Burning House of Love

There's a great post over in the Warren at Silflay Hraka by Blackavar, basically discussing the lies Hollywood sells us about sex and relationships. And while I really can't put it any better than he does, I can't resist throwing in my $0.02 about the subject.

The traditional male stereotype used to involve a single guy wandering around, shagging whatever blip popped up on the radar screen, until cowed, coerced, or shotgunned into marriage.

The key words there are used to. I'm sure there are still men who exemplify this kind of behaviour, but I don't know any of them. The vast majority of men in my social circles are married or planning a marriage - and happy about it. Some have children or are expecting children - and are pleased as all hell about that. Some are stay-at-home dads - and delighted to be able to spend all that time with their kids. And some of these men are former fraternity members - supposedly the very archetype of the infantile behaviour described above.

Women have now won liberation. They are just as free to amble about lonely as a cloud; to have casual sex, to have "committment issues" and to have problems communicating. Welcome to equality girls... bring a sweater, it's cold out here and a mite bit lonely.

Yes indeed. Those of us in my circle of friends who are still single are all looking for someone to settle down with. Because after a while, the 'glamorous' life of a single - devotion to career, going out on the town all the time, casual sex, the works - gets to feeling like an empty life, a hollow life. Hell, a lonely life. Not that we (or at least me - I obviously can't speak for other folks) are about to settle for whoever comes along. It's just that eventually all the bullshit mating rituals and courtship rites we engage in while single get tiresome, and the thought of finding someone you can trust, someone you can partner up with and thereby put to rest this nonsense, becomes very appealing.

I believe we are hard wired to mate, have kids, and settle down - male and female alike.

I've been arguing this point for at least the past ten years. Human beings are social animals. It's in our nature to partner up and form family units. And for whatever reason, it's usually been women who objected to this line of reasoning. When I mention thnigs like 'maternal instinct' and 'biological clock' I'm told these things don't apply to them, they don't children, they prefer careers to marriage. And oh-ho-ho the merriment we have when down the road they complain to me about their burning desire to have children and about the feller they're dating and his lack of desire to marry and reproduce. If you're female, twenty five or under and reading this - trust me on this. Odds are very high that, whatever you may think or feel now, at some point in the future you will want to partner up and have kids. Just saying.

And before one of the three or four people that reads this thing sends me hatemail about being a sexist pig. I'm not saying women should eschew career or freedom of choice in favor of being barefoot and pregnant. I'm all in favor of working woman and would have no qualms about being the housedad. I simply object to the notion that you can ignore or wish away our 'hardwiring' as Blackavar puts it; I also object the to the idea that there's not a price to be paid in living a certain way and making certain choices.