Mars And Venus Discussing What Women Want
From a long and tendentious book review, I gleaned what struck me as a powerfully descriptive theory on why what women say they want in a man never seems to match what they actually choose in men:
When a young girl becomes erotically aware of boys, she is endowed by nature with a set of blinders that exclude the majority of them – including many who can make good husbands – from her sight. What gets a male within her narrow range of vision is called “sexual attractiveness.” What is it?
It is not possible to find out by asking women themselves. They will insist until they are blue in the face that they want only a sensitive, respectful fellow who treats them right.
…
When women claim to be seeking kindness, respect, a sense of humor, etc., they mean at most that they would like to find these qualities in the men who are already within their erotic field of view. When a man asks what women are looking for, he is trying to find out how he can get into that field of view.
…
What women instinctively want is for 99 percent of the men they run into to leave them alone, buzz off, drop dead – while the one to whom they feel attracted makes all their dreams come true. One of the keys to deciphering female speech is that the term “men” signifies for them only the very restricted number of men they find sexually attractive. All the dirty articles in Cosmo about “giving him the sex he craves” and “driving him wild in bed” concern this man of her dreams, who by some amazing coincidence usually turns out to be the man of some other girl’s dreams as well.
During their nubile years, many women are at least as concerned with turning male desire off (i.e., telling the 99 percent to drop dead) as with turning it on (getting Mr. Alpha to commit): they get more offers of attention than they have time to process.
In other words, a woman talking about what she wants in a man is talking about the factors she uses to choose between men who already made it past her bozo filters, which are mostly subconscious (she needs low-effort heuristics because she’s filtering a lot of spam). Meanwhile, on a different planet, the man wondering what women want is usually looking for info on getting past those same bozo filters. In short, they aren’t even remotely talking about the same thing. Conversational madness ensues. Mars, meet Venus. Venus, Mars.
Shorter URL for sharing: http://www.erosblog.com/?p=3614
Deep down, I just want a boy with nice cheekbones in a suit. All the rest is optional.
Fortunately for the continued existence of the human race, women don’t agree amongst themselves on that 1% – 99% split. I’d guess fewer than 10% of all young males are deemed unsuitable by all young women.
How could that be otherwise? Afterall, those young men all had fathers who weren’t rejected by their mothers.
I’d say this is rather apt, actually.
It’s not that I want 99% of men to go away or drop dead- that part isn’t true for me- but I do agree with the “they mean at most that they would like to find these qualities in the men who are already within their erotic field of view”.
Everybody’s a contender until they eliminate themselves through some fault or flaw, but I do have a guy in mind when I list my turn-ons . . . he has those things in addition to just having that type of attractiveness that gets me, something kind of indefinable.
Do they actually need to know what they want? (Just go with your instincts!) The “senstive, respectful fellow” is never the one they really want, but that is what they are expected to say.
No matter all sexual liberation and freedom, there are still things you cant say or do because they are morally og socially unacceptable.
Yes the drop dead 99% are out of the game before it starts, but the 99 of the remaining 100 are equally filtered subconsciously.
There is no rational explanation why you choose the one, neither for men or women, and such matters are best not thought about but left to processes in the brain af which you are not conscious.
What can you expect when women are taught that it’s inappropriate to gave erotic agency? We’re supposed to be nice, not to say “I really just want a hot guy who’s great in bed and won’t bore me with interests I don’t share.” A lot of women aren’t mentally connected with their own sexuality enough to articulate it.
Maybe sometimes you dont need to know what you want, as long as you feel or otherwise sense it. Maybe too much talk or too much thought is bad for sex or romance… (with the content of this blog as a pleasant exception!)
The whole “Mars vs. Venus as natural gender difference” narrative leaves out the crucial (and social) dynamics of power. In a world that stacks the erotic and sexual chips in front of straight men and then says to women, “Want to play?”, it’s no wonder women want 99% of men to buzz off. As Krytella so aptly observes above, if women didn’t risk losing so much (reputation, safety, etc) by bedding any and every Tom, Dick or Harry and THEN choosing her mate(s) [right? just like boys who get the message that there are girls you fuck and they are different from the girl you marry], perhaps their filter would be a bit more porous. Women are not “naturally” choosy; they are choosy out of necessity and strategic self-preservation.
I definitely agree with that observation. :D
Now, of course, the rest of the article seems to be of the author stomping his feet and whining about women are too choose-y. It always astounds me when people can be smart enough to type out 20-page essays with nice prose and yet still be completely oblivious to obvious common sense:
People want what’s best for them. Not for you, not for anyone else. Best for THEM.
Don’t be surprised when people make decisions that don’t make you feel good or benefit you. After all, you wouldn’t do what was in their best interest either, right? Talk about a guy being completely oblivious to his own entitlement.