So now, onto the thoughts. The other day I watched He's Just Not That Into You. It was my second time watching it, yet I still felt the same sentiments that I originally felt. I was stunned by how obvious some of these things were. The character Justin Long plays is one in which he's a guy who knows how men are and knows how women are and has no problem telling the character played by Ginnifer Goodwin what men really think. So basically he tells her numerous times, that some guy is just not into her. So basically this guy tells her obvious things like, "If he isn't calling you, then he doesn't like you." Or something else like that. Something that should be obvious to everyone. And throughout the movie, the cute and likable Ginnifer Goodwin is fawning after guys that she doesn't even really like, and she is over-analyzing everything. Basically the stereotypical silly female. And it's kind of about how women are disillusioned about men since they are young. And I remember when I first watched it, I was sitting next to my sister, and I was shocked. I said, "Is this serious? Are women really like this?" She seemed offended, and said, "Yes! They are!" I am still confused. I mean I don't think I am like that, but yet again, I don't really ever have any hope with this business. For instance unlike Ginnifer Goodwin, who gives any guy who asks her number, and waits around all week for their call, I usually refuse people my number, or give them my number without the area code (which I regret because that guy does seem nice, and one day he came into the Kum & Go with no shirt on under his jacket, and let's just say yum). So to say the least, I don't get my hopes up. So maybe the reason that these women are like this is because they do get their hopes up. But I still think it's extremely depressing. That women are conditioned like they were in this movie. It actually reminded me of Brave New World by Aldous Huxley. Like how Mustapha Mond says, "One believes things because one has been conditioned to believe them." In the movie, they show a flash back of Ginnifer Goodwin when she was younger and a boy pushes her. She goes to a teacher and the teacher tells her that the boy is mean to her because he likes her. I know I've heard that many a times in my youth, yet it thankfully did not stick. However, imagine if it did stick? Imagine how people might act if it did stick. The idea that if men are mean to women, that means they like them. No wonder women love bad boys. Let's talk about domestic violence, huh? The shit that is force-fed down little girls throats is atrocious. I mean believe me, I know what its like to have a sexist father, I know what its like to feel like its worthless just because you are a woman. Thankfully I have been able to teach myself out of that way of thinking, but it's still going on for other women, and they don't have the strength to break that sort of thought. That's what I find sad. And that is what I saw in this movie. Women thinking the way society tells them to think. It is sad. Just like how Pecola in The Bluest Eye was conditioned into thinking that pretty meant having blue eyes.
However, it's even bigger than just women. Technically we are all conditioned to live a certain way, including men. I mean why can't a woman ask a man out? Why can't a man be the "weaker one"? Because society dictates life that way. It really is quite silly. I mean just like people so-and-so many years ago were conditioned to think that gay people were an abomination, and that it was a sickness. Or before that, conditioned to think that divorce was an atrocity. And before that, that beating children was totally cool. I can't decide whether or not the fact that society dictates norm is good or bad. I mean technically since the social norms are getting better, that would mean that society as a whole is progressing, therefore it would be good. And I mean if society didn't control the norms, then how would things go? I think it is one of those things that cannot be changed. It is a cause and effect sort of thing, and it cannot ever be a different way. It is a part of life. I don't really think its bad, just as long as society continues to progress in a good way. But knowing our system, it could easily start to go to a place that will cause the degradation of the people. Thats another thing that reminds me of Brave New World, like in that futuristic world it was a social norm to be sexually free at a very young age, and to use and manufacture humans just as they would computers. That's what I don't like about this idea. Because even in this book, the people who revolt against the norm get sent to an island, and can't make trouble.
Alas, this must be the natural progression of things. Things will get better, and then they will get worse, and then they will get better, and so forth. It's nice to know that much.
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