Cary Tennis on Asymmetrical Relationships
A woman wrote in about truly wacky, paranoid behavior on the part of her fiance, which Cary addresses while using the opportunity to reflect upon something that also bothers me – the media/internet/idiot/invented (?) assumption that being in relationship with another person is a contest, or a con game, or a battle.
Because here’s what bothers me about this thing: The assumption is that neither party is in good faith and that each is trying to screw over the other. That’s a model of the capitalist marketplace at its worst; it is not a model of a loving relationship. The assumption is a cynical one, and it sets up an exploitative condition: If one person is acting in total self-interest while the other assumes that they are acting collaboratively, an asymmetry arises that can be deeply exploitative. In fact, that’s the basic setup for any con or deceptive enterprise. Thus Tom Leykis not only suggests putting hot sauce in used condoms but suggests men routinely lie to the women they date, that they claim to be doctors or lawyers, that they create whole fictitious identities in order to get laid. For instance, he suggests that a man scribble his phone number on a found ATM receipt that reflects a large bank balance, so that a woman will conclude that he is rich. Such tactics assume that the woman must be tricked.
Leykis and his followers may claim that they are simply being realistic. I find the whole approach quite deeply insane.
via My fiance put hot sauce in his used condoms, a Since You Asked column by Cary Tennis | Salon Life.
“Quite deeply insane” – yes, me too. I ingest snippets of information from various sources that lead me to believe that many people do not approach relationships the way that I do. Not just approach – comprehend. I can’t say my way is better than any other way because my approach to other people is kind of fucked up in general, but it does baffle me that some people see relationships as needing some kind of elaborate strategery to accomplish. Perhaps I am too up-front, too literal, too retarded to get this, but working a relationship as a competition with a desired “winning” outcome and considering the other person the offensive team doesn’t make any sense.
I also read this article in the Washington Post this morning “Market for Romance Goes from Bulllish to Sheepish” which had some mind-boggling douche-a-tron quotes like:
- “I was so used to using my financial situation to leverage my dating.”
- “You’re not going to see much of me in the next 15 years if we start dating, because I’m going to be making a lot of money.”
- “One of the first questions is: ‘What do you do? You own your own company? How many people work for you? Are you working at home or do you go to an office?’ They are literally sizing you up.” And, he said, he doesn’t blame them — especially if the girl is beautiful. “They can afford to be picky.”
I mean, seriously WTF? You used money to leverage your dating? That sounds real romantical, bra. You are telling someone that you won’t see them for FIFTEEN YEARS b/c you’re going to be working? Again, super-romantical, fuckstick. That’s like a bad business partnership, not a relationship. I guess for those fifteen years she will be admiring the giant rock you got her, raising your mewling offspring and wearing Juicy sweatsuits to the supermarket while she works at one-upping the other bored housewives in your subdivision? No wonder she’s banging the gardener. Seriously, I’d rather live in a van down by the river with someone I loved than not see someone for 15 years b/c they were working. (Actually I would rather work and have control of my own financial resources and not have money be an issue in who I chose to be with.) What in the world are you going to have in common 15 years from now if you haven’t seen much of her in all that time, you tool? And the last line about the beautiful women being able to be picky… gross. If you’re after a trophy chick that you have to impress with your financial resources—well, you get what you go after, I guess.
This whole discussion is so foreign to me. Like these people come from another planet. Or maybe I do. To my mind a relationship = simple, honest offering of who you are to another person, they either like or do not like, you engage or you move on.* What is with plotting and scheming and complex machinations? Honestly, I don’t understand what the point would be. How are you going to manipulate someone into liking you? And even if you pull that off, do you think you can (or would want to) keep up that pretense for the rest of your life? Though if other people work it that way it does help me understand why there’s so much divorce and dissatisfaction/people cheating on each other. If you’ve presented a false image of yourself to someone, and gotten some kind of bullshit pretense in return, then it stands to reason that once you settle into it you’re going to feel tricked and angry and abused. As will they.
I dunno, it’s just weird. I have a simpler way of dealing with the world than that, I don’t have a lot of emotional energy to invest in tricking someone into thinking I am something different than I am, or trying to ensnare them via whatever method. Half the time I feel like an imitation of a real person anyway. If I was an imitation of a real person impersonating some other person… holy shit my head hurts.
*I am not saying that relationships feel that way; on the contrary I assume that for everyone else they feel like they do for me — like a crazytown meth-head dance party being held in an emotional Cuisinart — but despite how they feel, when I think about them intellectually that’s what they really are.
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I don’t really talk to my co-workers because it’s generally best avoided, but the other day I ended up in a random conversation about dating with a guy I work with who had to move back in with his parents for a while because of finances. No big deal. I know lots of people who’ve been in that situation. But then he says that he hasn’t been dating because any girl that would be willing to date him in his particular situation isn’t the kind of girl he wants to be with. A “quality” woman wouldn’t understand. ???
So I related an anecdote from my past and say “so I don’t know, if you’re honest about your situation, I think I’d be understanding about something like that.”* And he says “Yeah, but it depends on what kind of girl you want,” which I took to mean “thanks for the vote of confidence, but I want a hotter, meaner, more financially demanding chick.” Nice.
*Clarification: Co-worker guy knows I have a boyfriend and was just speaking hypothetically.
And no, no condoning of deadbeats, just a realization that no one’s life circumstances are and remain perpetually ideal. And a profound lack of expectation or desire for some other person to contribute to my financial upkeep. But then again, I have money and independence issues. I think those are issues #372 and #679, repsectively.
…I translate his speech to mean, “I’m looking for a Ferrari whore.” K. Good luck with that.