let lemons be angry

These days I've been thinking a lot about the women's liberation movement and the ensuing decline in gallant male acts. The liberated woman says "I can send myself home." The man complies. Multiply that by a couple of generations' worth of men, and you get a worldwide culture of men who don't send women home. So when the rare man actually offers to send his lady friend home, the woman is stunned and touched by his kind act, and assumes he must be in love with her. Men learn from this and avoid making such random offers in the future. Which gender is at fault?

I'm not sure what kind of female I am. Judging by the way I'm treated by most males, I must come across as a Liberated Strong Woman. Some girls step across a space of earth and get doors opened, bags carried, and sweet bunnies shoved into their faces. While I don't long to be tended to like a flower, I do appreciate the few genuinely gallant gentlemen I meet.

And I've made this observation: Asian dramas (Taiwanese, Korean, Japanese) teach us that the cold, ruthless, rich bad boy gets the girl. The girl is usually poor and simple. She falls in love with him despite all the banter, fights and MCP treatment. He makes up for his icy temper by occasionally doing something huge for her (filling the living room with flowers, buying her a beautiful dress) that shows that he actually loves her, but he just doesn't know how to express himself. His incapacity to tell her how he really feels makes him vulnerable and lovable to the audience, and so every time he shouts at her, we sigh and smile because we know the secret truth. There is usually a third party-- a guy who tries to win the girl with his caring gazes, everlasting presence, and thoughtful words. He never gets the girl. He's too good. Neither the girl nor the majority of the audience falls for him.

Western film history plots a very different idea of romance. I can only think of one bad Western boy who gets the girl, and that was John Travolta in Grease decades ago. In Western movies, the Asian story setup is often completely reversed: the girl starts off as the girlfriend of a rich man who treats her like trash, and then she meets a poor, simple boy who is an absolute gentleman. Think of Titanic.

Maybe the media influences society. Maybe the media takes its cues from society. Whatever it is, Western and Asian audiences get very different ideas reinforced in their heads. I find that girls who watch korean dramas tend to prefer bad childish boys, while girls who have never watched Full House cannot for the life of them comprehend how a man can shout at a woman and be loved for that. One school upholds the long-loved knight in shining armour, the other has sympathy for the misunderstood chauvinist.

Knights or pigs. Which shall our women fall for today?