The classy, healthy, and ethical thing to do is move on
April 12, 2024 12:37 AM Subscribe
Rejection isn’t the same as heartbreak, which entails a past acceptance. A rejection implies that you don’t even warrant a try. From the reject’s perspective, the reciprocity of heartbreak looks pretty appealing. And if you’re going to suffer, it may as well be exciting. Who would choose the flat desolation of rejection over rough-and-tumble drama, especially if they end the same way? The cliché—tis better to have loved and lost than never to have loved at all—is comforting to the heartbroken, but damning to the rejected. No matter how unpleasant or unequal, a breakup is at least something you share with someone else. Rejection makes only one reject. from The Rejection Plot by Tony Tulathimutte [The Paris Review; ungated]
I think like everything else, it really depends on the rejection. But I also think he's actually not talking about all rejection, but really one specific kind of rejection - hypergamic heterosexual man-by-woman rejection. And I think the reason this is such an issue is specifically because it is a way that many men conceive of their own self worth, rather than specifically being about the woman that they are pursuing.
It's woven through the article, as well - the sense of being rejected not just by this woman but by all women, of being rejected as a man as Not Good Enough. And that's a different caliber of rejection than 'Well, I gave this thing a shot and it didn't work, but I've had some successful and unsuccessful relationships before, so I know another one will happen sometime in the future."
Because like - I've definitely had some stinging rejections, but I've also had some delightful romances, so I mostly don't remember the rejections unless I pull them out to think about them. But if *all* you have is the rejections, then yeah, they're what you're going to fixate about.
posted by corb at 4:45 AM on April 12 [13 favorites]
It's woven through the article, as well - the sense of being rejected not just by this woman but by all women, of being rejected as a man as Not Good Enough. And that's a different caliber of rejection than 'Well, I gave this thing a shot and it didn't work, but I've had some successful and unsuccessful relationships before, so I know another one will happen sometime in the future."
Because like - I've definitely had some stinging rejections, but I've also had some delightful romances, so I mostly don't remember the rejections unless I pull them out to think about them. But if *all* you have is the rejections, then yeah, they're what you're going to fixate about.
posted by corb at 4:45 AM on April 12 [13 favorites]
I think there's an aspect that the author completely ignores and I think it weakens things: gender interactions. While the experience of rejection happens to almost everyone of all orientations, the negative reactions he writes about are usually men obsessing about women. And when it spills into violence, it is so much more likely to be men rather than women committing the violence (98% of mass shootings are by men (almost entirely cis men)). I don't know how much has been written, especially in the literary canon, about women's experiences with rejection. Perhaps the author didn't have the resources to draw on. But if he did not have them, he never mentioned that.
I think part of this is that men are not trained to subordinate their wants and desires to anyone, thus allowing them to act on the pain that is discussed in the article.
I do appreciate the article and agree that we need to create a script that allows men to more easily move on and not become obsessive. However, I think it is a mistake to cast it as a universal.
Looking at the substance of the article through this lens, is it that there need to be more stories (both in high culture and mass media) about men being rejected, not persisting in an effort to get the girl, and still being heroes. Maybe even in spite of or because of the rejection, perhaps having the rejection be a noble thing. The author finds a single instance in the literary canon, in a book that I had never heard of and suspect that most English speakers have not as well. And moving to popular media, the only work I can think of where the guy gets rejected and isn't about him trying to get her back is Rent of all things. Mark follows the called in advice and lets things go with Maureen. But beyond that, I can't think of any more. Even Casablanca, which is as close to a perfect film as I have ever seen, the one doing the rejecting is the man, being wiser than the female and setting their lives in motion. (I'll also give some credit to the Princess Bride, as Wesley accepts the rejection, only for Buttercup to realize who he is and follow him.)
All this is to say that yes, we need more media, both high and low brow, which normalizes rejection, but we need to acknowledge that this is primarily an issue of men when it gets to the level of violence. Ignoring that ignores part of why many men cannot let things go and limits the amount of work that can be done on the extreme end of the spectrum.
posted by Hactar at 5:02 AM on April 12 [16 favorites]
I think part of this is that men are not trained to subordinate their wants and desires to anyone, thus allowing them to act on the pain that is discussed in the article.
I do appreciate the article and agree that we need to create a script that allows men to more easily move on and not become obsessive. However, I think it is a mistake to cast it as a universal.
Looking at the substance of the article through this lens, is it that there need to be more stories (both in high culture and mass media) about men being rejected, not persisting in an effort to get the girl, and still being heroes. Maybe even in spite of or because of the rejection, perhaps having the rejection be a noble thing. The author finds a single instance in the literary canon, in a book that I had never heard of and suspect that most English speakers have not as well. And moving to popular media, the only work I can think of where the guy gets rejected and isn't about him trying to get her back is Rent of all things. Mark follows the called in advice and lets things go with Maureen. But beyond that, I can't think of any more. Even Casablanca, which is as close to a perfect film as I have ever seen, the one doing the rejecting is the man, being wiser than the female and setting their lives in motion. (I'll also give some credit to the Princess Bride, as Wesley accepts the rejection, only for Buttercup to realize who he is and follow him.)
All this is to say that yes, we need more media, both high and low brow, which normalizes rejection, but we need to acknowledge that this is primarily an issue of men when it gets to the level of violence. Ignoring that ignores part of why many men cannot let things go and limits the amount of work that can be done on the extreme end of the spectrum.
posted by Hactar at 5:02 AM on April 12 [16 favorites]
After I hit post, I see that corb wrote it better and more concisely than I did. This in my reminder to hit preview after I've been writing for a while.
posted by Hactar at 5:03 AM on April 12 [3 favorites]
posted by Hactar at 5:03 AM on April 12 [3 favorites]
This is a long-ass article; I read parts and skimmed the rest. Mostly, I just can't relate at a personal level. I've been romantically rejected (usually from misreading a situation, like where one of you thinks you are on a date and the other person is enjoying a casual platonic hangout; queue awkwardness when things are discussed) and it stings in the moment but I've never had the lingering, resentment-filled reaction that the article is focusing on. There's lots of great literature that centers on someone getting all hung up on an unrequited situation, but in real life most people seem to manage to move on pretty well.
Also, this snippet, quoting from and paraphrasing some researchers, feels like it edges perilously close to incel-dom: Certain categories of people are more likely to be rejected: those considered “dangerous, having little to offer, as exploitative, or rejecting of us.” And the leading cause of rejection, they argue, is hypergamy: desiring people more desirable than oneself.
I'm not saying the research is wrong, but this also is something I can't personally relate to.
From a comment above:
(98% of mass shootings are by men (almost entirely cis men))
Yeahbut what about all the movies and series about a psychopath trans serial killer? Have I been lied to all this time?
posted by Dip Flash at 6:05 AM on April 12 [4 favorites]
Also, this snippet, quoting from and paraphrasing some researchers, feels like it edges perilously close to incel-dom: Certain categories of people are more likely to be rejected: those considered “dangerous, having little to offer, as exploitative, or rejecting of us.” And the leading cause of rejection, they argue, is hypergamy: desiring people more desirable than oneself.
I'm not saying the research is wrong, but this also is something I can't personally relate to.
From a comment above:
(98% of mass shootings are by men (almost entirely cis men))
Yeahbut what about all the movies and series about a psychopath trans serial killer? Have I been lied to all this time?
posted by Dip Flash at 6:05 AM on April 12 [4 favorites]
Yeahbut what about all the movies and series about a psychopath trans serial killer?
You leave Angela Baker out of this!
posted by Faint of Butt at 6:19 AM on April 12 [4 favorites]
You leave Angela Baker out of this!
posted by Faint of Butt at 6:19 AM on April 12 [4 favorites]
CTRL-F "Incel"
Not there. Huh.
On the one hand, I think it's useful to try to understand why (some) men react so poorly to rejection, and on the other hand, some of this seems less like understanding and more like justifying.
Looking at it through the lens of 'a literary plot' and then sprinkling it with real world examples of men terrorizing women who rejected them just gives me bad vibes. Real women really die from this stuff, it's not a literary or intellectual exercise.
posted by jacquilynne at 6:21 AM on April 12 [16 favorites]
Not there. Huh.
On the one hand, I think it's useful to try to understand why (some) men react so poorly to rejection, and on the other hand, some of this seems less like understanding and more like justifying.
Looking at it through the lens of 'a literary plot' and then sprinkling it with real world examples of men terrorizing women who rejected them just gives me bad vibes. Real women really die from this stuff, it's not a literary or intellectual exercise.
posted by jacquilynne at 6:21 AM on April 12 [16 favorites]
Yeah. I’m a woman and I’ve been rejected by men a bunch of times (it’s pretty normal) and I’ve never felt a murderous impulse. I haven’t even felt so much angry as I have worthless and disgusting. But that’s also because some men, even in their rejecting, still manage to be kinda violent.
I mean, like literally a dude once trashed a bunch of furniture in my yard and threatened to punch me because he was being flirty and I asked if he wanted to kiss me because he literally thought I was insulting him by imagining that he was of so little value that he might be attracted to “something like you, “
But like I’ve also had men tell me they’d hurt me if I admitted to anyone we hooked up.
So I don’t know. I like being single. Toxic masculinity is a shitty drug, I guess
posted by thivaia at 6:29 AM on April 12 [17 favorites]
I mean, like literally a dude once trashed a bunch of furniture in my yard and threatened to punch me because he was being flirty and I asked if he wanted to kiss me because he literally thought I was insulting him by imagining that he was of so little value that he might be attracted to “something like you, “
But like I’ve also had men tell me they’d hurt me if I admitted to anyone we hooked up.
So I don’t know. I like being single. Toxic masculinity is a shitty drug, I guess
posted by thivaia at 6:29 AM on April 12 [17 favorites]
"Did this piece strike anyone else as an extremely humanities-nerd cover for the author’s own wallowing about someone offstage? I guess I can’t fault that, if so. Certainly better than a mass shooting."
It was a very long piece, and I'm not sure what its thesis was. So yeah, the article reads like the author working through his own stuff.
And hey, we've all been there, some rejections hurt a lot more than others. No-one wants to be rejected, no-one wants to have to face unpleasant truths about themselves. And this article seems like a big, long exercise in avoidance, looking to outside sources and for a 'plot', when the answers lie within. This is a long journey, but at the end -- you've always had the power, my dear.
posted by Capt. Renault at 7:02 AM on April 12 [6 favorites]
It was a very long piece, and I'm not sure what its thesis was. So yeah, the article reads like the author working through his own stuff.
And hey, we've all been there, some rejections hurt a lot more than others. No-one wants to be rejected, no-one wants to have to face unpleasant truths about themselves. And this article seems like a big, long exercise in avoidance, looking to outside sources and for a 'plot', when the answers lie within. This is a long journey, but at the end -- you've always had the power, my dear.
posted by Capt. Renault at 7:02 AM on April 12 [6 favorites]
I don't think we need a better script for accepting rejection. What we need is men to stop viewing women as supporting characters (or props) in their narrative. Women are people and sometimes they won't want what you want. The world is not a story. It is most definitely not a story about you.
posted by The Manwich Horror at 7:07 AM on April 12 [20 favorites]
posted by The Manwich Horror at 7:07 AM on April 12 [20 favorites]
I also feel like this dude thinks he's read a lot of literature but also hasn't actually read a lot of literature written before the nuclear family started being held up as the pinnacle of existence. Because classic literature is all about dudes getting rejected and finding ways to move on and do other things with their lives.
Cyrano de Bergerac! Dude accepts that he will be rejected, pre-rejects himself, if you will, and instead of being all "Fuck Roxanne, what a bitch, I'm going to hate her forever," once he realizes he can't have her, proceeds to just be a loyal and helpful friend for decades until he dies, never complaining about it. (Yes, there's some other stuff in the middle, I know, but STILL).
There's an awful lot of late-1800s early-1900s literature where dude gets rejected, and is like "I still consider myself your loyal suitor and protector and committed to your happiness, now I will make sure you lead a happy life while I go off and Slay Tigers or Climb Mountains or Become A War Hero or whatever.
God, I'm getting so thinky in my old age, but I think one of the major problems with rejection right now in this current moment for all people but especially for men in particular is that they don't feel there are any models for how to live an unpartnered life. And so we kind of socially push people to move on romantically before they're ready, because the idea of someone being *alone* is viewed as this horrendous Horror That Must Not Be Named.
In reality I think it actually is really normal for people to have long exit periods from romantic affection, and I think the world would probably be much better off if we gave them those grace periods rather than tried to push them into new romantic relationships where they then create baggage for new people anyway even if they do succeed. Nobody wins when someone's in a new relationship pining over the one that got away.
posted by corb at 7:16 AM on April 12 [22 favorites]
Cyrano de Bergerac! Dude accepts that he will be rejected, pre-rejects himself, if you will, and instead of being all "Fuck Roxanne, what a bitch, I'm going to hate her forever," once he realizes he can't have her, proceeds to just be a loyal and helpful friend for decades until he dies, never complaining about it. (Yes, there's some other stuff in the middle, I know, but STILL).
There's an awful lot of late-1800s early-1900s literature where dude gets rejected, and is like "I still consider myself your loyal suitor and protector and committed to your happiness, now I will make sure you lead a happy life while I go off and Slay Tigers or Climb Mountains or Become A War Hero or whatever.
God, I'm getting so thinky in my old age, but I think one of the major problems with rejection right now in this current moment for all people but especially for men in particular is that they don't feel there are any models for how to live an unpartnered life. And so we kind of socially push people to move on romantically before they're ready, because the idea of someone being *alone* is viewed as this horrendous Horror That Must Not Be Named.
In reality I think it actually is really normal for people to have long exit periods from romantic affection, and I think the world would probably be much better off if we gave them those grace periods rather than tried to push them into new romantic relationships where they then create baggage for new people anyway even if they do succeed. Nobody wins when someone's in a new relationship pining over the one that got away.
posted by corb at 7:16 AM on April 12 [22 favorites]
a breakup is at least something you share with someone else. Rejection makes only one reject.
what.
Rejectors have their prefab lines (“It’s not you, it’s me,” “I’m not dating right now,” “We’re not a good match”), but rejects don’t. What is there to say, after all?
What?
There may be no good way to accept rejection, but there are many terrible ways
literally what the actual fuck
Something is the matter with this person.
posted by We put our faith in Blast Hardcheese at 7:21 AM on April 12 [13 favorites]
what.
Rejectors have their prefab lines (“It’s not you, it’s me,” “I’m not dating right now,” “We’re not a good match”), but rejects don’t. What is there to say, after all?
What?
There may be no good way to accept rejection, but there are many terrible ways
literally what the actual fuck
Something is the matter with this person.
posted by We put our faith in Blast Hardcheese at 7:21 AM on April 12 [13 favorites]
The classy, healthy, and ethical thing to do is move on
He could have saved himself a lot of time by skipping ahead and just starting there.
posted by I_Love_Bananas at 7:25 AM on April 12 [8 favorites]
He could have saved himself a lot of time by skipping ahead and just starting there.
posted by I_Love_Bananas at 7:25 AM on April 12 [8 favorites]
But I also think he's actually not talking about all rejection, but really one specific kind of rejection - hypergamic heterosexual man-by-woman rejection. And I think the reason this is such an issue is specifically because it is a way that many men conceive of their own self worth, rather than specifically being about the woman that they are pursuing.
This rings really true. Yeah. I’ve known people like this, specifically men like this, for whom every step on the path to reproduction is a referendum on their manhood and therefore is viewed through a lens of threat rather than love or joy. It’s really terribly sad because there is no point at which someone like this can rest. It doesn’t actually end when the wedding bells ring. I wish it did. Now I’m sad.
posted by eirias at 9:32 AM on April 12 [7 favorites]
This rings really true. Yeah. I’ve known people like this, specifically men like this, for whom every step on the path to reproduction is a referendum on their manhood and therefore is viewed through a lens of threat rather than love or joy. It’s really terribly sad because there is no point at which someone like this can rest. It doesn’t actually end when the wedding bells ring. I wish it did. Now I’m sad.
posted by eirias at 9:32 AM on April 12 [7 favorites]
tis better to have loved and lost
...much, much better, in my case.
posted by Droll Lord at 1:21 PM on April 12 [3 favorites]
...much, much better, in my case.
posted by Droll Lord at 1:21 PM on April 12 [3 favorites]
This was difficult to read, and I mean that literally. Was there a thesis here?
posted by bq at 1:37 PM on April 12 [4 favorites]
posted by bq at 1:37 PM on April 12 [4 favorites]
because it is a way that many men conceive of their own self worth, rather than specifically being about the woman that they are pursuing.
"I am Kenough."
posted by AlSweigart at 4:38 AM on April 13 [5 favorites]
"I am Kenough."
posted by AlSweigart at 4:38 AM on April 13 [5 favorites]
I hate rejecting men. HATE IT. I am well aware that I can't afford to be picky and I cannot and should not be turning men down and that I should be "giving them a chance." Unfortunately I am hardly ever attracted to anyone and "give them a chance" when I know I already feel nothing doesn't work with me. I don't have better options out there and I need to take what I'm given. I know I'm a jerk for not going out with them. Also, it's terrifying to turn down a man because you never know how he's going to react. Hell, he might get homicidal. Is it them? Is it me? Probably both, really. I don't want to have to hurt anyone's feelings, except I can't just boink them either.
posted by jenfullmoon at 7:12 AM on April 13
posted by jenfullmoon at 7:12 AM on April 13
Would have preferred this if it spent more time on actual literary examples! I just reread Middlemarch and there are at least three romantic rejections contained in its enormous plot. I would argue that in all three the rejected party is ennobled in some way, at least temporarily. And since it’s Middlemarch, in each case the interiority of both parties is conveyed with deep empathy. This piece seems to consider a rejection plot only from the perspective of the person being rejected.
posted by yarrow at 8:26 AM on April 13 [3 favorites]
posted by yarrow at 8:26 AM on April 13 [3 favorites]
I know I'm a jerk for not going out with them.
On the slim chance this isn't sarcasm, no you're not.
You do not owe anyone your time or your intimacy. If a particular relationship doesn't bring you joy and pleasure that is 100% solid grounds to say no.
I know men can be entitled jerks, but please don't anyone internalize that entitlement. You do not owe men any part of yourself you do not actively want to share.
posted by The Manwich Horror at 10:03 AM on April 13 [5 favorites]
On the slim chance this isn't sarcasm, no you're not.
You do not owe anyone your time or your intimacy. If a particular relationship doesn't bring you joy and pleasure that is 100% solid grounds to say no.
I know men can be entitled jerks, but please don't anyone internalize that entitlement. You do not owe men any part of yourself you do not actively want to share.
posted by The Manwich Horror at 10:03 AM on April 13 [5 favorites]
I am well aware that I can't afford to be picky and I cannot and should not be turning men down and that I should be "giving them a chance."
So I have a hot and I believe entirely correct take that actually both the "I can't afford to be picky" and the "give things a chance" movement are actually harmful not only personally but also even from a romantic-utilitarian perspective.
I have been really fascinated due to personal circumstances both by people who have had long term partners and then broken up or gotten divorces later in life, and also by people who have had a number of short term partners such that people predicted they would never find a long term partner, and then against all odds did, and have been spending a lot of time talking to both partners in such relationships. Some interesting takeaways:
First, a lot of the divorces were where at least one partner might not have admitted it at the time, or might still not do so publicly, but where they had some version of the "I can't afford to be picky." There were either major red flags that they chose to ignore, or they were aware that things didn't really click in the way that they should be clicking for a 'for the rest of your life' relationship. I'm going to be super honest that in my own divorce, I was this partner. When I got married, I thought of myself, at least on some level, as 'the fat single mom who would always get picked last at romantic baseball', and when some guy did "pick me first", I thought that I had better take him up on it while the getting was good.
But what that marriage meant was just a longer term version of what a long of my friends that experienced short term relationships they weren't that into were experiencing, which is: they weren't emotionally invested enough to really commit, but the relationship wasn't bad enough for them to feel "justified" leaving. But each and every relationship, for all of us, took us 'off the market' for several years when we could have been finding better partners for ourselves.
And like, that's the thing. Those partners exist. We tell ourselves that they don't, and that's why it's okay to settle, but they do, it's just that we will never know it if we are out on dates with people we're not that into. And neither will our dates! Because we are wasting their time as well as our own. In this great mass of the world there is a whole host of people who are all dating the wrong people instead of staying single until they date the right one, which means almost no one is single at the right time *to* date, which makes us all long-term-single longer.
Give no chances. Build a better world. If you don't feel delighted to be in their presence, throw them back in the sea for another person fishing.
posted by corb at 10:55 AM on April 13 [5 favorites]
So I have a hot and I believe entirely correct take that actually both the "I can't afford to be picky" and the "give things a chance" movement are actually harmful not only personally but also even from a romantic-utilitarian perspective.
I have been really fascinated due to personal circumstances both by people who have had long term partners and then broken up or gotten divorces later in life, and also by people who have had a number of short term partners such that people predicted they would never find a long term partner, and then against all odds did, and have been spending a lot of time talking to both partners in such relationships. Some interesting takeaways:
First, a lot of the divorces were where at least one partner might not have admitted it at the time, or might still not do so publicly, but where they had some version of the "I can't afford to be picky." There were either major red flags that they chose to ignore, or they were aware that things didn't really click in the way that they should be clicking for a 'for the rest of your life' relationship. I'm going to be super honest that in my own divorce, I was this partner. When I got married, I thought of myself, at least on some level, as 'the fat single mom who would always get picked last at romantic baseball', and when some guy did "pick me first", I thought that I had better take him up on it while the getting was good.
But what that marriage meant was just a longer term version of what a long of my friends that experienced short term relationships they weren't that into were experiencing, which is: they weren't emotionally invested enough to really commit, but the relationship wasn't bad enough for them to feel "justified" leaving. But each and every relationship, for all of us, took us 'off the market' for several years when we could have been finding better partners for ourselves.
And like, that's the thing. Those partners exist. We tell ourselves that they don't, and that's why it's okay to settle, but they do, it's just that we will never know it if we are out on dates with people we're not that into. And neither will our dates! Because we are wasting their time as well as our own. In this great mass of the world there is a whole host of people who are all dating the wrong people instead of staying single until they date the right one, which means almost no one is single at the right time *to* date, which makes us all long-term-single longer.
Give no chances. Build a better world. If you don't feel delighted to be in their presence, throw them back in the sea for another person fishing.
posted by corb at 10:55 AM on April 13 [5 favorites]
But each and every relationship, for all of us, took us 'off the market' for several years when we could have been finding better partners for ourselves.
This is a great point. I'd add that I wish more people felt ok about being single, either temporarily or long term. Being in a (monogamous two-person heterosexual etc.) relationship is presented as the "normal," expected way to live life. But not everyone wants that, and also some people who want it might not find it just due to life events. I've known too many people who get into and stay in relationships that aren't all that great, just because they feel pressure to be coupled up Right Now.
posted by Dip Flash at 11:24 AM on April 13 [3 favorites]
This is a great point. I'd add that I wish more people felt ok about being single, either temporarily or long term. Being in a (monogamous two-person heterosexual etc.) relationship is presented as the "normal," expected way to live life. But not everyone wants that, and also some people who want it might not find it just due to life events. I've known too many people who get into and stay in relationships that aren't all that great, just because they feel pressure to be coupled up Right Now.
posted by Dip Flash at 11:24 AM on April 13 [3 favorites]
This was difficult to read, and I mean that literally. Was there a thesis here?
The thesis is that people have trouble dealing with the pain of rejection because we don't have a good "story" about how to behave after receiving one.
The article explores why rejections are painful (the loss of a fantasy, taking the rejection as an evaluation of the rejected's personal worth), and explores various unhelpful ways to deal with rejection (persistence, happiness-as-revenge, and mass shootings), before finding a model the author likes in a posthumous, unedited novel by a Portugese poet which essentially amounts to wallowing in your misery like a duck in a puddle.
My personal take: I was surprised that Mr. Darcy only gets a single, parenthical mention.
Darcy's approach to Lizzie's rejection is to write one letter correcting Lizzie's misapprehension of certain facts, and then to leave her the hell alone. And when they do accidentally bump into each other afterwards, he is an absolute gentleman about it.
Being an absolute gentleman about things is not as valued in our era as it once was. But it strikes me as a classier, healthier and more ethical approach to restoring one's wounded ego than even wallowing in your misery.
There's a pride in knowing you're Doing the Right Thing despite how hurt you feel, and how much you want to lash out, or curl into a ball and give up.
In conclusion: people should read more Jane Austen.
posted by davidwitteveen at 4:48 PM on April 13 [6 favorites]
The thesis is that people have trouble dealing with the pain of rejection because we don't have a good "story" about how to behave after receiving one.
The article explores why rejections are painful (the loss of a fantasy, taking the rejection as an evaluation of the rejected's personal worth), and explores various unhelpful ways to deal with rejection (persistence, happiness-as-revenge, and mass shootings), before finding a model the author likes in a posthumous, unedited novel by a Portugese poet which essentially amounts to wallowing in your misery like a duck in a puddle.
My personal take: I was surprised that Mr. Darcy only gets a single, parenthical mention.
Darcy's approach to Lizzie's rejection is to write one letter correcting Lizzie's misapprehension of certain facts, and then to leave her the hell alone. And when they do accidentally bump into each other afterwards, he is an absolute gentleman about it.
Being an absolute gentleman about things is not as valued in our era as it once was. But it strikes me as a classier, healthier and more ethical approach to restoring one's wounded ego than even wallowing in your misery.
There's a pride in knowing you're Doing the Right Thing despite how hurt you feel, and how much you want to lash out, or curl into a ball and give up.
In conclusion: people should read more Jane Austen.
posted by davidwitteveen at 4:48 PM on April 13 [6 favorites]
The author’s romantic rejection is his bete noir. I commend him for analyzing it and querying the culture around this idea but the rejection plot is not the western history “hero” / protagonist’s arc. In western literature even the antihero gets the affection of the girl - whether they are the pimp, drug dealer, gangster, detective, etc. To be rejected is to realize you are not the hero, or the anti-hero, but sort of a secondary or tertiary character in American letters. I think that is what the core wounding is of the essay and its discussion of the horrid men who desire yet hate women. It doesn’t call this feeling for what it is - the misogyny of men who sexually desire and want love (or some sort of fealty in lieu of love) from women as an empty object of desire and hate themselves for feeling weak, and hate themselves even more for realizing they are not the hero, or even the anti-hero but instead just a narcissistic guy with a god complex and a deep desire to never have their tiny exquisitely fragile male ego threatened. The rejection plot is one of brittle masculinity and a narcissistic obsession with being unable to imagine the sovereign emotional state of someone else’s mind and the anger with not getting what you feel you are entitled to.
posted by Word_Salad at 5:19 PM on April 13 [1 favorite]
posted by Word_Salad at 5:19 PM on April 13 [1 favorite]
Maybe this is just because I am a trans woman, but describing his desire as necessarily "hypergamic" in some ways to me completely fulfills the formula for why rejection is so painful for men.
If to desire being with someone you find attractive is wrong, because you are necessarily lesser and ugly as a man (which I don't really disagree with) then what are they supposed to do?
There is no man who is a fair match for any woman. Much less a conventionally attractive woman. They are always approaching romance from a position of being undesirable, DIAALV, subordinate in the ranking of desiring to desired. How can any man value themselves when the core formula of attraction is that they are ugly and women are attractive?
I haven't read the article. I don't care what he says. I care what my fellow mefites say.
posted by Audreynachrome at 8:24 AM on April 14 [3 favorites]
If to desire being with someone you find attractive is wrong, because you are necessarily lesser and ugly as a man (which I don't really disagree with) then what are they supposed to do?
There is no man who is a fair match for any woman. Much less a conventionally attractive woman. They are always approaching romance from a position of being undesirable, DIAALV, subordinate in the ranking of desiring to desired. How can any man value themselves when the core formula of attraction is that they are ugly and women are attractive?
I haven't read the article. I don't care what he says. I care what my fellow mefites say.
posted by Audreynachrome at 8:24 AM on April 14 [3 favorites]
There is no man who is a fair match for any woman.
This seems neither true nor a thing that men think is true. In my observation of incel-adjacent spaces, there are plenty of women who men think are beneath them.
posted by bq at 8:27 AM on April 14 [2 favorites]
This seems neither true nor a thing that men think is true. In my observation of incel-adjacent spaces, there are plenty of women who men think are beneath them.
posted by bq at 8:27 AM on April 14 [2 favorites]
There is no man who is a fair match for any woman. Much less a conventionally attractive woman. They are always approaching romance from a position of being undesirable, DIAALV, subordinate in the ranking of desiring to desired. How can any man value themselves when the core formula of attraction is that they are ugly and women are attractive?
Maybe I'm misunderstanding the point (it certainly wouldn't be the first time), but as written this is a really bizarre statement to me, completely divorced from reality (where both women and men express a lot of appreciation for conventionally attractive men, and where men are absolutely not approaching romance from a position of undesirability).
posted by Dip Flash at 9:14 AM on April 14 [1 favorite]
Maybe I'm misunderstanding the point (it certainly wouldn't be the first time), but as written this is a really bizarre statement to me, completely divorced from reality (where both women and men express a lot of appreciation for conventionally attractive men, and where men are absolutely not approaching romance from a position of undesirability).
posted by Dip Flash at 9:14 AM on April 14 [1 favorite]
If to desire being with someone you find attractive is wrong, because you are necessarily lesser and ugly as a man (which I don't really disagree with) then what are they supposed to do?
So to explain this a little better, I think this doesn't actually have to do a lot with natural attraction (which is more varied) but ties more into what I will term "societal attraction".
Let's say you have just an average looking guy. Pure middle of the pack, normal and unremarkable in any way physically. To quantify it for discussion, we will say a 5 out of 10. In the normal course of things, absent the gaze of anyone else, he would be sexually attracted probably to a lot of people - the conventionally attractive as well as the conventionally unattractive, because sexual and romantic attraction is about so many things rather than objective physical beauty. In reality, this 5 guy is attracted probably to people who rove up and down the scale - both "above" and also "below".
But there is a social component, where men are told by society that one of their objects in life is to secure a woman as a trophy, and so men who accept those societal values tend to perceive that the woman they are dating is taken as a judgment on them and their desirability and worth as a man. So with that in mind, even though they are attracted to women anywhere along that scale, they are highly likely to reject out of hand anyone below an arbitrary number on that scale, below which they feel other men won't respect them and like them if they date that person. That number varies - personally, I've found that perversely, the more insecure about themselves they are, the higher that number on the scale goes, as though they feel they have to "make up" for perceived failings with a particularly high number. So you'll see some guys, in their head, either mentally refusing any woman under about an 8 or a 9 on the conventional attractiveness scale, or dating them but kind of resenting them for not being higher on the scale. This is another thing that tends to create a lot of unhappiness in the world - the concept of a woman who is attractive enough to have sex with but not attractive enough to let other people know you're choosing to exclusively have sex with is poison.
And because this is all a societal thing taking place in their head, then if they are rejected, it becomes for them a referendum on "Do I Deserve To Date an 8-Scale Woman" rather than "This one woman didn't want me."
It's not that it's bad to want someone who you think is more attractive than you. It's that it's probably not good, or healthy, to want people who you *only* think are objectively significantly more attractive than you, because then it's less about the person-as-person, and more about the person-as-object.
posted by corb at 11:32 AM on April 14 [4 favorites]
So to explain this a little better, I think this doesn't actually have to do a lot with natural attraction (which is more varied) but ties more into what I will term "societal attraction".
Let's say you have just an average looking guy. Pure middle of the pack, normal and unremarkable in any way physically. To quantify it for discussion, we will say a 5 out of 10. In the normal course of things, absent the gaze of anyone else, he would be sexually attracted probably to a lot of people - the conventionally attractive as well as the conventionally unattractive, because sexual and romantic attraction is about so many things rather than objective physical beauty. In reality, this 5 guy is attracted probably to people who rove up and down the scale - both "above" and also "below".
But there is a social component, where men are told by society that one of their objects in life is to secure a woman as a trophy, and so men who accept those societal values tend to perceive that the woman they are dating is taken as a judgment on them and their desirability and worth as a man. So with that in mind, even though they are attracted to women anywhere along that scale, they are highly likely to reject out of hand anyone below an arbitrary number on that scale, below which they feel other men won't respect them and like them if they date that person. That number varies - personally, I've found that perversely, the more insecure about themselves they are, the higher that number on the scale goes, as though they feel they have to "make up" for perceived failings with a particularly high number. So you'll see some guys, in their head, either mentally refusing any woman under about an 8 or a 9 on the conventional attractiveness scale, or dating them but kind of resenting them for not being higher on the scale. This is another thing that tends to create a lot of unhappiness in the world - the concept of a woman who is attractive enough to have sex with but not attractive enough to let other people know you're choosing to exclusively have sex with is poison.
And because this is all a societal thing taking place in their head, then if they are rejected, it becomes for them a referendum on "Do I Deserve To Date an 8-Scale Woman" rather than "This one woman didn't want me."
It's not that it's bad to want someone who you think is more attractive than you. It's that it's probably not good, or healthy, to want people who you *only* think are objectively significantly more attractive than you, because then it's less about the person-as-person, and more about the person-as-object.
posted by corb at 11:32 AM on April 14 [4 favorites]
On the one hand, I agree it's awful to settle and you're wasting time when you could be finding better. On the other hand, I've been single and unwanted (by anyone but extremely inappropriate people, all of whom are nice and I don't want to slam them) for twenty years and waiting around to meet someone else has just not worked out, either. Thankfully I never wanted to reproduce so that's not an issue, but after twenty years you start wondering if dating that 70-year-old man that you're not attracted to but he's at least kind and nice, is a better option than infernal endless waiting for what doesn't exist.
A friend of mine has a nephew that is just a loser. Mama's boy, divey behavior, not good looking and pretty old at this point, not nice to his first wife, and yet somehow managed to find a second wife (who is also really awful like him, actually somewhat worse). I heard a few days ago that nephew had decided to divorce his wife because she won't put out any more, went on a few dates and shocking, nephew wasn't having a good time dating or being wanted by very many women...so the divorce is off. As my friend says, any awful dude can somehow get a woman, albeit maybe not who he wants either.
Then again, women are raised, as I was, to settle. My mom certainly settled. I don't think she was attracted to my dad, but he was the nicer of the two she was dating and he's the one who proposed. They fought all the fucking time and I'm surprised they never divorced. She didn't find true love until age 67.
As for how to behave once you've been rejected (speaking from experience): I think there's a public and a private answer to that. In public, you should probably avoid the rejector as much as you can and at best, keep a polite distance from them, and especially don't try to carry on the public relationship you had (or thought you had) with them after that, now that you know it's not mutual like. Do not pursue, do not reach out, but avoid and let them go. As previously cited, Darcy had it right. But in private, you may very well sulk in your misery. And it's impossible not to take that rejection as an evaluation of your personal worth. Unless your potential beloved is a lesbian, anyway, there is definite personal rejection of you and there's no way to make that better. I still feel like shit about the one I asked out and I haven't been able to resolve that with myself or make it better. I know I'm not the guy's type and the wrong age, but I felt better when I thought he liked me and was just having his own issues, and felt like shit sandwich once it became clear that it was me, not just him. And you can't make that better. It's just something you live with unless you find someone who does like you as you are, which it doesn't look like I will.
posted by jenfullmoon at 12:21 PM on April 14 [2 favorites]
A friend of mine has a nephew that is just a loser. Mama's boy, divey behavior, not good looking and pretty old at this point, not nice to his first wife, and yet somehow managed to find a second wife (who is also really awful like him, actually somewhat worse). I heard a few days ago that nephew had decided to divorce his wife because she won't put out any more, went on a few dates and shocking, nephew wasn't having a good time dating or being wanted by very many women...so the divorce is off. As my friend says, any awful dude can somehow get a woman, albeit maybe not who he wants either.
Then again, women are raised, as I was, to settle. My mom certainly settled. I don't think she was attracted to my dad, but he was the nicer of the two she was dating and he's the one who proposed. They fought all the fucking time and I'm surprised they never divorced. She didn't find true love until age 67.
As for how to behave once you've been rejected (speaking from experience): I think there's a public and a private answer to that. In public, you should probably avoid the rejector as much as you can and at best, keep a polite distance from them, and especially don't try to carry on the public relationship you had (or thought you had) with them after that, now that you know it's not mutual like. Do not pursue, do not reach out, but avoid and let them go. As previously cited, Darcy had it right. But in private, you may very well sulk in your misery. And it's impossible not to take that rejection as an evaluation of your personal worth. Unless your potential beloved is a lesbian, anyway, there is definite personal rejection of you and there's no way to make that better. I still feel like shit about the one I asked out and I haven't been able to resolve that with myself or make it better. I know I'm not the guy's type and the wrong age, but I felt better when I thought he liked me and was just having his own issues, and felt like shit sandwich once it became clear that it was me, not just him. And you can't make that better. It's just something you live with unless you find someone who does like you as you are, which it doesn't look like I will.
posted by jenfullmoon at 12:21 PM on April 14 [2 favorites]
Darcy is 100% the prototype for dealing with rejection. People joke about "Elizabeth didn't want him til she saw his house" but really, she went through a gradual process of realizing she'd been wrong about a lot of things, and then what sealed the deal was how thoroughly nice he was to her and her aunt and uncle when he happened upon them at Pemberly. He proves he's worthy of her by being gracious and kind and by helping her sister in secrecy with no thought of reward. He's just a solid dude.
because you are necessarily lesser and ugly as a man
So in addition to what corb says above about how men kind of rank themselves and want somebody who, in a sense, raises their rank, to prove themselves to other men, which I completely agree with, I also think there's another side to this, which is that: to people who are not sexually attracted to men, men are less attractive than women are—this is obviously/trivially true—but then because men have by-and-large set the standards of beauty in our culture, some men perceive themselves as being unattractive because they wouldn't be attracted to themselves (because they don't find men sexually attractive) without thinking through that, like, a straight (or bi/pan) woman will see them differently. Women are trained from birth to see things from the perspective of men, but men are not trained to see things from the perspective of women, so you get men thinking that their view of male attractiveness is the only possible view.
It's this poisonous combination of the male gaze and the sexist habit of disregarding the viewpoint of women.
posted by joannemerriam at 6:42 AM on April 15 [4 favorites]
because you are necessarily lesser and ugly as a man
So in addition to what corb says above about how men kind of rank themselves and want somebody who, in a sense, raises their rank, to prove themselves to other men, which I completely agree with, I also think there's another side to this, which is that: to people who are not sexually attracted to men, men are less attractive than women are—this is obviously/trivially true—but then because men have by-and-large set the standards of beauty in our culture, some men perceive themselves as being unattractive because they wouldn't be attracted to themselves (because they don't find men sexually attractive) without thinking through that, like, a straight (or bi/pan) woman will see them differently. Women are trained from birth to see things from the perspective of men, but men are not trained to see things from the perspective of women, so you get men thinking that their view of male attractiveness is the only possible view.
It's this poisonous combination of the male gaze and the sexist habit of disregarding the viewpoint of women.
posted by joannemerriam at 6:42 AM on April 15 [4 favorites]
as written this is a really bizarre statement to me, completely divorced from reality (where both women and men express a lot of appreciation for conventionally attractive men, and where men are absolutely not approaching romance from a position of undesirability).
IRL most straight women I know only ever talk about how physically repulsive their own husbands are and how much they hate them. There's a bunch of chatter about wanting to fuck Elmo or whatever but nothing particularly applicable to real human people. The only paradigm I know for valuing men's looks is through how fine-boned and petite they are, it's not about being men, its about perceived potential femininity. There's a reason twinks are *in*.
posted by Audreynachrome at 3:39 AM on April 22
IRL most straight women I know only ever talk about how physically repulsive their own husbands are and how much they hate them. There's a bunch of chatter about wanting to fuck Elmo or whatever but nothing particularly applicable to real human people. The only paradigm I know for valuing men's looks is through how fine-boned and petite they are, it's not about being men, its about perceived potential femininity. There's a reason twinks are *in*.
posted by Audreynachrome at 3:39 AM on April 22
IRL most straight women I know only ever talk about how physically repulsive their own husbands are and how much they hate them
There's a book out I keep meaning to get around to reading that a lot of my straight women peers swear by, titled, "Why Women Have Better Sex Under Socialism": a money-quote excerpt goes,
I am absolutely desperately sexually and romantically attracted to my partner now, but I have economic and medical independence from my partner; we can thus exist as equals without resentment or need.
There are few things, I think, that provoke more resentment and hatred than feeling trapped - and many heterosexual women who married at a time when marriage was at least in part an economic bargain do feel trapped. Many heterosexual women my age feel that they chose badly. When I say that people settled, often I mean that people settled for economic security rather than romantic choice, which I think is a poison pill that waits about twenty years to destroy you. The people for whom marriage was not an economic bargain seem much better off, in part because they felt free to leave.
(There's also the compulsory heterosexuality end of things; a lot of women my age also grew up straight because that's what they knew the options were; I'm not sure everyone actually *was*. There were a lot of girls kissing girls "to show the boys" in the 80s, man.)
posted by corb at 6:45 AM on April 22 [2 favorites]
There's a book out I keep meaning to get around to reading that a lot of my straight women peers swear by, titled, "Why Women Have Better Sex Under Socialism": a money-quote excerpt goes,
"When women enjoy their own sources of income, and the state guarantees social security in old age, illness, and disability, women have no economic reason to stay in abusive, unfulfilling, or otherwise unhealthy relationships."I think that one of the things that has also absolutely poisoned gender relations here in the West is by adding monetary interest to romantic interest, as well as for many years forcing control over the environments for reproduction, it has created a situation where women are often forced to perform emotional insincerity in exchange for security and the ability to have children. Again, this is something that I know the complications of personally - my healthcare for many years refused to allow reproductive assistance to unmarried women, and so whenever I thought about divorcing my then-husband, I had to think not only of whether I wanted to be romantically without him, but whether it was worth losing all of my fertility assistance and hope of future children.
I am absolutely desperately sexually and romantically attracted to my partner now, but I have economic and medical independence from my partner; we can thus exist as equals without resentment or need.
There are few things, I think, that provoke more resentment and hatred than feeling trapped - and many heterosexual women who married at a time when marriage was at least in part an economic bargain do feel trapped. Many heterosexual women my age feel that they chose badly. When I say that people settled, often I mean that people settled for economic security rather than romantic choice, which I think is a poison pill that waits about twenty years to destroy you. The people for whom marriage was not an economic bargain seem much better off, in part because they felt free to leave.
(There's also the compulsory heterosexuality end of things; a lot of women my age also grew up straight because that's what they knew the options were; I'm not sure everyone actually *was*. There were a lot of girls kissing girls "to show the boys" in the 80s, man.)
posted by corb at 6:45 AM on April 22 [2 favorites]
IRL most straight women I know only ever talk about how physically repulsive their own husbands are and how much they hate them. There's a bunch of chatter about wanting to fuck Elmo or whatever but nothing particularly applicable to real human people. The only paradigm I know for valuing men's looks is through how fine-boned and petite they are, it's not about being men, its about perceived potential femininity. There's a reason twinks are *in*.
By way of meeting anecdote with anecdote, I will just say that for the most part this is...wildly divergent from any of my personal experience as a straight woman. The straight women I know have complex and varied relationships with their spouses/partners but the majority are pretty obviously and openly attracted to them physically, and those spouses/partners really run the gamut of physicalities.
Again, this is just anecdote with anecdote; I have certainly read a number of thinkpieces on hostility in hetero relationships and don't doubt that many individual straight women are with partners they don't find physically attractive. But I can assure you that there's at least one straight woman who does not want to fuck a twink OR an elmo (?), because it me, I'm that, a straight woman who is attracted very specifically to some very stereotypically masculine signifiers.
posted by We put our faith in Blast Hardcheese at 12:24 PM on April 23 [1 favorite]
By way of meeting anecdote with anecdote, I will just say that for the most part this is...wildly divergent from any of my personal experience as a straight woman. The straight women I know have complex and varied relationships with their spouses/partners but the majority are pretty obviously and openly attracted to them physically, and those spouses/partners really run the gamut of physicalities.
Again, this is just anecdote with anecdote; I have certainly read a number of thinkpieces on hostility in hetero relationships and don't doubt that many individual straight women are with partners they don't find physically attractive. But I can assure you that there's at least one straight woman who does not want to fuck a twink OR an elmo (?), because it me, I'm that, a straight woman who is attracted very specifically to some very stereotypically masculine signifiers.
posted by We put our faith in Blast Hardcheese at 12:24 PM on April 23 [1 favorite]
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I’m not sure I agree with the premise in the pull quote, though. Rejection before you’re invested seems less humiliating to me than rejection after you’ve committed yourself publicly to a pursuit. This seems equally true in the case of romance as in other spheres.
posted by eirias at 3:52 AM on April 12 [10 favorites]