The Man

My brother recently laid a rather startling realization on me: I work for "the man." They work hard to convince you, at first, that they are not, that they are different, that this is a special place. Most importantly, I suppose, they convince you to extrapolate from the "do good" and "have fun" motto. We all (or anyway, those who stay) come to believe that the company has our best interest in mind. We actually believe that the company cares about us, and I suppose this comes from the fact that at a 1-to-1 level (my boss, for example), this is actually true. Or maybe that's just a delusion too. At the level of the system in general though, I am decidedly not cared for. What's best for me is relevant only inasmuch as it's best for the company. I suppose this is true of any large organization, or large system of any sort. "Caring" is a human thing, an individual thing, and the ability to do so breaks down pretty quickly with scale.

They worked to convince us otherwise because these relationships are always reciprocal. When I believed that the company cared about me, I cared about the company. I was willing to on occasion put the company's interest ahead of my own (e.g. late nights) because of that perceived relationship.

My brother's a smart guy for seeing through this illusion so quickly. I worry that I tainted him by talking frankly about what was behind the curtain, but I guess the cat's out of the bag. Now that I've been disabused of this naivete, everything changes, and not necessarily in good ways.

Ignorance is bliss.

Without further ado

One of the most important lessons we men learn is that women like to share. A lot. An important day In a man's life is when he learns to ask, when his lady friend starts in on something dramatic, "Honey, are you looking for my input here or do you just want me to listen?" (If you haven't learned little trick yet, you're welcome. Solid gold). What is true in the home holds true on the internets as well. Blogging, I have observed, is a world dominated by women. The gods of the blogosphere seem to enforce some egalitarianism at the top. For a while Salon.com had a nice, round, always gender-balanced table on their front page. But get lower, and the men fall away. I personally know at least three women with blogs, while the one guy I know with a blog writes about…wait for it…sports. A bit more scientifically, I looked at the first twenty blogs that came up (randomly, I think) on blogspot. Fourteen were clearly written by women, two were hard to tell but about domestic subjects (which, being women's work, is probably by a women, right?), and four by men. But here's the thing, two of these were by gay men and the other two were about architecture and, again, sports. So like I said, women are apparently the ones who fell inclined to share on the internet as well as in the real world.

It turns out that men, when they write, are very focused. I suspect that this is a machismo thing. Purpose = manly. One inevitably suspects that male diarists and memoirists (aside from the already-famous sort) swing from both sides of the plate, if not solely the other side, regardless of any actual evidence for or against. The theory seems to be that one ought not care about the feelings and sharing of others. Consequently, you shouldn't share your own either (presumably because your friends won't give a shit, and will think you odd for thinking they would). You'll notice that this also plays out in men's friendships themselves. 90% of male interaction (outside of work and family) is activity-based. When girls hang out, they just hang out. When guys hang out, they watch sports, play video games, shoot guns, or as a last resort, get drunk.

So anyway, when we men write, it tends to follow the same pattern. I've even seen this in myself. I've had this notion for quite some time that I wanted to have a blog, but always I held back. Why? Because I couldn't think of what to write about! I guess this misses the point. I noticed this, and being contrary by nature, decided I'd write without a purpose. Or anyway, the sole purpose being the sharing of my eminently authoritative and interesting opinions.

Keep an eye on the visit counter. I have a bonus clause in my contract that kicks in when the count hits twelve.