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Double Standard: Men are pricks and women follow their hearts

I was reading advice columnist Dear Amy today when I came across this gem.

There’s a double standard between men and women who break up with their significant others. When a man breaks up with an otherwise fine woman because she’s not smoking hot, he’s a shallow prick. But when a woman dumps a hardworking devoted guy because there’s no Hollywood created magical “spark,” that’s perfectly acceptable because she’s following her heart. Heck, some people would consider her brave for not settling.

I’ve changed the brave woman’s letter to be from a guy’s perspective on this issue to illustrate my point:

Dear Amy: I am responding to the letter from “Worried Fiance,” who is planning to marry someone he does not love as much as he loves his smoking hot ex-girlfriend.

I had the same situation and it turned out badly.

I was hesitant about marrying my fiancee because she didn’t have a great rack or perfect ass.

I was given lots of advice. I was told that lust could be a fleeting thing and that real, mature love will be more lasting.

Well, I married my fiancee and was always disappointed that the lust wasn’t there.

She was a good girl, but without the perfect rack and ass our marriage became a battlefield, as she realized I didn’t love her like she loved me. She felt frustrated.

It was many years and four children later when I finally had to leave the marriage.

We were both terribly unhappy and it was affecting the children.

I later met my current wife of 19 years and there were instant erections that have never stopped.

I hate that I allowed myself to be talked into a marriage that should not have happened.

I’m sorry I ignored my own instincts.

— Dude

Dear Dude: Thanks for your feedback. People may be divided about the role of lust in a marriage, but doubt on the way to the altar is the great equalizer.

Can you imagine anyone feeling sympathy for this male version of the story? I sure can’t.

He wouldn’t be praised for his bravery. He’d be criticized for breaking up a family and leaving a devoted wife to chase his base subjective desires.

However, read the woman’s version here. In both situations the dumper wants some subjective feeling from the dumpee. There’s no rational reason for a woman to demand ethereal “passion” from her husband any more than there is for a guy to demand “lust.”

And a guy can no more become magically romantic or passionate anymore than a woman can become magically hot. The goofball nice guy only becomes a romantic “catch” in Hollywood movies (or in the real world after he wins the lotto).

In a nutshell, I’m not saying either way is right or wrong. I’m not criticizing women who avoid “nice” guys. I’m not condoning Shallow Hal types who constantly chase hot chicks.

What I’m saying is that such guys are not shallow. They’re just chasing their own personal and utterly subjective desires, just like women do. But with a different underlying basis. Women want their perfect Cosmo lives. Men want their perfect Playboy lives. (And quite strangely, the covers for each magazine are nearly interchangeable.)

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We have a right to our opinions, but not necessarily to act on them

You might have heard about the bride to be who was denied a wedding dress. When the dress shop owner found out that the bride was marrying another bride instead of a groom, she refused to sell the first bride a dress.

Bloggers got a hold of the story and eventually it hit the fan at the Consumerist. Then people started rating down the dress shop at Yelp.

Some people argued in the comments that the dress shop owner should be left alone because she has a right to her opinions, e.g., you may believe in the right for gays/lesbians to marry, but the dress shop owner has a right to believe the opposite.

The dress shop owner does have a right to hold any number of irrational, racist, homophobic, and contradictory opinions. That’s an absolute right and no one can take it from her.

However, people who argue that the dress shop owner has a right to her own opinions are missing the point. The issue is not that the lady has a mere opinion against gay/lesbian marriage. It’s that she’d denying equal access to customer based upon illegal discrimination.

There’s a huge difference between having an opinion and committing an act. Having an opinion does not affect anyone else in anyway. Acting upon that opinion does.

Let’s look at some analogies of acting on an opinion. If acting on an opinion is acceptable, then a rapist should never be charged with rape, because his opinion that his victim should have violent and degrading sex with him is perfectly valid. The murderer should never be charged with murder because his opinion that the decedent should be dead is perfectly valid.

See how that works? Clearly, acting on an opinion can be harmful. And discriminating against a customer based upon her sexual orientation is illegal.

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Quote of the Day

“Don’t ascribe to logic what can be more easily explained by insanity.”
- ChuckECheese via the Consumerist forums.

Nearly every day we’re faced with people spouting or writing nonsense. Our brains are wired to make sense of their nonsense. We try and construct a logical basis for their BS. ChuckECheese is right. Sometimes the person is simply mentally challenged and we’re just wasting our brains trying to make sense of their BS. Unfortunately for us, sometimes such people are politicians who cannot be ignored.

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My Sacrilegious Post of the Day: National Lampoon’s Animal House Sucks!

I was so excited that National Lampoon’s Animal House was finally released on Blu-ray via Netflix. I waited until my family was gone so I wouldn’t be distracted and then I popped it into my PS3. I turned it off after 10 minutes.*

Why?

It sucks. Not the Blu-ray transfer, that’s OK. The movie itself sucks. Yeah, you heard me.

Animal House is a great example of how we look back on our lives with rose-colored glasses. Among white boys who grew up in the 70s and 80s, Animal House is considered a classic comedy. It’s not.

It might have been a funny movie back in 1978. Heck, it might have been the funniest movie back in 1978. But it’s not a classic in any way shape or form.

I know what you’re thinking, John Belushi was in it. Yeah, he was. He says about three words in the entire movie. He was also the only funny person in the movie. And he wasn’t even that funny.**

One of the main characters in the movie was Otto played by Tim Matheson. Tim went on to play the bad guy in Fletch. He was also the bad guy in A Very Brady Sequel. He is not a comedic actor. His forte is playing douchebags. More on that later.

The other main character was Boon and was played by Peter Riegert. Peter was in Crossing Delancey and Traffic. He’s definitely not a comedic actor.

So the only comedian in this one hour and fifty minute comedic movie is John Belushi, and he’s barely in it. Well, let’s put it another way, he’s in the only funny scenes the movie has. And once again, they’re not even that funny.

You might argue that it was directed by John Landis. But, so fricken what?! Sure, he’s had some funny movies. He’s also had a load of awful movies, e.g., Blues Brothers 2000, Beverly Hills Cop III, The Stupids. And I really hate The Kentucky Fried Movie. Unless you’re really stoned, that movie is not even remotely funny.

The main problem with Animal House is that it’s just a simple, low budget, coming of age, raunchy comedy. These are released year after year (Porky’s, American Pie, Van Wilder, etc.) and they’re almost always crap. They’re not designed to be great. They’re designed to extract quick money from teenage boys.

They’re crap because the writers lowly aim to please those teenage boys, who apparently can find anything funny if they’re stoned enough. E.g., a fat guy crushing a beer can on his head. A fat guy eating out of a garbage can. A fat guy eating a lot of food for lunch. A fat guy looking up cheerleaders’ skirts. A fat guy jumping around like a squirrel. A fat guy spying on girls and falling from a ladder. A fat guy squirting mashed potatoes out of his mouth like a pimple. A fat guy smashing a guitar. I’m sure if you’re young and stoned, all of that is funny. But when you’re grown up and sober, it’s just stupid.

Another problem with Animal House is that, at its core, it’s not a comedy. As I said, it’s really a coming of age film. It’s about characters reflecting on their current paths and trying to figure out their futures. In other words, at its core, it’s a drama. And it’s a sucky and utterly contrived drama.

Because the writing is bad, the characters are poorly conceived, and the situations are contrived, you simply never care if Boon and Katy end up together or whether Otto ever learns there’s more to life than getting laid.

All of that drama is just filler placed between “funny” scenes with a dildo joke*** and a horse. It’s not there to tell us a story or to give us a better understanding of the characters, it’s there because adding fake drama saves the writers from coming up with actually funny scenes.

Speaking of contrived, contrived is defined as “Obviously planned or calculated; not spontaneous or natural; labored.” What it means in relation to works of fiction is that something happens solely because it’s written that way. The plot does not flow from any inherent logic or reason, but because someone wanted it to happen.

The ending of Animal House is a great example of contrived fiction. We’re asked to root for the members of Delta House. The movie presents them as heroes. (Why?! I’ll address that below.) Their frat is dis-chartered, they’re kicked out of college (based on their midterm grades?! Talk about contrived!****), and will likely be drafted to fight in Vietnam. In response to that, they commit major felonies, which I guess might keep them from being drafted because their asses would be in prison.

So how do the writers make this a happy ending? In the Blues Brothers movie, director Landis didn’t even try to make a happy ending. Everyone went to prison for their crimes. For Animal House, the writers simply wrote a happy ending, ignoring all logic and reason to the contrary, let alone the entire movie up to that point. Despite being kicked out of college and serving some time in prison, Bluto somehow ends up being a US Senator and marrying the woman he kidnapped. Otter becomes a physician. Specifically, a Beverly Hills gynecologist. Which is Hollywood-speak for a job that gets him laid a lot. Hoover becomes a lawyer. And Pinto becomes editor of National Lampoon magazine. Which means he somehow gets into Harvard?!

And why are these guys heroes, anyway? There’s a reason why the actor who played Otter played so many bad guys in other films. Otter’s the quintessential douche bag. He’s one of those asswhipes we all hate. He gets everything he wants in life not based on his talent, his drive, or his intellect, but because he’s good looking.

Boon has given up on life even though he’s only 21 years old. He has his whole life ahead of him, yet he lives only to get drunk or high. The only times you see him happy is when he’s trying to get acceptance into Black culture. He’s up on stage dancing and singing with Otis Day and the Knights at the frat house. And he tries to buddy-up to Otis Day when they find him and his band playing at a “Black” club. You can almost see his heart break when he realizes that racism goes both ways and Otis Day pretends not to know him.

Pinto statutorily rapes a girl he knows is a 13 year old virgin.

Bluto is simply a self centered, violent, mean, drunk, retard.

Flounder is the only guy I’d want to hang out with. Despite not being very good looking or street smart, he has an extremely hot girlfriend. He’s also funny, giving, and loyal. Who wouldn’t want a friend like that? I actually felt sorry for him throughout this movie. He’s the only guy in this whole movie with a conscience.

My pet peeve with coming of age movies is that they always use actors who are too fricken old. If the coming of age movie is supposed to be about high school kids, they use college age actors. If it’s about college students, they use actors in their late 20s and early thirties.

I’ll assume that most people enter college when they’re 18, go four years, and graduate when they’re 22 or 23. But the 18 year old freshmen in Animal House are 25 (Tom Hulce playing Pinto), 23 (Stephen Furst playing Flounder), and 20 (Kevin Bacon playing Chip Diller).

I’m sure you’re thinking those ages are pretty close. They’re not. Real college freshmen look like high school kids. They’re pimply. They’re tiny. They’re weak. They look like they can be squashed. Go and find your high school yearbook. Look at even the senior football players. Even at 18 they look like kids, because they are. Males age a lot from 18 to his early 20s. That’s when they finally start looking like men.

But let’s keep going. John Belushi was playing Bluto who was in his 7th year of college. (Oh that’s so funny!) Assuming again Bluto started college when he was 18, he should have been only 25. Yet Belushi was 30 when he played the role.

Tim Matheson, who played Otter, and Peter Riegert, who played Boon, were 31. As I mentioned before, it was specifically stated that Boon was 21 in the film.***** James Daughton, who played the likely gay Marmalard, was 28. And Mark Metcalf, who played Neidermeyer, was a whopping 32.

I simply cannot buy what I’m being sold when I watch Animal House (and most other coming of age/teen/college/raunchy comedies). I can’t figure out why these thirty year olds are pretending to be 21. They’re on the screen trying to figure out their futures, when to me, they look like they’re trying to relive their pasts.

I should point out that I can suspend my disbelief. I can believe that John Belushi is on a mission from god. Heck, I can even believe that John Belushi is a blues singer, despite all auditory evidence to the contrary. But in watching Animal House, I cannot believe he’s a 25 year old college student.

Hate me if you want. Trash my mere subjective opinions in the comments. But all I ask from you is this: If you disagree with me, rewatch the movie first. My guess is that you’ll be as disappointed as I was.

* I did force myself to watch the whole thing a few days later.

** If you think about it, John Belushi is highly overrated. Sure, he was in the original SNL. He was also in the Rutles, which was a very funny movie. But his role was very small. He was in 1941, which I liked as a kid, but I also liked Animal House as a kid. It was universally panned and flopped. He was in the Blues Brothers, which is considered a classic. He was in Continental Divide, which was a terrible romantic comedy actually written for Chevy Chase. Which would have made sense because Chevy Chase was not a bad looking guy back then. He was lastly in Neighbors, which is a movie I simply don’t remember. According to Wikipedia, it flopped and critics hated it.

Basically, the only good movie he was in was the Blues Brothers and that was good mostly due to Aykroyd’s vision and Landis ability to focus that vision. Animal House didn’t have a vision, so there was nothing for him to focus. It was just an excuse to show tits to high school kids. Back then, before internet porn, the only way we could see tits was to find our dad’s Playboy collection or to sneak into R rated films.

*** They didn’t even bother writing a dildo joke. To a teenager, merely seeing a giant dildo is worthy of laughter. The writers knew that. Which is the sole reason the dildo was in that initial scene with Boon and Otto.

**** The reason the writers had to expel members of Delta house based on their mid term grades was because of the big Home-Coming parade ending the movie had. Colleges simply don’t have end term parades. So the writers were stuck writing something ridiculous.

***** 44:35

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