In response to a recent post on an SATC episode, and in view of other posts on the state of Malaysian men, a reader has offered a challenge that I'd like to bring to the forefront.
You gals out there, define romantic? since in general malaysian guys are not up to par with our western counter-part, pls shed some light why are we so bad?Posted by Tony Iomi at 2004?02?06? 15:46.
With Valentine's day looming in a week's time, perhaps the ladies (and enlightened males out there) can offer our less-than-clued friends a hand. Please pen down your ideas of what is romantic and what is desirable in a man.
p.s. For those of you who feel the need to talk about what you would like to see in a woman, wait.
Posted by Najah Nasseri at 2004年02月07日 13:11 | TrackBackOh God Malaysian men, don't get me started.
They have trophy girlfriends, put the whole 36-24-36 thing into consideration before anything else, they don't put in enough effort in trying to get to know us. Come on guys, this is the 21st century, we work hard, we have money, same kind of education, everything you can offer, we most likely can do, can get. Go the extra mile for crying out loud.
They don't dress well, they don't take care of their bodies. You walk around thinking what the hell is going on? And if we are better than them, financially and otherwise they get threatened!
A friend of mine visiting from the US commented saying there were so many good looking, well dressed and charming women compared to the men... what does that tell you?
Their Asian mentalities. The whole do what I say, cos I'm the man. Don't drink, don't talk to other men, YEAH I know most of you are going to deny it, but you know, I'm in my twenties in the dating scene and really, these things happen.
Please guys, start dressing well, taking care of yourselves, if your girl friend spends time making sure she looks good why can't you? And no I dont mean your favorite Liverpool jersey and jeans. GO all out once in awhile. I've done baskets, and perfume and read poetry, never had anything like that returned to me.... EVER!
Posted by: mini trooper at 2004年02月07日 13:27here's the thing also... when a guy goes all out to get all good looking, swanky and stuff, he gets passed off as gay instead! :D
Posted by: dilemmadude at 2004年02月07日 14:27Dilemma dude, if a man is not gay in the first place, there's no need for him to bother with others' perceptions when he goes all out being swanky. It's the woman he needs to convince and woo with his suaveness. :)
In fact, it's quite a desirable trait for a man to be confident enough in his masculinity that he is not afraid to get in touch with his feminine side.
Posted by: bayah at 2004年02月07日 20:34studies show that the sub-conscious mind of women will still pick out the one who can hunt, kill, provide and procreate... hence falling for built, hunky, good looking, wealthy men... and these men usually come with accessories such as chauvinism, bastardly attitude, etc. another factor is the sex appeal factor. women often fall for men who are liked by other women. apparently, their biological radar tells them that if that other woman digs that guy... there must be something worthy about him. the guy's "saham" increases if the other girl is regarded highly by the first one. men who're into trophy girlfriends tend to get more girls...
men who are not all that are labelled as "friend-only" material or simply seen as gay-ish.
popular excuse from women... "no spark-lah"
does spark only comes with good looks? why very often it does? i'm not trying to offend or defend anyone here... just stuff that came to my mind.
oh and men who don't know how to respect women does not deserve one.
:-)
Posted by: inbam at 2004年02月07日 21:43There's been trend for men being more conscious about their looks these days.
Men in Aussie goes to spa like us do. Though I wonder whether the trend has started in Malaysia. Hm, prolly they r the ones labelled gays, lol.
Anyway, I did recommend some Malaysian male comrades in Aussie to use nivea cream for his dry skin. And the response I got "Nah, it's too girlie."
Another comrade took my advice and bought a bottle after a few months arriving here. Prolly he realized he needed one.
Btw, my opinion is that looks can be the initial attraction between the male and female. But all this will be gone in the later courting stage as the personality and compatibility tests come in.
My idea of a romantic guy is still vague. I'm a perfectionist in a way but still willing to compromise with the lackings.
Maybe because I'm bare 20, lol. Perhaps there r more experienced women who can be more specific with the attributes of an ideal romantic.
Posted by: norlinie at 2004年02月07日 23:10wats rong with malaysian guys ? *sigh* we are terrificly terrific in bed...
Posted by: alphademon at 2004年02月08日 05:32There is just one thing I don't get, and I've observed Malaysian men doing this more than Western men: why are they only gentlemanly with the woman they are going out with?
As in.. he opens the door for his lady, and then walks in and literally slams the door - or lets it go hard enough to hit the person right behind him.
What's wrong with just being generally polite and holding the door until everyone walks through, male or female?
Posted by: Idlan at 2004年02月08日 06:54Most Malaysian women are more mature and knowledgeable to beat around the bush, especially the younger generation of 30s. Are we analysing a handful of hangovers?
Posted by: bill at 2004年02月08日 11:01the ideal guy, huh? ooh, tough one...
as a matter of fact, i dont think malaysian blokes are really all that vile...depends on who u end up with, i guess. gals out there who had d misfortune of coming face to face with the more moronic ones, well...your loss, really. dont go wallowing in ur self-pity, and become a saddie. theres a whole bunch out there who are actually pretty okay. open up a bit, and maybe ull chance upon one
I am indeed amused to hear that most Malaysian guys - in plain english - is thought plain and dull in appearance.
I do not have the habit of observing people in public, thus I cannot even speak on behalf of my sex. But if you ask me, I think being strikingly beautiful is more of an exception than a norm. In any case, men are only looking for trouble if they date women who are more shallow and stupid than they themselves are.
Anyway, I have yet ventured into the dating scene so please pardon my ignorance. Perhaps when I do, I will take the many interesting advice here and dress myself up like a peacock and keep my fingers crossed.
Should I be apologetic if I am not romantic enough by the standards of our womenfolk? I don't think so. I am sure there are many romantic men out there for the picking. In fact, there is quite a few who can be conditioned, tutored and schooled to pass off as Cassanova himself (or whoever the lead male character is in the latest romance novels that catches your fancy).
God bless those breed of men indeed.
Oh, the drama is killing me.
I think life is fair. You really do get what you're looking for.
Whatever happened to love built on mutual hatred, scorn and cynicism? LOL!
chez, i wonder too why most women look to malaysian men as plain and dull in appearance (and ungentlemanly or unromantic). i find it pretty irritating women who like to compare malaysian men with 'westerner/europeans' men. they think the world of these orang putih men. i feel it's just not fair to compare. it all depends on the individual, not where the person comes from.
ok, in the first place, do all women love romance? oops. many would said i'm crazy to ask that? because all should love romance? well i suppose then, we should define what is romance? sometimes i find that being too romantic is kind of a turn off... you know, too mushy mushy! :)
Posted by: lucia at 2004年02月08日 20:11i think the distinction between malaysian men and their peers elsewhere (i.e. from other civilized countries) is that malaysian men tend to think too highly of themselves. there's a long list of expectations of what they want from the women, but most don't even look in the mirror.
are you driven? do you have self-confidence? are you intelligent? are you neat (we're not expecting pretty, we're expecting something decent enough to distinguish between a date and a night out with the boys), do you have spiritual depth?
the list doesn't stop there. there are too many malaysian men out there who are not 'man' enough to stand up for their partners, or women in general. i agree with idlan's point in that why is it that our men are only gentlemanly with their woman and not women in general? i've seen too many malaysian men act all enlightened when trying to pick up, only to act like adolescent boys with others.
what we're asking for is not the sun or the moon, just for our malaysian men to treat us the same way they'd want other men to treat their own sisters. we want men who go the extra mile, f*** male ego, and show us how much they want to be with us...
Posted by: diann at 2004年02月08日 21:30If I had to list down what I'd like in a man, it wouldn't be a Malaysian man. They behave like children (probably because they've been too molly-coddled in the past), they're not assertive enough, very few have well-founded self-confidence (usually it's all a lot of hot air or none at all), they don't dress well, most don't have manners, many are not "cultured", few can actually hold a decent conversation in a language of which they actually have good command and finally my pet peeve - *urgh* bodies and even more *urgh* faces. People who think that looks don't matter and that it should be the insides that count - think again. Maybe looks shouldn't take priority, but they do matter. Otherwise, I'd be sleeping with every Tom, Dick and Harry.
Posted by: the bum bung at 2004年02月08日 21:49see what i told you? women complaining about malaysain men. you poor poor malaysian men.
in this blog topic, najah stated "Please pen down your ideas of what is romantic and what is desirable in a man."
what is romantic? what is desirable in a man? a man, mind you. any man (and the title is 'desirability factor'). what is desirable in a man, not are malaysian men desirable. and not are malaysian men romantic too.
i guess this all come about with the first comment - "Oh God Malaysian men, don't get me started." - and everybody did get started. :)
Posted by: lucia at 2004年02月09日 00:34You know lucia, we can somehow make out what SOME Malaysian women are looking for right from the first post. Lets deconstruct...
#1. put the whole 36-24-36 thing into consideration before anything else
Translation = Do not consider our breast-waist-hip ratio. It is the effort that we put into looking beautiful that counts.
#2. don't put in enough effort in trying to get to know us
Translation = Put in more effort to know us (e.g. this is where some basic police interrogation technique comes in handy) or stfu when we talk.
#3. Go the extra mile for crying out loud
Translation = Do more stupid things to draw our attention, we enjoy playing hard to get. It is our perogative.
#4. They don't dress well, they don't take care of their bodies
Translation = Exfoliate before you go out to the streets.
#5. And if we are better than them, financially and otherwise they get threatened!
Translation = Don't be intimidated by our superiority.
#6. Their Asian mentalities.
Translation = Be western, but God knows we girls don't have to change.
#7. Please guys, start dressing well, taking care of yourselves, if your girl friend spends time making sure she looks good why can't you?
Translation = Look, it is not that we're shallow or something but we want our men to be ravishing to others.
#8. I've done baskets, and perfume and read poetry, never had anything like that returned to me.... EVER!
Translation = GIFTS GODDAMMIT!!!
#9. It's the woman he needs to convince and woo with his suaveness. :)
Translation = Dress up and be suave - Key to Wooing 101. Now remember, guys are expected to do the wooing.
#10. In fact, it's quite a desirable trait for a man to be confident enough in his masculinity that he is not afraid to get in touch with his feminine side.
Translation = Cry at the movies. But try to avoid the limp wrist syndrome yea?
#11. Men who are not all that are labelled as "friend-only" material or simply seen as gay-ish. Popular excuse from women... "no spark-lah"
Translation = Ladder Theory & Intellectual Whores.
http://www.intellectualwhores.com/masterladder.html
#12. oh and men who don't know how to respect women does not deserve one.
Translation = Do what we say, or get lost.
#13. Btw, my opinion is that looks can be the initial attraction between the male and female. But all this will be gone in the later courting stage as the personality and compatibility tests come in.
Translation = Buy nivea cream and get a personality test guys (may I suggest the Myer-Briggs kit?).
#14. I'm a perfectionist in a way but still willing to compromise with the lackings.
Translation = Impress me.
#15. There is just one thing I don't get, and I've observed Malaysian men doing this more than Western men: why are they only gentlemanly with the woman they are going out with?
Translation = Guys need to be more civilised and polite.
#16. as a matter of fact, i dont think malaysian blokes are really all that vile...depends on who u end up with, i guess.
Translation = We need to find those gold-mines sisters! Keep digging!
#17. i think the distinction between malaysian men and their peers elsewhere (i.e. from other civilized countries) is that malaysian men tend to think too highly of themselves.
Translation = You should thank your lucky stars that I am even talking to you. I shall grace you with a date when I feel that you're worth it.
#18. are you driven? do you have self-confidence? are you intelligent? are you neat (we're not expecting pretty, we're expecting something decent enough to distinguish between a date and a night out with the boys), do you have spiritual depth?
Translation = Alanis Morissette listed 21 Things, mine's way shorter. Being driven, confident and intelligent is very important (read: career $$$) but we also want spiritualists. Nothing much.
#19. the list doesn't stop there. there are too many malaysian men out there who are not 'man' enough to stand up for their partners, or women in general.
Translation = Look, there is just way too many things in the LIST. So just do whatever we want you to do (read: OMG Beat the fucking crap out of this guy who was rude to me!)
#20. i've seen too many malaysian men act all enlightened when trying to pick up, only to act like adolescent boys with others.
Translation = You must be enlightened all the time to try to pick me up.
#21. what we're asking for is not the sun or the moon, just for our malaysian men to treat us the same way they'd want other men to treat their own sisters.
Translation = Okay, you don't seriously think that we'll settle for being treated like your sisters right? That's just a metaphor. We actually expect much better treatment than the ones you accord to your sisters, and that includes lotsa gifts.
#22. we want men who go the extra mile, f*** male ego, and show us how much they want to be with us...
Translation = Be our slave and adore us.
#23. If I had to list down what I'd like in a man, it wouldn't be a Malaysian man.
Translation = I would rather date an alien rather than a Malaysian man. But if I do, you can see how big my sacrifice is in lowering and debasing myself and go out with you. Count your blessings Malaysian men.
#24. They behave like children (probably because they've been too molly-coddled in the past), they're not assertive enough, very few have well-founded self-confidence (usually it's all a lot of hot air or none at all), they don't dress well, most don't have manners, many are not "cultured", few can actually hold a decent conversation in a language of which they actually have good command and finally my pet peeve - *urgh* bodies and even more *urgh* faces. People who think that looks don't matter and that it should be the insides that count - think again. Maybe looks shouldn't take priority, but they do matter. Otherwise, I'd be sleeping with every Tom, Dick and Harry.
Translation = I am very selective abt people who I sleep with.
-------------------------------------------------
It is not that hard to please Malaysian women. There are many types out there. I bet the dating landscape is like a jungle - sometimes you get the Amazons, sometimes you get Mary Poppins. But regardless of the types that you encounter, I think women are just beautiful paradoxical equations - which of course, serve to mask the fact that the entire courtship process is comically insane.
desirability factor: don't be so lazy, be a man. be confident.
you like someone, go get her, don't do the point and stare. then if she doesn't come to you, don't start pissing on how lame she is for not coming to you in the first place.
Posted by: gretta at 2004年02月09日 02:17I think the problem itself lies with the women. I have a theory that the people you tend to attract are basically an extension of yourself. So in order to date someone you would really appreciate, you have to set goals for yourself...how you want things to be, and don't settle for second best. But that's just my theory.
Posted by: meesh at 2004年02月09日 08:06chez1978: why did it take a woman to decipher all that? lol maybe we men need to be told plain and simple what you women really want and please don't hide behind obscure signs, symbols and crptic phrases :)
Posted by: Sexy Dude at 2004年02月09日 08:26aha. at last there is one woman here - meesh - who share (kind of) my view. the problem lies with the women indeed. how right. that's why i don't like to complain about malaysian men and also hate to see women do. hey i'm not speaking up for men, defending them but sometimes i just get so pissed off at women complaining so much about malaysian men.
Posted by: lucia at 2004年02月09日 12:03Oh I think there are huge problems on both sides of the sphere.... and it isn't as simple asasking our men to be more Western, the problem lies far deeper than that. We cannot neglect the fact that we do live in a patriachal society and this is where some of the problem starts.
Posted by: meesh at 2004年02月09日 12:44i think it has something to do with the social pressures to get married. women primp up, men revel in the knowledge that there are many fish in the sea. i know so many women who 'settle' because it's 'time'... and men, especially the malay ones, continue shopping till after they're married. what kind of dynamics does that create then?
Posted by: tower1 at 2004年02月09日 13:20Found this: http://minamona.blogspot.com/2004_02_01_minamona_archive.html#107631058869768926
Really good...
Posted by: Najah at 2004年02月09日 14:44minamona's write up is really good! but still a little cryptic :) oh i am such a party pooper lol.
any wonderful lass here would want to set up tuition centres for alpha males with a "how to decipher your (potential) mate(s)" module? :D
Posted by: Sexy Dude at 2004年02月09日 14:56I would like to think that there is no one desirability index of men applicable for all women. It's all relative isn't it? Some women like thin men, some like them muscular and some like them a bit plump.
There's no need to complain about men or women, Malaysian or otherwise. Find what you want and embrace him/her. Let's just hope that he/she will embrace you back.
It's well and fine to set your goals high, but we're not talking about objects here. The other side talks and walks. They don't like what they see and they will walk. And it's the same thing that you can do to them.
So, rather than complain or try to determine specific factors of desirability or impose on others what you think should be the right thing, maybe we should just live life and enjoy what we can get, as we like it.
Posted by: namiaf at 2004年02月09日 18:28I think the problem here is not Malaysian men but Malaysian women who are plain insecure. Go to Finnegans or Hard Rock Cafe and see how a beautiful 25 year old is practically drooling all over a balding 45 year old just coz he's white.
My white friends have actually confessed to me that back home they are sad nobody's but out here, they are like 'superman'! I've got a French friend here who is a rich expat and is 38 years old and is engaged to 22 year old college student and her parents blessings!!
BTW, why do Malaysian women love to play the 'tarik harga' game? This behaviour is plain stupid.
Posted by: sudo_nim at 2004年02月13日 19:35Why is it that when malaysian women go for white guys, or when malaysian women say why they don't like malaysian men, malaysian men almost never take it in its stride and instead of looking at themselves, they go around patting each other in the back and telling themselves that it's the women that have problems instead of trying to take the comments positively and doing something with it?
Posted by: sudotwo at 2004年02月13日 21:21Sudotwo wrote
"Why is it that when malaysian women go for white guys, or when malaysian women say why they don't like malaysian men, malaysian men almost never take it in its stride and instead of looking at themselves, they go around patting each other in the back and telling themselves that it's the women that have problems instead of trying to take the comments positively and doing something with it?"
You know one could say the same about you. I am not saying I am absolutely right but these are my observations.
Posted by: sudo_nim at 2004年02月14日 16:53sudo_nim wrote:
"You know one could say the same about you. I am not saying I am absolutely right but these are my observations."
Going round and round in circles will not achieve anything, but let's call a spade a spade. There is a reason why beauty parlours are so packed with women that new franchises are popping up all over the place. Most patrons of gyms are women too. I dare say that there are more women than men in local unis. Women in general are making more of an effort to better themselves compared to men.
Women here are always told to keep their man happy, else he finds someone else. Unfortunately, it's social conditioning.
Point out how our men are making themselves more desirable for the women. As it is, they seem to be resting on their laurels - note that we all somehow know of the ratio of men to women in kl - that women outnumber men in whatever ratio it is (some use it as a basis for polygamy).
Posted by: sudotwo at 2004年02月15日 01:33Sudotwo wrote
"Point out how our men are making themselves more desirable for the women. As it is, they seem to be resting on their laurels - note that we all somehow know of the ratio of men to women in kl - that women outnumber men in whatever ratio it is (some use it as a basis for polygamy)."
Most Malaysian men are busy working hard making the bucks and guess who is it for? But by and large arent most Malaysian men in pretty good shape? I think you need to get out more often. Go hang out in Bangsar and see for yourself. Maybe you're putting too much emphasis on pretty boys like Justine Timberlake and Leonardo Di 'Crapiola'?
Posted by: sudo_nim at 2004年02月15日 19:41'But by and large arent most Malaysian men in pretty good shape? I think you need to get out more often. Go hang out in Bangsar and see for yourself. '
sorry, i think most of those men are gay! :-P
Posted by: crayon at 2004年02月15日 20:16OK, since most of you never really answered my question, let's just move on... =) This debate is going nowhere anyway...
[closing comments before this drags on for too long. if you have a problem with that, email me directly.]
Posted by: Najah at 2004年02月15日 23:29