Vanessa is my blogging buddy and author of Vanessa: Unplugged!. She’s also a facebook friend and was curious about my view’s on comedian and morning talk show host Steve Harvey’s new book “Act Like A Lady, Think Like A Man”. I haven’t read the book but I did respond to her question to me on facebook. She thought my perspective was worthy of sharing with my readers and I did too, so here’s her question and my response.
Vanessa:
The book really is like a conversation with Steve. I’d like your take on it. Women should read it but do men think Steve’s messing up their game?
Martin:
I don’t know. Players who like to game may think so. But guys who aren’t into game playing – me for instance – and hate to see women making bad decisions because they have false expectations for the male gender, don’t think that way.
I think he’s doing a great public service for relationships. That’s the expectation in the end, proper establishment of relationships.
Like he says, women have all the control about what will and won’t be allowed. But too many women don’t realize that. I think if more dads were sure to talk to daughters on the subject early in life fewer females would give in to men so easily and then give up on them so easily.
There’s a reason that the “friendship-marriage-then sex” pattern has worked so well through out time and that all these deviations have always failed, to society’s detriment. It’s the only one that has consistently provided “relationship stability”.
I truly believe if more women started basing their life decisions on proper expectations (some of the things your mother told you about men are true) and if they would make smarter decisions about the people they associate with and what they do with their bodies (men are really simple about these things, not complex like women) then men would have no choice but to adapt.
Unfortunately, there will always be women for any number of reasons (background, home training, family example etc.) who will always need to have a man because being alone means failure, so any piece of a man will do. And there will always be women who think that the sexual act automatically means love. That’s how women think. That’s not how an uncommitted man thinks (see second set of parentheses above).
Let me leave you some helpful hints to share with your lady friends:
(1) Sex for a man who isn’t committed to you is just sex. Purely a matter of physical satisfaction.
(2) If he doesn’t say verbally that he loves you then he doesn’t so don’t make any naive assumptions about the physical stuff.
(3) If you wait until he expressly expresses his love for you, then marries and commits to you before sex, then everything is in proper context. You’ve eliminated STD’s, unwanted pregnancies, child support and all the other non-committal headaches just by doing things the right way in the first place.
For those hard headed people who will always say “I have a right to do what I want to do!” I reply by telling them the other half of that argument that their parents must have forgotten to teach them. You also have a right to the consequences of your choices. Rights and consequence go hand in hand so keep that idea in mind.
And I’ll end all these thoughts by saying this. Abstinence cures all ills in this context. If you’re doing what married people do but you’re not married then stop for all the reasons mentioned above.
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I’m glad Vanessa appreciated my input and I hope you get something out of it too.
