There was this cover story on Sunday Life! today which was really interesting.
I found it so interesting I had to write a post on it.
Basically it talked about how a recent survey found that S’pore women had extremely high expectations of men when it came to dating.
The full article can be read (here).
I shall quote what I felt was the most important paragraph:
“…according to a recent survey of 200 singles by the Social Development Service, which found that women’s expectations of their male dates are more like they are going out with Prince Charming than a real, live man. Get this: The survey found that they expect their men to pay for their dates, deposit them safely home afterwards, initiate celebrations and dress up on special occasions, meet them at least twice a week, open doors to cars and restaurants and – oh – some even expect guys to carry their handbags for them. Yes, handbags.”
My immediate response to reading the above is: That’s why they’re still single!
Ok, that was a bit mean I know…but what can I say. The last time I saw a Prince Charming was in Tokyo Disneyland.
…
Now I don’t wanna start some gender war here, so let me just reproduce some of the quotes pertaining to the article which I totally agreed with.
“I want a guy who can just be himself and who is secure about who he is. If he thinks he can impress me simply by sending me home but has nothing interesting to say during the date, then, sorry.” – Actress Tan Kheng Hua, 45
“How do these women expect to be taken seriously or seen as an equal partner in a relationship when they can’t even carry their own handbags or open doors? I’m not saying fight him to the door. If it makes your man happy to do these things, it’s perfectly okay to let him. But we set ourselves up for failure and disappointment when we put the pressure on the opposite sex to do all the things that we’re perfectly capable of doing.” – Image consultant Sara Dean, 40
“In Japan, many women of my generation don’t expect men to do anything special for them. It’s nice if he opens doors for me, but I’m physically capable of opening them myself.” – Ms Mika Fujii, 41
Hear hear!
Yes I read!!! Disgusting – the handbag and high expectations part.
Methinks it’s not right to focus on those “attributes” and completely lose focus on the REAL attributes.
I always think that when a man is chasing after a woman, he is capable of moving mountains, drying up oceans etc. upon her request. But once he “attains his prize”, that’s it, the magic’s all gone.
That’s why, I feel partly why some people are disappointed and dissatisfied with their relationship/marriage could be the fact that the other wasn’t being the Real him/her during courtship.
So to those who were surveyed and gave those answers… Dream On! ;p
Yeah, that’s true. I totally agree. People, especially guys, tend to be least “real” when they’re in the courtship stage, I feel.
I’m not sure why so many local females out there place such overly high expectations of males on attributes which are more superficial than anything else.
Although I am somewhat old-fashioned in thinking, the guy can occasionally do those special things like open the doors for ladies. It doesn’t have to be all the time lah. Maybe sometimes. For a fact, I think Singaporean men don’t really do these things very often, so got to be practical.
Well, the sending the girl home part is probably more of a security thing. If not to the doorstep, maybe just checking that she reached home safely is good (although if anything really happened, it’ll be too late). Sorry, I probably have a bleak view of the safety we have these days.
However, the handbag part really turns me off. It’s so uncool for a man to carry a lady’s handbag and it’s really awkward (how is he going carry it?!). Surely a lady can carry her own handbag! Also for practical reasons. Not that I’m saying anything bad lah, but what if he goes off with your handbag somewhere then you have nothing on you! :P
haha. i wanted to respond to that article on my blog too.
i don’t expect guys to send me home or open doors for me..but when they do, it does reflect that they care enough for me, and also on their own level of social etiquette. it really does impress.
i dun believe in guys carrying girls’ handbags… but u’noe what, my dad does help us (his daughters) carry our girly bags when its too heavy. And the fact that he offers shows that he’s not afraid to put down his own manly “pride”/face for our comfort and that’s rather impressive. If i’m lugging a laptop/carrying heavy bags/groceries, etc , it wld really be v nice if the guy offers to help me lug it.
its not so much abt “expectations”, than a reflection of what is within the guy that is expressed through his actions.
Lingfeng: Agreed. Sending the girl home is an act of concern, because he wants to ensure that she’s back home safe & sound.
TSL: Agreed also. If a guy does it, it would certainly impress. Bonus points for him! And true, what a guy does is usually an expression of what is within him. He might be extra “fake” during the courtship phase, but time will tell in the end.
You know, if you compare the responses here with the ones in the newspapers, you begin to wonder if there is something wrong with the sample the papers chose to survey, or that Jeremy, your friends are just abnormal. I prefer to think the former. Ronnie has *never* carried my handbags, nor opened *any door* (not car door, not house door, not shopping mall door, zilch) for me and I’m married to him. Personally, I think these “majority” that was surveyed are the ones that give us, Singapore women, a bad name. I wonder if this Mak Mun Sun person is male or female. Cos if he/she were female, either she’s one of them men-worship-me women, or she just did herself and her kind much injustice.
Kat, I think Mak Mun Sun just needed something to write about, and he/she decided to sensationalise what might have actually been an insignificant and unimportant survey result. Sometimes writers just spin a story out of nothing, cos they’re desperate to submit something in.
hmm…i believe such guys still exist cos out of most of the guy i met are like that. hehehe….