6/17/2007 Confessions Of An Underground Man

6/17/2007 Confessions Of An Underground Man

One thing I was born with more than most is backbone. I may think I'm not sexy, not attractive, and that in general few people actually want to hear the things I really think. But I have never felt like others knew what was true or false, right or wrong better than I do. It's hard to convince me I'm wrong. That might be because I'm smart or stubborn, but it's makes it a lot easier than otherwise.

Before I get to “Confessions Of A Matchmaker”, I'll say a word about the movie, “The 40 Year Old Virgin”. That movie came out when I was in a therapy group. The other members had seen it, and they thought it was funny. But none of them really knew if I should see it or not. The movie had relevance to my life that should be obvious. I wanted to see the movie, but I never did go to see it in when it was in theaters. I didn't think i was afraid of it, because after all, it was a romantic comedy with a Hollywood ending. If anything, it would heal me. But I guess I was more afraid to see it than I realized. But when it came out on video, I rented it.

My verdict: I can't think of a funnier movie. Steve Carell, who I sort of saw as a weak link on, “The Daily Show”, does a fantastic job creating a caricature; but one that seemed human enough that we rooted for him, and felt for him when he finally found love. Yes, some of the jokes aimed at him seemed aimed at me, but I was still able to laugh. I wish I had friends like that to help me.

But one added virtue of the movie: it understands me. Yes, he is a caricature, but if it's not a contradiction to say so, he is a fully formed one. When Carroll says what he says about women, “I respect women. I respect them so much I stay away from them.” That eloquently states what my own attitude was for much of my life. Carell's character is clearly stuck in childhood in a way that I could not have afforded to be. I have always felt like an adult, for as far back in my childhood as I can remember. But while the character was not exactly like me, I still felt a kinship with him, and I was happy to see him overcome his problems. The people who wrote that character knew how to write characters; they had at least some understanding of human nature.

If “The 40 Year Old Virgin” understood human nature in a way that satisfied me, “Confessions Of A Matchmaker” is mired in narrow-minded views of gender roles. Last night the matchmaker had a client named John. John was a 41 year old virgin. He was, as the show kept reminding us, good-looking. He might have been cursed, though, with a gay-sounding voice. He admitted to having fantasies about both men and women. But he didn't deserve what he got.

What he got was a female matchmaker who had no understanding of him whatsoever, and only a superficial understanding of male-female interactions. The first thing she does is match him up with a women who is good-looking, like he is, That was the featured criterion. Not that a guy who was a forty-year old virgin had ever seen an attractive women before. That must be the problem. Put a hot chick out there and the guy will jump over the table to hump her. Right. If the guy is a forty year old virgin, he's probably occupied with something other than being in the vicinity of a hot chick.

Not that maybe someone as timid as he is might not find any sort of chemistry with a woman who is so, “open about her sexuality.” If you're a 41 year old virgin, and you're on a date, then sex is the last thing you ever want to talk about. Someone who has played it so safe his whole life might want someone to establish some comfort, no? Someone who would prove to him that she values him for something other than sex. If you're a 41 year old virgin, then you are old enough to know that your going to fumble through sex like a teenager for a long time before you learn how to really please a women. Someone who wants to hop into bed in an instant and is almost immediately paving the way there with her words isn't a “match”, not by a longshot. You need to know that she'll stick with you. You need to know that she knows that your a good person and have passion for her, even though you don't know what you're doing. She needs to understand that you are still a sexual man even though you don't want to drive her off by looking like a fool. And the more expectation she pours on you, the more convinced you are that you will.

After the disastrous first date, he tries to tell the “Matchmaker” that his date was moving too fast, but it fell on deaf ears. Of course, she then concludes that he is gay.

Because since men are animals, the fact that an attractive women even mentions sex is supposed to mean that he is going to pop a boner and do whatever it takes to get to fucking her. Women have this idea that men have to earn their passion. But when this women drives her date away, she never asks herself what she did to earn his reaction. Women think that because we have high testosterone levels that we will be driven to “hunt”, that we don't have minds that control our actions. Just because you have to fight off a lot of men in your time doesn't mean that all men are dogs. Most men are afraid of women. Most men only learn to approach because that's the only way to get love. Most men realize that being nice isn't going to get them anywhere.

The next part of the show features John going on a date with a gay man. John enters into it only reluctantly. He starts the date by running down a list of what the matchmaker told him not to say and saying it. Could it be he's driving the guy away? No, that would mean that the matchmaker is wrong, and we can't have that. So they go on. John's gay date is appalled, but remains undeterred. They end up in a fairly easy exchange. This is called, “chemistry” by the matchmaker, though they don't ever actually make any physical contact or any overt gesture of attraction. The Matchmaker concludes that John is, in fact, gay. Talking to John after the date, John indicates that he was not attracted to his date. Couldn't be that the easy exchange came from the fact that he wasn't attracted to the guy and that took the pressure off? Couldn't be that it was easier talking to a guy that you couldn't care less about impressing because you're not really gay? “No more matches for John.” John did not like the one women he was matched with, so apparently his problems are too big for the matchmaker.

I think John's problem is that he went to a narrow-minded women who made no more effort to understand him than his disastrous date. Here it is, for anyone who cares to know. Most men are afraid to approach women. Even the men who learn to “hunt” learn to do so because that's the only way to get sex. 99% of men, even the hunters who have learned to love “the hunt”, would much rather sit on his barcalounger and have the women come to him. But women don't come to you. The best you can hope for is for them to bat an eyelash. But men still discriminate, and many of us want to be accepted for who we are. And for most of us, that means nice guys who haven't the foggiest idea why a women would be interested in us, and guys who want someone to love without the requirements of being alpha males or rich men. While the Matchmaker's superficial understanding of gender roles probably informs her, correctly, that integrity has no place in the sexual realpolitik, some of us still value our integrity and want to tell the truth. That's why he couldn't lie to the “sexually open” women.

And appearance was a poor reason to hook the two up. She passed the decision off as intuition, but she was clearly thinking quite logically. that if he was still a virgin at his age, that he was a lousy shot and that she was going to, oh god, do him a favor by supplying him with an easy target. Not that simple, honey. Never is. And when, predictably, the date went sour, both the matchmaker and the date displayed that characteristic that always seems to go hand in hand with ignorance: they judged him. The date decides that because she doesn't “smell pheromones” that he is gay. And when he doesn't deny it quickly enough, she feels confirmed. Of course, she doesn't realize that the fact that she isn't attracted to me indicates that she is a lesbian. But we'll let her discover that on her own.

But the matchmaker is the one that most incurs my wrath. Just the fact that she calls herself that indicates some sort of authority, at least to those who are willing to trust labels. I'm sure that in her own simplistic view she was trying to do him a favor fixing him with an easy target. But appearance is in the mind, as is everything else. When he went on the date with this women, she made him uncomfortable. No one would question a women for telling a man to go away if he made her feel that way. But as he physically shrunk further and further into his shell, and his date first didn't see this and then looked for reasons to blame him, he proved himself to the feeble minds around him to be less of a man. And if you're less of a man, then your gay.

Here's hoping that John trusts himself enough to “judge” them back, to realize that they are simple-minded women with superficial expectations of a man, and that they are not worth his time, and certainly not his money. I am in the same situation, and I would tell a women to go away in a second if I felt she was a rube or if I felt she went straight for the crude so gracelessly or articulately. Just because a women gives you a sent of vagina doesn't mean you lose your mind. For those that think, and those that long for feelings that are subtle and complex, Her words can erase her body in a hurry.

If the matchmaker is so schooled in the sexual realpolitik, then she should have known that if John were going to be lured out of his comfort zone by appearance, then it was going to take a younger one than assigned. Remember, matchmaker, we're being realistic here, right? But we all want things on our own terms, don't we?

John, though, may be looking for something that truly does not exist. That is a women who's attitude is not to sit back and let the men roll up and try to impress her. A women who decides who the best mate for her is the guy who makes her feel good with a few jokes and his confident style. A women who wants to put the work in to instill confidence in a man by letting him know that she wants him to love her, not someone who waits for a man who puts confidence on display and tries to take her. A patient women who knows that the best lover in the long run may not be the best one in the short term. A women who sees him as passionate and masculine even though he is too sensitive to do whatever it takes to get tail, like women think we do.

If I ever find such a women, I'll refer her to John. And spend too much time thinking of the lies I'll have to tell if I am ever to get love.

I won't be able to get to my marriage list today as I have two hours of awake time and about a week of work to do. Until later..