The Impact of Music on Romantic Expectations

I think my favorite music has fucked up my ideas of relationships.


My favorite singer (Pat, from Train) is someone I actually know; our families worked together and were friends back when he was a teenager and I was an infant. We aren't buddies or anything, but we've talked a bit, and he's genuinely a very nice and generous man.
Perhaps because he was very close to his mother and had sisters closer in age than his brothers,he tends to be "more like a woman" (at least in the stereotypical sense of womanliness); in fact, most people think he's gay, but to everyone's knowledge he's completely straight.
Regardless, he's very (perhaps overly) sensitive, exceedingly romantic, exceptionally giving, almost ridiculously self-effacing, and prone to (sometimes extreme) self-sacrifice to please the other person.

It's evident in his song lyrics. Unlike most other popular male songwriters, who write about the kind of "love" that is more about dominance and control (think about, for example, the narrator who sings "No sugar tonight in my coffee/no sugar tonight in my tea" and goes on to try manipulating the recalcitrant girl into putting out), he writes things like:

"Help me to be, save me when ... push me if I, catch me when ... wait for me and hold me when ... wake me in the, love me 'til I'm fine ..."
"Throw it on the table ... you keep on running away. I don't know if I'm able to say what I need to say/ To get you to stay. I can tell by the cold/ We're running out of daylight ... but I don't mind talking through the night [...] / Why can't we get this right?"
"And I don't mind being blind, if you don't mind/ Doing time ..."
"Maybe I'm not, but you're all I've got left to believe in [...] Making it/ Ain't making it without you."

and so on.
And he means it. He's REALLY LIKE THAT.

So of course I came to believe there were actually men who thought like this, who wanted be cared for AND to care, to be loved AND to love, to receive AND to give (and give and give and give) ... just like him, and just like me.
Possibly as a result, I keep falling for Pat-type men, the wounded gentle sensitive souls ... but they end up expecting something completely different in the end. Maybe he's the only one ... ? ]

In any case, tt makes me think that music really influences what we want out of relationships. To simplify my experiential research findings, a friend who listens to Mariah Carey and Britney Spears wants someone who will love her and be her everything for eternity; another friend who rocks out to copious Led Zeppelin is slightly misogynistic and goes through girls like water because life is short and "they're all the same in the end anyway."

What I am wondering is: What do you think of my theory, that the music we listen to influences what we want out of relationships?
And, slightly off the topic, do you think straight men with more balanced expectations -- that both partners should give AND receive -- exist?

 

Well, for one thing, I definitely believe that music influences the way we think about relationships and a lot of other things. I used to listen to country and western music, and the lyrics began to influence the way that I looked at relationships. When I quit drinking beer, though, I kinda lost interest in the music..:cowboy: ...that was a good thing, though.....

There's a saying, 'you are what you eat'. There's a lot of truth to that. But there's also a lot of truth to the saying, 'you are what you think'. There's a verse from the Book of Proverbs that has kind of stuck in my head: 'as a man thinks, so he is'. And there's a whole lot of truth in that, too. If you put something healthy in, something healthy is gonna come out. If you put junk in your head, you'll get back junk.

If I listen to music that talks about peace and love and is peaceful and serene, I'll begin to think that way. Or, if I listen to rap music that is abrasive and hateful and is constantly talking about raping and killing, I'm going to start thinking that way, or throw the CD player out the window-but it's going to affect me, one way or the other.

There absolutely, definitely are men who want to be cared for and to care, to be loved and to love. And there are plenty of them that are straight that think that way, too. I happen to be one of them. In fact, a man in no way has to be effeminate to love, care, and desire good for his woman, or for anyone else. Those are human traits that, in my experience, don't have a heck of a lot to do with what gender a person is. There are plenty of good and bad people of both sexes. Those are virtues, and people of either sex are free to cultivate them or reject them.

In fact, I think music, like a lot of other art forms, helps to form ideals for us. If we listen to music that extols love, peace, harmony and so forth, these are ideals to strive for, and we'll be carrying those tunes and ideals around in our heads even when we're not listening to the music. I'm absolutely convinced of that. However....we should also not deceive ourselves into believing that everyone thinks this way. This is the trick.

I'm actually a pretty religious person, and I believe that I'm supposed to love everyone, even my enemies, forgive other people if I expect to be forgiven, to treat other people the way that I would want them to treat me. Fine. However, part of the realism that I have from these beliefs is that I KNOW that not everyone is going to do this, simply because it is an ideal that I and others have, and that nobody is going to do it perfectly. But, it's still an ideal to be strived for, and to look for in other people. That's kind of the trick-it's great, even necessary, to have these ideals, but at the same time to realize that it's a big, bad world out there where not everybody (even most people) think that way.

I think one of the big errors of the modern world is to believe that we can just put anything into our heads and expect to come out with something normal. That's impossible. You are what you eat, and you are what you think, too.

 

Oh, I ABSOLUTELY agree. However, overarching society does not seem to ...

Of COURSE not. It would be folly to think EVERYONE wanted this ...
What I meant is, I tend to assume that men who seem to be like Pat (shy, self-effacing, gentle -- and also artistic and intense) have a great potential of wanting the same things he (and I) want. However, it seems I've been mostly finding the artistic and intense guys who only SEEM to be kind and gentle ... but really aren't.

Thanks for the reply ... I do believe what you say! I'm not religious at all, but I too believe that you get what you put in (or, to quote a different song, and one by Train at that), "it seems you get the things you give along the way."

 

These are very interesting obseravtions. In my experience (and it's experience that really taught me this) there is a stereotype that men that act shy, self-effacing, and artistic are the ones that are more likely to be kind and gentle. In reality, this is not true at all. Why?

There is a stereotype that the average guy that seems fairly masculine must not be capable of love, gentility, or kindness (or at least not as capable as guys that act not so masculine). Actually, nothing could be farther from the truth. In my experience, there are guys that try and put on a front of being 'gentle' 'artistic' 'loving', etc.,only to reveal later that it's just that: a front. Deep down, they're actually anything but that.

Why is this? Based on what some guys think that society expects out of them they figure, 'well, if I'm going to be a caring, loving person, I have to act or think more like a woman' or at least not as much like the stereotypical 'man'. The underlying problem with all of this is that, from the very get-go, this is an act, whether they realize it or not.

I used to hear my father say, 'be a man'. And I used to say, 'what the hell do you think I am in the first place?!?' What a person is really trying to say when they make a statment like that is 'become a man', as if you're not one already. Obviously, that's not possible. You're either already one or you're not.

And herein lies the problem. For instance, if I believe that God made me, and I've got a deep, commanding voice, heavy beard, and other 'masculine' traits, then it's simply the way He put me together. I don't need to change that (or add what someone thinks are 'feminine' traits to myself) to be what He also expected me to be, which is caring, and gentle, and loving. It's not a matter of becoming anything. It's a matter of being. It's just simply a man-made stereotype that being masculine and loving/caring are mutually exclusive. And so, some people (men, in this case) set out to basically engage in what is a rather elaborate act to appear to be caring and gentle and artistic, as if those were somehow external traits, rather than something that is really internal. In fact, many guys that I've met that are, on the surface, seemingly gentle and self-effacing are actually, deep down, some of the meanest SOB's I've ever met in my life! Why? Because most of this 'gentleness' and 'humilty' was really just an act from the get-go!

And, I'm not sure that the majority of society even expects these things out of men anymore, anyway. In some ways, I'm not sure it ever did. These attitudes seem to me to have been more prevalent in more lower class, uneducated cultures than in anything else, and are rapidly disappearing altogether. Maybe not, but that's the way it seems to me.

 

I dont see why those things would make him gay. My boyfriend is all those things. Giving, loving, caring, self-sacrificing(sometimes to the extreme) These straight men exist. Men who want to please and make happy...but its not gay

 

I know that. He knows that. You know that. But most Americans don't know that.
Otherwise, when one typed Pat's name into Google image search, one would not come up with the suggested search term "Gay Pat Monahan" -- implying a great many people have associated him with homosexuality.

What gives. Go figure.

 

Yeah so most Americans dont know that. What does that have to do with anything at all? This is about you, and him

 

Yes, it does.

And it doesn't stop there. Our experiences influence what music we favour too.

Men like the Pat you're describing exist. They're everywhere. Most people just don't know how to stick around or deal for the long term. Relationships and loving are a LOT of work.

 

How much of what we expect is based on tunes?


Beyonce Knowles sings about a soldier who can stand up for her. Faith Hill wants a white knight with a good heart, soft touch, and fast horse. And it goes on. So I wonder if that is why a lot of women desire men who seem more "macho" -- and ergo appear more strong? They want someone who can take care of them, and men who seem to be "more womanlike" don't appear to be good prospects for protection.
Of course, this trend has its roots in animalism -- our ancestral females needed mates who could protect them against wild animals, invading peoples, etc. But I think sometimes the stereotype is perpetuated in music now, because really we don't NEED to worry about being attacked by lions or carried off by Vikings anymore.

... What? ...
I'm not trying to date Pat. (Although I would NOT mind in the least, and neither would his sisters )
I don't care what other people think, about him or about me or about anyone, really. I'm just wondering WHY people think the way they do. Is it because of what they listen to ... ?