It seems I am going to be complaing about “inspirational” quotes again… The proper response to this might be to delete my FB account, but I just can’t help myself. Annoyance is good fuel for writing as well so it’s not all bad…
The category I am going to hate on today are the quotes that attempt to be empowering and do this by questioning the “realness” of other men and women. Some examples:
It might just be the fact that English isn’t my mother tongue, cause I don’t know what half of this stuff even means! The adjective “real” in this context can mean anything varying from “brave” to “honest” and from “sophisticated” to “independent”. And what’s more, it feels like it’s not even really meant as a declaration of “realness” as much as it is a diss to someone they consider to be the opposite of real… which is what…. a man? not human (zombie?)? an un-woman… really no clue…
…and one last thing, somewhat unrelated: WHY is it so hard to remember that womAn is the singular form?! Nobody talks about “a men” but when it comes to the female version it gets confusing for some reason….. Maybe because we often travel in packs and are not seen as individuals until later on in life?
Anyhow…. back to the real topic of today… because there is also a category about “real” men (yes, this is the plural form), that needs to be addressed. These quotes are actually usually quite boring, imo, as they are mostly just a creative attempt by some women to vent about their exes or just another way of dealing with being turned down, because you see, he just wasn’t “real” enough to deal with her… You ready for this?
COME ON, ladies…… This just makes me feel ashamed of my gender…. Give the guys a break already… How can the dudes ever live up to this shit? If the guys you are dating keep turning out to be shitty specimens, maybe there’s something you are doing that is making them behave this way!
And I haven’t even discussed the “what-he-says-and-means-vs-what-she-says-and-means”-quotes that go around……… You know the ones…… Man, they annoy the heck out of me…
This last category might need a whole blog of its own, to be honest. And I must confess I’m actually a lousy woman in this discussion because I totally agree with a lot of the complaints guys have about us, as far as our indirect communication goes, our weird expectations and fickleness. I am totally that way sometimes (but I do apologize later (sometimes))!
How DO we coexist? I guess it’s all about finding the balance, right?
Epiphany 
I suppose I should be glad that almost everyone I know on FB thinks memes like these are transphobic or just dumb.
“Real” is opposed to “false”; a false woman is secretly a man; a false man is secretly a woman. Say what one will about popular media and the trans* cause, but plenty of people still think trans folks are disgusting gender deviants, and use the threat of being a bad member of the group as a form of social coercion.
In other words, it’s a form of bullying, just like calling someone “gay” in elementary school just because they don’t like the same movies as you or some other stupid thing. (Though occasionally, of course, the advice is perfectly sound.)
Thanks for the comment. On the mark, as always!
My default response to anything like those “real” sayings is “A real man does not allow another person to dictate to him the terms of his masculinity.” That usually shuts them up pretty quick.
“It might just be the fact that English isn’t my mother tongue” – that makes me curious, what is your first language?
I’m Dutch. 🙂
Given the transgender craze, I believe that the term “a real man” will soon have a very different meaning. 🙂
Haha yes, could be. But on the bright side: using “real” in its most literal sense would make things much more understandable to me. :p