All the young dudes for dude bros

All the Young Dudes

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Ahh Dude bro’s

This post topic was suggested to me yesterday on the mighty Twitter and I marked it as a possible future topic and went to bed pondering it. I had thought that maybe I could let it pass by but then I woke up this morning to people justifiably outraged over a post about how to approach a woman wearing headphones. Now I am not going to spend a lot of time going over the horribly bad advice that this article gives. The short answer is, if a woman is wearing headphones, she doesn’t want to talk to anyone. If she does find you the most intriguing thing since sliced bread she will take out the headphones and talk to you.

Instead I find myself needing (yet again) to talk to the men most likely to fail utterly at listening to my advice.

The dude bro.

Now Molly had no idea what that meant and I struggled to find a Brit equivalent, so I will attempt to describe the murrican version.

They tend to be white  males, usually 16-25 (but I have seen them into their 30’s and beyond) years of age, they come from anywhere, USA. Known for their love of College football, pickup trucks or SUVs, beer, cut off cargo shorts, branded polo shirts, and baseball caps. They are almost always Frat brothers and they might even be interning at a start up.

Dude bro’s are amazingly insecure in their manhood, which makes them: insanely jealous of who their girl friends talk too, stupidly macho, and aggressively homophobic. In groups they boast about their sexual prowess in horribly misogynistic ways and frankly they are utterly bewildered that women need to be treated as actual human beings and not like prizes or achievements.

This is not to say that older men can’t be raging assholes as well. Poor Molly has had to tolerate all kinds of ridiculous behavior from the men at the local photo club. I could easily fall into this group because of my age, but I was introduced into a better way to behave in my teens. I learned my manners from the older generation and to respect women as equals from the social movements of the 60’s and 70’s. Even then I know that there are those who think I still have some of the wrong notions of my elders.

Now that I have all that out of the way, what I really came here to say is that it is time for the Dude bro’s to wake up. The entitlement of the world you inhabit is going to pass away and you will be left old and lonely. Remembering your glory days is not going to keep you warm and loved like the company of a caring and equal partner. Stop misleading those that are looking up to you as role models that this is any way to live or treat people. It isn’t too late to make this right.

Then maybe women won’t need to wear headphones as a sign that they really just want to be left alone. Maybe they will feels safe enough at a bus stop to have a conversation withotu becoming a target for you to hassle. And for fuck sake learn to handle rejection gracefully. You don’t get to be a prick just because someone isn’t interested.

 

For love of all that is holy relearn what it means to be a man and a gentleman.

Michael


Comments

6 responses to “All the Young Dudes”

  1. Rose Bliss Avatar
    Rose Bliss

    Sometimes, Michael, I swear we are twins separated at birth… so many things you write about are ones that I relate to so strongly.

    I have known some of these dude bro’s… they were alive and well when I was in junior high in the early 60’s (like the two who said they fucked me when I was 15 but who had never laid a hand on me, had barely even talked to me). Sadly, these same ones are still dude bro’s, who have never grown up and are indeed wondering why they are alone and lonely. One long time “friend” has been married 4 times and divorced 4 times and laments daily as to where all of the real women have gone.. you know, the ones who are brain-dead, air-head doormats with the 50’s servitude mentality. Now I know there is a sub group of D/s and M/s that love and live the 50’s lifestyle, but that is by mutual consent. But this friend demands it of all women. And since he couldn’t find any such women in the US, he three times “ordered” mail order brides from Asian countries, online, believing that Asian women are naturally submissive. Each one of them took his money to get to the US and promptly disappeared. Apparently he just didn’t think that if these women were online, they were much smarter and knew more about America than this man gave them credit for. And when he whined, “what’s a conservative man suppose to do?” I answered, how about get an education… about the world, about women, about relationships, about sex and stop demanding that all women kneel down and kiss your fucking feet? It didn’t go over well. Because he doesn’t see women as human beings and probably never will. Oh, well, I guess that’s karma.

    1. I do wish that karma would kick ass more often 😉
      Michael

  2. HAH!!! I laughed most of the way through this Michael! This describes most of rural Texas and pockets of surburbia and inner-city! Well, and I’m also sure much of the south — lived in Mississippi for 11-years — particularly Dixie. (feels nauseous thinking about it again). Yes, of course there are exceptions, however the fact remains that there is something glaringly wrong with THIS teaching of ‘masculinity’. As a male it embarasses my gender. 🙁

    A great read and a great solution to Dude Broads… whoops, I mean Bro’s! (sarcastic wink)

    Thank you Sir!

    1. It does seem to be worse in the US south, but I do know it isn’t much better in the North East
      Michael

  3. I’m from the very country south u.s. and down here we call them a ban. Boy/man. Lol. Loved this btw. You tell em!
    -long time reader…. first time commenter

    1. I spent a lot of time in the South in my concert sound days.. it has a lot to offer.. But not the bans 😛

      Loved the last line of your comment, it made me grin
      Michael

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