"He Says, She Says"

The topic of gender communication is a mystery so fascinating to me, and something I want to learn more about. Each new experience and relationship will teach us something new and different, either about ourselves or our relationships. I find it interesting that there are so many books published about self-help and relationships in particular. The book “Men are From Mars, Women are From Venus” by John Gray truly reflects the predicament so many of us find ourselves in, even in the title itself. This link provides a brief summary of some of the main points he makes in his book for those who haven’t read it.

Although I found the literature in the Mercury Reader and the other handouts helpful in putting my thoughts into words and providing examples of poor communication and ways to make it better, there is no better way to learn about cross-gender communication than to be involved in a situation or relationship where you are experiencing this communication first-hand. It is similar to learning a new language—Spanish, for instance. A person can sit in a classroom and study the verb agreement and vocabulary all day long from your textbook, but they will learn the language much more thoroughly if he submerses himself in the culture of a country like Costa Rica or Brazil.

I’ve recently “submersed” myself when it comes to understanding men. I have been spending time with a close friend, Jason, and his friends. Since I’ve known Jason I’ve gone out to bars to watch a few Monday night games with some of his male friends. This isn’t my first choice of how I’d like to spend a Monday night as I’m not a big sports fan, but it can be fun getting into it every once in a while. This pattern of outings with the guys has been an interesting experience because by being out with them (usually at Hooters), I have come to understand and appreciate their behaviors a little bit more each time. They interact very differently with each other than women interact with each other. They don’t exchange in as much conversation as women usually do. When we are at Hooters watching the game, they all have a clear view of a different TV, and they just eat and watch the game. When one of the guys brings a girl with him, I sit and chat with her, even if she is a sports fan coming to watch a game, too. Come to think of it, maybe that is why in general, women enjoy watching sports less than men because it involves sitting and watching, and not much talking or other interpersonal interaction! I hate to generalize, but this is my theory! I believe that for women, talking leads to intimacy and they need to feel some sort of intimacy in their relationships. Men however, don’t need this intimacy in their relationships with their friends, and so sitting and talking is not something on which they place high value in their friendships. They need to “do.” Deborah Tannen says it well in the following quote, taken from an article I found online Laura Bryannan:

"For males, conversation is the way you negotiate your status in the group and keep people from pushing you around; you use talk to preserve your independence. Females, on the other hand, use conversation to negotiate closeness and intimacy; talk is the essence of intimacy, so being best friends means sitting and talking. For boys, activities, doing things together, are central. Just sitting and talking is not an essential part of friendship. They're friends with the boys they do things with."

Sometimes we need a “buddy”, and sometimes we need a “friend”, per our discussion in class on Wednesday. For women, communication is the centerpiece of friendships and relationships. It is crucial for us to express our feelings. Similarly, I’ve found that the relationships men have with each other are as vital to them as women’s relationships are with each other, although I may not understand them or like the way they act when they’re around each other. Whereas men need the time with their buddies to engage in man-to-man conversation, women need the time to engage in woman-to-woman conversation with their buddies, too. One relationship that I place high value on is my relationship with my friend Jason. We can relate a lot to each other on many different levels. His honesty and openness in talking about relationships between men and women in particular has allowed me to learn a lot from a man’s point of view. As psychology majors, we have both taken classes that examine all kinds of relationships very closely, and we have rather insightful opinions on the secrets to successful relationships. Talking about our thoughts and feelings helps us to better understand the workings of communication between men and women.

In class on Wednesday we talked about how men show emotional closeness through “doing” and not usually talking. Almost all the time, men are looking to solve a problem. There have been many times when I have been on the verge of tears and had no other option but to spill my guts to my father, a male friend or my boyfriend. In situations where I need to “vent” it is better to talk to a girlfriend, sister or my mom, but they may not be available all the time. I can’t count the number of times that such a conversation turned into a problem-solving situation on the part of the man when all I wanted was someone to listen (and maybe offer a hug). Not only does this misunderstanding affect the way we are able to communicate, but it often leads to another conversation: an argument!

Men reading this blog are truly going to roll their eyes when they read the following story…
I was recently sitting with Jason on the couch and he had his arm around my waist. He was playfully tugging on my tummy “fat” and I kept nudging his hand away because it makes me feel fat and I don’t like it! I told him to stop and when he asked why, I explained that I’m self-conscious about that (this is where guys get all pissed off). Since this is a friendship that involves lots of open, honest communication, we decided to delve into a small debate about how and why women often talk about feeling fat or insecure about their bodies. It’s gets on the man’s nerves. Instead of leaving it at that, which until that point had satisfied me, Jason decided to step in and offer a solution to the problem. He opened his mouth to say “well, why don’t you just—” and I stopped him right then and there.

“Choose your next word or words very carefully,” I cut in, looking him straight in the eye. “I do not want to hear what you’re about to say if it’s going to be something ‘constructive’. I’m very sensitive about my body and what I look like, and I know what I should and shouldn’t eat, so if you have anything you want to say on that matter, please, for the sake of my feelings, save it.”

He went on to say that when people talk about thinking they are fat, his solution for them is to just stop eating the junk. “Cut out the chocolate; cut out the munching,” was his advice as Problem-Solver. As someone who has told me countless times that he likes the shape of my body, I didn’t let this comment get to me. But in the past, for instance, my dad has commented on how much food I serve myself at dinnertime. He has looked at my servings and said things such as, “if you’re trying to lose weight, you should watch how much you serve yourself, and try to eat slower.” He has no idea how much it hurts, because he thinks only about how to get from (A) the problem to (B) the solution. However, by doing this he makes me feel stupid because I feel talked-down to and makes me feel like a pig for eating fast! Being hungry and losing weight are two independent factors. Note to men: Don’t try to be a problem-solver, especially when it comes to a woman’s physique!

If I took Jason’s advice and “stopped munching” right then and there, I wouldn’t immediately shed the weight I want to lose. So why give me that advice? It’s only hurtful, and not effective. What is interesting about this interaction is that Jason assumed I wanted to hear constructive feedback so that if I took his advice and cut the snacking out of my diet, I wouldn’t feel bad about my body in the future. Nice in theory, but not realistic. If any other guy said that to me, I probably would have interpreted that as, “if he is giving me advice to stop snacking, he must agree that I have weight to lose. He must think I’m fat,” …and the miscommunication begins. When I talk about body image, it is much more effective when it is with another woman, because she can almost always relate. Women can share their insecurities and weaknesses with each other because they know other women have similar thoughts and feelings. Women also generally have more compassion, even if they are going to take the problem-solving role. The miscommunication in this situation was simply that he saw it one way and I saw it another way.
“When Harry Met Sally” and “The Breakup” both illustrate excellent examples of ineffective communication between men and women. It’s a shame we weren’t able to watch the entirety of either of them, because there are plenty more examples in both. One of my favorite examples is when Harry is telling Sally about a man’s thought process after having sex. He says that after having sex, men lay and ponder how much time they have to stay there and hold the woman until he can get up and go home. I don’t know if that is true for all men, or if they just wonder how long they have to lay there with the woman until they can roll over and fall asleep, but either way, it is a funny scene!

There really doesn’t seem to be a solution to this issue. Both sexes acknowledge that there is a miscommunication between the sexes. To be resolved, there would have to be compromise and full understanding of one another about an issue, but what stands in the way of that is often the miscommunication itself. Until there is a book written about the solution, we will have to continue trying to crack the code by learning through our experiences and relationships.