Men have always been believed to be the stronger sex because of their physical capabilities while women have been the emotional ones who need to learn to control their tear ducts. However, while reading the essays “The View Of Me From Mars”, What I’ve Learned from Men: Lessons From a full Grown Feminist”, and “I Want a Wife”, I have learned that in as much as men differ from women, there are still some shared traits and that oftentimes, women often compare themselves to the men and end up being envious in the process.
My readings have shown me that men and women are similar in more ways than one can imagine. For example, neither men nor women deal well with confrontation. When faced with an impossible situation, both sexes prefer to wimp out. This is evidenced by the paragraph in “The View O f Me From Mars” when the father describes his feeling as his wife begins to make him feel uncomfortable and yet he wants to avoid a confrontation with her and actually telling the truth. It seems that the instinct of men is to basically lie in the manly way. He says:
… And suddenly, taking note of the thump-thump my heart made and how one cloud in the east looked like a bell, I stood at the sink, steadily drinking glass after glass of water, trying to put some miles between me and her suspicions.
Women also know how to feel uncomfortable and also prefer to avoid confrontations. However, the female instinct differs in reaction in the sense that women tend to use meekness to an advantage when feeling threatened, aggressive, angry, or resentful. Case in point would be the following explanation from the essay “What I’ve Learned From Men: Lessons For a Full Grown Feminist” that explains:
… And when we are feeling angry, aggressive, or resentful, we just tighten up our smiles or turn them into rueful moues. In short, we spend a great deal of time acting like wimps.
Even though men and women have some similarities, the contradictions in personality can also be glaring at times. Men and women tend to deal with stressful situations quite differently because of the way society has always viewed the opposing sexes. Men are allowed to get loud and physical while women tend to bottle up the emotions instead. For evidence that will support my argument, I would like to refer you to the previously mentioned essay that indicates:
Finally, we may be able to learn something from men about what to do with anger. As a general rule, women get irritated ; men get mad. We make tight little smiles of ladylike exasperation; they pound on desks and roar. I wouldn’t recommend emulating the full basso profundo male tantrum, but women do need ways of justifying anger clearly, colorfully, and when necessary, crudely. If you are not just irritated, but pissed off, it might help to say so.
Once we get past all the differences and similarities though, we will discover that men and women envy each other’s similarities and differences because it serves to compliment each other’s weaknesses. Neither sex is perfect in any way. But, according to the essay “I Want A Wife”, the women are the more perfect sex because they can multi – task better than the men.