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ALAN_ALDA_PARADOX

                                              July 16, 2006

    Jensen remarks:
                                             SCREAMED_WITH_JOY
    "It seems to me that your author is
     probably saying what a lot of
     others are starting to realize,
     that being passive and quiet
     doesn't need to mean fragile,
     helpless, and weak, that it's just
     as okay for a woman to be passive
     and emotional as Alan Alda has been
     trying to tell us it is for a man,
     and that if women as a whole tend
     to be more passive, more quiet, and
     more emotional than men this is
     *NOT* a problem to be dealt with by
     trying to browbeat people into
     acting in ways that feel unnatural
     to them."

                                                           
Can someone explain to me how Alan Alda                    
came to represent the epitome of the                        
sensitive new age male?                                    
                                                           
The character he played on MASH was                        
a dominant, swaggering, loud-mouthed
clown that would screw anything with
tits.

                                      (December 25, 2006)

   A guess:

   Has to do with women looking for a
   "sensitive but strong" character.

   Compare to
   "Gone With the Wind"        GONE_WITH_THE_WIND


   The worship of strength
   warps perception of the     He gets what he
   nature of the character.    wants, he can get
                               away with anything.

                                  That's the
                                  important     How nice of him
                                  thing.        for not being
                                                (an even bigger)
                                                jerk about it.

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