Debate Topic : Men Are From Bars, Women Come Between Us

The proposal, not ZM Unlimited's, that women do, in fact, communicate in a different way and at a wholly other level to men, and that men would do well to try to 'listen' to this secret language that flows between women.

As pictured here?
The Unlimited View is posted at the end...

From Dixon in Kingsley Amis's Lucky Jim   Copyright 1953 Kingsley Amis : ISBN 0-1400.1648 1

The whole thing sounded rather childish, but better than peevish. All the same, what messes these women got themselves into over nothing. Men got themselves into messes too, and ones that weren't so easily got rid of, but their messes arose from attempts to satisfy real and simple needs.

From Zorba in Kazantzakis's Zorba The Greek   Copyright 1952 Simon & Schuster : ISBN 0-671-21132-3

'Why? You can't say what you like, woman is something different, boss . . . something different. She's not human! Why bear her any grudge? Woman's something incomprehensible, and all the laws of state and religion have got her all wrong. They shouldn't act like that towards a woman. They're too harsh, boss, too unjust. If I ever had to make laws, I shouldn't make the same laws for men and for women. Ten, a hundred, a thousand commandments for man. Man is man, after all; he can stand up to it. But not a single law for woman. Because--how many times do I have to tell you this, boss?--woman is a creature with no strength. Let's drink to Noussa, boss! And to woman! . . . And may God give us men more sense!
   He drank, raised his arm and brought it down with force, as if he were using an axe.
   'He must either give us men more sense,' he said, 'or else perform an operation on us. Otherwise, believe me, we're finished.'   More on Zorba Zorba and essential realities

Anon Nov 2003
This pictorial input from 'the unnamed one of many likenesses...'   Male brain is right... or below...

Anon Aug 2003

1. Viva la difference.

From: Hank Field <hfield@uclink4.berkeley.edu>  Date: Mon Aug 11, 2003 14:21:00 US/Pacific

Marilyn sandwich looks very good. My opinion is that women don't get between men and their drinking, they get between boys and their drinking.

Anon 11 August, 2003  Date: Mon Aug 11, 2003 13:34:41 US/Pacific

Your website is fun. Men do listen to women's interesting peripheral communication style, then comprehend it, then ignore it, mostly. Good topic.

Unlimited response 10 August, 2003

The premise of this concept is contentious. If it is true that a majority of women communicate with silent and hidden meanings, is a similar thing occurring between men? And between men and women?

Focus on the women and men that both sexes admire - does this Mars/Venus division still apply? Now bring to mind a woman and a man that you admire individually, how different are they?
Do such women need to disguise their true meanings in order to communicate?
Do such men always behave like oafs?
Unless we are mindless, we all withhold certain amounts of information. In any case, we all communicate with thousands of nonverbal signals all the time: Body language, facial expressions, smells, the way we proceed around the house. Women do this, and so do men.

Yet, there clearly is a tendency for some types of women to use 'silent' communication to a greater degree than other women and most men. The question is, should this be encouraged? Does empathising encourage a deceitful type of behavior in such women?
A part of the proposition suggests that men should imitate this behavior. But isn't the least desirable type of 'female' behavior? Should women in turn be encouraged to adopt the worst behavior of men?

There is a line of argument that says that this is the way women communicate naturally, therefore it must be good because women like each other in general. This is sophistry. Even if women like each other in general (which is often not the case) they may still be 'naturally' cautious and suspicious precisely because this behavior is common between them.

The worthy intention of improving communication between men and women should not encourage this approach, even when it illicits compliments from these same women, because it perpetuates behavior that would be better to be replaced by confident, honest interactions wherein a women feels no need to withhold expression or disguise intention

Everyone should mean what they say (and, as the saying goes, say what they mean).