Is this the last frontier...

...of the women's movement? While so much has changed for women over the last 50 years or so, one thing that seems to be resisting tooth and nail is the notion that men are expected to pay for the cost of a date. I should mention that I am old school and have always picked up the entire cost of a date. It does, however, seem like an outdated thing to do, especially if the female is well-off financially. I'm sure the practise has its roots in the fact that very, very few women used to work, and therefore had no money. Don't you think it's time that we drop traditions that no longer make sense for the times? I was astounded at some of the answers people gave to the following question (I didn't ask it). (I am copying the question and answers verbatim and adding my comments in red.)

Question:

Why are guys supposed to pay for dates?

It just seems a little unfair, doesnt it?
I'm all for being a gentleman and stuff, but its just been on m mind...

Every girl's all about empowering women nowadays, so it just seems a little out of place...

Answers:

I guess it's just the traditional way and shows that the guy cares.

If paying shows caring, does it follow that when a woman doesn't pay, it shows she doesn't care?

because paying for the dates would be something a gentleman would do

Using the same logic, a woman who doesn't pay is not a lady?

Because he's the guy

The girl above thinks that picking up the tab is in the male genes.

Do you want to talk about unfair? Try having to pass a human through a little tiny hole later on in life. . Or have monthly visits taht make you all moody and irritable. You have got it made. next time you feel like complaining about it remember what we have to go through . Dont complain & just pay the bill =) plus if you do.. its so much more attractive. even though we are all about "empowering" we still like manners and having respect.

Wow. The girl above thinks it's only fair that males should pay for dates as compensation for the inconveniences that the female physiology possesses. Furthermore, every guy a girl dates should pay for the day she has to suffer the pain of passing some other guy's child. And since, according to her, it's also a matter of manners and respect, I think we can conclude that she rarely displays her manners or shows respect.

Because it'a woman who will have to pay for rasing a child alone, if anything goes wrong.

Interesting take. This young lady's idea of "a date gone wrong" is getting pregnant, having a child, and the father skipping town. And she demands a free meal just in case such unfortunate circumstances arise. I suppose that's fair compensation.

Oh, c'mon. Admit it; you just don't want to spend the money. It's okay to be a cheapskate if that's what you want. Don't blame it on the ladies.

What this woman believes is that a person who doesn't pay for a date is only a cheapskate if they don't have a vagina.

i like it its better that way its like their role they barely do anything nowadays anymore the least they could do is pick up the check

The lady above doesn't mind dating lazy, ne'er-do-well's, so long as they pick up the check. And it also sounds like she feels all men are lazy.

Q & A's from around the web

If you're in your car stopped in traffic, and look over and find a girl staring at you, and then when you look at her, she smiles, does that mean she wants you?

Yeah, she does. And $80.

Global warming

I was standing at the supermarket checkout yesterday and they had a a small ad taped to the scale where it is just below the height of most people's chin. It was hard not to notice it. It was a plea for charity. Specifically, it said "Could you still ignore it if it were this obvious?" Below that, was a picture of a sad looking boy of perhaps eight years old sporting a t-shirt which read "I'm Hungry". Apparently, I could not and I reached into my pocket and gave the requested Toonie (Canadian $2 coin) to the cashier.

Before I had advanced to the point of the sign, I had noticed that the girl in the queue ahead of me was buying quite a few tins of cat food, and it sparked the affection I will always hold for felines since I had 13 beautiful years with my own cat before I had to put him down due to health problems. Anyway, as I started to put my items into my eco sac, I noticed a cat food tin, so I quickly looked up and out the door and could see the girl who bought them, and gathering up my stuff, I rushed out and caught up with her as she was getting into her car. I handed over the tin and as she thanked me, I told her we can't have hungry cats meowing all over the countryside.

As I continued on my way home (walking distance from the store), I noticed that despite the nip in the October air, the two events left me feeling a little warmer than I was on my way to the store. I would like to take this opportunity to challenge you all to go out of your way in the next day or two and perform a random act of kindness, no matter how small. This kind of global warming is good for the planet.

From the anals of time

At my age, pinpointing when something occurred, is sometimes tricky. My best guess is that the following occurred around the early 90's.

On a hot summers day, in Guelph, Ontario, Canada, young Gwen Jacobs was walking along the sidewalk of a busy downtown street. She suddenly decided right there and then that it was unfair for men to walk along topless while women had to be uncomfortably covered. She removed her top and nonchalantly continued her trek. In due course, as one might expect, the police arrived on the scene, "scene" being the operative word here, and promptly arrested her.

Gwen, the assertive and resourceful gal that she was, even at her tender 20ish age, secured herself a good lawyer. To make a short story shorter, the court was convinced that she was right in having equal rights to a man in regards to public (un)dress.

The effect of the case was immediate, if not widespread. In the following months, the occasional young, and even not so young, female could be seen exercising her new-found "freedom of expression", most often at beaches, parks or in one case, while watering the front lawn. Each incident that was spotted by a member of the hordes of press that were now scouring all venues they thought might yield another "Gwen", was immediately flashed across the television screens and had everyone wagging their tongues about it. Beach attendance figures broke all records that summer, attended by mostly adolescent boys (of all ages) hoping to get a head start on September's anatomy class.

Well, extremely conservative Canadians couldn't stand for such a public debacle. But what to do about it? When a "lady" of a certain age, in a small public pool, with even smaller children, insisted on exposing her ample bosom, thereby covering up her navel, enough was enough. The police arrested her and somehow managed to convict her of some sort of community standard statute. After that, one or two more incidents were reported to have occurred at the beach and that was the end of it. Canada was proud to revert back to the prude it has always been. And Gwen Jacobs was indelibly etched in Canadian history.

How much more dirty can politics get?

The following ad has been playing on TV more times than I can count the last few weeks.



It seems to me that if politicians put half as much effort into serving the people as they put into digging up dirt and defaming their opposition, things would be a lot better for all of us. I've never understood why they get away with the slanderous messages they bombard us with. They never seem to get sued. I'm sure that at least some of these messages are true but either way, they are scumbags for libelling someone so viciously or else they are scumbags for having done what they're accused of. I can't wait until one of them is "exposed" as a paedophile or necrophiliac.