Juneau is his Narnia.

Friends, our new friend Matthew has made his first regular post at Boundless.  I’m not sure there’s much we can do for him.

An excerpt:

Roughly two weeks ago, I returned home from leading a missions trip to Juneau, Alaska, with Campus Crusade for Christ. This was my fourth time up to Juneau with Campus Crusade; I spent the summer there back in 2004 as a college student on the Juneau Men’s Project, and I’ve been back each of these last three summers to help lead Alaska Transformation, a two-week version of that summer-long missions trip I attended as a student.

I could seriously talk your ear off about Juneau. I love it there so much. My first summer in Juneau was, most definitely, the watershed experience in my life. And my subsequent three visits — two years as a small-group leader and this summer as the guy in charge — have each been phenomenal. That place and my time there are, collectively, very present to me.

Goodness. I’m getting nostalgic just thinking about being there.

I wish you all could know the joy Juneau brings me. I mean, Juneau is my Narnia, people.

……

Also: I totally talk to the animals and they talk to me. Bald eagles are as regal as you would imagine; whales are patient, gregarious folks; and sea lions, as a general rule, could use an attitude adjustment.

Are those crickets I hear? Did this post just get weird? No, I’m not crazy, people. But I do refuse to talk to crickets. I don’t like them.

Um, OK.

Uses of totally: 2

Uses of seriously: 1

Uses of phenomenal: 1

Total number of adverbs used that end in -ly: 8

Uses of goodness (as exclamation): 2

Uses of italics for emphasis: 2

Uses of unironic exclamation point: 2

Odds that Matthew will find a churchly wife before I find a churchly husband:  4:1

The Dr. is in!

I’ve mentioned before that on one of the message boards I read, there is a dating advice thread.  Since the board is primarily female and college-educated, there tend to be a lot of feminist-inspired dating mistakes, feminine overanalysis, and questionable advice.  For your reading enjoyment, I’ve compiled some of the most recent stuff.

Earlier this month, Female A, one of the board’s most prolific and well-liked posters who is internet famous outside of the board, posted that her mother had met a charming, extroverted young man at work who was brand new to town and had shown him A’s picture.  The young man was intrigued by the picture, and A’s mother, in true Mrs. Bennet fashion, started scheming to invite him over for dinner so he could meet A, who has not met anyone new in a long time.  The only problem is that the picture the young man saw is 13 years old, and A, by her own admission, no longer resembles the girl in the photo.  Most crucially, she is much heavier now.  A acknowledged that she didn’t think Young Man would be interested in her and that he could do much better than herself.  However, she has been in such a never-ending dry spell that she’s willing to cling to any shred of hope.

Any time a woman puts herself down to other women who like her, that is an automatic invitation for the other women to pile on with “don’t say that” compliments.  A 500-pound woman could tell her girlfriends, “No one will ever love me.  I’m too fat,” and whether or not the girlfriends secretly agreed with her, they would tell the fat girl, “Don’t say that!  That’s not true!  There’s someone for everyone!  You just need to find him!  Don’t give up!  You are the most loving and kind person I know and some man will be lucky to find you!”  It’s one of the unwritten rules of female friendship that when a friend denigrates herself, you must prop her up with praise, disregarding reality if necessary.

Anyhow, this is exactly what happened in the thread.  A lot of YOU STOP THAT RIGHT NOW, YOU ARE SO FUNNY AND SMART AND KIND, and GO FOR IT AND REPORT BACK!s.  So far there has been no reporting back, so I don’t know if Mom’s Dinner has happened, but Dr. Haley’s initial assessment is that things are going to go only so far as Mom’s Dinner and no further.  I’m guessing that Young Man is not going to like discovering that not only does A no longer resemble her picture, the main reason she no longer resembles it is because of her weight.  And she’s 13 years older.

Female B attends a church that a Nice Young Guy (whom I’ll call Brad) also attends.  They primarily see each other at church since they don’t live in the same town.  B has been harboring a crush on Brad for several months.  Finally they get to the point where Brad asks for B’s number via instant messenger.  B spends several days in anxiety as she waits for Brad’s call.

A week later, B reports back that Brad didn’t call but then called to apologize for not calling.  He’s been busy, you see, and he’ll call this next week when he has more free time.  She confronts him at church and becomes upset when she thinks he doesn’t want to talk to her.  So she approaches him after the service and asks if he even still wants to be friends.  He immediately answers yes, and B susses out that Brad had no idea that girls get upset when guys don’t call.  She also thinks he has never dated before.  They make plans to hang out later in the week.

Two days later B reports that Brad did come over and they made out.  Brad thinks she is beautiful and really likes her and just had to get over his nerves.  However, they are not yet “dating.”  B is glad she tolerated Brad’s shyness.  Other women in the thread congratulate B.

Yesterday (about two weeks later) B posts that she is no longer livid that Brad stood her up twice and then called four days after the fact to inform her that he was too busy for her and that he didn’t want B to get her hopes up for a relationship.  B is infuriated that Brad would kiss her and then do this.  B tries to get the last salvo in by telling Brad that she gave up hope after he stood her up the second time.  B’s girlfriends console her with talk of kicking him in the nuts.

Dr. Haley’s prognosis:  Brad was never that interested in B.  Most of the work in their “relationship” was on B’s end.  Brad, however, was probably consumed with churchian guilt over using B for smoochies and hence broke it off.

Male C reports that things are “going well” with the girl he is dating, but for the fact that she often will not contact him for a WEEK.  C finds this “frustrating.”

Dr. Haley’s prognosis:  C is this girl’s beta orbiter.  Her tingle for him, on a scale from 1 to 10, is around a 1.5.

How to write a beta profile.

Boundless has a new blogger by the name of Matthew. Here’s an excerpt from his introductory post:

I’m excited to be blogging here. Why? First of all, I’ve been reading Boundless for about six years, so I’m a little bit emotionally invested in the site. Also, I think we could use more single guys one here. Can I get an “amen”?

(That’s the first time I’ve ever said “Can I get an ‘amen’?” And I promise it’ll be my last. I’ll leave those kind of comments to Lisa A.)

OK, so, how about I share a little bit about myself here. Considering that you could read my bio, I’ll keep the cutesy details to a minimum. Mainly just some Boundless-type deets.

Such as: I mentioned above the fact that I’m single — contentedly single. That’s not to say I don’t want to be married; I certainly do. I should admit, though, that I’ve become truly, legitimately “marriage minded” only in the last little while.

…..

Also: I’m 27. Which feels so much younger than I thought it would back when I was 17. As it turns out, I’m enjoying being in my late 20s: I have enough experience out in the world — career-wise and otherwise — that it seems people are beginning to take me seriously. And I feel like I’ve honed in on what it is I want to do with my life — be a professor. So I guess getting older isn’t all bad.

Overly chipper, overly wordy, overly cutesy, on-the-nose, and super qualifying.  He has Future Youth Pastor written all over him.

One of these days I’ll do a post on writing, but here is a very good example of how to write about yourself in a way that advertises that you find cats more exciting than women.

Yes, true tale.

The latest hubbub at Boundless is over this article in Christianity Today.  Gina R. Dalfonzo, the article’s author, writes:

Once there was a good Christian girl who dreamed of growing up, getting married, and having children. She read all the right books and did all the right things. She read about how she was a princess in God’s sight and how he wanted the very best for her. She committed herself to sexual purity, to high standards, and to waiting for the good Christian man that God was going to bring her.

Just as she was getting old enough to start dating, however, she noticed something. Some of the popular Christian books were talking about not dating at all, and just being friends, until God had made it clear that the guy she liked was exactly the right one for her. Her Sunday school teachers taught from a very popular book about how dating was unbiblical, and how a truly righteous young Christian man would initiate a courtship with marriage as the goal, working in tandem with the girl’s father and the pastor and others in the church body.

……..

The girl was given to understand, from various quarters, that it was girls like her, girls who delayed marriage, that were the trouble with her generation, with Christianity, and with the country in general. She was informed that it was her own fault that she didn’t have the things that she longed and prayed for. She started to hear words like “spinster” and “bitter” and “self-absorbed” and “career woman” whispered around her.

And the girl grew tired.

She was tired of advice. She was tired of waiting. She was tired of hearing about Prince Charming and Mr. Darcy. Perhaps most of all, she was tired of shaking heads.

So she ran off with the first non-Christian man who showed some interest, asked her out, and treated her with respect. And the knowing ones shook their heads and said, “What happened to her? She used to be a good Christian girl.”

I’ve never read a more succinct compendium of all of the bad dating advice bandied about in church circles.  While not every single Christian woman over a certain age will run off with the first man who looks twice at her, whether or not he is a Christian, the temptation to do so will increase and the rationalizations will start to creep in.  As long as he had good morals… But if we got along really well… He wants the same things in life that I do… He’s kinder than any of the Christian men I know, and smarter and funnier, too… He’s the only man who has ever thought I was beautiful…

It’s tiresome to hear married Christians lecturing singles about God’s good gift of marriage and how we must wait patiently for God’s perfect timing, and the meantime work on perfecting our marital skills (except for sex), or some other drivel.  At some point, every Christian longtime single asks him- or herself, “Are my Christian principles the hill I want to die on?”  What Dalfonzo’s article points out is that for some, the answer is no.

A Christian woman who holds on to her principles sometimes ends up in limbo:  not cute and girly enough for Christian men, too prudish and boring for non-Christian men.  This is how a non-ugly-faced, non-fat young woman can spend over a decade with minimal male attention thrown her way.  I have this suspicion that men think that if they see a woman and think she’s attractive, the woman somehow automatically knows and it counts toward her inner mental count of male interest.  For many women, however, short of a definitive action such as being asked for her number or out on a date, the woman will never know.

By the way, yesterday was my birthday, or, more aptly, the __th anniversary of my increasing SMV irrelevance!  Feel free to congratulate me in the comments.

One thing women don’t want to hear.

There are a lot of things women don’t want to hear, but this one ranks pretty highly:

You’re the kind of girl men want to marry.

On its face, it’s not a bad thing to tell a single woman.  It’s a compliment to be wife material.  The problem is that the only time a single woman ever hears this is in the context of her not dating while she watches all of the sluttier dumber more fun girls getting asked out and being showered with male attention.  Usually this sentiment is uttered by an older married woman who is decades removed from singleness and has no clue how the current dating market operates.*  It’s even worse if it’s uttered by a newlywed.  (Marriage makes everyone a sage expert on relationships, and no one is sager or freer with advice than a woman who has been married fewer than two years.)

Single women really hate being told they’re marriage material, because what they hear is:

• You are not pretty.
• You are not fun.
• You are boring.
• You are staid and matronly.
• You are such a dud that men would rather spend time and money on stupid girls than you.
• You are such a dud that men would rather spend time and money on girls with bad personalities than you.
• You are not good enough for a man’s firstfruits; you get the leftovers after he’s had his fun with the fun girls and finally decides it’s time to be boring and settle down with the girl who “saved herself.”  Thank the Lord for the boring girls, because otherwise he would have to marry a dumb slut!

The companion sentiment just rubs salt in the wound:  I don’t understand why no one has snatched you up yet! (Also, Those guys don’t know what they’re missing!)

This just makes single women irate (on the inside).  They must smile politely and offer up a gently self-deprecating demurral, but in their minds they are screaming, “If I’m so great and I am truly what men want, then why don’t any men want me?!?!  HEY, YOU INSENSITIVE BOZO, HAS IT EVER OCCURRED TO YOU THAT I’M NOT THAT GREAT AND I’M NOT WHAT MEN WANT?  MEN WANT THE OPPOSITE OF ME AND YOU ARE NOT MAKING ME FEEL BETTER.”

I think a better approach is to agree with the single woman that it’s hard to find someone.  Affirm her feelings on the matter and encourage her to hang in there.  This other stuff is just damning with faint praise.

*My mother would be appalled and in denial if she were told that the current dating scene goes something like this:

1. Go to a party.
2. Get drunk.
3. Make out and/or have sex with someone you meet at the party.
4. Repeat steps 1-3 a few times with the same person.
5. If neither of you can find someone better at another party, decide you are now in a relationship, you guess.

OT: Go see Inception.

Inception was so good that I’m hijacking my own blog to tell people to see it.

Comments are open to spoilers, so reader beware if you haven’t seen the movie yet.

…Okay, slightly on-topic:  all of the actors, both male and female, in this movie are beautifully lensed and a pleasure to look at.  However, even though Tom Hardy’s Eames has the devil-may-care alpha swagger, I was most taken with Cillian Murphy’s Robert Fischer.

People on the internet only date very attractive people.

I have noticed that no man on the internet ever dates a woman who is less than an 8.  Whenever men seek relationship advice, half the time they mention their girlfriend is an 8, sometimes a 9.  (No one dates 10s, because that would just be pretentious.)  If I ever see a man come out and admit that he’s dating a 5 or a 6 who loves him very much and does her best to make him happy, I will probably keel over.  But then I suppose that would mean that the man is either a 5 or 6 himself, or he’s slumming, and nobody wants to come clean on either count.  But since 5s and 6s are the bulk of the population, and the bulk of the population does marry, then someone is dating those people.

Just not people on the internet, I guess….

Even Christian girls want men to put the moves on them.

I am not advocating that men pressure women for sex, or refuse to take no or other signs of disinterest/discomfort for an answer.  But even a Christian woman wants to know that the man she is dating has some sexual interest in her.  This is not easy to determine if the man refuses to touch her in any way* or basically acts like there is a 3-foot virginity forcefield surrounding her that will not allow him to get any closer. (*Sidehugs excluded.)  If this goes on for long enough, the woman will seriously start to question why the man is even dating her.

The other reason a man should not act like he will become electrocuted should he touch the woman he is dating is that it’s a DLV.  It makes the man seem deferential and complacent – maybe even fearful – without even having tested the waters.  This is a big tingle-killer.  If a man tries to put his hand on the woman’s waist and she pulls away, and he doesn’t try again for the rest of the night, a woman will respect him more than if he never tried at all.

One caveat:  this kind of touching is generally not appropriate for a “getting to know you” date.  If you’re meeting a stranger or someone you only cursorily know at a coffee shop, for example, it’s better to keep your hands to yourself.  Otherwise you’ll just get branded Grabby McHandsallover:  Sex-Crazed Pervert.  But if you’ve been on a few dates and it’s looking like this may turn into a regular thing, a woman is going to want you to assert your sexual interest.  A little touch goes a long way in assuring a woman that you are attracted to her.

ManLingo: “I want to marry a girl like you.”

Sometimes when a man and woman become close friends, the man will say to the woman, “I want to marry someone like you” (or some variation thereof).

This is how the woman hears this statement:  “I am falling in love with you but I don’t know how to express it.”  Usually at this point in the relationship, the woman is harboring secret hope that the man is in love with her, because she is already in love with him.

This, however, is what the man really means:  “I want to find someone hotter who has your personality but I don’t want to hurt your feelings and actually tell you that I’m not physically attracted to you in the least.  Plus, I am enjoying your no-strings-attached company and you’ll do until I find someone who meets my criteria for physical attractiveness.”

On statutory rape.

Yesterday Roissy made a post about the show Californication, at first praising its portrayal of an unrepentant divorced manwhore named Frank Moody who is the master of cocky/funny game, then complaining that said character is also a white-knighting chump who defends all of the women who treat him badly.  One such woman happens to be a 17-year-old who seduces Frank, then steals his manuscript and passes it off as her own, while threatening him with the specter of statutory rape if he tries to expose her fraud.  Roissy then veered off on a tangent complaining about statutory rape laws and how inconvenient it is to have to think twice about having sex with an attractive young woman if there’s the possibility she’s underage.  After all, there are well-developed 13-year-olds out there!  Many of the commenters on the thread vehemently agreed – how dare these evil feminist laws exist that prevent men from taking what has historically been available to them!

The thing is, historically older men were able to have sex with attractive 15-year-olds because they married those 15-year-olds.  Which meant that in addition to getting the sex, these men were also taking on the responsibility of housing, clothing, and feeding these 15-year-olds – FOR LIFE.  And also taking care of any children their union might produce, which, in the time before birth control pills, patches, and implants, was highly likely (and one of the primary societal reasons for marriage to exist in the first place; a society of bastards won’t remain a society for long).  Even if a man were having sex with a 15-year-old on the downlow, if she got pregnant, he would be under enormous societal pressure to marry her so as to avoid the bastardy of her child.

Men today can still have sex with the 15-year-old of their dreams, legally, by marrying her.  At that age in the United States, parental consent is required, but surely an older man who has the skills to woo a busty and willing 15-year-old must have the ability to charm her parents as well, no?  But if all the 15-year-old and man want is sex, then why shouldn’t the law shield her from a man who will not marry her?  Who may pressure her to abort their child if she does conceive?  Who could leave her emotionally devastated when he tires of her and moves on to the next tasty 15-year-old?  Because the age of first marriage in the U.S. has risen so high, why shouldn’t there be laws shielding young women from early sexual experiences that will greatly impact their ability to marry later on?  How can it possibly make sense that a functional, stable society with a high age of first marriage also has a low age of consent?  If men want the age of consent to drop, then the age of first marriage has to drop with it.  No matter how sexually mature of a body a 15-year-old may have, her mental and emotional states are not nearly as developed as those of an older woman.  And even older women have great difficulty handling the emotional aftermath of sexual relationships that end.  If men will not be the guardians of a woman’s mind, heart, and body, then the state will step in and try to do the job.

Additionally, the reasoning behind these complaints smacks of Adam-and-Eve to me.  The men who gripe that they can’t go out and bang the voluptuous teenybopper of their choice without fear of criminal repercussion are the same ones who believe that women are fickle and irrational and are in great need of a man’s authority, guidance, and protection from herself in their lives…except when it comes to women’s sexual impulses, apparently.  Especially if they are impulsing in his direction.  Then it’s all the woman’s choice and “hey, she wanted it, so why is it my fault?” – just like Adam in the Garden of Eden when God confronts him about eating the fruit:  “the woman gave it to me, and I ate it.”  Interestingly, God does not say, “Well, Adam, you’re right.  You just did what Eve wanted you to do.  You’re off the hook, bro.”  Instead, God metes out a punishment with the ultimate domino effect – cursing all men to work to live – while specifically condemning him for listening to Eve.  The argument against the high age of statutory rape laws is as old as time, and about as effective.

There’s always a price to pay for sex, and female sexuality in particular has always been pretty pricey.  In the past, it was protected by social pressure and personal restraint through religious convictions.  Now that both of those have largely fallen by the wayside, the law has stepped in to mandate self-restraint.  Kind of ironic that women are more “available” than ever, but in order to achieve that, the most desirable women are less attainable than ever.