From time to time, I receive friendly feedback from my feminist friend, Cassandra, who for some reason was extremely pissed off with my piece on the “Me Too” campaign. “What is wrong with you? Harvey Weinstein is a repulsive looking toad whom no sane woman would hold hands with. How dare you diss these brave women who are standing up for their rights?” Hell hath no fury like a woman who feels another woman has been scorned…At the risk of provoking another diatribe from Cass, I think the lady doth protest too much and offer scientific evidence in support of my theory. Guys are on the horns of a perennial dilemma: make a move and suddenly you’re Creep Central/ Harvey, sit back and do nothing and you risk being perceived as a wimp. Clearly, this stuff about “unwelcome advances” is fraught with the kind of complication that the male brain is unable to deal with. As my friend, Manjunath solemnly observed when accused of marital rape, “Guru, these ladies should have some signal system. Yella ok, tension yakke?”
Those who lead a sheltered life and watch (or read) National Geographic will agree that whatever the species, be it furry, feathered or crustacean, it is always the male who has to make the first move. Look at the hapless peacock: that silly bird is moonwalking in the manner of a Michael Jackson reincarnated and the peahen couldn’t give a *^it. “He’s got all the moves, but I’m like more into salsa,” would be her response, if peahens could speak. Men are saddled with the social responsibility of initiating dates or sexual encounters, while women just need to land up or seem open enough to convince a man to say something. Both Tinder and OKCupid’s data indicates that men send nearly four times as many introductory messages as women.
The phrase, “and then she bit off his head,” was probably inspired by the female praying mantis who does precisely that after mating and then plays soccer with the severed head on a girls night out with her buddies. Clearly, the male of the species is willing to give up a lot, if you catch my drift. One is inclined to think men should get a little more leeway when it comes to courtship because they are hard-wired somewhat differently. “You say yes, I say no, you say stop and I say go, go, go. You say goodbye and I say hello,” as Lenin with an O wrote many moons ago.
It’s difficult for us guys to deal with the possibility of rejection and come up with great pick-up lines; Cassandra’s other beef was about how corny these sound. “This guy comes upto me and goes, ‘Haven’t I sawed you somewhere back when I was a conjuror?’ I mean, gimme a break, is that supposed to be funny?” I was tempted to riposte with Lawrence Durrell’s immortal line: “I envy conjurors with the ability tosaw a woman in half: they get the half that functions without the half that talks…” but decided against it on ground of self-preservation.
The reason I ask the ladies to cut us some slack is because I vividly remembermy teenage years and how tongue-tied I was when I asked this girl to dance at a party. She had apparently been raised on a steady diet of the Old Testament and after giving me a lecture on how modern dance was sinful and akin to lowering oneself to the level of the beasts of the field, stalked off, if that’s the word I’m looking for, to purify herself with the Book of Job. This is the scary power you women have over men and you should try not to misuse it. In fact the next time some guy hits you with a cheesy, knuckle-headed line like, “Haven’t I seen you somewhere before…I know, on the cover of Vogue,” don’t pour your drink over his head. Remember he is under intense evolutionary pressure and has only stolen that line for the far more noble purpose of stealing your heart.
