I would like to know what you folks think about the following.
I was at the grocery store yesterday when I felt some resistance under the wheels of my cart. Immediately without conscious thought, I began to push forward with more strength rather than stopping the cart and moving it to the side to be able to continue.
Another example. You go to pull a drawer open. Something inside is sticking up and blocking it from opening. Instinctive reaction? Yank it open rather than reach in and solve the problem .
Basically I’m talking about the behavior of immediately applying more force on inanimate objects when finesse would be a better option. It’s almost as if my body is on autopilot trying to muscle something to do what I want it to do before my brain intervenes.
Does anyone else do this? And is it more of a male behavior than female?
It might not be just you, but I don’t think it is instinctively male. I’m male, and my first reaction upon hitting resistance is to back off and try a different approach. This applies to shopping carts, drawers, women, etc.
It’s only when the different approach fails that I whack things with an axe!
Well, as a woman, my first reaction is to use force in a stubborn situation. However, after I’ve learned that a lighter touch is necessary, I never use force in that same circumstance ever again.
I do this, including the drawer thing, to the point where the drawer’s on the verge of breaking. I think it’s 'cos I’m short-tempered and lose patience very quickly, even with inanimate objects! I did something similar just this morning - getting make-up on my top saw me scrubbing at the mark furiously while swearing under my breath, rather than gently sponging it out. It didn’t work. Goes to do laundry.
The funny thing about me is the fact that I am not a short-tempered individual. Perhaps when I use force, I am subconsciously seeking to punish the inanimate object for daring to defy me.
Recently I was tightening the bolt on my seatpost clamp on my bike and it sort of jammed. Did I remove the bolt, grease it and re-thread it?
No, I cranked harder and snapped the tip of the bolt off.
TRUNK SMASH!
I had to buy a new clamp, but I wasn’t done with the original. The bike shop guy tried to cut the bolt with a bolt cutter, but he couldn’t get it in there.
I took it home, and sawed through the steel bolt with a rotary tool. Half of it was still jammed in the clamp.
I took it back to the bike shop and one of them went to work on it. Clamped it in a vice, drilled the bolt out and yanked out the remains. That bolt pissed off a lot of men.
I’ve also blown up tires because even though I KNOW they’re at full pressure, the valve on the pump says they’re not. What do I do? Just keep pumping until BLAM!
My reaction to anything that doesn’t work is “force it”.
I’m always calm and rational, except when I’m not. My darling Marcie, on the other hand, will NOT ACCEPT failure of a mechanical device. If it doesn’t work the first time, destroy it completely seems to be her mindset. I’ve never seen such a full-force, straight-ahead attack mentality in anyone else, male or female.
I’m pretty much a girlie girl yet I do this all the time.
Just today my computer locked up at work. I hit ctrl/alt/del to bring up task manager. Nothing happened, so I hit the keys again. Still nothing. So I hit them harder. Yeah, like it’s the force with which I hit the keys that makes the computer work.
Some people are like the OP; some aren’t. I’m not, particularly, and I’m male. I don’t think it has much to do with male/female. Sorry to discredit your theory—I guess you’ll just have to try arguing harder.
And the best response to feigned incompetence is genuine incompetence. “Sure I’ll sew a button on your shirt…Does it matter where I put it?”
I am also of the brute force persuasion. I prefer to summon the household brute for that purpose. He, on the other hand, launches an investigation of the problem that may involve anti-matter and several hours.
