Say hello to the 'emosogynist'
Put on your chastity belts on, ladies, there’s a new cad in town.
People are always looking for a higher hit these days. The drunken chases that lead to one-night stands no longer do it for the progressive male. Along with pore-specific moisturizers, overpriced button-down shirts inspired by Laura Ashley and bespoke colognes from obscure perfumeries, the upwardly mobile male also has a downwardly dastardly game.
Say hello to the emosogynist. First introduced by New York mag after the appearance of RISD hippeur Aaron Rose in Gossip Girl, it is no longer enough that he gets the girl in bed; he needs to also make her fall in love with him.
Ethan Hawke, the tender Gauloises-puffing, Keats-reading beta male who shafted Hollywood’s golden goddess Uma Thurman with their nanny may have been an early peg. Of course, true to the ‘90s sensitive-guy model, Ethan stayed with the nanny and lost his career. The emosogynist is a silent effer. He wears his Paul Smith and breaks some hearts along the way using lines made for alternative bands.
The Pinoy emosogynist is a peculiar breed. First, they travel in packs — flower-wearing wolves, hungry not for the hot chick but innocent baby chicks. They don’t want blood, they want tears to validate their manhood. It’s rather curious that they chose this sport but it’s been a tale told over time in movies like Casablanca and Don Juan de Marco. If you think about it maybe Cleopatra was the original emosogynist. Maybe this is manhood’s revenge.
Whatever it is, the bigger question is why would such intelligent men waste their time? If you want to protect yourself you can blame it on ADD. However, the truth is they just don’t want a chase, they want a conquest. When the woman has melted into butter you will hear the familiar lines: “I really love you, that’s why I have to let you go.”
“I woke up today and realized you deserve better. I’m not good enough.” “We’re better than lovers, we’re friends.”
Suddenly the alternative band lines have morphed into lines that belong to songs of Chicago and Air Supply. Cheese saves all. These faggish men have stolen a technique mastered by women for centuries: letting them think it was your idea.
Revenge of Cleopatra, indeed.
The emosogynist is the living and breathing nightmare of every woman. Love is the greatest ideal. You can ask why not in athletics? Why not business? In the game of love, for the emosogynist it’s an infinite playground of experiences and unique triumphs. Unlike the closed-up commitment phobe, the emosogynists see this vast grazing area as the ultimate killing fields. Romanza extreme sports. This is why Pinoy emosogynists stay in packs to share the game. They are not the hapless cads that eff up in relationships. They have a method.
First, they act gay. Or at the very least, look gay. This puts the woman’s guard down. Then they espouse wholesome highbrow activities, trolling around art galleries where they know all the owners and are buddies with all the artists, perhaps critiquing and casually noting the era of the pieces the woman picks; this is capped off with cocktails at some book launch or museum event. There are long talks on the phone — it’s almost Edwardian. Until, of course, it ceases to be. And the woman in love becomes another notch on his canopied bedpost.
All in all, it may not be “all fair in love and war,” but in this case you can hate the player and not the game.
