I wouldn't let mrteenwordpower buy me so much as a burrito until we'd been dating for well over half a decade, and we were (and are) both still mighty swoony. There was (and is) totes walking on the beach and eating ice cream and making out, even AFTER I started driving and voting and handling currency, like some kind of MAN! I mean, he doesn't LOOK completely emasculated and miserable, but then maybe all my feminist body hair and bluestockings are blinding me to the truth.
@missteenwordpower: Oh dude, preaching to the choir! My boyfriend keeps trying to loan me money so I can get an apartment and he can move here and I'm always all, "that's okay! I can do it! Just as soon as I pay off my mountains of debt I'll get right on that!" I have to physically force myself to accept him offering to help me pay off medical debts that could prevent him from being able to move here so we can get married.
Why is romance dead? Could it be that romantic notions or ideas of what love/marriage/relationships should be tend to be steeped in patriarchy and were created to mask the unequal bower balance in between men and women/playing on gender stereotypes? A man being the answer to all your problems? The hero who comes in to save the day? The woman who ends up making a man a better person by loving him (because of course men are uncouth creatures who wouldn’t be able fend for themselves without a woman i.e. mommy/wife*rolls eyes). Maybe feminism just opened women’s eyes to the BS that relationships can be so women either decided to shun them or play on their own terms, challenging traditional values/relationship norms thus scaring of men/being more picky and willing to hold out for someone who values equality and shares their values? Or maybe everyone is just so damn rude these days, that’s why romance/chivalry is dead. I’m guessing several factors have contributed to the so called death of romance and not just feminism.
@Eric Northman is mine: My girlfriend is awesome. I always considered myself a liberal but never knew much about feminism. She talked to me all the time about her FGSS classes and opened my eyes to feminism, etc. She doesn't put up with shit from anyone, including me. I'll take a strong woman like her over the traditional power relationship between my parents any day. I don't think romance is dead-there's plenty of romance between us. Personally, I was ecstatic to go to a very liberal college and meet a woman like her who didn't expect a traditional gender roles relationship and opened my mind (not to say most women are like that, just from my experiences growing up very Catholic, going to Catholic school, and my parents, at one point scared I was gay-God forbid, right-introducing me to very conservative young women).
Wait a second - hasn't the media been telling us that feminism is dead for years, murdered by Ally MacBeal, Girls Gone Wild, pornography, Bride Wars, etc. etc. etc.? Hmm...maybe feminism killed romance in a crime of passion and then turned the gun on herself?
@Your Screenplay Sucks: I think romance tried to have sex with its boyfriend but found him exhausted from watching 20 hours of hentai porn, so it killed itself.
Well here is the part where I get all soppy and call BS on that. I am now 7 months in with my boyfriend and he is well aware of my feminazi boner-killer stance. Yet he still continues to do wonderful things for me like taking me to the movies and dinner on a regular basis. He also took me to theatre and dinner the other night.
So there feminism!
But you have a point: if he stole all the makeup, there won't be enough left over for the women, and if we don't wear enough makeup, then the men won't know we are women, and then they can't ask us out on dates.
I'm going to go with reality tv/FOX and its endless parade of such gems as "Who Wants to Marry a Millionaire", "The Bachelor/ette" and my personal favourite, "Joe Millionaire". don't judge!
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Sarah Palin gunned-down romance from a helicopter and left its' rotting carcass for the wolves and tabloids to pick at.
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So there feminism!
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But you have a point: if he stole all the makeup, there won't be enough left over for the women, and if we don't wear enough makeup, then the men won't know we are women, and then they can't ask us out on dates.
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