There are a lot of observations women have made about men over the years by knowing them, dating them, and simply living in the world with them. However, many of the things we’ve realized aren’t necessarily ones men are open to hearing about. The women over on the TwoXChromosomes subreddit decided to air out some of the biggest things guys need to know but just aren’t ready to confront.
1. Your bad moods aren’t our problem.
As u/Pinsit reveals, there’s no excuse for treating other people like crap just because you’re in a bad mood. “If you are intentionally mean/cruel to people when you’re in a bad mood, said people will like you less and eventually not like you at all. This includes your beloved wife/girlfriend,” she wrote.
2. Female customer service workers are rarely flirting.
In fact, they’re just doing their jobs by being kind and courteous, but so many men take this as an excuse to start acting and talking inappropriately. “Women in customer service are simply treating you with basic human kindness. Stop being so damn creepy towards them,” u/T1m3f0x said.
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4. Your friends are not necessarily great boyfriends.
As u/Mander2019 points out, many men assume that their male friends are cool with them, so they must be great with women. Not the case. “Your friends may be great guys with you and other guys but that doesn’t mean they don’t treat women like s–t when you’re not around,” she shared.
5. Just because you know or like someone doesn’t mean they’re not an abuser.
To further on from the previous point, u/boooooooooo_cowboys expressed frustration with men being unable to accept that not all rapists or abusers look particularly nefarious. “Rapists and abusers are often just regular-seeming people with friends and family who love them. They can even be especially charming or attractive, and will put up a convincing false front to anyone who isn’t their victim. And every last one will claim that any accusation is false and driven by a bitter ex or something. I don’t think that this is that difficult of a truth to accept that these people exist,” she wrote. “What does seem to difficult to accept is that you might be friends or family to such a person. Tons of guys on Reddit love to talk about their buddy who was ‘falsely accused.’ And an awful lot of them are wrong about the ‘false’ part.”
6. There’s nothing weak about seeking professional help.
As much as men are made to believe that being open about their feelings or admitting that they’re struggling is the opposite of masculine, that’s just not the case. “Go to the doctor, therapist, psychiatrist, etc. It’s not weakness to admit you need professional help. Weakness is trying to make it on your own when such an attitude will kill you faster. Men actively avoiding professional help is the root of many of society’s ills,” u/tiny_galaxies advised.
7. You’re not “helping” when you live there.
One of the biggest frustrations women in straight relationships have was expressed perfectly by u/kitylou. “You aren’t helping around the house, you are a member of the household taking responsibility for maintaining the place you live,” she stated. So true!
8. Men should be getting support from other men.
While many men get their egos stroked by getting compliments or attention from women, it shouldn’t be this way, according to u/sluggardish. “Men need to compliment each other more and generally support each other more rather than relying on the women in their life to do that. One of the comments on [another] Reddit thread was about how they wished they were complimented more and held on to random compliments for years afterward. Women generally don’t compliment men because they interpret friendliness as flirting.”
9. Women aren’t “withholding sex” when they don’t want to sleep with you.
As u/Xenoph0nix shared, the idea that men accuse women of “withholding sex” when they’re barely pulling their weight in a relationship is infuriating. “If you’re s–ty with me, don’t contribute equally to the house and don’t emotionally support me, it’s not ‘withholding sex’ if I don’t want to sleep with you. Your bad attitude means I don’t find you sexually attractive,” she wrote.
10. You are who you hang out with.
Many guys don’t see a problem with associating with people that are not so great. That’s a serious problem. “Birds of a feather typically flock together, so when you support your actively problematic friends/ family don’t be surprised when women look at you and see you as a threat also,” u/Bopnoodle wrote. “Sooo many guys I know still hang out with men who were accused/ confirmed to have done very problematic (ranging from assault to general assholeness) things and then wonder why women they like start to distance themselves from them. BECAUSE YOU’VE SHOWN YOU’RE WILLING TO PUT UP WITH THAT BEHAVIOR THEREFORE WE ARE NOT SURE IF YOU ALSO DO THAT BEHAVIOR!!”
11. No, women aren’t exaggerating for dramatic effect.
How many times have you been sharing a scary/obnoxious/upsetting experience with a guy, only to be accused of lying or exaggerating? That’s got to stop. “When women tell the stories of their experiences, they aren’t lying/being overdramatic/etc. In most cases, they are making it LESS than it was, because men generally can’t deal with/accept women’s reality,” u/Dharmaqueen815 shared.
12. You shouldn’t have to be told how to be an adult.
So many men’s response to women’s frustration with them not pulling their weight around the house is that we didn’t tell them what needed to be done. But why should we? “Doing housework is also part of SEEING it and pro-actively doing it,” u/ToastAbrikoos vented. “No waiting on the wife/girlfriend/… whoever to tell you what to do. It boggles my mind how you are just unable to see (or a Pro at ignoring it, if that is the case). Why?”
13. Women aren’t all mean by default.
It’s amazing how a woman who isn’t super smiley/overly accommodating automatically earns this label, right? U/SunshineAllTheTime is over it. ” I’ve been told I’m cold, stand-offish, I should smile more, it wouldn’t kill me to say hi, etc etc. I was the warmest, friendliest, silliest kid. I still am super bubbly and chatty and smiley with those I trust. But if I’m alone in public? I learned so many lessons through my teen years that being a you-know-what was my defense,” she wrote. “Smiling at an older man in the grocery store invited him to make a sexual comment to me. Making eye contact on the street got me catcalled and called names when I ignored them. Saying hi in a restaurant got me felt up. I was 14 when men started making comments about my body, looks, and dating life. I was barely 18 when a 31-year-old man thought my friendliness meant I needed to date him. I was 26 when a 60-year-old man took one conversation as me being interested. And what happened to me is the norm. I didn’t even have a “bad” time of it. This is what happens to the girls and women that you know. And a lot of times it’s so much worse. So if you tell me to smile, I’ll happily tell you to f–k off.”
14. Not all sex is consensual.
Just because a woman didn’t fight you off doesn’t mean you didn’t force her to sleep with you. “If you’ve ever guilted, sulked, cajoled, begged and whined until a woman has sex with you, that was not consensual sex. End of story,” u/Laurenhynde82 said.
15. It’s not a woman’s job to fix you.
As u/agibb55 pointed out, we’re all adults here and you’re not our children. “You have to find your own resources and do your own work,” she advised.
16. You’re probably upholding misogynistic ideals even if you don’t realize it.
So many men do this and so few realize it. “If your parents make your sisters do all the cooking and cleaning and you don’t have to help you are directly benefiting from sexism. Expecting your wife to do everything because that’s how you were raised is you upholding the status quo,” u/Mander2019 wrote.
17. Some of you have extremely unrealistic expectations.
Many men seem to believe they deserve qualities in women that even they’re not offering themselves, which is why they’re single for so long. “So many men fail with women because you have radically unrealistic ideas of what your baseline should be, given your own lifestyle and what you have to offer. Let’s be real here– a lot of you are single because you feel you deserve a very specific kind of woman, and have little actual chance of attracting her, because you, yourself, have none of the qualities you’re looking for,” suggested u/Dinosaurbears. “In college, I would seek out men like myself– intelligent nerds, not movie star handsome but pleasant-looking. And you know what? They were LIVID that someone like me would dare to think she had a chance. And were STUNNED when they got rejected by the gorgeous, extroverted, popular women that made up a small percentage of women on campus, because those women had options, and weren’t interested in this person with whom they had nothing in common, who was substantially less attractive, and who often had no interest in them as people. Men’s expectations vs what is realistic given their circumstances are often severely out of whack.”
