Personal Anecdote
Let me tell you a true story about myself; it may shed some light on our cultural problems. The names are changed.
I went back to college as an older male, suddenly surrounded by young freshman females.
I really liked a girl named Angel, but she was a little reluctant, and I took her nervousness as indicating a total impossibility, so I backed off temporarily. I tried to forget about her and attempted to concentrate on my studies.
Angel used to baby sit, and I would see her occasionally with children in the park. She looked so beautiful and natural with children.
Joe Counselor, a friend of mine, befriended Angel and told me about their talks together. Joe, like me, was older than Angel. He was acting as a sort of big brother to her, helping her sort out issues in her life. It sounded like a platonic friendship. But then suddenly, it was not.
He came first to me, his friend, confiding in me that something had gone wrong. He felt ashamed. He had been goofing around, teasing her and then playfully wrestling with her, and then he found that he got turned on. He violated her in a moment of passion and lack of self control.
Soon after his telling me, Angel reported it to the dean of students as date rape. Soon it was also apparent that Angel was pregnant from this incident. She went through an awful ordeal, with all her friends telling her what they thought she should do- some suggesting abortion, others, suggesting adoption. Finally she decided that she would carry and then raise the child herself, much to everyone's dismay. She loved children. What a great gal.
She had some feelings for Joe, and she waited to see what he would do. Joe also still had hopes in a long distance relationship with a European girl who was going to be coming to the states. Joe Counselor wrestled with his sense of duty, but he really was not interested in Angel.
Angel then showed renewed interest in me. She told me about guys she would often meet, who would compliment her but wouldn't follow through with asking her out. Hint, hint. I didn't take the bait, though I never said why. I remained a supportive friend. I admired her for choosing to carry her child to full term, and understood and admired her maternal desire to keep the child. But as I knew who the father was, and was still hurt by her prior rejection, I just couldn't be the one to woo her and marry her, it seemed to me at the time.
Later in her pregnancy Angel casually mentioned something about some guy, Sam Ugly, who was "bugging her". I guess I was supposed to rescue her from Sam. She was signaling to me her impending decision, and I was too slow to understand, or didn't want to. SAM UGLY WON HER, because he didn't mind the fact that she had Joe Counselor's child. I did mind, so I was the loser, twice: first as a poor wooer, then as a poor adapter to the thought of raising my friend's Joe's child. As it turned out, the child was sickly at birth, and died in the hospital soon after they were married.
"Too proud" says the culture to me, speaking with a woman's point of view especially. Well, ladies, men need a certain amount of pride. Kill a man's pride completely, and he's a goner. Women's fears and vulnerability create humiliating situations for many young men.
Why do young women entering college have fears? Because they are not under the protection of their family. Generally there is the lack of a conscious family and community culture around the setting up of marriage. Women need this to feel safe and to sort out their choices of suitors. Teenage women are not getting enough support from their parents in judging their suitors. In high school and college they must make do with the council and support of their friends. There are few adults who take a personal interest in them. There is really no one around who can let them know which guys they can trust and what they think of them. They thus take longer to make a decision. They discourage their shy suitors and lose them. They give in to their bolder suitor's sexual demands and still sometimes lose them. They remain unmarried in college and then seek advice about dwindling suitors in their twenties from friends in their work place. They finally marry someone marginally acceptable out of desperation in their late twenties.
