Month: January 2006

I use to love getting my female counterparts pissed off at me, by asking them this simple question: If women can do everything a man can, how come everything is Man-Made? It is of course a joke, but it does point out the gender bias in our society. No one ever comes out and saids, that such and such is Woman-Made, not even children, we kind of just take many of women’s contributions as either unimportant or simply downplay them. This is why the blogging world is so interesting.

In the early 90’s the Internet was a male dominated sphere, some might even say it was a white-male dominated world, but let’s just leave it as male-dominated for now. The biggest activity that was not really a legitimate use of the Internet, was smut. In the western world, the market for smut is men. They buy it the most and its prescence on the Internet was immediate and cutting edge. As the Internet went commercial, the adult industry used more and more technology and made the Internet there most important platform since the VHS tape.

Then a funny thing happened on the Internet, women started using health oriented sites more and more. In fact their usage climbed higher and higher until at last the most often used service on the Internet was no longer adult oriented, it was health information, and the market for this service was female oriented.

Now flash forward to 2005 and blogging is the new medium which is growing by leaps and bounds, and while the blogging world is not completely dominated by either gender, at least I think so, it is perhaps one of the best ways for women to express themselves.

But why are women and blogs revolutionary or even important you ask? Well, the western world also has its little histories that people tend to forget. Ever wonder what a parlor room is? It is a room that is set aside for lounging, for discussing the topics of the day. Many houses in colonial times had them, and this is where women talked about such things as the political questions facing the colonies before they became the United States of America. Eventually after the U.S. became a country, many of these rooms were no longer included in new houses, perhaps the men did not want their women discussing politics without them, but one often wonders about such architectural history. Essentially, women have been repressed from communicating their thoughts and even if you somehow doubt that this still goes on in today’s modern/postmodern world, the blog as a platform for women’s expression is priceless. A blog can be anonymous, it can be downright silly, or downright radical, and of course serious, so it is the modern day digital parlor room that many houses don’t have.

Women bloggers, from my own perspective, are in fact very good at blogging. They have interesting views and their blogs are not just about the latest Playstation or XBox game either.

For a long time I have been quoted as saying that the male species is in danger of extinction, simply because I see so many men today stagnant. Women are the better gender; they continue to evolve without us, or as some feminists might say in spite of us men.

My significant other, usually I call her My Woman, not because it’s particularly sexist and macho of me, but because we are not married but have been together for over ten years now, and so I find it appropiate to say My Woman, instead of the woman I’ve been attached with for a decade now or perhaps my lover, but anyway to get to the point of this, is that as a man you get older and while you would like to think that 16 year old girls are perfect, the truth is that most women bore me, and not just the younger ones.

What happens is that external looks like nice breasts, thighs, face, whatever fade and while young women are certainly in their prime when it comes to their looks, they are also not very interesting. Older women have a certain confidence that makes them sexy, that is if their bitterness has not completely corrupted their personalities. More importantly they know things, like how to make love, what a good book is, and even if they don’t know how to cook, they at least know a good dining establishment to go to.

My woman told me a story about how a man my age, was caught by his wife having sex in his office with his assistant. His wife at the time had already had two children and was going through cancer treatment, if I remember correctly. I totally understood where that man was coming from. He was bored. He still loved his wife and kids, I’m sure, but he was definitely bored and stupidly tempted by a younger woman.

Chris Rock has this great joke about how a man is only as faithful as his opportunities; if she chases you, you can’t run that fast! I’m sure most men would want to think that way, but it is usually more likely that the man never runs away to begin with, if he’s bored or having trouble communicating with his partner.

Like I said, women over 30 are sexy, even if their youthful looks are fleeting. It really is too bad that women in the western world are paranoid about their looks. I always remember this scene In The Heart of Darkness, where the narrator describes the African woman on the bank of the river. There’s nothing more sexual than an openly confident woman.

My advice to young women, stop worrying about your looks, read some more good books, and never accept any man’s shortcomings. To women in their 30’s or older, you should already know this, and if you ever catch your man cheating on you, well you already know why he did it, you just have to decide what you are going to do about it.