There was a time when women were dreaming of a “knight in shining armour” but a steady decline in the prestige of shiny things coupled with a long set of economic crises have put an end to those romantic times. Today women seem to want a man who’ll pay and they rely on the State for protection and Facebook and/or Twitter for DIY reputation management (aka PR). A recent article on dating and paying for it (ctch-tspr) reopened a long-forgotten subject, a subject I haven't attacked in a while (since between 12 and 12-B, to be exact), despite a desire and even a plan to do so.
As my own ethics tend to usually deviate from the norm, I tried to find out how others see this issue. In the past, I talked to friends; today I’ll be looking into a YouTube playlist (linked above, under illustration) as well as a few blogo.ro-oaie articles and more interestingly, their comments.
opiniones
The YouTube videos (yt-should) seem to validate my previous observations:
- most men and women seem to think that the man should pay
- when asked why, men say “so that he can get some” while women offer “because that’s the way it is”
- there is a minority of women who does not seem to have this expectation and in the YouTube videos they also come across as generally more attractive, more self-assured and most likely more educated
I also did an informal survey among some male friends and was nearly apoplectic when I heard one saying “if she’s cute and I like her, I’d pay”. Is there any wonder that some women have come to measure their self-worth in terms of how much money they can extract from men? The tabloids are full of them.
My view is that women who expect men to pay for everything have every right to expect it, but it would be a more helpful thing for them to be honest with themselves and correctly identify the prostitute within. I am not saying this with malice: sex work is a profession similar in terms of ethics to that of economist, lawyer or politician – and probably more necessary for society – and it’s high time that sex workers got the respect and admiration they deserve. Why is it that a lawyer working during the day at a law firm and moonlighting as an escort would never introduce themselves as an escort, even though the latter is a far more honest and laudable profession?
(I am very proud to have finished the previous paragraph without mentioning Ana Birchall even once.)
I can see some of the reasons why some women prefer not to live a more honest life:
- one can get anxious that for a prostitute rape becomes mere theft, but to the best of my knowledge that is not true in any jurisdiction
- most people look down on this profession and look up on other, less ethical professions and you cannot fight [nearly] alone against a tsunami of prejudice and bigotry
- there is value in denial or keeping a discordant view of reality in that sometimes you manage to get reality to follow your
lievision
A rather strange observation is that most staff working in hospitality or restaurants/bars seem to report that men always tip more than women (inbo-tipping). If true, I can think of a few reasons why that might be:
- men are more accustomed to both receive and give money, while women make less and spend less
- making money is like the metabolic rate: men consume more and accumulate less fat
- all men and women tip more the opposite sex, but there are more men who consume and women who serve and women will always tip other women less than men
The end result is that while most men and women perceive calling someone a “whore” to be an insult (slut-shaming), men readily offer work and money with the expectation of sex, while women readily trade sexual favours for money, goods or services. As a landlord for instance, I was constantly surprised by women current or prospective tenants who seemed to be looking for such arrangements – i.e., sex for rent – and were quite persistent with their offer even after I made it clear I am not interested. I have never asked this question, but I am quite sure that none of them considered themselves to be a prostitute and would have been insulted if I had even asked the question (which I never did).
historia
I have already covered the natural beginnings of prostitution, with the female monkeys exchanging sex for food in the echo of the Economist debate on prostitution – it is a widely observed behaviour among primates and especially bonobos, where sex is used by female leaders to keep frustrations and aggression low within the group. With humans, things are basically the same, although underneath a few layers of complexity.
For most of homo sapiens history, men have had higher levels of testosterone, causing them generally to be stronger and more likely to take risks. (In short, though sexual dimorphism in humans often makes males appear bigger, bigger is not necessarily better.) This natural tendency has been further “enhanced” through education and socialization, according to the Matthew Principle, sometimes called “effect”. Since they were presumed to be in a better position to tend to the household and raise children, women did just that. The exchange of sex (seen as something women “give” or “offer”) in exchange for raw food or services arose thus naturally. As society evolved and people specialized, women were often forced into “home” roles, while men were assigned roles that involved more risk-taking, and also more rewards.
A sexy woman was a woman as dependent and as apt to bear children (i.e., fat or Rubenesque) as possible (see Beautification, Sexualisation, Maiming).
Because of such well-set customs, some dumber men and more docile women have even readily adopted the view that women just cannot do certain tasks as well as men do because of “lesser” intellectual ability. This fallacy was proven wrong especially during the second world war, when women had to take on tasks previously assigned solely to men and fulfilled them just as well and sometimes better than men. Personally, I believe that there is no difference in tasks or professions that men and women can take; even for tasks or professions that involve physical strength, women can overcome some natural handicap through more training, and there are outlier (exceptional) women who may even stronger than the average man.
In the industrial and especially post-industrial society, for various reasons, social mobility decreased and specialization increased. Certain professions require not just intensive learning, but also social connections that are developed within families, often across generations. Women who “grow into” their parents’ cognitive-complex profession tend to be better prepared for success than men who enter it from the outside, even for professions traditionally seen as “masculine”.
Most people no longer live in trees and society has evolved more hypocritical, less obvious mechanisms to exchange sex for food. Such mechanisms are especially prevalent in poor areas, where the economic activity is weak, the very few jobs are generally held mostly by males and females are either forced into marriage at an early age or live lives frowned upon. We see such early, arranged marriages in poor areas of the world such as India, Gypsy communities in Europe, sub-Saharan Africa, or slave communities in Northern Africa.
At the opposite end, we have the Western society, where gender discrimination has long been outlawed and although certain customs have persisted, women are generally treated as well as males in the workplace and in some cases better. A strange effect has nonetheless been observed in some of the “most free” and “most developed” societies: despite (or maybe because of) a lack of material constraints/poverty, women choose professions where women are already overrepresented. Nevertheless, the overwhelming majority of women in the Western world do not have to sell sex, either overtly or covertly, in order to make a living. Personal expectations and social customs have yet do adapt to this new reality.
One study of equality in the workplace has found that possibly the last major obstacle to full equality is the married boss, who generally has chivalrous attitudes and though not a misogynist, refuses women equal treatment (with “best intentions”) and may have a patronizing attitude rooted in patriarchy.
One effect of feminism and the rising tide of equality seems to be plummeting birth rates, a phenomenon seen throughout the developed world, but not so much in patriarchal societies. Some alarmists feel that for this reason, feminism is a self-destroying meme, as it causes societies to collapse or be overtaken by other societies that do not eliminate their population growth.
ejemplo
In his article (ctch-tspr), the author makes a few very simple points:
- Women are generally unwilling to ask somebody out, so men step up to the challenge and are the ones to take initiative; if they did not, there would be no dates.
- Paying and financially supporting women was required from men of yore as women were prohibited from getting an education, but society has evolved and such barriers have been removed.
- It is assumed that woman wants to go out with a man in order to get to know him and not to get a free meal. Nonetheless, extracting money from men is seen of the confirmation of her sex appeal and this needs to change.
- A historical lesson with Catherine the Great is used to drive home the point that “social inertia, habit and customs push us to do things that may have been valid and necessary once but, later lost their purpose. Many rituals we perceive ourselves as being obsolete and meaningless, but not having the courage to oppose a critical resistance, we undertake them further mechanically and without pleasure.”
Since most women who believe in “men should pay” seldom articulate their reasoning beyond “that’s the way it is” we shall use an article by a blogger who recently set up their domain name and screwed up all her internal linking in the process (ll-utnu).
We managed to read two articles on her blog (it is a bit difficult, as the language is reminiscent of a prison or some other kind of social minority).
- She was born in Szekely Land, a part of Transylvania known for being among the most economically backward and implicitly socially conservative. According to her, men take a chivalrous approach to women. For example, a taxi driver refused to take a tip from her saying he does not take tips from women.
- “No, men and women are not equal from one POV: the desperation in interacting with the opposite sex. I have my mail, mailboxes, mobile phone filled with SMSs from guys more or less known, who want to go out, drink coffee, eat, drink wine, to fuck with or without obligation. On the other hand, very few men can boast that they have the same from me. Ditto all the women I know. (..) This idea of the modern man, that he is freely deserving of all this time of a person who owes him nothing, for the heck of it, is why increasingly more men are completely useless as partners. Nobody is asking today men to buy houses for women, to give them expensive jewellery, or lay the moon at her feet. But if even a coffee they cannot offer, what’s the point of wanting interaction with the opposite sex?”
- According to her “About” page, she is a fan of a Zensa Raggi, whom she spells “Zenza”.
- “You can insult me as much as you can, but if you are male and want to make friends with a real woman, not just with Pornhub all stars and the two upper limbs, you must understand that a girl has expectations. (..) Yes, the woman is equal as a citizen, in society, where she works eight hours a day and pays taxes. No, she is not exactly equal in a relationship, when she starts to give up things” (..) carrying a higher housework burden.
Except for a few studies I still have to link here, this article is more or less done in that it gives me and whomever might feel like reading a clearer picture of attitudes in Romania and other “transitioning” countries vis-a-vis feminism, patriarchy and equality in general. I do not share some of the views reflected here, but finding out exactly where and what is left for other articles, this one’s already too long.
Incidentally, this is also why I avoid dating Romanian women. Their views on equality are, in general, a bit behind the norm in the civilized world. This is true even for Aurora Liiceanu.
Sources / More info: ctch-tspr, ll-utnu, yt-should, yt-pldp, inbo-tipping
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