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Rantings of a Sandmonkey

Be forewarned: The writer of this blog is an extremely cynical, snarky, pro-US, secular, libertarian, disgruntled sandmonkey. If this is your cup of tea, please enjoy your stay here. If not, please sod off

Wednesday, October 19, 2005

A school for ordinary gentlemen

The British have opend a "finishing school for men", where men can go for 3 days and learn how to become siss....I mean gentlemen. But after three days in a Scottish castle, the students emerge from a minefield of etiquette knowing everything from how much to tip the gamekeeper to how to walk with a book balanced on their heads. [...] Table manners and cutlery terrified the nine pathfinders on the first course. "What glasses for which wine, which knife and fork -- that was what frightened them the most," Mather said. In deportment, they learned with the help of a book balanced on their heads "how to stand, sit and walk with stylishness and poise." To the relief of their nearest and dearest, they were even taught basic sewing and ironing skills as well as such manly pursuits as fly fishing and clay pigeon shooting. Scottish reels were danced "for fun and fitness" and the networking class even taught how to offer a power handshake. LOL This, is of course, to counter the fact that more men are..ehh...behaving badly, or in an ill-mannerd way at least. But check this out: Feminism is to blame. Feminism and political correctness, she argues, may have to shoulder some of the blame in an age of equality. "These days do you open a door for a woman or give up your seat? Rabid feminists may not think so but most women like to be treated like a lady. A lot of women still want a knight in shining armor," she said. Awww... Well, on behalf of all the men of the world kadies, please let us know when you finally know what you want, cause we are getting mixed signals here.

7 Comments:

At 10/19/2005 07:08:00 AM, Anonymous Anonymous said...

It's really very simple. I want different things from different people.

I want appropriate respect for my doctorate from my boss, and more important, I want the number on my paycheck to be the same for me as it is for a guy with the same job. I have had the experience of having some jerk, who was paying me 20% less than the guys, make a big deal about opening the damn door for me. At work, I don't care about the door. I want the paycheck!

I want the nice little courtesies from my husband. Nobody in the whole, wide world can substitute.

See? It really is not difficult.

;-) Valerie

 
At 10/19/2005 07:48:00 AM, Anonymous Anonymous said...

I hold doors open for either sex, regardless. It never does any harm, and many people seem to be pleased that somebody noticed that they exist. A smile does no harm, either.

 
At 10/19/2005 09:02:00 AM, Anonymous Anonymous said...

I want the door opened, the car brought around when it is raining, basically I'm happy when my @$$ is being kissed.;)

 
At 10/19/2005 11:38:00 AM, Blogger Mia said...

I want to be treated the same way you’d want to be treated. No more no less. Oh yeah and while we’re at it before you start staring at my boobs and butt take the time to at least look at my face and say “hello” first.

 
At 10/19/2005 02:50:00 PM, Blogger programmer craig said...

Hello, Mia! Do you mind if I stare at your boobs and butt?

Valerie, paying everybody the same amount of money regardless of their job performance is a good way to promote incompetence and laziness. I don't like the idea of that, at all. That's what the government does, and how many civil servants have you met that were efficient and competent workers? On the other hand, in the private sector, favorotism is a major problem and causes a lot of resentments. Why did Joe get the stock options when everyone thinks he's an idiot? Why was my bonus check so small this year? How big was yours? Whose %$&@ did she suck to get that promotion? Etc etc. Doesn't happen at every company, but it happens at a lot of them.

 
At 10/19/2005 07:08:00 PM, Blogger Mia said...

Well hello to you to Craig.. yeah go ahead knock yourself out stare all you want. As long as you don't touch we're cool otherwise i'll set my pitbull loose on ya.

 
At 10/20/2005 07:20:00 AM, Blogger Candace April said...

Yes, please open the door, stand when I visit your table to say hello, kill spiders for me, etc. I like all of those things well-mannered men do for women.

In return, I will be happy to sew the buttons back on your shirt and other little things that seem to trouble most men.

At the same time, these societal rules should not imply that most women are less intelligent than most men...simply that there are niceties and rituals that have evolved in our society out of respect for our differences.

As you can probably tell, work in our household isdivided very much along gender lines, with the exception that I do all of the electronics stuff; and of course, when DH is in the field, I have to do all of it.

 

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