Women Choose

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Although men may pursue, ultimately the woman chooses. It surprises me often what women choose because I noticed from a young age that women chose the crappy guys who abused them all too often and bent over backwards to make things work. As an adult, I watched women I know put up with abuse and infidelity because they "knew he would change" but really because that was what they wanted to happen. They have this narrative in their head that they don't share, and if you aren't in the cast you don't get on stage, and if you go off script you don't make it to opening night. From the very beginning, they choose whose attentions they permit. In courtship they decide whose attentions may persist. In mating, they decide who gets to rehearse for fatherhood and who ultimately gets the part. It's like Cee-Lo Green opines in "Forget You" that if he were richer he'd still be with her. It's like Forrest Gump who finally gets the girl only after he's rich and who gets to have a bastard son with her because she wants him to be the father but wants to play around with other men. I used to think these were just fictional stories, but they have proven to be all too true as women chose men with better bodies, different affinities to their Faith, different jobs, different locations, different cars, different houses, ad infinitum. I don't understand what they choose, but I understand that they are the ones who ultimately do the choosing, and so they get what they truly desire. It frustrates me, but I don't have to live with the consequences, or do I?

A woman chooses which men's attention she permits. Like it or not, in the modern era, women are free to turn away any invitation. The reasons vary widely, and many of them are simply a matter of disinterest for whatever reason. People have their preferences, and if the guy doesn't meet them, he doesn't really stand a chance, and that's ok. I have decided on enough dates myself that I didn't desire a second. Women are not obligated to return calls, to accept the date, to accept another date, or to accept any level of affection with which they are not comfortable, and the law corroborates that with provisions against unwelcome advances. Sometimes these provisions put men in awkward positions, but if it were my own wife or daughter, I would desire her protection as well, and so I abide by the terms and hope to be exonerated if I mistakenly communicate something unwelcome beyond the mark. My sister is wise and nice enough to not accept a date just to get a free meal or go do something she always wanted to, and so she turned down a fair few invitations so as not to lead men to believe their odds were greater than truth. Women have MORP which is prom in which the women ask and Sadie Hawkins, neither one of which I was asked to attend by a woman, but then again I was a nerdy, pimply, creepy dork. I even had to ask more than one woman to prom as the first said no. We have the appearance of choice, but when a woman likes a guy, she will give him chances and opportunities, because she knows who she wants. As a man, I appreciate that and the opportunity to not waste money on some other man's future wife. However, all too often the metrics by which women disregard men seem arbitrary or immature. When a dork is attractive, they love dorks, but if he looks like Comic Book Guy from The Simpsons then he's gross, creepy, and unwelcome. At a Christmas party one year, the woman to whom I was speaking lost all interest when a friend showed up who was "going to be a doctor" because his future potential is superior to my present as a chemistry professor. I notice a lot of it is shallow and superficial, semblance over substance, about how rich or ripped he is rather than about character because the girls are immature. They get what they truly desire.

The woman chooses which men's proposal she accepts and under what terms. You date for a while, and either you decide to marry them or they decide to manipulate you into marriage. I know people who were told "we get married or we break up", and very few break up. For months now, the story has circulated the internet of an asian fellow who made a large mural of his beloved from rubics cubes only to be rebuffed. "I'm just not ready for marriage". My neighbor dated this smoking hot chick who he thought was perfect until she said she was afraid of commitment. Even after marriage the woman is in charge all too often. What's good for the goose is good for the gander is the historic version of "happy wife, happy life", but it implies that the man submits himself to whatever the wife demands in order to be happy. People tell me that the most important phrase isn't "I love you" but "Yes, dear", as if falling in line even if I disagree and oppose the notion necessarily leads to happiness and satisfaction. If the marriage fails, she claims title to half your stuff even if she did absolutely nothing to help you achieve or acquire it. Simply marrying you is enough to entitle her to your substance, and you get to pay in monthly installments, forever if you impregnate her.

Each woman's body decides which ovum she accepts. In "The Selfish Gene" Richard Dawkins explains how women's anatomy chooses the father regardless of her relationship status. By this phenomenon, many men are duped into raising children they didn't sire because the woman is more likely to be impregnated by a stranger in a tryst than by her lawful husband after years of drudgery. Physiology dominates, which is why it's so risky for young women who are not married, because in the excitement and danger of the moment, she's playing with fire and risks impregnation with a greater computational certainty than in a monogamous relationship. Many young people walking around campus assume that they were born because they were the first sperm cell to arrive at the ovum. A recent scientific video I watched showed a human ovum (in vitro) surrounded by several dozen attached sperm attempting to penetrate the egg's outer layer. Once one sperm cell manages to reach the inside, the rest slough off and die. The race doesn't go to the swift or the strong but to those who are found chemically acceptable to the ovum. Yes, many don't stand a chance, but even the ovum decides whether or not a sperm that arrives actually has a chance. Some sort of chemistry is involved in all levels of dating and intimacy. You may know a couple that seems a strange match when it's simply a matter of pheromone compatibility that keeps them together or because they are physically intimate so that oxytocin has created a bond between them that would otherwise be otherwise. From then until conception, it's also chemistry until ultimately the ovum coat decides by compatibility which sperm to accept. Men are often blamed for the gender of a child, and while it isn't possible for women to provide the chromosomal complement to produce a male offspring, the ovum she deposits may still be able to reject all potential males, particularly if the woman is under stress or duress, since female children are more likely to survive and more essential for the perpetuation of the species. After all, it really only takes one viral male lion in a pride to perpetuate his line, but each female can breed with much lower frequency since she must bear and nurture the cub.

Society often blames men who are single for their plight. Many men are picky, this is true, but just as frequently if not moreso women reward members of the Lucky Sperm Club rather than men of character. In her groundbreaking roast, Tracy McMillan makes the case that women are to blame for the choices they make. I do not see any criticism in her work or in the writings of Dr. Laura Schlessinger of men. In fact both of these female writers excoriate women for the way they choose, what they choose, and what they do about their choices, and my own opinions and attitudes about courtship admittedly derive at least in part from a study of these two works. Couple that with my own experiences (and I will tell you stories in my autobiography when I finish), and you understand why this frustrates me and frustrates true potential for success and civil society. While empowered to choose, women have not been educated so to do and are done just as much a disservice by this emancipation as the Christian congregation was when Guttenberg made the Bible available without educating people on how to read it or how to learn from it. I understand people have their choice, and I understand that most of the women we date will eventually marry other men. I also know that I don't understand or agree with their choices in most cases and that the things so many of them pursue will not necessarily lead to good, happy marriages. Then again, I didn't make those choices, so I shouldn't have to deal with the consequences, right? No? Great. Lucky me.