Well, I have been lately kind of trying to get a date. Or, at least, I am putting myself out there. And the reason I bring it up is that the job search and the mate search have many similarities (this is either disturbing or bizarre or my approach is completely hackneyed - take your pick).
Yes, I think Seinfeld once said that dating is like applying for a job. Or was it Woody Allen? Or Martin Lawrence or one of the black comedians, I'm not sure. Anyway, this is a truism. Especially with online dating. You have to write a little blurb that is eerily similar to a resume. Then, if you are lucky enough to get a date (interview), you may or may not get a chance at the woman (a chance at the job). Either way, the whole process is emotionally tiring, trying, sometimes exhausting. And the potential for a wounded ego looms always.
Hilarious the similarities, no? Indeed. It's true. Not to mention that in my experience, especially with the temp/staffing agencies, it is a perky, energetic lady who is the one tasked with evaluating you (and hopefully your date will be perky and energetic, if nothing else).
So get it right, eh?
Thursday, June 7, 2007
Friday, June 1, 2007
Slouching Toward Gomorrah
I recently did a search for "escorts" online, "seattle escort", and I found a plethora of personal ads, many of them seemed kind of desperate, to be frank. I guess $200 an hour isn't bad money. It's like the backdoor for the working girl - instead of 70 cents on a man's dollar why not make a cool 10 times what the man makes and then take the rest of the day off!
On the other hand, take a look at many of the jobs that women fill in this economy - young women in particular - they are in service and retail. It would seem to me that many of these low-paying gigs - such as server, retail clerk, hostess, etc., can be degrading in subtle and sometimes not-so subtle ways. I subcribe to the "slouching toward Gomorrah" view of our culture - it is getting sleazier by the day. I challenge anyone to dispute this. It is painfully obvious to me and I was born in the '80s! I can only imagine what others are thinking, like my dad and those who grew up in the '50s!
I was talking to a female friend who is a full-time nanny. We were discussing one of her families where hubbie is a Seattle Mariner MLB player. She described how they would have dinner parties where the husbands would be upstairs shooting craps with, literally $100 bills flying around and how some players would encourage their own children to play! There'd be little kids everywhere while grown men gamble with stacks of cash. Meanwhile, my friend claims, the wives would be downstairs in her words "getting plastered". She claims to have met J.J. Putz several times, for example, and has seen firsthand how the parents neglect their children, mother using daughter as a sort of fashion "accessory" at dinner parties and such (think movie stars with their African-adopted tots for the papparazi). She bemoans the "skanky little outfits" some moms buy for their nearly toddler aged daughters, and the sexualization of young girls generally.
My contention regarding young women and their young jobs is that when they become debutante-aged (14, 15, sweet -16) our crass, bottom-line economy wants to squeeze them for their value - and increasingly their "economic value" lies in their sex. Many and manifold are the means by which capitalism seeks to extract young women's "sex value", if you will, but I believe it is a steadily creeping phenomenon that has seeped into the culture. I don't know the origins - there are surely multiple causes - but nevertheless, Capitalism in pure form is like water running down a drain. It inevitably heads for the bottom-line - this is the nature of the beast.
So, you ask, why don't we just get right down to it and have daughter put up her very own "escort" ad on the Web for her 18th birthday? Golly gee, it would help pay for college, right?
On the other hand, take a look at many of the jobs that women fill in this economy - young women in particular - they are in service and retail. It would seem to me that many of these low-paying gigs - such as server, retail clerk, hostess, etc., can be degrading in subtle and sometimes not-so subtle ways. I subcribe to the "slouching toward Gomorrah" view of our culture - it is getting sleazier by the day. I challenge anyone to dispute this. It is painfully obvious to me and I was born in the '80s! I can only imagine what others are thinking, like my dad and those who grew up in the '50s!
I was talking to a female friend who is a full-time nanny. We were discussing one of her families where hubbie is a Seattle Mariner MLB player. She described how they would have dinner parties where the husbands would be upstairs shooting craps with, literally $100 bills flying around and how some players would encourage their own children to play! There'd be little kids everywhere while grown men gamble with stacks of cash. Meanwhile, my friend claims, the wives would be downstairs in her words "getting plastered". She claims to have met J.J. Putz several times, for example, and has seen firsthand how the parents neglect their children, mother using daughter as a sort of fashion "accessory" at dinner parties and such (think movie stars with their African-adopted tots for the papparazi). She bemoans the "skanky little outfits" some moms buy for their nearly toddler aged daughters, and the sexualization of young girls generally.
My contention regarding young women and their young jobs is that when they become debutante-aged (14, 15, sweet -16) our crass, bottom-line economy wants to squeeze them for their value - and increasingly their "economic value" lies in their sex. Many and manifold are the means by which capitalism seeks to extract young women's "sex value", if you will, but I believe it is a steadily creeping phenomenon that has seeped into the culture. I don't know the origins - there are surely multiple causes - but nevertheless, Capitalism in pure form is like water running down a drain. It inevitably heads for the bottom-line - this is the nature of the beast.
So, you ask, why don't we just get right down to it and have daughter put up her very own "escort" ad on the Web for her 18th birthday? Golly gee, it would help pay for college, right?
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