OK, a running gag on various sitcoms focuses on the tendency of women in relationships to enjoy high culture (ballet, theater, etc.) while the men in their lives begrudge them about it.
For example, Home Improvement: Jill was always wanting to go to the opera or somewhere while Tim would bitch and moan about it, while Tim always wanted to go to monster truck rallies and such.
Or another example, from Everybody Loves Raymond. Quoting Debra: “Ray, in the past, your… dumbness… has kept me from doing several things I’ve wanted to do. The book club, theater,… having conversations.”
However, in my marriage, the roles are reversed. Whereas I would love to go see the Illinois Symphony Orchestra, Mrs. Rastahomie prefers the stylings of Garth Brooks & The Dixie Chicks to Beethoven or Brahms, and would run from the room screaming if she ever found out that I had snuck her into the symphony hall.
So ladies, are your S.O.'s really that obtuse when it comes to cultural/intellectual pursuits? Or is this something one just sees on TV?
Well, Roommate* and I enjoy/ed a lot of very different events. We have both been to the ballet**, stage plays, and symphony concerts, and only once had he complained about being “dragged along” (it was an experimental theatre piece, and I have to say, I can’t blame him). He and I volunteer/ed with a couple of local theatre companies.
And yes, we do enjoy other entertainments.
He watched WCW.
I like NASCAR.
[sub]may the gods of revenge toment him for the rest of his life but that’s another story that would take up the whole board and way too much of your time[/sub]
**We attended a performance of The Nutcracker, his first ballet ever. End of the first act, beautiful white set, everyone in white, excellent dancing.
Lo and behold, a red sphere decends against the backdrop.
I think, “Ah, how clever, a setting sun, nice contrast, points to the designer.”
Nope.
A red balloon stuck in the rafters had deflated enough to sink and land on the stage. It bounced around the stage, helped along by the ballerinas kicking it everywhere, trying to pretend it wasn’t there, which of course made the kids (and some adults) in the audience giggle. Looked like a beachball at a rock concert.
Roommate starts laughing, and I gave him an elbow in the ribs (“Quiet, this is supposed to be cultural. Just ignore it”). Of course, that was impossible and the whole audience is now in hysterics.
Finally, one of the ballerinas took two steps out of line and backhanded the airborne balloon offstage.
That scene got a standing ovation.
We’d been to other ballets, but in his opinion, nothing could measure up to that.
I like football, hockey, and the philharmonic.
He likes that goofy fake wrestling, and art films.
We both like book clubs, musuems, rock music, and nature documentaries. I guess we play up to the stereotypes because I like the nature documentaries to see the cute little baby animals, and he likes to watch the lion take down a gazelle and rip its leg off while it’s still moving.
Neither of us like the ballet, but I would love to see the Nutcracker as described by Screech-Owl.
We are pretty evenly split on the low/high culture issues, although he likes art films and I do not.
However, I would like to insert a brief rant on the way men are being made to feel increasingly unwelcome in “high culture”–the media reinforces this issue. A great example of this can be seen in any liberal arts department. male faces are becoming more nd more rare. I worry what we will end up with is a ‘low’ culture that deginerates, objectifies, and oppresses women and a ‘high’ culture that deginerates, objectifies, and oppresses men. I don’t like this senario at all.
I’ve been somewhat amused by the portrayal of men in TV commercials and movies as insensitive, dumb, and culturally vapid. Now that it’s un-PC to mock women’s foibles Lucy-style, men have become the comic target, stereotypically idiotic. Look at commercials where the man is helpless and lost among the household products until a wise-woman takes pity on the poor sap and shows him what bowl cleaner to use.
My husband is just as interested in theater and art as I am, can do anything around the house that I can, and can discuss literature very well.
It seems to be socially acceptable to make fun of men in general, as a member of the aforementioned group I sometimes get annoyed with the way men are portrayed as testosterone driven dolts.
The fact is, we are testosterone driven dolts but hate to have it pointed out to us.
We both like theater and sailing and science museums. He likes football and going to the movies. I like art galleries and vegging in front of a video. He LOVES his motorcycle. I LOVE chatting on line. He hates doing things alone, and I cherish the occasional solitude.
I don’t think either of us falls into a cultural stereotype… But the way I look at it - we live our lives as we choose. Who cares if someone else wants to categorize us…
My dear husband does not like the opera, and I do.
However, he loves the blues and gospel, and I love ABBA.
He likes movies about poverty, teen prostitution and heroin abuse. Ideally the movie should have subtitles. I like Jane Austen movies and Jackie Chan. (But, perhaps, not Jane Austen movies starring Jackie Chan.)
I like Donne, Milton, Shakespeare, science fiction, fantasy, and romance novels. He likes Hemingway and Elmore Leonard.
I think that the stereotype, like many stereotypes, is mostly baloney but has a grain of truth in the real cultural differences between men and women. And most tv shows and commercials that portray men as ignoramuses are catering to a female audience.
We’re pretty evenly split as far as “high” culture goes. She likes ballet better than me, we both like modern dance. Neither of us likes opera. We both enjoy lecture series heavy on science. Our tastes in popular music differ, but neither of us go to many concerts. In an art museum, I go to the modern art, while she seeks out the impressionists.
Where we differ, tho, is at the low end. I, and many of my male friends can be entertained by cheesy action movies, or stupid sexploitation or fantasy TV, wrestling, etc. She, OTOH, enjoys shows I don’t, such as Friends, Frasier, ER, and such.
Also, most of my guyfriends don’t mind tipping a few, telling stupid jokes, leering at hot women and fast cars, farting, belching, scratching, napping, and the like. Not sure Mrs D and her gal pals do the same. So some element of the guy stereotype holds true IME. Not sure what would be the same for women. Maybe an attention to detail in decoration? Caring whether clothes match? Thinking how a meal LOOKS matters.
My wife and I have almost no common tastes, so anytime we do something together, one of us is usually being polite and going along with something we would never do on our own. With two children under four years old, this is an infrequent problem these days. In general, however, my tastes run more to high culture than hers. While she likes Broadway musicals, she tends toward contemporary spectacles while I prefer Rogers and Hart/Hammerstein, Jerome Kern, Cole Porter, the Gershwins, etc. Neither of us could be considered a devotee of classical music or opera, but I do enjoy certain works, while she has no use for any of it. That’s it for her on music; my pop music tastes include everything from punk, power pop, psychedelia, and garage bands to jazz, classic country, blues, and r&b. Her idea of visual art does not extend beyond what one finds in a well stocked poster shop; if you ever encountered either of us in a gallery, it’d be me. As for movies, we can agree on classic screwball comedies and an occasional current romantic comedy; she hates any amount of onscreen violence (one of the biggest fights we ever had was after going to see Miller’s Crossing), while I have little appetite for most of what passes for comedy and romance these days. Once again, however, if you plotted our tastes against a graph of what’s considered “highbrow” or “lowbrow”, I’m the one who’d be considered more “cultured”. I leave out reading, since that’s not something one is dragged to by an SO.
She has shown a willingness to learn about and enjoy baseball since we got together; otherwise, neither of us cares at all for sports.
My husband and I are just about perfectly suited to one another: we are both techno-hermits. On most weekends, we batten down the hatches, never glimpsing the outdoors as we indulge in computer games and DSS movies. Neither of us is terribly into high culture, but occasionally we will go out to a show or a fancy dinner. My only regret is that he doesn’t like to dance. However, he did agree to take some ballroom classes with me and we both found them boring. So perhaps he was right after all.
I dunno where my Wife and I stand. I know she likes Musicals/Opera and the like, whereas I’ve only been in one musical, and can take it or leave opera. We both read scifi/fantasy literature. She loves the ER/LawandOrder/whatnot circut on television, whereas I’d rather watch History channel.
I really enjoy live theater but am not so much into museums or anything involving music.
Baglady is much more into museums than I.
As for the “men as clods” stereotype. Baglady and I watched All About Eve for the first time the other night. Great movie and one of the great things about it was that the men real people.
They were intelligent but human. More important they were not portrayed as completely subservient to their hormones. They loved their wife/girlfriends so of course they weren’t tempted by the pretty young thing. That was just one of the many reasons it was a great movie (another was that you got more good dialogue in the first have hour than you have any dialogue in most movies these days.)
Math Geek and I do not fit into masculine/feminine stereotypes. We both like going to the symphony and the theatre, and although I don’t think he’s ever been to the ballet or the opera (both of which I like) he’s not opposed to trying it, and has expressed admiration of Cecilia Bartoli’s voice. He watches Jane Austen movies with me.
I’m the one who likes power tools and watching brutal sports (but just soccer, and hockey if the Leafs are winning) on TV. I’m also more likely to play sports than he is. I’m the warmonger, he’s the peacemaker.
I don’t have an SO (officially… yet…) at the moment, but have dated a wide variety of men. Here’s what I’ve learned:
Very few have shared my love of Indy Cars or any sport involving loud engines.
Some of 'em tortured me with 12 hours of football on Sundays. I love football, but it’s not my second religion.
Some of 'em took me to the theatre, which I love, and an occasional opera or ballet, which I also love.
I also love heavy metal and hard-core punk and industrial bands, to balance out the blues and classical.
Some of 'em were better artists than I am and took me to galleries.
Some of 'em made fun of me because I read. (Actually that was one guy and I retorted back that only a true boring person could watch the Weather Channel for hours on end. At least books CHANGE from one page to the next. The weather in Munich will probably not change much in the next hour or so.)
These days, I consider myself lucky to be taken out at all, so I’m pretty flexible about what I’ll tolerate. For the long term, I’d have to say I’ll prefer someone with very diverse interests. As much as I love high art, sometimes it’s more fun to just go outside when it’s raining and play in the puddles. Or watch South Park. I can’t take too much of any one thing and am hoping my future life partner will be the same way.
I’m thinking that men don’t like to be pigeon-holed any more than women do… I’ve clearly known a diverse group of men and none of them really fit any of the stereotypes discussed here.