The Picture Isn’t Pretty

With our divorce rate hovering somewhere between 50% and 60%, is it not reasonable to ask if men and women really can get along? My readers know, from my book and previous articles, about my interminable fascination with the battle of the sexes.

Fueling my quest for better answers on this subject are the constantly changing statistics of my Website traffic. I have online access to a comprehensive report containing the number of visitors, the URLs of referring Websites, visitors’ IP addresses and browsers used, and examined content and visit durations — important metrics but nothing too exciting.

The juiciest part of the statistics report, however, is the list of keyword phrases that brought many visitors to my Website, via their favorite search engines. These keyword phrases tell me a lot about what men and women really think and feel about romance, and about each other. The picture isn’t pretty.

Below are two lists of keyword searches — one of men’s searches and one of women’s searches — that I gleaned from over 2500 keyword phrases posted in the past 15 months of visits to my Website. For this article, I chose the ones to which I had a significant reaction when reading them. What do they show me? Basically, that men and women are the same and have the same desires, fears, concerns, hang-ups, and vulnerabilities. What surprised me is the high degree of suspicion each gender has about the other’s trustworthiness.

Women are Equal-Opportunity Practitioners of Infidelity

In my article “Five Myths About Women,” I dispelled the long-held belief in our society that men are the cheaters. Women are equal-opportunity practitioners of infidelity. I am truly astonished by the high number of male keyword-search visitors to my Website who are in pain about their girlfriends, fiancées, and wives cheating on them. (Notice that all keyword phrases concerning infidelity are in bold type.)

My anecdotal discovery of massive distrust leads me to hold up a mirror, this article, so men and women can see the dysfunction for themselves. As I’ve stated in previous writings: Unless men and women eradicate their outdated socialized behaviors and relate as peers, they never really will get along. There is no excuse for this painful disconnect: men and women are virtually the same and absolutely equal. It’s time to get real.

On October 18, 2004, Fortune magazine featured another of its excellent “50 Most Powerful Women in Business” sections. And, on November 8, 2004, the Wall Street Journal presented its version of the top-50 women in business (and how they got there): “Women to Watch: Through the Glass Ceiling.” Both of these reports prove, again, that women are powerful, smart, tough, savvy beings who can achieve whatever they want. All the women who constantly whine about inequality would do well to study their successful sisters.

Ironically, the meteoric ascendancy of women in the past decade is the root of the problem, causing many men and women to struggle with the roles they play in their love lives. The love dynamic between a man and a woman always has been related directly to their workplace dynamic — with the man traditionally dominating. Time for a “dynamic” overhaul: Today, women are CEOs, doctors, lawyers, judges, jurists, legislators, mayors, governors, cabinet officers, highly paid entertainers and athletes, and heads of state. New rules.

Goodwill and Good Humor

Women are struggling with these changes, too. There always will be women who feel aggrieved and powerless in the workplace, making B-lines to the EEOC for their remedies.

On the other hand, the ones who know how to succeed, like Bernadine Healy, former president of the Red Cross and the only physician to hold that post, find better solutions using personal power. In Harvey Mackay’s new book, We Got Fired!, Healy summed up her experience dealing with men’s outlandish antifemale behavior: “…somehow we all survived with goodwill and good humor in the end. Bottom line: Don’t get fixed on things you can do nothing about. Otherwise, they will slow you down.”

Success stories about women abound, like the Healy story above. Yet, many women who do well professionally find few men who are secure enough to be with them. Legions of lonely, accomplished women have said as much to me.

In one of the female keyword searches in the list below, an obviously successful woman wrote this nugget: “Why do smart, independent women have problems in relationships?” There are two basic reasons:

1. Men who, emotionally speaking, still live in 1950, cannot deal with self-sufficient women
2. Women who are overly assertive and have a need always to be in charge — because they’re insecure — are hard to live with. Worse are the successful women who also want to be wined, dined, and placed on pedestals — give me a break!

Use these keyword-search lists below to gain new insights into where we are today as a society, as well as how far men and women must travel towards each other to create no-nonsense relationships. Happy hunting!
 
Significant Keyword Searches by Men (unranked)

01. Black man’s guide to understanding black women
02. How to seduce women through hypnosis
03. Seducing women over the Internet
04. If I choose golf over my girlfriend, would I really miss her?
05. Women seeking men for sex in California
06. Women afraid of intimacy
07. Girlfriend has intimacy problems
08. Why married women shut down intimacy
09. Women don’t want tenderness
10. Dump-her eCards
11. Married women who cheat in Dallas
12. Cheating girlfriends explained
13. Married women who like to cheat with younger guys
14. Loser’s guide to women
15. Why women cheat on boyfriends?
16. Clues of a cheating woman
17. How a married man can keep a single woman
18. Why do girls break relationships once they have been given a ring?
19. Why women can’t commit in a relationship
20. Girlfriend expects me to pay for everything
21. A real player never gives women the impression he is a player
22. How to succeed with women by being a jerk
23. Why do women leave relationships for no reason?
24. How to show your emotions and not scare away women
25. Every woman expects engagement ring for Christmas
26. Girlfriend pressuring me into marriage
27. Why are older single women so weird?
28. Websites for dating older women
29. Why am I so blind to unavailable women?
30. Why do men have to do the pursuing?
31. My girlfriend is having sex with her ex-husband
32. My wife is unhappy with herself and resents me
 
Significant Keyword Searches by Women (unranked)

01. Rules of being the mistress of a married man
02. Getting ahead by cheating on your man
03. Men-are-crap eCards
04. Signals a married man is cheating
05. Loving a married man and having a boyfriend
06. Do guys like the chase of a hard-to-get woman?
07. Boyfriend putting daughters first, guilt
08. Biggest mistakes made by women looking for a man
09. Why do smart, independent women have problems in relationships?
10. When is it a relationship?
11. What is an insecure man afraid of in a woman?
12. Dating the same guy for 5 years and still no engagement ring
13. How long should a woman wait before a man proposes?
14. How to deal with a man’s past relationships
15. How to attract, seduce, and keep a man
16. How to impress a younger man
17. Women asking out a younger man
18. Forcing a man into marriage
19. Expected behavior of a mistress to a married man
20. Why do women want to be a man’s mistress?
21. Clues husband is cheating with another man
22. How to seduce a married man
23. Would a woman admit cheating on spouse?
24. Why do married women cheat on vacation?
25. Why do women go back with cheating guys?
26. Women who cheat while traveling on business
27. Married women cheating with younger men
28. Married women cheating with women
29. Contact with ex-husband bothers boyfriend
30. Why women hate beautiful women
31. Why older women cheat?
32. Women who chase after another woman’s man
 

The NoNonsense Bottom Line

The solution to creating harmony between the sexes is quite simple, yet challenging to implement for those stuck in obsolete thinking and behaviors:

1. Men: eliminate your old definition of masculinity — protecting and providing for women — and embrace educated, able, competitive, and proactive women; don’t tolerate women’s double standards
2. Women: be yourselves while coexisting with men; achieve your goals without sweating over what men might think; stop demanding and expecting chivalrous, deferential treatment; and use humor to disarm and create bridges to resocializing men.

About the Author

Marc H. Rudov is the author of the book The Man’s No-Nonsense Guide to Women: How to Succeed in Romance on Planet Earth^TM (ISBN 0974501719). His book and articles are available at TheNoNonsenseMan.com

Copyright © 2004 by Marc H. Rudov. All rights reserved.