Don't play with it

It's 1.22 am and you'd think I'd be in bed by now. Instead, I am going through this blog I just discovered getting all caught up in someone else's relationship drama... but it's really good empathetic drama. I stumbled upon it since about 4 hours ago. I was inspired to write a few posts and link back and all sorts of stuff.... but I couldn't stop reading.

It's called "Internet Drama." I'm not entirely sure who runs the blog beyond a "20 something year old women living in the 21st Century" but the general themes revolve around her perception of relationships and musings about her experiences.

Reality -- a few of my relationship pieces sound a bit similar except I think I lack the bitterness. Her observations are fair because I've made similar observations myself but I wouldn't quite phrase it the way she does. However, the idea is poignant.

And after going through some 30 or so posts it has left me with a question --- What's the meaning of this all? This relationship thing? Aside from my relationship, objectively speaking.

It's so hard to find one long lasting relationship that works. Divorce rates are 50/50 chances. Most men(and women) are being raised much more differently to guys(and girls) in the past. I have touched that point on a subtle level before... but I guess now would be an appropriate time to openly address it.

So many things have obviously changed with the gender roles. It's now acceptable to pursue a guy rather than wait for him to make the first move. In many ways, the relationship scale has been leveled, flipped, and roles reversed.

Now rather than being pursued by a guy, you now have a population of men that are neither here nor there on pursuing a girl. I mean, they would chase, but it's more like a sport now, more so than before. It almost feels as if the going consensus is they don't have to bother because whatever you're not willing to do/put up with there's another girl out there more willing to take their bullsh*t.

This then places women in a precarious position. I'm not saying it's true for all women, I'm just saying that some women would find themselves in the given situation. The relationship then transforms into a sort of power dynamic and most of the time the edge seems to be in favour of the guy. Who has the power calls the shots. It's the safety of knowing that no matter what the girl will be there... or you could find another just as easily - never truly having to fall - again.

I say again, because like in one of my relationship posts a while back, I spoke about how endearing it isn't to keep running into guys with a heartbreak-could-never-love-again-because-of-this-one-girl story. Sure it's cute. Makes for some good melodramatic love songs. But no one likes to be in the receiving end of that kinda roller coaster ride.

Back to story. So then the women remain somewhat insecure or resort to games. I personally hate games. I've tried them before in the past... but like Ms. Internet Drama I've conceded that I'm just too naive and trusting and want to believe in the inner goodness of humanity so much that I can't help but not play...and just hope that whoever I'm with doesn't take advantage of my niceness. I get tired of "waiting people out" and "ignoring phone calls" and "seeing who'd text first" and just cut right to the chase and say what I have to say, ask what I have to ask.

Anyone who knows me and knows me well knows this must be one of my most annoying attributes - I'm always asking questions. I refuse to sit down and be confused and come up for explanations of someone else's behaviour. I've discovered that all that does is help one to bury one's head deeply into the sand and ignore potential red flags or avoid dealing with real issues before they blossom into deal breakers. If everyone is straight up and asks then there will be little or no misunderstandings/miscommunications. No longer will you have to say "...Well I just assumed" after realizing you assumed wrong.


So women then proceed down one of two paths - insecurity or games. When she's insecure she's likely to behave in a manner which can be defined as needy and borderline crazy. But again, guys (and girls who make their boyfriend's insecure) need to ask themselves why is his/her significant other behaving like this? Is the behaviour completely irrational? Have you been pushing your limits with him/her and doing things that may result in diminished trust? And with the insecurity comes along jealously and all sorts of other issues because said party just doesn't know where they stand. No one likes being in that uncomfy shade of gray area -- in fact that's why the person with power probably worked so hard to maintain it. The games factor comes in with just manipulative tactics to get a desired reaction. This too ends up in a power play. And again, I agree with Ms. Internet Drama when she says that you have to have a certain level of detachment from the person you supposedly love to toy with them. Because games means you have to hurt the person to maintain that power... Can you really hurt someone you love?

Since this post supposedly is mostly about guys... I'll address women in a future post... How does how they're being raised affect how they treat women? I found myself going through her blog roll and realized that on all of these relationship blogs, how men are today keeps popping up and the blame seems to be lying on the parents, more the mother than the father ironically.

Some argue that mothers spoil their sons too much so they end up leaving home expecting their girlfriends to treat them the same. Thus, rather than feeling appreciation they tend to believe that women are obligated to do certain things for them. Ms. Internet Drama argues that

"Now men are no longer taught to be responsible but are taught that they don’t owe anyone anything. Men no longer have a sense of responsibility to women and society, they only care about how much they can get without having any type of commitment. Mothers have fostered this by not disciplining boys and “letting him be the man of the house” without earning that role... Mothers expect women to continue to be under their son’s thumb without providing the security they once did... This mentality allows men to take, take, take, and not feel any responsibility because the woman is suppose to automatically support him without anything in return. Men need to be raised with a sense of purpose and obligation which will result in a society were commitment isn’t seen as a limitation but as an emotional bond that provides unconditional love, respect, and advancement. There was a time when all the adulation of being “the man of the house” came with responsibility and commitment. Can we please bring those times back?"

Now again, I repeat, I don't necessarily agree with all that she says on her blog. But I do believe there is some merit. I haven't personally encountered such guys like that... None of my ex-es or current were spoilt mommy's boys per se that felt a sense of obligation on my part. Rather they were/are boys who loved and respected their moms, and used the experience of treating their mothers with respect as a model as to how to treat their gfs... I can't say that we parted ways because of disrespectful maltreatment per se... Just irreconcilable differences that just made us better friends than romantic pairs. We're still pretty good friends.

Oh wait... there was one guy that I encountered that had mommy issues or maybe it was just parent's abandonment issues... I don't know. I noticed he had difficulty truly getting close to anyone or trusting anyone. But I guess that's the extreme opposite of being too close to your parents whereby you're not close at all and find it difficult to create real bonds with anyone. Perhaps it's possible to find abandonment issues more prevalent in our societies with the general lack of proper male role models or men growing up without their fathers. I'm going out on a limb, but I think there are a lot more single parent households here or households whereby the mother has to take on both roles for whatever reason... But again, my one person is hardly a valid statistic. I don't have any facts to back this up. This is just my community observation.

 I have heard of  friends of friends having the afore mentioned experience though... and there are too many Google blog/article post hits for the theories not to have some merit.

In another post she says

I believe that we need to reevaluate the way we are raising males and females. We cannot continue to develop relationships where there is no give and take. Society needs to learn to be more selfless and give others what he or she needs. If we start from a place of MUTUAL sharing and consideration, then relationships will have a higher survival rate and women will be happier and less confused beings.

This I probably agree with a bit. We are developing into a rather selfish society... and Facebook isn't helping by morphing us into self-serving narcissists checking our status and profile pics for comments every 2 minutes. It's becoming too easy to leave something and not work to maintain it.... because it's become increasingly easy to find a replacement. This translates into every thing in our lives today, not just relationships. I think this accounts for why people are so quick to divorce. You can change your relationship like you change your shoes. Don't like how it fits? Buy a new pair. The world is becoming a lot less sentimental and a lot more focused on individual feelings and personal rights rather than compromises to co-exist.

Anyways, I realize I'm a bit all over the map with this post. Granted it is 2:13 am in the morning. Check out Ms. Drama's blog... I'm sure you'd understand my post perfectly. And if nothing else, you'd get to understand the inner workings of the mind of a single girl trying to find Mr. Right.