h2g2 The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy: Earth Edition

Why do guys act the way they do? How do they go about not seeming to care about anything? Someone, enlighten me, please.

A depressed little rat

Again, I thought this was going to be a linguistic question and was prepared with flippant answer concerning Guy Fawkes and Morris dancers, but I think the serious answer to your serious question is "Because they can". Despite what you were told in primary school, there is very little immediate payback for bad behaviour. Don't waste your life waiting for them to change. Find some more pleasant people to socialise with

It depends what they don't seem to care about. Men are, by nature, not as good as women at expressing they're feelings. It's not a question of them 'getting in touch with their emotions' or 'getting in touch with their feminine side' (most men don't have one!). They're brains just aren't made that way.

If it's housework you're on about, again men aren't made that way. Most women feel some sense of achievement after they've tidied and cleaned a room, regardless whether or not they enjoy housework; most men don't get the same sense of achievement. And that's beside the fact that a lot of men won't even notice that the work needs doing.

I know that there are men out there who will be up in arms about this, and that there will be women who say 'Men don't do housework because they've been taught that it's woman's work'. Although there may be SOME truth in the latter comment, a lot of the 'not caring' is nature, not nurture, whether we like the fact or not.

Rat, when I read the above post, I didn't think that it really applied to you, so I visited your home page and saw that I was right. You're only 17 so you're probably not complaining about housework. So, I'll tell you what I know, I hope it helps.

When I was your age (a big four years ago) I had just started dating a guy, who I stayed with until about 6 months ago. This guy cared too much about everything. He read meaning into every little thing I did, was worried about me anytime I wasn't in his sight (meaning that I was cheating on him and maybe something bad happened to me both), and he would want me to call him practically every hour that I wasn't with him. So a guy showing that he cares all the time is not always a good thing. (I know this guy is clearly unstable and this is not what you had in mind about caring, but it is my experience, and since I don't have a degree in psychology or anything, it's all I have to go on.)

My almost-boyfriend now, is almost the exact opposite of the last guy. He never shows that he cares about anything. But I know that he does. Most guys have problems with saying what they need and stuff like that, so you have to look for other signs. My guy won't tell me how he feels about me, but when we're at the club, I'll notice him looking at me, and that look tells a lot. He won't call me on the phone, but he remembers things I said in conversations from months ago. He will show me how he feels from his actions, but when I ask him, he will never tell me.

Guys do care about things. You just have to pay attention to find out what they are. And when you do find out where his priorities lie, you can decide whether you should waste your time on him. But, whatever you do, don't ask, because chances are he won't answer.

You sound a lot like I used to. If you need anyone to talk to I would, be happy to listen.

GreyRose

I just have to say that I couldn't agree more. See, its not that my ex doesn't care, I think he wants to not care. He wants the easy way out and that pisses me off. He is my best friend, we are still best friends although we broke up two months ago. And now I am hearing about stuff that he was hurt by and it seems he is telling me this because he doesn't care. So annoying, I am so confused. Now I am hurt because I feel bad that I didn't pick up on certain things but why can't a guy just talk? I mean, I know there are guys that care too much, but I had a guy that seemingly cared but didn't want to show it. so let me rephrase the question, why can't guys let us know that they care? I feel like such a pathetic weakling when I get upset over things and but guys seem to forget what they were upset about in a second.Not just my ex, but I noticed that in my other guy friends as well as boyfriends. I need to know how to get guys to care, or at least show it. Why is it so hard to show what is on your mind, if you want it known? My ex wanted to tell me things and has waited too long to tell it to me, now its too late. Like, GreyRose,why can't that guy of yours tell you how he feels? I don't know what he is thinking, and he reminds me so much of my ex right now. Argh! Well, let me know what happens,it sounds like you like him a whole lot. If only I knew how my ex feels about me, maybe I could stop ranting and raving like a looney head.

A really good way to learn why guys act the way they do is to observe a group of children. In grade school kids start to solidify their positions in society. The learn from their parents and their peers, primarily. Most parents fit into the typical stereotype of traditional male/female roles. Mom takes care of the kids, is sympathetic and understanding, and shows her emotions readily. Dad spends a lot of time away at work, fixing appliances, and pretty much only talks about serious stuff and almost never cries. Sure, this is slowly changing, as we learn to be less gender biased in society, but traditional thinking is still basically the norm (especially with people who decided to have kids).

So the kids model their behavior after their parent of the same sex. And then when they get into school those roles are played out to the extreme. And then they see these traditional roles in the media, the meme of what a boy is supposed to be like, and what a girl is supposed to be like, is reinforced. So when these kids grow up, they act like what men and women are "supposed" to act.

Yes, the genders are different, genetically. Our brains are even structured different. But social pressures make it nearly impossible for the average guy to show he cares, or for the average woman to not care about make-up and hair products.

All we can do is to be patient with eachother. Listen to what the other is saying. And remind them that we care.

Oh, dear, I'm waxing philosophical here. Maybe it's bed time!

Unfortunately, I think turtle is right. Society says that guys are supposed to be tough. So, for the most part, they won't let on if they are having a bad time. And, we're the ones who have to deal with them.

Regarding your ex, he must have cared about these things that hurt him, or he wouldn't have said anything about it. He probably only brings it up now, because you're broken up and he feels like he doesn't have to be macho or something like that. You may want to try to talk about this more since he might be more forthcoming now.

About my guy, argh! is right (I say that exact thing all the time). This is my problem with him now. Two weeks ago, we kissed for the first time, and I am very happy about that, except it brings along a whole new batch of communication problems. Last week at the club, he was leaving right when I got there. This was the first time we had seen each other since we kissed. We talked for a little while, but he had to go. I wanted to kiss him good-bye, but there were a lot of people around. I have no problem with that, but I don't know if he does. So, I didn't kiss him. Now, since he hasn't called me, I wonder if he thinks that I don't like him. The next time I see him I'm going to have to find out how he feels, and it is going to be an uphill battle. But, I'm going to do it somehow, because, yes I really do like him.

Communication has always been and always will be a problem between the sexes. I would tell you to keep your eyes open. The best way to tell what a guy thinks (IMHO) is body language. A guy can control what he says with his mouth, but not the rest of him.

GreyRose

I don't think we should underestimate guys either when it comes to showing feelings... Yes, society is, or at least it has, decided that men should be though and not show feelings, and women should care about everything and everybody, but isn't this society slowly changing? Men and women are getting more and more equal, well, not in atonomy, and there *are* differences, but sociey's expectations for men and women are getting more and more equal. At least that's what I felt last week when this guy came in to my class, talking about computer study at universities. Yes, there is more guys in computing, but does that mean we have to force women into computing aswell, for the sake of equality? I think it's more important that each person does what he\she wants, that be programming or nursery.

Oops.. there I go again.. I'll get back to the real discussion here..

I know my bf cares about me, and he doesn't have any problems of telling me or anything like that. We can talk, and I think we communiate quite well. Event though, he's not very well in picking up other signs, body language, when I need to talk with him or something like that, and that really upsets me sometimes. He's nice, caring and sweet, but just when I need him.. well... he's gone..
Maybe it's my fault.. I don't know.. but I am not really good in saying;"Hey, listen.. I'm depressed and I need to talk with someone!"

Oh..
good luck in your relationships anyway!

Vakuum

We have spent the whole of evolution getting to this point.
As all us guys seem to have an inate ability to do it, we can assume that it must be benificial to us to P*** off the female of the species even though we can see no logical reason why.
It is now so pre-programmed into us that we can't explain it.

When DNA wrote about the "Someone elses problem field" he was describing it almost perfectly.
Whenever somthing happens all you ladies seem to get involved whilst we stand there thinking almost "so what"

O.K., so society is changing and it is becoming more acceptable for men to show their feelings. But 9 times out of 10 (at least!) they won't, because it's not the way they were made. From what I have read (I'm no expert here), there is no connection from the part of a man's brain that handles emotions and the part of his brain that handles words / speech. This makes it hard for a man to put his feelings into words. And I've only seen a man pushed to the point of crying twice. It's not that men don't care or don't feel, they just can't express it as readily as women can. Women take they're ability to express their emotions for granted and expect men to be able to do the same, by putting some effort into it or 'getting in touch with their emotions'.

Men also don't pick up on things like body language and facial expressions as readily as women do. So unless you're crying your eyes out, he probably won't realise that something's up. (This is one reason why women are better at dealing with children than men are; a woman can spot that something is up BEFORE the child gets to the crying or tantrum stage.) If you're not happy about something, tell him. He's not a mind reader.

One book I've read that deals with gender differences from the 'What has science/research found out?' viewpoint rather than 'Men and women are different because society teaches them to be different' viewpoint is: 'Why men don't iron' by Anne and Bill Moir. I found that I didn't agree with everything they said, but there is a lot in there to think about. I think it's well worth a read.

Anybody noticed yet that most of the postings effusively expressing emotions here appear to be written by women? Face it people, boys and girls are different and the less time we spend agonising over why instead of just getting on and dealing with it the better it will be for everyone. We're all differently able as far as expressing ourselves and emoting with others goes - but in general, most guys just don't find it as instinctively natural as most of us gals do.
I've seen sensitive male friends cry at the movies and I've seen insensitive female friends not notice they were shredding the feelings of their male partners. My boyfriend once told me he thought I was laughing when I was in fact grimacing to hold back tears!
Unless I exaggerate my body language to the point of caricature he just isn't able to read it. But he's got plenty of other ways of demonstrating he cares.
If you want to be sure somebody knows how you feel tell them - but just be prepared for them not to react as you would. We're all different and it does nobody any good to try and pretend otherwise.
As my old mum used to say with a sigh 'Folks is folks'

When struggling for answers, one must go to the source.

As regards emotionality: Boys are taught to suppress their emotions, especially the "girly" ones that would make one cry. When a little girl cries, her father is quite likely to embrace her and talk soothingly. His same little boy, however, is more likely to be given instructions like "Quit your crying!," or "Be a man." Sounds terrible, I know, but the reality is that if Dad wasn't harsh on the boy, the boys at school would eat him alive. And further on down the line, he would never get a date. In one of the many paradoxes with womankind, you seem to yearn for a sensitive man who can express his feelings without shame, but if you found such a one, you'd call him a sniveling bitch. In my understanding, women want strong men they can lean on and depend on. This is how they're made.

As far as expressing emotions, I think I do a fair job of it...except to my girlfriends. This is because women, who are much more attuned to emotions than men, tend to read too much into what may have been a casual remark. Therefore, I always feel the need to guard my tongue. Maybe it's silly and stupid, but it's the way I've always felt. And it's supported by the many times I've made a flippant remark, to be met with an intense glare and the phrase "Why did you say that?"

There's also the matter of who else is around - a few guys who are close friends can hang around in a female-free environment, and talk reasonably openly about their feelings, particularly about their feelings for women. (Though I must admit, if they have a beer or two and a bike engine that needs putting back together, or something that needs demolishing, that can make it a *lot* easier. )

There's also a question of how much the feelings of the person you're speaking to matter to you. It can sometimes be a lot easier to talk about deep feelings to a stranger you meet on the bus, and who you're never going to see again than to the person the feelings are about.
Also, especially for men who aren't particularly good (or experienced) about talking about their feelings, the fear of failure can be intimidating - if you do phrase something badly, and upset someone, you fear you wouldn't be able to say anything to make things better, and these days, if you resort to a hug as an alternative, you can't be confident about how that would be interpreted.

I certainly don't think that male emotions are any less intense than female ones. My one reply so far to a newspaper equivalent of 'Ask h2g2' was to a question about why men can write beautiful love poems and songs, but be so uncommunicative face to face with the one they love. Personally, I think the answer is something like :
a) Writing can be edited if it wasn't phrased right the first time.
b) You've no fear of interruption, and the chances are someone will read all you wrote before responding.
c) There's no danger of being collapsed into a tongue-tied heap by a smile, or a glimpse deep into your beloved's eyes.
d) Assuming you're not *too* strange, it's unlikely that someone's going to feel threatened by your writing. If you meet someone in person and you're nervous, you'll probably put them on their guard as well.

I would like to point out that this imbalance in the sexes is getting better. Back in the sixties women learned that they didn't HAVE to always "stand by their man", and that they could do more than just care for the kids and cook and clean. The woman's movement helped teach society that women could be both caring AND aggressive at the same time. (I'm not talking about the aggression that causes pain, I'm talking about standing up for your rights and asserting yourself.) Women learned to be more balanced as individuals.

What's funny is that there really hasn't been much of a movement on the male population to do the same thing. But, as a society we are slowly maturing. Out are the old macho male heros like Rambo and Arnold. Today's generation of young men get a more balanced hero, like the Jedis in Star Wars, and the Woody character from Toy Story. The boys in the grade school where I tought for a while, were quite capable of expressing themselves emotionally, and their peers thought that it was perfectly normal. Hopefully these guys will grow up with these traits still intact.

Sure, boys and girls are born with different biologies, but the human mind is amazingly maliable. There is nothing in our genetic makeup that says we HAVE to act a certain way, just that we have a TENDENCY to act in one way or another. The human mind can learn to do almost anything. And being emotionally expressive is no exception. There are plenty of men these days who are, in fact, quite sensitive and caring. And, for the most part, these men are very successful in both love and career. (Now, don't confuse caring and sensitivity with low self esteem. That's completely different. People with low self esteem often pretend to care about others simply becaue they are terrified that no one will like them. That's not at all attractive. It's the genuine article that is so great an attribute.)

I think a lot of macho acting guys are afraid that expressing themselves makes them a wimp. Far from it, it takes a lot more bravery to expose yourself to the world, than it does to pretend that everything is all peachy.

Oh, and, personally, if a guy cries in front of me, I know he's a keeper. So that crap about women only SAYING they want a sensitive guy is, just that, crap. My rallying cry: Give me an emotionally mature men or give me frogs!

Ok, so I have taken all the psychology classes that my school has to offer and I know all about how guys are influenced by society to act a certain way and blah blah blah. But how exactly do you penetrate that thick wall around them? They want you to be happy but how can any girl be happy if their guy friend or boyfriend can't communicate? The thought of a crying guy weeping at Titanic scares the living daylights out of me. But come on guys, show something, anything! Arghhhhhhh!

There, it passed. I'm better now.

Heh. Are you trying to impress me GargleBlaster?

And Rat, I think you've got the million dollar question there. How do you get guys to come out from behind those Berlin Walls that they wear around their necks? Other than getting out the pick-ax, I don't know. I suppose you could start with showing them the movie Good Will Hunting, and see what happens.

This was the very question that I was in the middle of trying to solve when my last boyfriend got fed up with trying to be in a committed relationship and moved out. So I'm definitely not much help. But if you ever figure it out, let me know, ok?

I am going to be attempting to break down a wall tomarrow night. And, I am scared out of my mind. My almost boyfriend hasn't called me since I saw him for like, 3 minutes a week ago. He is the typical guy who won't let you know what he's feeling. He says it straight out too. I know that he likes me a lot, I can feel it whenever I'm around him, but when I'm not I always worry that he's stopped liking me. It's not because he doesn't call me, he wouldn't call me for months and he liked me that whole time. It's because I like him so much, and I can't see why he would like me. That's not really the problem, since as soon as I see him, I'll know if he still does.

The problem is that I don't know how or why he likes me, and he won't tell me. I want to be his girlfriend, but I'm not looking for someone to marry or anything. I'm pretty sure that's not what he's after either, but what if he thinks I do want that? I don't know how to approach him, because I don't know where he's coming from. I don't know what he's afraid of. And there's no way for me to find out.

I need some info here. What are some unspoken signals that guys give out that tell you how they like you? And if anyone has any advice about how I should talk to him about all this? He knows that I like him, but I don't think that he knows that I want to go out with him, offically. I would appreaciate any advice anyone has to offer. I don't want to go out tomarrow empty handed.

GreyRose

Let me lead off with something which might offend you, but it's a chance I take everywhere else on this site, so why stop now...

"The problem is that I don't know how or why he likes me" It doesn't sound like the problem is him. It sounds like it is you. Speaking for myself as an example of the whole, guys have no interest in "why." It is simply enough to accept that the feelings exist. I've never been curious enough to ask a woman why she was interested in me, but I have had women, in that desperately-needing-to-know tone that I've picked up from you, ask me why I love them. The thing they had in common: poor self-esteem. So poor that it required buoying by everyone around them on a regular basis. Perhaps my armchair psychology is way off the mark here, but I would recommend you look deep into yourself. If you can find reason enough to love you, then there is no reason others can't do so as well.

Epilogue to the story: those relationships never lasted very long. I've always found self-confidence to be incredibly sexy, and poor self-confidence to be something of a turn-off.

I will offer what signals I can, though, because it IS entirely posssible that he's just bluffing you along. Realize that most of these things are unconscious, so I don't have many to offer.

Hold your gaze: in most conversations, especially with other men, guys will look directly at the other person for less than 8 seconds, then dart their eyes off elsewhere before reestablishing eye contact. It's a well documented behaviour. Gays use it as a way to detect other gay men. Anyway, if he locks onto your eyes for long moments at a time, you can be sure he is plenty interested.

Touch: guys are generally not touchy-feely types, although I've known some exceptions. But your dude sounds like he falls into my category, which is that he prefers to keep people at a certain distance from him. Therefore, a casual touch on your knee, or the small of your back might seem innocuous, but is for him a loud broadcast of his feelings.

That's all I've got for now. Perhaps some of the females in this conversation could do better than I have.

Don't worry, I wasn't offended. I know I have low self esteem, but it used to be a lot worse. I don't ask him why he likes me all the time (because I know that he won't tell me), I would just really like to know. But, it's the HOW part that gets me. I don't know exactly what he wants from me.

I'm just not used to this kind of thing. I just broke up with a guy I'd been with for almost four years, almost 7 months ago. Don't worry, this isn't a rebound thing. I had been wanting to break up with my ex for over a year, I had just been trying to convince myself otherwise. Because for the longest time, I didn't think that I had a legitimate reason to do it, since he hadn't hit me or cheated on me or anything. But, being unhappy is a great reason to break up with someone. What it really took though, was me liking another guy, then I realized that I couldn't put it of any longer, because it wasn't fair to my ex or myself to stay with him when I wanted to be with someone else.

From what you said, he really does like me a lot. I really hope so.

Thanks a lot, GargleBlaster, now I need your input on the Valentine forum, if you have the time.

GreyRose