Perhaps it's a flaw in my psyche, perhaps in the y chromosome, perhaps in the human genome. When a woman I like portrays herself as the faultless victim of other men's expectations and behavior, I buy her bullshit narrative completely. Tell me more, sweetie. He did what? Long after the cracks in her stories have become canyons, when things sour between us, only then does it occur to me that I will join that very same pantheon of infamous men. Of course I will. Why wouldn't I?
Knowing my bogus legacy so well drives me mad.
Girl A ridiculed her ex for crying when she dumped him, and I too mocked his manhood. Then I cried when she dumped me, and my place in history, I suspect, is quite secure. And deservedly so.
Girl B? The guys she cheated on were porn addicts or rage-a-holics who were this close (you can't see, but it's really close) to being physically abusive toward her. And then she cheated on me, I left, and I too was reviled as "scary."
Girl C was always used for sex by guys, then thrown away. She liked me because I was different. I would change her life. So what did she say after I dumped her for being a chronic imbecile? I have a guess.
Girl D cheats on guys because of their deep emotional problems. And now I wonder which of my pathologies caused her to cheat on me.
And on and on. I'm by no means a model human, but I do tend toward treating women with respect. It would be swell to get some return on that particular investment, but I'm not holding my breath.
They say the cardinal sin in a job interview is to bad-mouth your former employer. Your interviewers will rightly see themselves as future objects of your scorn. This makes sense. I never do it, and when I'm interviewing candidates, red-flags pop up when they do.
Would that this foresight extended to all parts of my life.