The Lies Women Love to Hear

I borrowed the title, I didn’t make it up. I read this as part of a featured blog on msn. I can’t even begin to express my annoyances! …alphabetically or chronologically?
Nah, I’m not losing sleep over it, I’ll just insert a thought (or three) after each one of hers.

1. I always want a guy to tell me I look skinny.Now, yes, I know I sound like a real anti-feminist, saying this. But it pleases me to no end when people — male and female — say things like, "My god, you're tiny!" Or, "Wow, what are you these days, a size two?" I know societal pressures have done some bad things to my body image (and to our collective body image); I won't deny that. But I do love to feel petite.
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I don’t think that has anything to do with feminism. Why don’t you love being you? Why is feeling petite the thing to make a person feel good? I don’t think there is awareness here of what societal pressures have done or it wouldn’t be added on in this manner. It’s not what I would consider ‘funny’. We seem to be excusing everything as a cute little joke. It reminds me of when people make racist jokes and then say something like, "…back when racism used to be ok."

2. I always want to hear I look shockingly young.New Friend just made things worse after the "athletic body" debacle by trying to guess my age — and he got it right on the nose. Fishing for a compliment, I said, "Ah, too bad, I actually look as old as I am, huh?" He replied, "You're incredibly well-preserved for someone your age." Oh, dear. Well-preserved?! I felt like a canned sardine. Couldn't he — just to be nice — have told me I looked like I'd just gotten back from shopping for my prom dress? Couldn't he have told me my skin looked as soft and smooth as a baby's bottom? Couldn't he, at the very least, have said, "Wow, you must be getting Botox, because you look terrific!"?
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I understand how many will compliment someone on looking young. But how is it at all helpful? Doesn’t it mean that when you don’t look young anymore, you will reflect on all the young compliments and become depressed? Ok everyone that is over 30, go curl up under a rock because your life is over. I would have lasted approx. 3 seconds talking with that person and moved onto someone who could discuss literature. Fishing for compliments usually brings up Carp. (That’s a garbage-y fish; I didn’t misspell Crap, although it works too) She just kept offering a shovel for him to throw more dirt on! I don’t think it’s good to open the door to a burglar this way. Your spirit will be robbed!

3. I also don't mind it when guys say, "Now you — you I'd sleep with!"Luckily, New Friend turned things around a few minutes later. He was describing some woman in his office who drove him nuts because she thought she was the cat's meow; she'd dissed one of New Friend's male coworkers who'd asked her out. "And this woman, she's empirically attractive, I guess," New Friend said. "But she totally lacks charisma! I'd never sleep with her — and I can't imagine too many men who would." Then, gratuitously, he turned to me, and almost out of the corner of his mouth, he said, "But you? You I'd sleep with in a second. You've got the je ne c'est quoi."Now, sure, it's a little embarrassing, a little crude, when a guy says something like this. But I like to think it's also his awkward, dorky way of flirting. Of trying to say, as directly as he can without downright asking for it, that he thinks you're hot. Call me crazy, but I find it kind of endearing.
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So, let me understand. You didn’t reply back with, "You totally lack intelligence. I’m done talking to you. I can’t imagine too many people who would talk with you." Ok, so I wouldn’t be that crude, but any person that would try to give me a prize like ‘sleeping with them’ would last less than 3 seconds. It’s not embarrassing, it’s dumb. It’s not a little crude, it’s out-of-line. If that is his dorky way of flirting, he’s probably that dorky in every other area of his life that counts too and you should consider yourself warned.

I don’t find any of these endearing, I find them shallow and spirit-depleting. To me, there is nothing better than when a person wants to get to know your brain. Or how about, better yet, get to know THEIR brain! It’s no wonder relationships are so empty, they were based on nothing to begin with!

But you know, I love when people like that guy show his true colors right away in a social environment. I can dismiss them good and early and still have time to meet the good ones! :)

ROCK ON!
Karen :)
"We must not allow other people’s limited perceptions to define us." ~ Virginia Satir