Tuesday 16 February 2010

A Man's Gotta Do What A Man's Gotta Do

Earlier in the day, I had a little squabble with my mum regarding learning driving. Unlike most of my friends, I do not think it is an absolute need to learn driving because I can't afford to buy and maintain a car and I have a terrible sense of direction. However, my mum is insistent on it saying that as a man, I MUST learn how to drive. Furthermore, it is a skill and it is shameful that my female friends know how to drive and I don't.

That sets me thinking. Are there prescribed things that a man MUST know or are we desperate to fulfill the gender stereotype?

Why do we impose all these "requirements" on ourselves? Shouldn't we be free to do what we want and what is necessary in relation to the choices that we chose? What is being a man anyway? It is with these rigid mentality that we often find ourselves trapped and bogged down by life and thus, falling short of living a life.

To me, being a man or a woman is essentially just being yourself.
Let's consider this case in point:

A man does not go out to work to provide for his family. Instead, as he chose to have a family, he cares about the welfare of the family. This includes emotional, material and spiritual welfare of his family. As long as he and his partner works out how to achieve and maintain the general welfare of the family, it really doesn't matter who does what. A man is not less of a man if he decides to stay home and take care of the children while his wife is the sole breadwinner.

But a man is not a man if he just decides to have children just to fulfill his base desires. He has no self-control and it appears that his only consolance in life his through his sexual prowess which can be terminated by various means.

Therefore, being a man is truly about being active in choosing how you want to live your life and being responsible for the choices you make and there is no textbook way of how one is supposed to do that.

So mum, if you are reading this, I ACTIVELY CHOOSE NOT TO LEARN DRIVING FOR I DO NOT SEE THE POINT OF IT NOW! Besides, I'm being eco-friendly ;P