In this review of Tracy McMillan’s book “Why You’re Not Married… Yet” she offers viewpoints on assisting women to look at things in a different perspectives in relationships.
One of the points she makes which is referenced in a review below is that men’s and women’s ways of processing emotions are different, and that a woman demanding that a man “talk to her” if he prefers to be silent is effectively the same as man admonishing a woman to “stop being so emotional”. The point being that it’s very presumptuous assume that talking though things is the only way to process something, and it’s rude to force a man to verbalize if he would prefer to be silent on the matter, and essentially more or less equivalent in rudeness to a man telling a women to " stop being so emotional".
There may be a point in there about communication styles, but the essentialism kind of muddles it there. I’m a terrible communicator and hubby is constantly demanding that I open up, and AFAIK I have a set of ovaries and no penis in sight.
It’s valid on a certain level, however my gf demanding that I “talk to her” is not necessarily insulting to me, whereas me telling her to “stop being so emotional” certainly would be to her.
I think it’s a valid point to say that people have different styles of communicating, but I don’t agree that asking someone to communicate with you using your preferred method is akin to accusing someone of being irresponsibly emotional.
Well, there’s a bit of difference between “asking,” and “asking, dammit” or “demanding.” There’s also a bit of difference between “asking” and “accusing.” Did you notice how you flipped the script there?
For that matter, the scenario isn’t presented as a question of communication at all, but of “processing emotions.” It’s not that the man necessarily has anything to communicate; he’s just feeling stuff, and the woman is requiring him to share the feelings in a certain way because that’s what she would want to do.
The problem (for me at least) comes when ‘talk to me’ gets combined with emotional rule.
When I talk about an issue, I’m going to use reason. If you willfully allow your emotions to override reason, yet demand that I speak about the issue, you are only setting us both up for conflict.
That probably would have been a better way to frame the question for discussion.
So… is a woman requiring a man to be verbal as to his interior thoughts and feelings because that is her preferred form of emotional processing, as rude of presumptuous as a man requiring a women not to be so emotional in processing her thoughts and feelings?
First, people should be sensitive to their partner’s communication style, period. I am a woman who doesn’t talk emotionally. So I’d be the one sitting silently and the one wishing all the emotional stuff could be left out on the front porch. Gender ain’t got nothing to do with it.
Secondly, just because you’ve got a preference doesn’t mean you can’t be accommodating. Flexibility goes a long way. Maybe you don’t feel like talking, but that doesn’t mean you can’t talk at all. Likewise, while someone can’t help their emotions, they can try to communicate without using their emotions as a weapon. Either party should be able to request things that are well within the control of the other.
Yes. (And the statement is equally true if the genders are switched up.)
If somebody’s relative has just died, say, and they’re going through heavy feelings, but don’t want to talk about it–they want to do something else to process–then it’s just jerky to insist that they have to talk now, even a little.
I think the present obligation for flexibility and accommodation is more on the partner of the person who is dealing with whatever. If your partner has shit on his or her mind, your job is to be there for them in the way that they need, at that moment.
It’s all about whether you think about your partner’s concerns when you make your demand. Both issues - “talk to you” and “stop being emotional” - are tactics that men and women use to deal a problem in a relationship. Both can be used to confront the problem or they can be used as a way to ignore the problem. The author in the book sounds like she’s talking about both statements when they are used as a way to ignore the problem.
When men say “stop being so emotional” it’s usually to belittle the woman’s concerns. It’s said as a way of avoiding responsibility for whatever bullshit the man has done. E.g. “So I went to Vegas and blew my salary on whores and heroin. Stop being so emotional.”
However, it’s not always used this way. Asking someone to stop being emotional is a valid concern. Men and women both have problems behaving emotionally. With men it’s usually about sports, honor, and aggression. With women it’s about body image and shoes. (I’m talking generally here, not making any scientific observations.)
Similarly, asking someone to “talk to you” can used in both ways. A women can demand a talk from someone without considering his communication style. Maybe this man needs time to process what happened alone. Maybe he can deal with the problem without a long discussion about his feelings.
However, if it’s used with concern for your partner, it could be a good thing. If you know your guy hates talking about emotions, then you can find a way to communicate about your problems without a deep emotional discussion. Sometimes it’s unavoidable, but most issues can be resolved with exploring your feelings.
Except that if they won’t talk to you, how can you figure out what they need? I’ve known more than one person–male and female–who feel like what they need to be supported should be intuitively understood by their partner, and when it wasn’t, that was a failure on the partner’s part.
I’ve also known people who actively concealed emotional turmoil, and then blamed their partners for not accommodating it.
Finally, going through some heavy emotional shit isn’t a get-out-of-all-relationship-responsibility-free card. Your partner has a vested interest in knowing whether you are in a dark and deepening hole from which you doubt you will ever emerge, and wherein you are questioning everything you ever held dear, most especially your romantic relationship and relationships with your children, or if you are just feeling a lot of grief and need some time to process it. After a period of time–days, weeks?–your partner has a vested interest in knowing whether your pain and grief are being worked through or if you are just sliding more and more helplessly into the pit. It doesn’t give you the right to ignore your partner’s emotional needs as well, and if you are both going through something–or if even you going through something is making them go through something–you have to be responsive to that need, however strong your own emotional turmoil.
Now, I will also cheerfully argue that having a lot of emotions isn’t a get-out-of-relationship-responsibility-free card either, and especially isn’t an excuse to be endlessly thoughtless, demanding, or insensitive.
The very notion of someone preferring to be silent I think is misleading.
I can’t see many excuses for not wanting a short, to the point conversation with your partner about something significant enough to trouble him or her.
IMO, if a partner is refusing to talk about something it’s because they:
Don’t think you’ll like what they have to say, and it will be a drama.
or
Think it will be a long rambling conversation going nowhere, and it will be a drag.
Just wanting silence for its own sake, I don’t see it.
It reminds me of the Men are from Mars series. I really liked it at first, and then tried it in real life. . .
Actually, I do think that that it’s good to remember that other people have different communication styles, but it does a disservice by reinforcing stereotypes.
I’ve noticed in a lot of human pairings, gay, straight, lovers or buddies, you’ll find a talkie feelie half and a wall half, to differing degrees.
Who knows? It might be perfectly normal for humans to occasionally poke each other to open up and talk, and occasionally shut up and let it go.
When I was young it did seem there was a definite bias towards women’s communication style being the superior one, and boys and men had to learn to communicate better and express their feelings and crap like women do.
We don’t still think that, do we? I mean, not so simplistically.
Yes, that’s what comes to mind. It’s meant to simply illustrate that people are different, but many will come away thinking they’vre found remarkable insight into the opposite sex based on the two examples, missing the larger point altogether. Of course that may be the fault of the reviewer, missing that larger point. Perhaps the book had a little more to say.
Maybe I’m missing something. Since when does “processing emotions” necessitate communicating with another person? It is something that might be done alone and silently by people of either sex.