A Woman's Place? It's in The Kitchen

You see, this is a matter of the biological predisposition of the woman. So many women today attempt to stray away from the kitchen, imagining that God had something else in mind when He created them.

Well, let me be the first to tell you -- he didn't. Women, your chances of escaping this God-ordained fate are about the same as a rat in a python's cage -- sooner or later nature will take its course. Thus, it's my hope that women will find themselves in their proper place: the kitchen.

Now why would I allow you to think that I subscribe to the chauvinist ideas that these first few paragraphs seem to illustrate? Because clearly it's similar chauvinist ideals that form and perpetuate distorted messages to women about what is the shape of a healthy body.

Thus, it is my hope that women will find themselves in the kitchen, or wherever it may be that they choose to find a meal.

Before attacking where society goes wrong, I'd like to say there is nothing wrong with being attracted to a sexy woman (or man). Regardless of whether your taste in sexiness is socialized or God simply made it so you just can't stop staring at that woman at the bar with wide birthing hips, finding someone attractive is no sin.

Finding where we do go wrong, however, is not a challenging task. Just click on the TV or flip through a magazine, and you'll find beautiful people prancing around everywhere you turn.

Still, I'm not going to talk about the problems that you've already heard, like how Vogue and Barbie are wreaking havoc on many generations of young women and girls.

The problem I'd like to emphasize is that we treat each other like large-mouth bass.

For men and women alike at UNC, we view our significant others as trophies reflective of our own self-worth. We look for a person who will meet our peers' approval and then attempt to catch, stuff and mount them.

Soon after, we like to show off our catch. I can't help but picture little Opie Taylor walking into the sheriff's office holding hands with a wet, robust Pamela Anderson and saying, "Ain't she a beaut', Pa?" To which Andy replies, "Why, I always knew I'd been raisin' a D-cup-quality young 'un."

I think every guy on this campus has, at one time or another, heard another guy friend say, "Yeah, I'm talking to this new girl, (insert name here), she's not like really hot or anything, but she's really cool. I'm not sure if we'll actually 'date' or not." As if to say, "Man, this one probably won't make the mantelpiece or anything, but I'll keep it in the live well for a while."

The means by which this confused way of thinking continues to dominate is self-denial. We don't like to admit that deep down, we care what our friends think. But believe me, you probably do. I know that I care.

We simply convince ourselves that people who don't meet the standards of attractiveness that our friends hold aren't really right for us.

This unhealthy and foolish concern over meeting the approval of our peers is not a problem that is exclusive to men on this campus. Women are often just as concerned with finding a man in the right fraternity, with a chiseled chin and a butt that shows he works out. I know because having none of these traits has me at home writing this column.

The reason the focus of this column is women is in part because I don't have space to cover both genders and because of the cruel simplicity of the criteria for meeting the approval of most men -- tits and ass. In fact, I think a better title to the best-selling novel Men are from Mars, Women are from Venus would be Men are Horny, Lust-Driven Pigs, Women Aren't.

Thus to meet this silently agreed-upon "standard," women are pressured to starve themselves. Guys implicitly pressure each other to find a woman who doesn't fill her only real duty in a kitchen -- eating.

Ben Dickens has decided to duct tape himself to the floor of his room until he thinks 11 consecutive clean thoughts. If you know him personally and feel that this might mean never seeing him again, please e-mail your good-byes to bdickens@email.unc.edu.