The Old Coot asks of change

This was written and published in 2004. Nothing has changed. Probably won’t. But, the issue has to be aired every so often. 

It’s time for a new set of male mating rituals. The old ones don’t work; they never did; they just make my gender look stupid. Take the scene I witnessed the other day as I walked into town. A young woman was walking in the same direction, but a block ahead of me. A male in a pick-up truck honked as he passed. She didn’t wave; she just looked down at her feet. A few minutes later another guy came by and rolled down his window and yelled, “Hey baby; need a lift?” Her head went down again, and her pace quickened. Then a little white Honda drove up with four “young adult” males in it. The radio was blaring; the bass was so loud that the whole car vibrated. I thought it was going to explode. 

I noticed the windows go down as the car came alongside the girl; it slowed to a crawl. All four guys leaned out and began yelling, “Hey baby!” “Do I know you?” “What’s your name?” “What’s your sign?” They screamed and banged their fists on the side of the car, whooped and yelled, but to no avail. She kept her head down and increased her pace. 

They kept at it for half a block before launching a final volley of whoops. Then they peeled out and tore down the street. A few minutes later they came back in the opposite direction. Two guys were on the roof and one was on the front hood. They unleashed another round of male mating calls and sped away. The guy on the hood almost slipped off as the driver performed a fancy skid. 

Men have been whistling, honking, pinching, and otherwise assailing women in a failed attempt to get noticed for eons. Cavemen invented the technique and it worked for them, but only because they used a club. Construction workers have made it into an art form, but their success rate is no better than the guys in the white Honda. I’m not sure what they expect. Do they really think a woman who is being hassled by a group of whooping, yelling, drooling primates is going to turn around and say, “Boy, I like the way you whoop and yell; pick me up at six big boy; we’ll go to dinner!”

If you are out there whistling, yelling, whooping, pinching, blowing your horn and otherwise making a spectacle of yourself to get a woman’s attention, give it up. The guy taking her to dinner is the one who talks to her; and more important, listens. He loves it when you cruise by in your car with your friends and go into a courting frenzy; it makes him look good. Don’t take my word for it. Ask any woman. Just go right up to her, look her in the eye, smile, and don’t say, “How you doing, babe?” Like Joey Trivani, on the TV show Friends, just say, “Let me get the door for you.”