Of frogs and men

I am taking liberties here, recently read a colleague's Friendster blog and I teased her about it since. Actually, some of my recent blogs were inspired by her.

She said men are like frogs.

If you want to stew them, the worst thing you could do is to dump them into boiling water,  since they'll be jumping right up and escape your fury.

The better way to handle them is through subtle persuasion. Put them in a pan of cool water, that way they will be swimming happily. Cover, then slowly boil the water and they'll never know what hit them.

She's making parallels about how men dig women who are playing hard-to-get, and how men take for granted those who are easy.

To stew men like this, you have to treat them like frogs?

First of all, I think all humans have this in their psyche - anything that doesn't take too much to get is nothing to be proud of. I mean, who wants something that's as freely available as air, you know...try taking away free air and it becomes a very precious commodity.

Second, I don't think it's about how hard is was to get something. It's not about easy, it's about being too available. Like the "pick me! pick me!" girl we all laugh at sometimes.

Third, accomplishments are heady, but which ones will last? I mean, getting a hard-to-get girl doesn't automatically make her your bride, does she? In reverse, being easy doesn't mean a girl isn't wife material. Trouble is, we equate bedding (and marrying) someone to accomplishments like closing that $50M deal, making $1M in options trading over an hour, participating and successfully completing the Everest climb, or joining Doctors Without Borders right after internship. Those are heady.

To be honest, what got me in this mode is not about the men being frogs, but by the way the frogs are being treated in the example above. OMG, dumping frogs in boiling water? Talk about treating animals inhumanly.

So, let's just say to stew men, just dump them in boiling water. Or dump boiling water on them. That's more human.

Or the best thing of all, JUST DUMP THEM!

Of course, I am taking the female perspective here, just like my colleague. Fortunately, I do not have to think about dumping men (or frogs) in boiling water at all.