A topic about Prom. Yay!...?

So, April and I decided to create an actual list of future topics for a while now, so we have an actual topic that can be specified:

Prom: Date for the sake of a date? What about going as friends? Asking to prom with intention of going out later? (As in, "will you go to prom with me? By that I mean I like you")

So, this topic is an interesting one. Prom is one of those things that it seems everyone is thinking about this time of year. But, what is prom really? Is it just another dance, except you have to get extra dressed up? Or is it something special where you should ask the love of your life to?

I guess that isn’t really addressing the question, but I think it ties into it. I think that some of the way that you view what prom is can change what you think of taking a date to prom. If you feel that prom is something very special, and all that jazz, maybe asking someone to prom, or taking someone to prom has that much more connection for you than for you than for someone who feels that prom is just another dance and are just taking a date as a friend.

But then comes the question, can it really be just defined by these two polar opposites. Where one side has to think that asking someone to prom is basically telling them you like them and then other side believes that going to prom as just friends is perfectly normal, and maybe even better.

Of course it can’t be that simple, we as humans have way too many emotions and such things that keep us from being that logical about such things as prom. I guess then we should look as what I believe. What I think about the whole situation; because that is where I’m going to be able to provide input, whereas if I just talk in the abstract it will be just that, abstract and possibly boring or uninformative.

So, I can see both arguments being made. That prom is a dance where you should be asking someone you like as opposed to just going as friends with someone. It has a connotation as being a “special night” whatever that may mean, depending on your idea of special and your preferred movie dealing with high school situations. But, one concurrent theme in these stereotypes is that prom is special and to make it perfect you have to take your crush and you two have to fall in love that night. Of course, now I’m sounding like April after she’s watched a particularly sappy movie. But, there is a valid point, the conventional wisdom that prom is a special night can possibly help to advance you toward a goal of getting closer to the person you like.

Of course, with all of this complicated liking the person you’re going to prom with comes the possibility that you stop liking them, or that they don’t like you and that the rest of the night becomes seriously awkward, or something to that effect. Which could be one of the reasons for the cornucopia of teenage drinking that occurs at prom, or before prom, or after prom. But, I digress. Wouldn’t this be able to be very easily solved by just taking someone who is your friend to prom? You have no expectations; you can just have a good time. You know you will with them, you’re good friends. And this can make the night both less “special” and more fun. Now, I’m again technically speaking in the abstract since I haven’t been to prom yet, but I think that I’m judging the situation in a way that is both logical and fair.

So, maybe one way to look at the situation is how you want to place your bet. One the one hand, the date that you take could be someone who you like and have intentions of “making a move” on during the night, whatever that may mean to you; or your date could be a good friend who you’ll have a good time with no matter what. On the one hand you could be utterly ruined in both any sort of friendship with the person as well as chance with them, and it could ruin both of your prom’s; on the other hand you could not have the chance, the easy chance, to make yourself known to the other person and to get a favorable outcome.

So, it’s the gamble between the risk and the safe bet.

How are we mysterious? All we want to do is make out.

Really, though, those excerpts from the article that April mentioned in her previous post seem to pretty accurately reflect guys, at least in my opinion. Now, a lot of what is said in the article (the parts that aren’t the guys being quoted) are generalizations which are true a lot of the time. Yeah, sometimes I think about making out with girls; a lot actually. But that doesn’t mean that it actually is really my sole purpose in life.

April brings up a good point, it turns her off to guys when she thinks about them only wanting to make out and have sex and stuff. Now, granted, I think that is a little bit of a hyperbole, and also doesn’t apply to everyone I’m sure, but I think that it can explain one of the reasons that guys act differently than we think, or at least how Seventeen thinks we think.

So, April does have a point, we definitely don’t totally think like that all the time. But the idea that guys are like the ones in movies and on TV, who are the “perfect” guy and stuff is definitely not true. Sure, we want an emotional connection to, we aren’t that stupid as to just want to have sex and make out all the time. Really, we aren’t that shallow. But, think that the way that a lot of guys express their love, like, attraction, whatever is different than girls and that gives an impression that we just want to make out.

So, I’ll respond to some specific things April complained about:

“BRAIN SCAN: Find out what he’s really thinking when you’re...cuddling
“I’m basically thinking about how warm and soft she is. After a while, I get bored just cuddling, and I start to feel antsy. That’s when I’m thinking about how I want to touch her breast.” - Aaron, 19

Again, kind of annoying. Like, can guys just not think about things like that?”

Ok, so while yes, I can see where Aaron is coming from with this, and I can see where April is coming from. I don’t think it is a really entirely accurate reflection of guys as a whole. Sure, sometimes you’re restless and don’t want to just be comfortable. But, a lot of the time, at least for me, just being comfortable on a girl is really nice. And generally, I don’t think about anything unless I’m trying to get something going. If I’m just there to watch a movie and I’m lying on my girlfriend or whoever, it doesn’t mean that I’m going to always turn my thinking to the girls breasts.

But I’m just speaking for myself.

“But that’s not to say guys aren’t doing things right. There are plenty of things guys do that are adorable. Like...

[at the movies] “If it’s the first date, all I’m thinking about isi what to do when. Do you hold her hand or put your arm around her? How do you transition your arm from your side to around her shoulder? What does she want you do to do? Honestly, the movie is the last thing on my mind.” -Isaac, 20
and
[at the end of the night] “I’m probably kicking myself for spilling something at dinner or being clumsy. At the same time, I just hope she likes me. If she stalls when we get back to her place, I’ll go in for a kiss. It’s nerve-racking, but I try to play it cool.” -Garrett, 18"

I agree with April, these two guys are pretty cute. And I definitely agree with them. Both of those things are definitely things that I think about. Especially the movies, what do you do? Because holding hands, or arm around the shoulders can be either right or really awkward and you want to find the right thing to do, but that’s a difficult thing to do. And to the second part, yeah, definitely guys do stupid things a lot. And we’ll worry about little things we did that might throw stuff off in our minds. Because, especially when a guy is taking a girl out somewhere, even if they are actually dating and like each other, anything stupid the guy does is going to be noticed by the girl and we don’t want to be seen as less than perfect.

Ok. So I think I’m about done posting to tonight. Check out both April’s post and the new guest post as well.

another guest post!

Hey everyone,

I’m Cyril the newest addition to this strange and philosophical blog, if that’s what you want to call it. There are a million things I could write about but I think for this post I’ll talk about the thing that aggravates me most about the female gender.

Now don’t get me wrong I’m not trying to put women down in any way whatsoever, but I guess its just some things don’t make too much sense to me. First of all id like to talk about the fact that most girls our age wear a pound of makeup resulting in a look that’s extremely unnatural. I guess some guys think this is alright but in my mind it’s unnecessary to look unlike what you are when you first wakeup. The thing that frustrates me most of all is the whole black eye look, maybe its purpose is just to draw attention to the eye, but in my mind you just look like someone punched you in the face. Some individuals specifically in our school put so much makeup on that they look similar to a toy doll, something completely unnatural and fake. The way I see it you cant hid whatever is underneath it all which is your personality.

Second on the list of nuisances is the fact that girls seem to be the more stressed of the two genders. There’s always this mysterious term “Drama” that seems to be on the minds of every teenage girl. I don’t see how the concept of relaxing is so difficult to every human being. Simply closing your eyes and listening to whatever sort of music you enjoy is enough to get your mind in a relaxed state. Worrying about who’s going out with who or what happened on last nights One Tree Hill has nothing to do with your life. You achieve nothing by worrying, and your only making yourself more stressed out. The simplest thing you can do is just sit down and take a deep breath and just think about your life, where you have gone, not what other people are up to. Figure out your life first and then you can aid the others around you.

The biggest disappointment that I find in most high school girls is the fact that they seem more apt to due drugs. I don’t really have a problem with individuals drinking alcohol or getting high, but when girls complain that they were taken advantage of I get really annoyed. When its to a point when you drink week after week and get high almost every day, you forget the real purpose of your life. Most people throw away their lives when they take drugs that often, your throwing away your high school education (which I don’t think is very important) but most of all your throwing away your chance to get into a good school in college, and becoming something more than just an average person. There’s no reason that by the time you are 15 or 16 you don’t have the self responsibility to watch what the heck your doing. If you decide to make the decision of going to a drinking party expect that there will be many drunk people there and several people who you might have never met before.

Some of the stuff here may be a little controversial but whatever, that’s the point of a blog to see what other people think and then get a common view of what you are trying to talk about

-Cyril

The Mysterious World of GUYS

Last week, we talked about how girls may or may not have a secret code. Conveniently enough, there’s a article in the May 2008 issue of Seventeen magazine called, “INSIDE the secret world of GUYS.” Seventeen magazine, in my opinion, isn’t usually as blunt about how guys only want sex as they are in this particular article. Maybe because this article is mostly actual guys talking.

But as a girl, how am I supposed to respond to what this article says? Personally, it’s kind of turns me off to guys as a whole. Here, lemme show you.

“What he really means!”
HE SAYS: “Do you want to hang out at my house tonight?”
HE MEANS: “Let’s hook up.” This guy isn’t inviting you over to watch a movie -- he wants to make out with you until your parents call and tell you it’s time to come home.

HE SAYS: “Seriously, I”ve been thinking about you all day.”
HE MEANS: “Seriously, I”ve been thinking about making out with you all day.” Or at least that’s what he’s been thinking about from the moment you walked into the room and distracted him from his video games!


I mean, this entire thing bugs me. First of all, I was perfectly content with believing that guys really are like the perfect romantic guys in chick flicks. Oh, Seventeen, why did you have to ruin it for me? I refuse to believe that all guys want is to make out with you. That’s just stupid. Maybe it’s true, but it’s not all they want. (And by that, I do not mean sex. I mean like a real emotional connection.)

BRAIN SCAN: Find out what he’s really thinking when you’re...cuddling
“I’m basically thinking about how warm and soft she is. After a while, I get bored just cuddling, and I start to feel antsy. That’s when I’m thinking about how I want to touch her breast.” - Aaron, 19

Again, kind of annoying. Like, can guys just not think about things like that?

But that’s not to say guys aren’t doing things right. There are plenty of things guys do that are adorable. Like...

[at the movies] “If it’s the first date, all I’m thinking about isi what to do when. Do you hold her hand or put your arm around her? How do you transition your arm from your side to around her shoulder? What does she want you do to do? Honestly, the movie is the last thing on my mind.” -Isaac, 20
and
[at the end of the night] “I’m probably kicking myself for spilling something at dinner or being clumsy. At the same time, I just hope she likes me. If she stalls when we get back to her place, I’ll go in for a kiss. It’s nerve-racking, but I try to play it cool.” -Garrett, 18

All in all, I highly, highly, highly recommend checking this article out. If nothing else, it’s hilarious. If you don’t learn anything about the male species, at least you’ll get a good laugh out of it. And guys, maybe you can validate some of the claims made in it as well.

Freakonomics

I'm reading Freakonomics by Steven Levitt and Stephen Dubner and came across something interesting that sort of relates to this blog.

In a section in the book about online dating sites, there was something that caught my eye:

[In talking about what traits on your profile you list get you the most responses] "The traits that do draw a big response, meanwhile, will not be a big surprise to anyone with even a passing knowledge of the sexes. In fact, the preferences expressed by online daters fit snugly with the most common stereotypes about men and women.
"For instance, men who say they want a long-term relationship do much better than men looking for an occasional lover. but women looking for an occasional lover do great. For men, a woman's looks are of paramount importance. For women, a man's income is terribly important. The richer a man is, the more e-mails he receives. But a woman's income appeal is a bell-shaped curve: men do not want to date low-earning women, but once a woman starts earning too much, they seem to be scared off. Men want to date students, artists, musicians, veterinarians, and celebrities (while avoiding secretaries, retirees, and women in the military and law enforcement). Women do want to date military men, policemen, and firemen (possibly the result of a 9/11 Effect, like the higher payments to Paul Feldman's bagel business), along with lawyers and financial executives. Woman avoid laborers, actors, students, and men who work in food services or hospitality. For men, being short is a big disadvantage (which is probably why so many lie about it), but weight doesn't much matter. for women, being overweight is deadly (which is probably why they lie). For a man, having red hair or curly hair is a downer, as is baldness--but a shaved head is okay. For a woman, salt-and-pepper hair is bad, while blond hair is very good. In the world of online dating, a headful of blond hair on a woman is worth about the same as having a college degree--and, with a $100 dye job versus a $100,000 tuition bill, and awful lot cheaper."


So, the conclusion that this book has is that at least when anonymous in online dating sites, men and woman are stereotypical in their attraction toward the opposite sex. Men want beautiful blonds who aren't making more money than them, and woman want powerful, tall men who are making lots of money.