first read it?" "Oh, I think junior year of high school?" "How did you react to the ending?"

"So one of your favorite books is Ender's Game?" "Yeah." "Did you read the Ender's Shadow series, by any chance?" "Yes!" "What did you think about what I think is Petra's pretty flat character development. It's always something I've thought about and I'd love to hear someone else's opinion on it."

"So one of your favorite books is Ender's Game?" "Yeah." "So what do you think about Ender's use of violence? Did you think it was necessary?"

"So one of your favorite books is Ender's Game?" "Yeah." "So are you a Peter, a Valentine or an Ender?"

It's not that hard, but I can't tell you how impressed by these questions I would have been on a first date. Maybe they sound corny but they're great icebreakers and a great way to start a discussion that has the potential to evolve into other great discussion territory. It's better than asking someone how many brothers and sisters they have. "One." "Yeah?" "Yeah, a brother." "That's great." .....*chirp* *chirp*.

Disclaimer: I have totally used one of the above questions on a date. When date could not answer, I was disappointed :(

Jamie Oliver: Teach every child about food

2010-02-14T14:41:00.000-08:00

Jamie Oliver, if given the chance, will do more good for Americans than any of us social researchers ever will because he's hitting one of the biggest social problems today: childhood obesity. I strongly believe this is a question of inequality. Obese children will be disadvantaged in almost every possible way. Their life chances will criminally shortchanged.

I love Jamie Oliver. He's a hero.

Women in the Apocalypse: Part I

2010-02-02T01:02:00.001-08:00

There is actually a surprising list of novels where women take the lead in an apocalyptic scenario. Many of these authors have to grapple with the longevity of socially-policed gender roles once society dies away. For this reason, as a sociologist, I've always found these kinds of thought experiments interesting. Books for your reading pleasure:

Parable of the Sower by Octavia Butler - Lauren's afflicted with hyperempathy syndrome, a delusion which makes her vulnerable to feeling the pain of others. You can imagine how this might play out in an post-civilized world, where violence is the norm and she can't defend herself without also experiencing the pain. Her sense of empathy leads her to create and follow her own religion, Earthseed, after the mindless slaughter of her family. Most of the novel documents her journey northward, picking up followers and taking on the role as a spiritual guide in the chaos. Personally, the religious rumination was difficult to follow, but other than that the book is graphic and sticks with you for days. There's a sequel, Parable of Talents, in which Lauren's settlement is invaded by a fascist Christian regime that rises in the wake of the catastrophe. Warning: Even more graphic and violent than the first.

Into the Forest by Jean Hegland - What I'd consider a quiet apocalyptic scenario, two sisters ride out the collapse of civilization in their deserted California home. It's a long time coming, and while resigned to the inevitable for some time, their father's accidental death is the one event for which they hadn't prepared. Without giving away pivotal plotpoints, the story involves how two girls come of age and into their own sexuality as social norms fade away.

The Girl Who Owned a City by O.T. Nelson -Sort of difficult to accept at 24, but the book is supposed to be something akin to Atlas Shrugged for Kids, a vehicle for distributing Objectionism to a wider audience (yeah, actually). The plot follows ten-year-old Lisa in her Chicago suburb as she takes control of a world in which all adults are wiped out by a virus, leaving only their children behind. The main point of the novel is really about what qualities make a leader and how Lisa--as opposed to her brutish male enemies--exemplifies them.

The Hunger Games by Suzanne Collins - How could I make any decent list and not praise the virtues of this book? A fascist government demonstrates its authority in a post-war scenario (the details of the scenario are hazy) by demanding tribute from all twelve districts under its domain. The tributes are children, one boy and one girl, selected by lottery to fight each other to the death in a televised arena. After her younger sister is selected in the lottery, Katniss volunteers herself for the games and her stubborn perseverance makes her a symbol of revolution. Check out the sequel, Catching Fire, as well.

Y: The Last Man by Brian K. Vaughan and Pia Guerra - (Actually, it's a comic book!) A virus wipes out all life on earth containing a Y chromosome, leaving Yorick and his pet monkey the last two dudes on the planet. For whatever reason, Yorick looks exactly like Ryan Reynolds. But whatever. The point of the story is to observe from a male perspective what women do after men are gone and the heterogeneity of responses. I thought it was a pretty realistic take on the scenario. It's not painted as a utopian, female-friendly paradise like it might have gone but neither is it a hopeless woe-is-us where-is-the-men? scenario either, and I appreciate that.

Corporate Negligence is a Crime Punishable by Death in China

2009-11-24T11:08:00.000-08:00

While it's not surprising that China might take punishment to the extremes, as I read this article today about the execution of milk producers who were found to be involved in a number of tainted milk deaths among infants nevertheless kinda shocked me. I think of all the recalls and disfunctions that American corporations get away with each year and how many deaths such negligence might cause. Can you even imagine how much safer things would be if you had to wager your profits against your life? Can you imagine the kind of braking we'd have on accelerating income inequality?

Just a terrible, mean-spirited cynical thought.

How do We Sell your College?

2009-11-13T10:50:00.000-08:00

Marketing is pretty hilarious generally, but for elite colleges, the status quo is to keep marketing subtle. Because, you know, God forbid *those* kids heard about your school and thought they had a chance to get in.

But anyway, my alma mater, Wesleyan University, unveiled its new website to pretty universal disapproval from both alumni and the student body alike. The problem? Desperation. In fact, the demographic I most see this appealing to is 17-year-0ld Ted "Ohio is where my parents from; I live in the moment" Mosby from How I Met Your Mother (a show created by Wes alums--and yes, Ted's character is also an alum). In other words, it caters to a specific sub-group of Wesleyan freshmen who learn after two or three weeks on campus how utterly irritating they are to the rest of the student body.

Wesleyan is a place that loves to consider itself a haven for the intellectual elite. And you know what? It is. Coming from a distinctly blue-collar background, Wesleyan kicked my ass intellectually. My learning curve that first year was steep; I remember feeling so behind my classmates who could spout out Foucault line-by-line and I didn't even know who the dude was. I remember my first paper actually had the words "See me" scrawled across the top. I went from being the valedictorian of my giant public school to--well--this.

But that's your first two months at Wesleyan. That's not your college career. And for one thing, I know if I saw a website like this that literally says, "Do you like to quote Hegel, Hume and...Homer Simpson?" as a high school junior, I know I would have been intimidated. Yes, this girl's not an idiot. But I sure as hell didn't know who two out of three of those H's were in 11th grade (I'll let you guess which ones).

I'm a pretty typical public school graduate as in Pocono Mountain was not a private-school alternative for the suburban elite. I think our average SAT score in 2004 was something like 970 out of 1600. Needless to say, Hegel was not in the curriculum.

Anyway, the point here is that admissions marketing is interesting in the sense that whatever message you send you will both attract and repel potential members of the next generation of leaders. Who you repel sometimes is more important than who you attract, especially in an age when elite private colleges struggle to recruit more than 2% of their student body from backgrounds such as mine (bottom 25% of the income distribution).

But beyond this, the idea is inauthentic. I'm not sure who came up with this marketing pitch, but it doesn't seem to resonate with the students who actually go or who went to the college. Again, we come back to the idea of desperation. A front that while probably accurate is one we keep to ourselves, knowing such an attitude is perceived as arrogant and elitist to most we interact with outside of our campus. And I'm sure this feeling isn't unfamiliar to other students who attend elite private schools.

Hence, using this feeling as an advertising gimmick strikes me as uncomfortable, for lack of a better word. It's making public what most of us keep to ourselves. Yes, I took ridiculous classes where we read books with titles like Sadomasochism in Everyday Life and wrote papers dissecting the symbolic violence hidden in magazine advertisements. I'm happy with those memories and ecstatic with the education I received at Wesleyan. But at the same time, I am uncomfortable with the distance it created between me and my high school friends. Between me and my family. Between me and actually most people who did not attend a ridiculously progressive, intellectually-rigorous liberal arts college. I'm very aware that who I am was shaped in part by Wesleyan and the learning experiences it provided for me, but at the same time, trying to capture that experience in words and sell it to high school students is inauthentic. Maybe just showing pictures of racially diverse students sprawled out on Foss Hill is trite, but it's not--at least for Wes--artificial.

I'm probably being terribly contradictory here, but I thought I'd try to figure out why this campaign bothers me. I'll probably change my mind at least six more times before I'm done thinking about it.

Findings

2009-11-03T15:56:00.000-08:00

Why zombies? It's mutants we should fear.

2009-10-31T14:35:00.000-07:00

My brother and I were discussing some of the possible reasons why zombies have taken such a central place today in the horror genre. When you first think about it rationally, you come to the conclusion made in Shaun of the Dead that zombies really aren't that scary. Yes, they are undead and they are gory-looking with scraps of skin falling off and what not. But given they have no living parts, they don't make any sense as they shouldn't be sentient given their human brain no longer has blood pumping through it. In this way, they should be easily dispensed with in the event of a zombie apocalypse.

So why zombies? What people should be afraid of if they are afraid of anything are mutants. Mutants are not zombies. Mutants are living, breathing humanoids that have been genetically altered to survive pretty much anything. And they *are* sentient. So on the two fronts in which you can discount zombies--sentience and durability--you should fear mutants. They will chase you. They will outrun you. They can wield firearms and shoot you. They can drive armored tanks. They can captain warships. They can enslave us wholesale. They will--undoubtedly--destroy us all systematically, methodically, horrifically, brutally and mercilessly. We have absolutely no reason to believe they would be benevolent. We only have reason to believe they would want us exterminated.

Thus, in conclusion, mutants mean business and they will kill you.

Rich Kids Don't Get STDs

2009-10-31T08:41:00.000-07:00

There's a site popular among undergrads at Harvard called HarvardFML. The site is reminiscent of a site that was popular at my undergrad, the Anonymous Confession Board. Basically, the premise is you post shit anonymously and thus--seemingly--without consequences. Anyway, since I work with undergrads here, I for whatever reason think it's important to keep somewhat informed about the goings-on on campus. Now, I could probably do this more effectively if I took the time to read their newspaper or go to events on campus but I prefer to do it the lazy way and read anonymous whining about their life on HarvardFML. This morning I read quite a gem:

I figure the chances of catching an STD from another Harvard student are pretty low, so I usually don’t make the guys I hook up with wear a condom. I just found out that I have chlamydia…again. FML

Which, naturally, made me wonder where these kids think STDs come from if--as a Harvard student--you think Harvard students wouldn't be carrying them around. Is this an admissions question I don't know about? I guess the most basic conclusion is that the underlying assumption here is that only poor, uneducated people traffic disease? And that this individual thinks the predominately wealthy, educated elite would never soil themselves with sexual contact with the underclass?

Mind you, these kids go to Harvard. Future leaders of the world and all that jazz.

What Apocalyptic Literature Tells Us

2009-10-30T05:02:00.000-07:00

Chanda Phelan wrote a rather creative undergraduate thesis at Pomona. Her topic? Analyzing the causes of our demise in apocalyptic fiction. One of her fascinating findings is that that trends seem consistent with the paranoia of the times until you get to the 1990's. She writes:

It's not the idea of Ending itself that has faded – that will be around until we are actually mopped off the face of the Earth. It's the actual moment of disaster, the blood and guts and fire, that has been losing ground in stories of the End. Post-apocalyptic fiction is a 200-year-old trend, and for 170 of those years, the ways writers imagined the end were pretty transparently a reflection of whatever was going on around them – nuclear war, environmental concerns, etc. In the mid-1990s, though, everything just turned into a big muddle. Suddenly, we'd get a post-apocalyptic world whose demise was never explained. It was just a big question mark.

...

That's an overly simplistic way of looking at it, though. It's not that the moment of destruction is boring; it's that it doesn't even matter anymore. There are an increasing number of books and films, like The Road and Zombieland, which pick up after the catastrophe and sometimes don't bother to explain what happened at all.

What does this say about the 90's? Is it commentary on the individualist, choose-your-own-adventure mentality that Generation X grew up with during the 80s? Is it a response to lower cohesive idealization of the end? Is it a publishing preference for realism--i.e. your crazy alien/bodysnatcher scenario not getting past an editor's red pen? This is what I'm going to be thinking about for the rest of the day. Thanks, Chanda.