MSN and the Great Cliches of America

I have a Hotmail account. I of course should have shut it down years ago because it's clunky, but it's just easier because I'm kinda lazy when it comes to that sort of stuff. I mean, I'd have to e-mail everyone with my new address and worry that some people would still e-mail to Hotmail . . . and yeah, you see where I'm going with this.

Anyways, after one signs into their account, we're given a page with various articles (usually Feature and very little actual News). A few weeks ago, I came across this article: "5 Dates No Guys Want To Go On." I then made the stupid mistake of indulging my curiosity and read it. And was horrified.

First off, there's no way a man wrote this article. It claims to be written by a guy named Mark Miller, but I'm betting "Mark" is just an abbreviation for "Marsha." Or something like that. If this was really written by a guy, then (and no personal offense intended) then he must be the Living Cliche. The men he writes about his article represent a league of men that only exist in bad sitcoms and in commericals in which men are played as the stupid married guy. He clearly does not know or understand the modern male.

Let's get the run-down of his list, shall we?

"Hiking
Hiking is an activity many men look forward to with the same relish they take in reading Aristotle in the original Greek, receiving a prostate exam, or attending a Celine Dion concert. The way we see it, nature is way overrated. How many flowers can you smell? How many sunsets can you ooh and ahh over? How many coyotes can you worry about being in the vicinity? Plus, there’s no access to the Internet or email. No TV sports. Bugs everywhere. What about any of this spells fun? Unless you look at fun as the first three letters of funeral.

You want your shot of nature? Invite us to the beach at sunset. Take a blanket and a six-pack, make out for half an hour, then head home so we can get back to civilization. That’s enough nature to hold us for the next three months."

Seriously? Guys don't like hiking? We don't like, say, exercise by taking in pleasant surroundings? And all men hate bugs? Since when? I love the assumptions here, too. We only want to drink beer, watch sports, get on-line, and make out. We surely can't appreciate the beauty of nature and the allure of fresh air.

The fact of that matter is that you'll probably find as many men out on the hiking trail as you'll find women. I'm betting you'll even find as many women that dislike hiking as you'll find men.

Apparently, Mr. Miller hates hiking and thus, has never done it. Certainly not with a woman because I'm fairly certain women don't talk to "flowers" the same way they talk to babies.


"Opera
If given the choice of how to spend a Friday or Saturday night, what guy wouldn’t vote for putting on some uncomfortable formal clothing after spending a couple of hundred dollars for tickets, then another hefty chunk for parking, all to hear overly-costumed and overly-made-up folks belting out tunes that don’t have a beat and don’t rhyme, in a language only U.N. translators can understand? Exactly. And yet we still get the evil look from girlfriends when we try to stay awake during Madame Butterfly by playing a video game on our cell phones.

If we must do something cultural and uplifting, at least make it ballet, where the women are in shape, wearing form-revealing clothing and moving their bodies in ways that cause us to imagine them with us in a variety of other non-dance situations. It ain’t Dancing With the Stars, but it sure beats counting down the seconds ’til it’s over when the fat lady sings."

This one, I might give him. Not a lot of guys like Opera, but I'm pretty sure that there's probably just as many women. And let's not put down Opera. It can be more beautiful and more meaningful than, say, most movies, nearly all Sports, and probably 99% of all video games.


"Travel
If my extensive online-dating experience has taught me nothing else, it’s that, at least according to their dating profiles, the one thing every woman most enjoys is travelling. Yes, they all want to get out of the country and see the world, explore other cultures, become enriched and broaden their horizons. These are all noble and worthy pursuits. Men, however, view travel slightly differently. We even spell it differently. We spell it this way: t$r$a$v$e$l. We also view it as time away from our jobs. This will virtually guarantee that not only will a huge stack of work be waiting for us upon our return (and that our bosses will find out the business runs just fine without our being there), but we’ll no doubt come down with some exotic disease and need to be treated in a culture where doctors are still playing catch-up with the wonders of Medieval medicine.

Got the travel bug, ladies? That’s why God created National Geographic. We’ll gladly treat you to a subscription."

Oh man, I love this one too! Do you see what it implies? Women don't know anything about money, working, how travel happens. It also tells us that the rest of the world is fairly stupid (Medieval medicine?). Further, men don't like to travel -- as we're also jerks.

"Clothes shopping
This is how men view clothes shopping: You get to follow your sweetie from store to store with the added bonus of holding her purse as she tries on one dress, blouse, or pair of shoes after another, while you struggle to convince her that each garment does not, in fact, make her butt look big. (Even the shoes!) Occasionally you meet the eyes of another girl’s boyfriend there against his will, and the look you give each other is as though you’re both begging, “PLEASE FOR THE LOVE OF GOD, PUT ME OUT OF MY MISERY NOW!”

You want to try on clothes? Great, we’re OK with that. Just not in the mall. And we don’t care if you try to sweeten the offer with cappuccino and doing some clothes shopping for us. Instead, here’s what we would be interested in: We’ll light candles, put on some mood music, pour some wine, and you can give us a private fashion show. Oh, sure, it won’t be nearly the same without the neon lights, price tags, and judgmental stares from other women who think we’re perverts as we wait for you to emerge from the dressing room. But it’ll be close enough for us."

. . . I'm going to let him get away with this one because I (reluctantly) agree.

"Relationship workshops
Naturally, we men are going to want to avoid the mistakes we made in our past relationships, and we’re not averse to keeping our current romantic relationship as perfectly tuned up as our cars. But that doesn’t mean we welcome the prospect of attending the “Enhancing Couples’ Intimacy Workshop” or “The Two of You: Closer than Ever! Seminar” to which you’re so determined to drag us. It’s bad enough our intimacy needs enhancing; must we now attempt to jump-start it in a face-to-face with other romantic losers? We’d rather get up at 5 a.m. Sunday morning to join you on a bird-watching walk. We’d rather get in touch with our feelings and cry about what we never got to tell our fathers. We’d rather attend a taping of Ellen.

You want to enhance our intimacy? We’re all for it. Hold our hands, kiss us passionately, give us a massage, get naked with us—you’ll be stunned at the intensity of intimacy enhancement. In fact, let’s start right now. After all, we went hiking with you; it’s your turn to do something we enjoy. Hey, where are you going? Oh, come on, it’ll be fun!"

"Oh, honey, I know we're having some problems, but let's just have sex. Sex fixes everything! I don't care about your feelings, I'm an unemotional dude who is only guided by hormones! You want to get closer to me? Nah, just get closer to my penis."


What's worse is that there's a women's version of this. Being a guy, I originally felt I couldn't comment on all it. But there are certain parts I think I need to address.

"Theme parks
In life, there are roller-coaster people and there are those who get queasy looking at the merry-go-round. Find out which one your date is before you take her to the nearest Six Flags to ride the Mind-Eraser. We know you’re eager to be the manly man as we clench your arm in terror while spinning upside down in a quadruple loop. It’s just that some of us are not aching to toss our cookies in the bushes next to the churros stand while you watch. Sure, we might get to know you better while waiting in those long lines, but we’ll probably have other things on our minds if our stomachs are filled with knots and our hearts are racing in anxious anticipation—like avoiding the next date."

Since when do women hate theme parks? Last I checked, most of the women I know love them as much as the guys.

Are women most likely to toss their cookies than guys? Does the author of this article (Nicole Kristal) really believe that men are only in it so we can be manly-men?

"Chain restaurants
We love a guy who wants to feed us and perhaps even more so a man who wants to pay to feed us. But if you take us to a place we can find in every major city where the interior always looks the same, you might as well feed us lattes at Starbucks. Fast-food joints obviously rank as the worst dinner choices, but corporate restaurants (oh, don’t make me name names… you know the ones I mean!) also lack originality and thoughtfulness. As a general rule, don’t take us to a place where we know what we’re going to order before we walk in. We’d rather be taken somewhere off-the-beaten path—where there are candles instead of fluorescent lights, and we don’t have to listen to Top 40 songs blaring from a speaker overhead. If you have no idea where those places are, remember—God created the Zagat Guide for a reason."

Men hate cooking; women hate Wendy's, Fridays, Applebees, Starbucks, Taco Bell. This is fact and law. Not saying that a non-chain restaurant isn't a good idea, but to assume that guys don't know that it is an insult.

"Gross-out comedies
We know you think the whole dinner-and-a-movie idea is infallible, but not if the movie completely grosses us out. You might find it funny when Ben Stiller is standing near a pier and a fish hook gets stuck in his cheek or when Johnny Knoxville jumps into a vat of plastic balls filled with venomous snakes—we don’t. Men and women have different senses of humor. Various studies have proven this, so try to respect this biological fact and refrain from making us indulge your Three Stooges sensibility for two hours. Your buddies may laugh, but we’ll simply be rolling our eyes."

Really? I just randomly looked five different women I'm friends with on Facebook and guess what? They all have so-called "gross-out comedies" listed in the Favorite Movies. Take that!

MSN -- please fire these hacks. They obviously believe we're living in a society that is populated by somewhat stupid cliched men and women. There's a intense lack of understanding of the modern man and a severe school of thought that women are still living in the 1950s. They clearly have no idea how a relationship truly operates, where both partners get an equal say and are able to come to agreements as far as their plans for the evening.

Now, if you'll excuse me, I'm going for a hike, then meeting up with my fiancee after she's done seeing a gross-out comedy.