The Metrosexual Male

June 26, 2003

It's the latest trend in the decline of the American male: metrosexuals.

Metrosexuals, according to the New York Times, "are straight urban men who are willing, even eager, to embrace their feminine sides." They love to shop with their gal pals. They wear designer jeans, fashionable tops and have long conversations about thread counts. Some even wear makeup and nail polish

Take 30-year-old Karru Martinson. "He uses a $40 face cream, wears Bruno Magli shoes and custom-tailored shirts," says the Times. "His hair is always just so, thanks to three brands of shampoo and the precise application of three hair grooming products: Textureline Smoothing Serum, got2b styling glue and Suave Rave hairspray."

The little twit.

We must go back a little ways to see how the American male has ended up in such a pathetic state. Some feminists weren't content to improve equality and opportunity for women. No, they wanted to destroy the enemy and the enemy was the American male.

Though feminists must be credited for their brilliant strategy. First they convinced men that we were wrong, that our tendencies and habits were products of how we were socialized as boys. They changed the socialization process to make us more sensitive, more emotional, more like women.

Once the door was open the marketers, those parasites, drove a Mack truck through it. They applied the same techniques on men that had always been successful with women. They beat us down and made us feel fat, ugly and unwanted so that we'd buy their lies, and the many useless products they advertise, to make ourselves feel better.

Boy, have they succeeded. Whereas men used to talk about sports or transmission maintenance, now they argue over botox and liposuction. Instead of watching football at the neighborhood pub, they're at the mall trying on jeans and tops and spike heels.

And while men have turned into women, women have turned into men. Whereas television depicts men as wimps and goofs, women are routinely depicted as being strong, decisive and athletic. One ad, which promotes a product to quit smoking, shows angry women kicking the bejesus out of a large cigarette.

I've met lots of "masculinated" women here in Washington. They work long hours in their high-stress corporate jobs. They are aggressive and decisive 70 hours a week. To climb the corporate ladder, they suppress their emotions, their individuality, their femininity. Then they use their hard-gotten gains to buy hard-charging sports cars which they drive aggressively, the way men used to.

And much of what men and women have allowed themselves to become is bunk.

Look, if you want to see what men and women really are, go to a playground. By nature, girls are softer and gentler. They like fashion and nail polish and playing with dolls. By nature, boys are rough and tumble. They like trucks and tools and they couldn't care less about their clothing or how their hair looks. Until they become feminized metrosexuals, that is.

Now I know you metrosexual fellows are highly sensitive, but it's time somebody reintroduces some basic facts about being a man:

The average American male should NOT enjoy shopping. You may go shopping but only under duress, and if you do go, you should whine and complain until your girlfriend or wife finally gives up and agrees to go home.

You should NOT know the difference between mauve and taupe. You should not know what mauve and taupe even look like. You should never, under any circumstances, mention either word, not even to your mother.

Most importantly, you should stop defining who you are by the trendy fashions and gadgets you adorn yourself with. A man is not a man until he defines himself by his depth and substance - integrity, honesty, compassion - and by his actions, not by how he looks.

The fact is, my metrosexual friends, that despite all the efforts to pretend that men can be like women and women like men, men and women are still very distinct and unique and neither sex will be happy until we admit it.

In fact, a recent study came out with an interesting conclusion. Male sweat has a calming effect on women. This probably traces back to a time when males showed their love by sweating long and hard for their women, not by shopping with them.

Of course, men of old didn't have to worry about sweating. They didn't pay $135 for a lousy pair of jeans.

Tom Purcell