Guys Vs. Girls 2

Gym class at school ranks way down there on my list of non-academic classes at school.

It's not that I don't like exercising. Trust me, I would have quit karate long ago were that true. And, although I'm not crazy about sports, I do enjoy playing them enough for that not to be a factor in my disliking of P.E. My school just seems to find ways to make gym class incredibly dumb, such as "capture the flag", which sounds fun until you realize that our version has 50 kids on a soccer field for a playing zone. Very, very stupid. Things like that are profusely infused into our P.E., and serve to make said class quite unpopular.

Thus, a fun, interesting gym class is a rare gem buried in a pile of junk.

So a few weeks of fun gym classes has felt really, really good.

I stink at soccer, but I'm capable of playing defense well enough to make it fun. So soccer is always nice to have. With snow on the ground, though, you can't exactly play outside on the field. So, we use the gymnasium instead (basically, a basketball court with a little extra space). For the last two weeks, we've set it up using lunch tables as goals (as an encouragement to keep the ball low) and would swap out having all the guys out or all the girls. Good stuff, especially when we guys sort it out so we only have six on the court at one time. Very fun, actually; gym floors and low, narrow goals make things interesting. And it's nice to have periods of rest in between intense games (when the girls play).

Anyway, all this to get to the point.

When the guys are out playing soccer, everyone, excepting two or three, get really into it, and at least make some effort to run after the ball and try to score/defend our goal and whatnot. While watching the girls play, however, you find only a handful who run, who try hard to score, who do more than stand around and wait for the ball to come near them for them to try to kick it.

Now don't get me wrong, I'm not insinuating in any way, shape, or form that girls can't play sports or are lazy or are inferior to guys. I know plenty of girls that could cream me in any sport. The only thing I'm saying is that most of the girls in the gym class were not trying as hard as the guys were. In fact, half of them were purposely sitting out and talking. Besides three or four that ran around after the ball and actually tried to score or defend their goal, the others would just stand around, occasionally jogging a few feet here or there when the ball came near them, unleash a kick, then stroll along back to where they were standing with their friends and giggle while they continued the conversation they were having with their friends before the ball entered their general proximity. Thus, it was more like watching pinball. The ball gets launched from somewhere, it bounces off a pin, then another pin, then another, and somehow doesn't seem to go very far.

I was sitting there watching this amusing sight, wondering why it was that the girls seemed to not try at soccer. I knew most of them were better than me in sports like basketball or volleyball, so athletic ability wasn't really a factor. It just seemed like they didn't care. They just didn't really care whether they won or lost. We guys were working our heads off, being tied at 0 to 0 for almost the whole game, until the other team finally scored a goal at the end (yeah, we lost, but 1-0 was actually WAY better than I thought we'd do. Their team was stacked with some of the best guys on the soccer team, and I was hastily made captain of a rag-tag bunch who were all of an average skill level. We played hard to make sure they didn't cream us, and I'm proud of it). The girls just didn't care, they almost didn't even consider it a game, just something to do to pass the time, it seemed. And, as I thought about it, why should anyone care? It was just an activity we all had to do, it wasn't like we were playing another school and trying to make our school look good by winning, we were just all out there doing what we were told to do.

The only difference was the guys just had the desire to win, to be the best, while the girls didn't care, as it didn't really matter anyway.

So, upon pondering such a pondering, I pondered a little more, and my pondering led me to think beyond the soccer game taking place before me. (oooo, dramatic sentence, :D)

I think, for the most part, guys are just way more competitive than girls. Again, notice I said for the most part and please note that I know many competitive girls. Guys just always want to be the best, no matter what it is. Thus, guys have a bigger ego, thus they don't submit to leadership as easily as girls do, thus they do their own thing more, etc. (e.g.--Who gets in trouble more at school? Girls or guys? And even though part of that at my school is due to sexism (trust me, lol), I will admit guys break more rules than girls do). Guys don't like feeling inferior, even if they are. That's honestly one of the reasons why I like going to Saturday morning karate classes as opposed to the Monday night ones: there are less people there of a higher rank/higher skill level than me. This hatred of inferiority makes us want to win, makes us not like to have to have someone governing us, makes us not want to have to have someone else's help for something, makes us more independent.

Girls seem to lack this competitiveness, for the most part. True, everyone likes being the best, but we guys just take it to the next level. Girls like having people they can tell their thoughts and feelings to, and thus have closer friendships, because they don't care if they need someone else's help. They don't rebel against the rules as much (but they still do it plenty) because they don't feel inferior, or at least don't care. Basically, they have a smaller ego. Which is a good thing, obviously, although it results in less drive to become the best, and less independence. Thus, less effort in a soccer game whose only reward is the satisfaction of winning.

So then, after expostulating this wondrously basic, and yet somehow not often thought of, thought, I decided that it would make good blog material. And, as I did in my first Guys Vs. Girls post, I am now asking you, the general masses, to further expostulate on said thought. Do you agree with my thought, or am I hopelessly confused/utterly wrong?

Impart some of your collective wisdom unto me.

(And before I get any nasty comments, let me again take the time to re-specify that this post is not in any way, shape, or form, meant to demean females/make guys look good, nor do I assert that this is true for everyone--I already know of some exceptions. This is only meant as a general thought which has seemed to be true)

Alright, after that disclaimer, comment away!

2008

Here I am. I made it to 2008!

For those of you that have forgotten, this is the year I graduate from high school, decide which college to attend (I've applied to three but am not sure of which one I want or will go to), decide what major to study (looking like Biology right now), and thus begin my journey into--*cough cough hack*--responsibility and maturity.

Yeek.

In case you didn't know, being a kid is the best. Being where I am: the best also. Being an adult: Scary. Although adulthood does have aspects to look forward to.

Ever come to a major turning point in your life and, looking back, realize how great life has been so far? And, when you look at your current station in life, realize that where you are is really, really, good, so good that you'd almost be happy to stay the same age at the same area of life?

Then, you look ahead, and realize that you have no idea how it's going to be later on? Actually, you realize that later on, you're going to be responsible for not only yourself, but, possibly, for others? That you actually will be responsible for yourself, that you will shape your future in the most drastic way yet? That all the free time you enjoyed, the times of blissful idleness that are already becoming few and far between, will all but disappear?

And, considering all this about the future, you take a step back and see...you have very little in the way of a plan. You're stepping out into a cloudy future, with barely anything in the way of a map. Yet, this is your future. This determines what you will now make of yourself.

Like I said, scary.

The future is not all dark and forbidding, however. In it, you catch glimpses, dreams of the independence you will have, the blessings you may receive. And these visions of happiness and the thought that maybe, just maybe, each station of life one is in can be the best, give you the hope and courage you need to begin to almost look forward to your future.

A new year. A new chapter of my life.

I'd like to ask whoever reads this for prayer. I really need God's guidance for deciding which college to go to and what to do. And I want to make sure I do what God wants me to do, because I know that whatever it is, I'll be happy as long as I'm doing His will.

Guys vs. Girls

Who would you rather have upset at you, a guy or a girl?

And, oh yes, they're really, really, REALLY angry with you.

Fightin' mad.

Tough choice? Maybe not, I know my answer.

In case you need some help, allow me to break down the behavior of each when fighting. And, in case you're expecting some deep philosophical delving into this subject, let me shatter your expectations and say that what I'm about to say is very unlikely something you don't already know, I'm just observing a few points we all see. But before you stop reading after learning that you know all this, may I be so bold as to say that sometimes it's enjoyable to contemplate the obvious for the simple reason we take it for granted. (Just a side note that probably only Mrs. B. will get, that whole paragraph is what my karate instructor calls "filler crap"; the unneccessary yet neccessary stuff. No, I don't really know how that works, but there it is.)

And now for the feature presentation.

You've seen it, you know. A guy pokes fun at another guy, that guy gets annoyed and fires back a more offensive remark, the first guy gets annoyed and spits out a worse one, the other guy gets angry and yells out something worse, the first guy...you get the picture. If it escalates enough, one guy will hold a grudge and then one day when they both meet and one will say something and the other guy throws a punch and a fist-fight breaks out. Ouch.

Quickly zap to a scenario with two girls fighting.

Again, you've seen it and you know. One girl does or says something another girl doesn't like. All of a sudden you notice that that girl is acting somewhat strangely around the first girl. Then you notice that the girl starts talking badly about the first girl. Then the girl starts trying to win her friends over to her side. The other girl notices and does the same. Before you know it, you have two groups of opposing opinions. The two girls in disagreement are shunned by the opposite group. And along the way there are tears, there are slanders, there are small psychological tortures such as ignoring the other girl and ostracizing them. When they talk about the other, to quote Alexander Pope, "At every word, a reputation dies." And so on, for a very long time, until a common enemy arises or the original problem is somehow resolved. As I said earlier about a guy fight, Ouch.

Now that we've reviewed the fighting techniques of each gender, which at times are reversed, did you change your mind? Considering the fact that you probably already knew all of what I said back there, there probably couldn't have been any reason for you to do so. Personally, I would much rather get in a fight with a guy than with a girl, possibly because I am a guy and thus would deal with the situation more naturally. But I actually have a good reason for my choice. When I fight with a guy, in most cases the fight is resolved at some point, normally not very long after the start, by either a good ol' yelling match or a few good ol' fisticuffs. And when you've channeled your anger into either of those, most of the time it dies down after that and you become friends with the guy you fought with. With girls, on the other hand, the fights are stretched for as long as every drop of malice can be squeezed out, drop by stinging drop. Add that to the fact girls tend to involve innocent bystanders/close friends into the fight, feeding them 'til they're fat with that particular girl's side of the story. And then there's the way they torture the other girl mentally. I've seen girls hurt really bad because of the psychological tortures of another girl. I think it's a lot easier to stop being angry at someone when you unleash it all in one burst rather than eak it out little by little.

Anyway, that's what I think, but now I want to hear from you.

What do you think is worse? And am I right in the way I look at the fights of each gender?

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