Warning: naughty f*ckgirl language ahead! 

“Face it, all girls are the same when you’re this basic…but all girls aren’t the same.” ~ MAY-A

~

As we begin to make our way back into to the world, and thus, the dating world (and dating apps), I think we should be more conscious of how we go about doing that.

So let me take you back to pre-pandemic dating with—dun dun dun—you, dating, trying to manage…a “man-fly.”

So you scared him off. Was it because you’re too opinionated? Or was it because you showed your blossoming affection for him too soon? Nah…that’s too juvenile.

Oh, wait, I know. It was because, fuckgirl, after enough dating experience, deconditioning, and nurturing your impenetrable self-worth, you didn’t get easily attached to him—he has not yet demonstrated if he is worth getting attached to. Something in his man-fly logic alerted him to the fact that you weren’t the babe bait who was going to validate and squeal over his minimal effort and female-downplaying male centeredness.

So, he bailed. He made the decision to stay uninteresting and static, rather than grow and expand, with you. And by the way, he still thinks you’re hot—he just doesn’t see you as obedient and malleable.

As a fuckgirl, I get “dumped” occasionally, but they rarely actually leave—permanently. I’m always astonished: why are they more angry over the dump as the dumper than I am as the dumpee? There’s something off about that.

The kind of man I am referring to here is a man-fly: the least emotionally robust men when it comes to appreciating, connecting, and relating to women. After I am dumped, I then have the audacity not to sulk for very long, and then I begin flirting with new men instead of doing what I’m supposed to be doing, which is messaging, pining, and stalking the social media of guys who almost thought about possibly investing in me one day. Perhaps. Maybe! We’ll see…but who knows?

Why aren’t you falling in love with that, fuckgirl?

You should be in love and obsessing over him, and you’re not! You aren’t playing the game right, which is to put him on a pedestal and let him be in the driver seat at all times. You’re not letting him back into your life three more times because you’re uncomplicated, easygoing, convenient, and you have everything he needs—oh wait, he’s confused you with 7-Eleven again!

Since you’re not dating or playing the game the way the patriarchy intended—acquiescing to men, to their male aggression, and to the male version of intimacy (if we can even call it that?)—you will be loathed for it. That is, until the court of public opinion updates its lens and focuses and adapts to seeing that fuckgirls are not the problem.

So what is the problem? The status quo and its followers who can’t be bothered to employ soft skills, critical thinking that’s sharp enough to process male and female differences, advancements in women’s rights, and agency and mutual respect in interpersonal relationships. Why is it so hard to find a mate who gives you security without smothering you, who gives you freedom with unquestionable trust?

There’s a plethora of evidence on YouTube with dating coaches and gurus who peddle a dating paradigm that posits men are the prize to be won. See, I argue that the status quo actually shapes a man to be a man-fly and it takes a really astute dude not to buy into it.

We know this is true because no matter how many ways women emotionally contort themselves, it is always too much or too little, and two things are still happening:

1) We get dumped if we do not submit enough to his romantic standards.

2) When we do get into relationships, they don’t fulfill us enough, leaving us unsatisfied.

And by the way, who decided that “too much” is too much? Why was he allowed to graduate from college without reading The Laugh of the Medusa by Cixous? It’s mandatory reading if you ever hope to comprehend women: “Woman’s imaginary is inexhaustible,” “My desires have invented new desires,” and “You only have to look at the Medusa straight on to see her. And she’s not deadly. She is beautiful and she is laughing.” Demonizing women and their actions keeps men and their actions and interpretations front and center.

When we watch these dating coaching videos, we are bombarded with a flood of answers that appear to be the right answers, as they sound refreshing, brilliant, and even helpful—but they’re actually different versions of the same answer, which is: this is how women need to act in order to get and maintain a man’s interest. The reason the videos work and women find “success” is that men are trained and conditioned to stay with women who pander to them and to reject women who don’t.

If I’m wrong, then why is such a vast portion of the dating industry making YouTube videos with garden variety titles of: “Behaviors that Scare Men Off,” “Never Say This to a Man,” and “This is the Type of Woman that Scares Him Away.”

The dating industry markets their material to women under the premise that men have the upper hand in dating. As if men are the valuable, elusive creatures to be caught—not both men and women. Think about that for a second. Women take their hard-earned, unequal pay and give it to some YouTube dating guru to teach them how to pander to male dominance and the male ego—enough to make him swoon over their learned female obedience.

Uh, this isn’t romance; it’s patriarchal bullshit! And I’m not falling in love with these men or these dating coaches.

These dating coaches aren’t aware that they’re trying to get women to obey the patriarchal status quo by molding them into what men want. More intelligent dating coaches are actually trying to get women to put their self-worth first and “act like yourself.” And you know what? Both can be problematic. The first one is obviously a “how to gaslight women” approach. The second one is more tricky because “being yourself”—if you still have not done the hard, dirty work to get to bona fide self-worth—is still going to repel men because female, clingy, yes-girl conditioning runs deep in our culture. I know this because I’m a fuckgirl who has done the deconditioning work; I’m not a life coach or a dating coach. I think both are highly suspicious if they don’t contextualize the highly-biased environment women are dating in like I do.

Dating coaches love to say, “Women, you need to swim like this,” or “Swimming like that scares him away”—so what the fuck is happening when you “scare a man away?” Really, what the hell does that mean?

Let’s take the attention off of “scary” you, and put the attention on him: what is he actually scared of? Am I an escaped convict or a deadly virus? Am I possessed by demons? Oh, look, I’m an angry beehive and he is allergic to bees!

What it actually means is that he’s scared you’re not going to cater to male standards, so uh-oh, we’re cray-cray. Right ladies? Even though the majority of us don’t have mental illnesses. The patriarchal definition of a “crazy female” is simple: it’s a woman you can’t put a leash on, a “crazy bitch!”

These dating coaches who are coaching us to uphold male dominance will never tell you that you’re swimming in shark-infested waters because—LOL—they, too, are sharks. As a fuckgirl, I’m gonna tell you that when you enter the dating pool, make sure you’re in a shark cage! Part of this “fear of crazy women” is manufactured misogyny meant to uphold male dominance and keep strong, badass females single, as if we’re defective—because we are, according to some of the man-flies I have dated and repelled. If these man-flies are to be believed—that I’m crazy—then why have some of my exes been there for me in emergencies, donated to charities I post about, helped me move, supported my writing, and flown me and my girlfriends places? Why do they still say hi on social media? We’re cool. Not all the men I date try to put me on cray-cray lockdown—only a man-fly who could not control me does that.

So why is it so important to avoid a man-fly, the outdated, dead weight who’s decided he doesn’t need to join the 21st century, therefore slowing female progress, and thus, optimum relationship progress?

Because picking the wrong guy and bumping up against female-specific hostility and misogyny on your quest for intimacy is not just dating spam, it’s also a risk of becoming a misogynist yourself and co-enabler in male dominance. This may sound pretty weird, right? But, the reality is: that is exactly what’s happening.

The main reason women loathe dating is because misogynists amongst us, either covert or overt, force dating to lose its fun—because women’s past relationships have raised their vigilance; it’s like a psychological scavenger hunt of whether or not you’re going to be gaslighting her after you move in together. Women are like perpetual, low-grade trauma victims on a battlefield trying to pretend they’re at a fun carnival.

So how do you discern a man-fly from a conscious man who’s going to raise your game, not stall it?

Dating has become increasingly ugly because the social bedrock of our world is rapidly shifting and the man-fly is not okay with it—and he takes it out on his dates and on women.

Just go on Twitter and watch how aggressive men speak to women with a verbal, misogynistic smackdown that Kate Manne refers to as the “Misogyny Shock Collar.” A new man you are dating will test the shock collar on you to see if you’re obedient and submissive or if you bark and bite back. Based on your reaction to his test, he’ll pursue you or dump you, buzzing off because he’s a man-fly. It’s what he does.

So, it’s really not about your looks, personality, or talents…rejection has a lot to do with how he relates to women, and his preconceived notions of how you should be relating to him, even as his male-centered world is crumbling all around him. This may raise his own dating stakes to look for a woman who validates him—because everyone else is wrong and “the liberals” are taking over all facets of society. (But why is being anti-male dominance even a political side? Shouldn’t all politicians be for equality between the sexes?)

One of the ways to easily spot a man-fly is they’re disagreeable, negative, overly-amused, and often speak in one-word responses, such as; “wut,” “huh,” and my favorite, “haha.”

“Haha” can a neutral communication ice-breaker, but the man-fly weaponizes it by overusing it to make women feel trivial, like they’re not to be taken seriously. Fuckboys like “haha” a lot too—but that’s just because they want to keep things casual; whereas a man-fly reflexively minimizes women as naturally as he breathes.

Being constantly overwhelmed and triggered everywhere you go, as if the world should be operating at a fifth grade level, is covert male dominance; it could also be called unchecked male-entitlement that men get to walk around acting so fucking incompetent. He can’t adhere to left-brain, logical feminism (which is merely philosophy) because it’s “just a theory” (so is gravity) if he doesn’t understand it, now can he? But he can go to his traditional man job and do quantum physics and computational linguistics—an hour after he says “huh?” to a feminist tweet online. It’s a phenomenon we see specifically on social media—especially Twitter and on dating apps. Their microaggressions turn these men into conforming cartoon characters. Imagine having a simplistic, dumb-fuck call sign like you’re a type of bird and no longer a complex living and thinking human man? It’s dehumanizing, I guess. Or maybe I am a caveman—haha.

Tired of “wow,” “shut up,” and “lol” comprising 99% of men’s responses whenever I quote tweet another man telling me I’m worthless piece of shit when 99% of men call themselves good guys. https://t.co/8JsV5BR2Ao

— feminist next door (@emrazz) July 1, 2021

Why do men decide what’s considered “healthy” in a relationship? (Which just so happens to be rooted in male dominance and an old fart, father-knows-best man-logic?) I say fuck that! Fuck it all day long—the idea that men are perfect and I’m the one who needs to mold myself around his version of female perfection because I’m trying to lock him down? No, no, no.

Beneath the surface, it is women who are getting locked down—with male dominance masquerading as dating how-tos. If we don’t recognize this bullshit “romantic” coaching for what it really is, then the gap for male/female relating just widens more and more.

I know that being my authentic self makes me an intelligent, refreshing, stunning bachelorette in a turbulent sea with a lot of manufactured, creepy, weird shit that just makes me shake my head and ask, “Is this even worth it?” So many women are choosing to be single over being with a man who can’t get their act together to be a decent human being.

How come dating coaches don’t coach men to appreciate and handle mad, passionate women they’re never going to be able to tame, like Elizabeth Taylor types? Aren’t we getting a little boundary obsessed at the expense of epic love stories?

My main question for a man-fly is:

Why do you fold so easily where your backbone ought to be?

Most of all, why do you let yourself miss out on the gold mine you know damn well that you want and need?

I know it’s what you want and need, because so many of you try and come back. But dating you feels like dating a deer who startles and scatters in the forest—and that’s just not normal.

Do you ever feel like dating gurus think you’re a horse who spooks too easily if a woman says the “wrong thing” or act the “wrong way?” Do you feel obligated to buck her off? What about how you feel after you’ve bucked her off only to realize too late that she was possibly the one? That’s gotta ache.

I know this because I’m exhausted from watching men argue, yell, cry, and plead with me to date—or even marry—them while they continually do not allow me to be myself. I’m over all of it. I have fly strips hanging in my head that only a conscious, male feminist, warrior-type (who is now sprinting past you man-flies!) can clear. In fact, he already has. He may not physically be in bed next to me right now, but it’s his contrast that is here. Him. The one who gets me, who never tells me I’m too much or not enough, because he knows not to measure my female depths on a masculine scale. Who holds me when I’m fatigued, heartbroken, and grasping for hope. Whether he is physically here or a bright light on the way, the divine masculine keeps those flies at bay for me like no man-fly can…or will even attempt to in my lifetime.

The divine masculine that enthusiastically exclaims to me, “Get it girl!”

A fly-swatter for the ladies:

What made me so much happier in dating was getting really good at quickly repelling the man-flies who landed on me.

I know for a fact you’re not being nearly cutthroat enough, ladies. There’s actually no place for niceness in love. There’s tenderness—but the road to tenderness is pretty bumpy and unforgiving, just like the unruly wilderness. You’re too nice to strangers. Your softest side should be earned, not given. What makes your love magnanimous is that he brings his magnanimity to the table as well, and you lift each other up. It’s equality.

The last man who dropped the C-word in my dating inbox (he was referring to his ex) got such a strong feminist response from me about my zero tolerance for misogynistic ad hominem that I repelled him instantly. I was strong and assertive, not snotty or condescending, and he unmatched me right away, which is exactly what you want—because he got out of my life and did the administrative work of deleting himself for me. That’s how it should be: when he vomits, he should clean it up. My fuckgirl vibration should always be that strong. It should make waves that instantly repel or instantly attract, with nothing meh in between.

I know in my heart that there’s nothing I could say or write that would scare off the right man—a hip dude who is already aware that it’s high tide for a misogynistic low-life. I don’t have to explain it to him—he doesn’t act like a petrified squirrel. Even on my worst days, I could not instantly shatter his desire for me with my personality, which isn’t a single channel. He’s not afraid to channel surf through my motley moods any given day.

My job as a single woman is to stealthily discern between the two men. Fuckgirl adventures provide the opportunity to practice and hone that skill. The man worth having around will see and be able to articulate what women have to deal with and will be moved to make his female empathy muscle part of his #gainz regimen. He’ll zoom out of all the toxic crap being shoved down his throat too, to fully see me for who I am at my core, and that’s what he falls in love with.

We will see each other. And meet there.

You can’t actually scare off a man who cares. Real and caring love walks through fire. Misogyny in service to male dominance doesn’t.

This message has not been dating coach approved, but it is fuckgirl approved.