Warren Farrell - Why Men Are the Way They Are (1986)

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The rules of sexism do not free men from the terror of violence; they only keep men from complaining about it.

Warren Farrell
Together, we came to understand how we beg men to express feelings, but then when men do express feelings, we call it sexism, male chauvinism, or backlash.

Warren Farrell
Alan Alda is loved not because he's sensitive, but because he's successful and sensitive.

Warren Farrell
Most women's ideal is to not be sexual until nine conditions are met: physical attraction; respect; emotional compatibility; intelligence; singleness; success (or potential); being asked out; being paid for; and the man risking rejection by initiating the first kiss…. Men want sex as long as only one condition is met—physical attraction.

Warren Farrell
Our love for children is so immediate in part because we feel their powerlessness immediately; conversely, part of the way we deny our love for men is by denying men's powerlessness. Too often we have confused love for men with respect for them, especially for their power to take care of us—-which is really just love for ourselves.

Warren Farrell
Unless a woman asks men out (the first time) as often as men ask her out, then the assertion He asked me out, therefore he pays is just a double jeopardy of the male role: he must not only do the asking, he must pay extra for risking extra rejection.

Warren Farrell
Fear of emotional contact with men out of fear of being a sexual suspect makes boys, ironically, even more powerless before girls. Homophobia is like telling the United States it will be a sissy nation if it doesn't get all its oil from OPEC.

Warren Farrell
Men give the same lines to different women for the same reason women wear the same perfume for different men; we all try the things that work.

Warren Farrell
From evening soaps to preteen romances, [the message is that] inner values are for losers.

Warren Farrell
When women's consciousness was raised, women ended up seeing housework as their shit work ; when men's consciousness is raised, risking sexual rejection will be seen as the male shit work.

Warren Farrell
A man cannot tell whether a woman is in love with him or his security blanket until she is financially and psychologically independent enough to leave. Until a woman has learned how to leave, even she cannot be sure she has learned to love.

Warren Farrell
Both sexes work on their lines before they appear onstage. His lines are a lifetime of work; her introductory 'line' is her appearance—or her lack of lines. Just as careers give men power, so beauty gives women power. But just as the comparison between herself and the most beautiful women makes a woman feel powerless, so the comparison between himself and the most successful men makes a man feel powerless.

Warren Farrell
Success as panacea and trap:
The less a man is willing to give up a sex object, the more he'll be trapped into becoming a success object.

Warren Farrell
A single woman who supports herself is called a career woman, while a single man who supports himself is called a playboy…Ironically, a woman who commits and becomes financially dependent is considered more mature than a man who does not commit but is financially independent.

Warren Farrell
How can I call security a woman's primary fantasy if I am saying it is also her primary need? Because while her primary need is the security of a home and a family circle, her primary fantasy is that someone else will earn enough to pay for them. Hence the focus of 2 billion women on the latest royal wedding.

Warren Farrell
From the male perspective, when commitment is associated with diamonds and mortgages, promises of love can feel like promises of payment.

Warren Farrell