| "The Prattle of Sexes" by Adrianne Pielou Statement "Prattle of Sexes" is an interview by Adrienne Pielou of Deborah Tannen, dealing with the differences between man and woman, and the friction that comes between them at times. Mrs. Tannen uses several arguments, with several superficial scenarios, in order to strengthen her thesis about man and woman not speaking the same language. Beforehand, let it be noted, that this statement is written from the man's point of view, since I consider myself to be an ambassador of masculinity. I myself can relate to many points of Mrs. Tannen's argument, such as: ".grumble they're being nagged when asked to take out the rubbish." (Ll.
7-8).When taken into thoughtful consideration, who would prefer taking out trash to sitting back, relaxing, and watching TV, or other people working? (This fact applies to men and women alike, as typical people of both genders generally enjoy pleasure more than work.) Though I would be so bold as to declare that men do not listen, we merely listen to a certain point. At this point, we decide we have all the required information, so we proceed to ignore the rest. It does not possess valuable information. What heels Martha was wearing, when she realized her dog was hit by a car, is purely useless detail.
We in the business like to refer to this as "selective hearing." Furthermore, Mrs. Tannen mentions following about men and their habits: "they cringe at the prospect of discussing anything personal (Ll.6-7)". This may be true, but personal feelings are called personal for a specific reason, if we open up about them, they are no longer personal! ". if they lose their way, rage at the suggestion they ask for the way (Ll.8-9).
" So stated Mrs. Tannen about the difficulty men have when it comes to asking for directions. Later she also mentions the fact that men are typically concerned about their social status. Men require a social status as support. The social status gives them a feeling of confidence, and confirms them as affable. All these statements listed above are based on the fact, that boys are raised to become men, not sissies or wimps.
Since the beginning of recorded history, men have taken care of the family by putting food on the table, they were the hunters and collectors, and they were their families' keepers. This is another reason why men don't talk about their feelings or ask for the way; they were always supposed to be invulnerable and omniscient, they were the superior sex. This feeling is burned into the minds of every man, regarded as the definitive mark of manliness, and this is one burn that more than likely will not heal in the near future. Once again, back to why men refuse to listen. Many men are of the opinion that the prattle of women is not really worth the listen. Men have short attention spans and lose interest very fast, after a certain point in the conversation; men just cannot follow it anymore.
This is the point when the basic information is spent. At this point, the only way to get more solid information is to read the meta-messages in the head of the female. "So where is the problem?" one might ask, but the answer is simple: men like me are not able to examine those meta-messages; our psychology is not developed enough to perform this difficult task. The male communication is bound to our inability to read those meta-messages and a few straightforward rules: "Say what you want to say and get to the point. Keep it as easy as possible, so every man can understand it." Men think in a basic, but logical way, which is why men can only scratch the surface of human dialogue.
Beating around the bush is not recommended. On the other hand there is woman. For decades, women have always been a mystery to men. Many men have gone crazy attempting to identify with the woman's thought process. We currently know less about the woman than the after life or the vagueness of the far reaches of outer space. We can't live with them, but humanity would become extinct without them.
Mrs. Tannen herself pronounces: "they read things into the most innocuous comment" (Ll.10-11) it matters not what men say, these supernatural beings integrate whatever they want to hear, to perceive something as negative. Even a simple answer like yes or no can be enough to activate their self-defense mechanism, causing an infiltration of the lowered defense of the men with acute efficiency and intense precision. Women use any words that men make use of to express their view, in order to attack and kill their male counterpart. By this point, men are so close to the edge, that any word would push them over the cliff, as would remaining silent.
Essentially, I can agree to the statements given by Mrs. Tannen. For instance, just the other day, I was watching a TV-Show (Fresh Prince), and when the man said that he would have to think about the situation, before he makes a decision, his wife got irritated and stormed out of the room. Why? Well, he said: "I'll have to think about this." he forgot the all-important we, which would include his wife in the process. This is a perfect example for Mrs. Tannen's declaration about how women get upset when their man says "I" rather than "we" (Ll.
11-12). Another of Mrs. Tannen's points I would like to bring to light is the women's demand of impossibly detailed reports of every conversation they miss - who said what and how they looked when they said It (Ll. 12-13). The male brain possesses not the ability to take so much information all at once and remember it. This is an all-too complicated request for the male psychology, which, as mentioned above, is not made for remembering such detail on demand.
Furthermore, women are equipped with some supernatural weapons men cannot defend against. For one, women are living lie detectors; they can sense a lie before it is put into words. Another weapon in their arsenal is the ability to raise feelings of love and passion inside a man, just by allowing him to be a part of their life. In this case, men begin to act like marionettes, controlled by those women. Some particularly weak exemplars of the manliness will actually start to act against their instinct and talk about things they would never have talked about before, like feelings or matching clothes. The most horrific and terrifying weapon in a woman's armory is THE look.
Its devastating powers can reduce a man to a fumbling foul or babbling baby in a fraction of a second. For a man to stand the look or stare back would surely mean certain and immediate casting into oblivion. Feeling the deep burn, the man will put forth maximal effort to qualm the rage and make the storm subside. Due to the fact, that I am not a woman, I dare not try to put up rules of woman's conversation, but I can say for sure that the male and female rule for conversations are in no way related. Conclusively, Mrs. Tannen is correct in saying that men and women speak a different language, though they use the same words and grammatical rules.
Furthermore, men used to be the superior beings in human history throughout decades, but the big feminism movement put the woman over the man and showed the men their mighty, invisible weapons, which are futile to try to resist. This is why men will remain women's subordinates, until men will rise again and rule the world eternally.
|
