The Vine: January 12, 2005
I can really feel for Mr. Feminist — I was his feminist friend. I still
own two copies of The Natural Superiority of Women, though I couldn’t tell
you where they are. I attended Radical Lesbisan Feminist rallies —
sometimes several a year — and thrived on the break-out sessions on
Separatism. Men = evil. Women = divine. I seriously considered moving to
a commune in central Missouri where there are no men. Allowed. Period.
It’s really a form of religious ecstasy. Seriously. The answer to all the
world’s problems and you get to think of yourself as, well, naturally
superior.
She will get over it. Hopefully. A friend will give birth to a child to
just happens to be a boy and she’ll realize that maybe the male of the
species isn’t necessarily born evil. Or she’ll have to take a good, hard
look at some of the women in the world, realize that they suck pretty hard
and that it may be genetic, but not necessarily gender. For me it came down
to trying to find a way to pull myself up after having been horribly beaten
down. It worked, but at a hefty cost to some of my friends.
Trying to make her head explode is good sport, though.
I still have trouble letting the women drivers jokes pass unchallenged, but
am otherwise reformed. It should pass, though for me it took a good five or
six years.
Signed,
Gloria Steinem and Mary Daly are still my heroes, but so are Spider Man and
The X-Men
Dear Gloria,
I agree that she does it for a reason, that she needs something from that mindset — well, obviously — and it may take some time for her not to need it anymore. But people who take radical positions can be difficult to spend time with, and she should probably consider whether it’s worth it to her to lose friends because she can’t stand to tone it down.
I said in my response that I don’t know any women like that, but the fact is, I don’t know that many sexists, period, and I don’t spend any significant time with them if I do. It cuts both ways.
I have been dating X for almost two years now. I had
been friends with X for quite a few years beforehand
and knew one of his best friends was a girl. We will
call her Z. Anyway I knew at one point X and Z lived
together and one time, prior to us dating, he had let
it slip that they had a few drunken, we aren’t
attached to anyone, kind of interactions (a.k.a. sex).
So fast-forward to me and X dating. His best girl
friend? Fine. What am I gonna do, right? It was
before my time. So I try to make it clear that I
don’t care about X and Z’s friendship but I should not
be expected to be her best friend. So a couple of
parties happen and stuff and me and Z tend to get
along well. Fine. I start to notice though that
occasionally Z can be caught staring at me or will do
something that can be considered quite annoying to the
girlfriend of your male friend such as flash a boob
and wonder aloud who hasn’t seen them in a party of
six. Anyway after a while I explain to X that, to
me, it kinda feels like I am hanging out with an
ex-girlfriend of X’s. It starts to feel too close for
comfort and I say that their friendship is theirs and
I don’t need to be a big part of it.
So I noticed that X starts to separate himself from Z.
When I ask about it X says that he is showing me how
much I mean to him that he would push Z away so that I
don’t have to be uncomfortable. Partly endearing and
partly wrong. I tell him that is not the point and I
don’t want their friendship to end but to no avail.
Part of me feels like “that girl” who broke up a
friendship. After a night of drinking, he recently
asked me if him and Z could be friends again. I, of
course, was all for it but again stressed that I don’t
need to become best friends with Z. I can do casual
acquaintance just fine. Z also has a boyfriend who,
as X has said, suspects that maybe they had “more than
just friends” moments and part of me wonders just how
he feels and if that would affect Z’s friendship with
X on her end.
X has shown me nothing but respect during this issue
and has stressed many many times that any interaction
with Z never ever meant anything. I even know that it
was Z who X confided to when he started to be
interested in me and on more than one occasion Z let
me know how unbelievably happy she was that we were
finally together and how happy it made her feel to see
X so happy.
Sars…how am I supposed to feel? Am I wrong or
playing the jealous type unconsciously? There is no
one around me that X would ever have to be aware of me
having a past with so I’m sure that he doesn’t fully
understand how I feel. I’ve tried to be Z’s friend
but I just don’t feel entirely comfortable with it.
I feel very caught up in this and also that their
large circle of friends might think that I am a crazy,
jealous, friendship-breaker-upper type.
Help!
Unwanted Threesome
Dear Unwanted,
You caught yourself up in it. If you don’t want to be Z’s BFF, then don’t. Let X spend time with her on his own and you can stay home and rent a movie.
Unless, of course, when you say you don’t want to be a big part of their friendship, what you really mean is, “I don’t want to hang out with the two of you, but I don’t want you to hang out with her if I’m not there to supervise you, either.” Which I think is pretty much what’s going on here, and you need to get over it. Either you trust him or you don’t; he’s bent over backwards to accommodate you on what you yourself call a non-issue, so it’s clear that he respects you and wants you to be happy with the situation. What more do you want? Because…he’s friends with her. He’s not going to just decide to stop hanging out with her on his own, so if you want him to dump her as a friend, you’ll have to order him to do it yourself. Which I wouldn’t do.
So Z can be inappropriate. Whatever. It doesn’t mean X is going to act on it, or care — he’s already seen her boob, it’s no big whoop. If you’re just not a big fan of hers on a personal level, make other plans when it’s their night to hang. But if the real problem is that you think Z’s going to hook your man if you look away for five minutes, you need to get that in hand. You do, because this is your problem, not Z’s. Trust X or don’t, but stop trying to split the hair.
Sars,
My
problem is that I’m thinking about doing something fairly sleazy and I
wanted to know if you think that my reasons for doing so are good and/or whether I should do something else to remedy the problem.
I would say I’m somewhat normal: I’m a college graduate getting ready
to go to law school and I’m working at a minimum-wage job right now.
In general, my problem is that I feel really disconnected from the
world, I don’t have friends or romantic relationships and I’ve never
had this, unlike most people my age. I haven’t done a great deal of
social interaction in general.
In many cases, being a solitary person
doesn’t bother me but my lack of experience with women makes me feel
pathetic. I haven’t even kissed anyone yet and I feel weird about that
at 22. Now that I actually have some money coming in (I work long
hours and make decent tips) I’ve been looking at more pornography and
visiting more strip clubs. In a way, and I’m not saying this is the
only reason, I feel like I’m doing research and learning how to talk to
women (even though you have to buy the entertainers drinks before they
will talk to you). It makes me feel more at ease and less nervous
because I’m technically paying for the interaction so I don’t have to
worry about the other party getting bored or feeling like I’m keeping
them from something better. I just like being in a place where I feel
like I actually have something to offer these women (money) and so they
aren’t really wasting their time on me. I get very nervous around
people in situations where I kind of have to put myself out there (my
job is different because I’m kind of affecting a whole different
“service-drone” personality).
My problem is that I really just want to get the sex thing over with so
that when I meet someone who might want to be with me, I could be a
little experienced. I was thinking of going to Nevada (I live in West
Virginia but I was thinking of maybe taking two weeks to do this) and
going to one of those brothels and having sex there a couple of times
to acclimate myself to the experience. That way, when the time came to
be with a person I met, it would be better for both of us.
This sounds kind of sleazy and I don’t know if I want to be that guy.
But I figure if know one ever found out, it wouldn’t matter. As I said
above, I do frequent adult establishments and I’m almost worried that
if I do this last thing, it would almost be like my last break from
polite society and reality. There seems to be something of a fine line
between college student and dirty old man in a trench coat. I should
also point out that I really don’t believe in demeaning women and I
never yell or grab at people on the street or anything like that but I
can’t seem to reconcile that with what I actually do in my personal
life. Although I would argue that by abstaining from normal
relationships, I’m hurting no one but myself. I just need to know
whether I should cross this line or not, thanks.
Contemplating Something Skeevy
Dear Contemplate Therapy Instead,
No, I guess it doesn’t hurt anyone but you…but it does hurt your normal development fairly significantly, in my opinion. By restricting yourself to social interactions that are defined entirely by 1) sexual gratification and 2) the fact that you have paid for them, you are getting farther and farther away from learning to relate “normally” every time you tuck a dollar bill into someone’s G-string. I understand that it might seem like a solution, however imperfect, but…you rely on it to the exclusion of even attempting to form bonds or connections with people on an unpaid basis.
You have a social anxiety disorder, I suspect, and you should really see a professional about sorting that out — and try to get a behaviorist, who can give you some practical solutions to feeling shy and alienated in social or interpersonal settings. You say you’ve been this way most of your life, but that doesn’t mean it’s permanent — which you also seem to realize, but the thing is, it’s one thing to hire an escort just to get your first time over with. What you’re doing is a bit different; you’re using sex workers to build yourself a social life, and if that’s your entire experience of relating to your peers, much less women, the chances of your finding a “regular” woman, and then of being able to build a healthy relationship with her? Not good. Because you’ve never done it before and you don’t know how.
That doesn’t make you a bad person; it’s not a state of affairs you have to accept. But I would strongly urge you to start spending the money you drop in peeler bars on counseling instead.
Hiya, got a problem for ya. It’s a school problem. More specifically, an essay writing problem. I never learnt how to write PROPER college standard essays.
My school essays are CRAP. One lecturer very kindly pointed out that my ideas were disconnected, my writing didn’t do justice to my ideas, yada, yada, and yada. So I’m desperately seeking out ways to improve my skills on writing essays. I mean, I cannot even start on the introduction when I have TONS of ideas on what to write. How pathetic is that? So do you have any advice? And what books would you reccommend that I look up? I’ve already looked up that book On Writing Well but I think I need more help than just that. Thanks a million.
I’d be real lucky to just be able to graduate
Dear Lucky,
Um…did you just “look up” the book? Or did you read it? ‘Cause you kinda need to actually read it. Then look up, and also read, Strunk & White’s Elements of Style.
Keep those on your desk and close at hand, and check out your university’s writing center; almost all colleges have one. If you don’t see one in the directory, ask your academic advisor or one of your profs if they can recommend a resource or a tutor. Any college of any size has these resources.
The best way to come to an understanding of the way the language works and the way you can best use it is to read, ceaselessly, and sort of absorb how words are supposed to sound and hang together…but that kind of nearly innate “ear” for writing can take years to develop, and some people don’t have that kind of time, or their brains don’t work that way, and that’s when it’s time to get some help.
Oh Punctuation Queen,
I go to a private university in the South and not surprisingly, the word “ya’ll” is tossed around quite a bit. An argument arose at the lunch table among a group of Texans the other day concerning the proper placement of the apostrophe in that word. One girl argued that she had always seen it spelled “ya’ll” while her boyfriend argued he had only seen it spelled “y’all.” I’m a midwesterner only mildly familiar with the term, and haven’t found much use for it in my English papers, so I’m fairly clueless. Is there a proper placement for the apostrophe in “ya’ll”? Literally, we agreed that it was a conjunction of the words “you” and “all” which would seem to point to the apostrophe between the Y and the A, but no agreement could be reached. Oh Sars, can you shed some light on this Southern problem? Thanks.
Don’t Mess With Texans
Dear Or Usage Mavens,
It’s “y’all.” “Ya’ll” makes no sense — what is the apostrophe abbreviating in that case? What would either “ya” or “ll” be short for?
I could accept, grudgingly, “yall,” with no punctuation at all, since “y’all” has become a default (if not formal or strictly “correct”) second-person plural in English; it’s its own thing, sort of, and without getting into the finer gradations of “all y’all” and whatnot, I think you can make the argument that, at this point in the term’s development, “yall” is okay. But “ya’ll” is a contraction in which neither of the contracted parts would mean anything on its own.
Also, it super-extra bugs me to see it written. “Y’all.” Not “ya’ll.”
Tags: boys (and girls) friendships grammar
