Sunday, September 20, 2015

Are "dating coaches" like Evan Marc Katz encouraging domestic violence?

Evan Marc Katz is defending against objections to his advice for women by offering a false equivalency.

He claims he has similar expectations from men and women when it comes to the best ways of attracting a mate. He presents an exchange between himself and a dissatisfied customer which includes this:
(CLIENT)
I have to talk to men in a certain way or they won’t find me appealing. 
(EMK)
Yes. Then again, don’t men have to talk to you in a certain way as well? They can’t be arrogant, rude or condescending. They shouldn’t be negative or nakedly insecure. They shouldn’t blather on about themselves without taking an interest in you. It would seem that there are certain characteristics that make all people unappealing, no?
As he states, he expects men to refrain from being arrogant, rude, condescending, negative, blatantly insecure, and talking only about themselves. The kinds of things he must surely expect from women too. But Katz has one extra piece of advice for women that he doesn't have for men: be passive:
Being passive doesn’t mean that you can’t do anything proactive. It means that you’re choosing not to do anything proactive, because being proactive during courtship is ineffective in making a man feel attracted to you. 
Here are a few common examples of being proactive:
  • You have a great date, you email him the next day to say you had a lot of fun.
  • You haven’t heard from him all weekend, you text him to make sure he’s doing okay.
  • You want to see him next week, you tell him his favorite band is playing downtown and you can get tickets.
  • You’re confused about where your relationship stands, you ask him where things are headed.
You think you’re being real; he thinks you’re acting clingy. Understand, the man of your dreams doesn’t NEED to be pushed to be your boyfriend.
Katz expects women to be so extremely passive that any and all attempts on the part of the woman to communicate, without first being contacted by the man are considered by Katz (on behalf of men) horrifically clingy and pushy.

The male prerogative to pursue a woman, and the female requirement to be the passive object of that pursuit are known as "traditional gender roles."

As the organization "Futures Without Violence" states:
Traditional Gender Role Beliefs: Men who hold traditional gender role beliefs (men as breadwinners, women should stay at home, etc.)14 and conform to masculinity norms (believe men need to be self-reliant, have power over women, etc.) are more likely to commit violence against women, particularly sexual assault.15,16 Alternatively, men who view women as their equals are less likely to commit an act of sexual assault.12
...as discussed in the VicHealth prevention framework, research has consistently found that individual men who hold traditional views about gender roles, have a rigid belief in male dominance, or hold sexually hostile attitudes about women are more likely to perpetrate violence (see VicHealth 2007: 34).
Katz doesn't refer to the men he is selling to women as believers in "traditional gender roles" he refers to them as "masculine men." But there is no doubt at all that traditional gender roles are what he is promoting for women who want to find "love":
Men win you over by giving to you. We ask you out. We call you. We pay for dates. We initiate sex. We ask for commitment. We propose marriage. We give. You receive. Reverse this order by asking him out, initiating sex, asking for commitment, or proposing marriage, and a masculine guy will feel, well, emasculated. Thus, if you want a masculine guy, your greatest move is to embrace your passive feminine side.
Evan Marc Katz is encouraging women to date and marry men who are statistically more likely to perpetrate violence against them. But as long as he gets his success stories and makes his money, why should he care? After all, by his lights, women should not expect anything more than rigid traditional behavior from men (unless they are by Katz's definition, insecure losers: "But most men do not want to be actively pursued. The only guys who do are really shy, really insecure, or really clueless about women."). Because men, manly, masculine he-men, must be in complete control in all the usual, traditional ways or they feel, well, emasculated. Or as another dating advice huckster whom Katz highly recommended says:
So you can either support feminism in the hope of bettering the state of affairs in the future, or better your life now by finding love.

This is the hideous evil dystopia that Evan Marc Katz and his fellow sexist hucksters are selling to women. And Katz has the nerve to whine about occasional criticism.

And lest you think I'm too hard on Katz, when reviewing what I've written about him previously, I've often gone incredibly easy on him. I just noticed that I said of him:
Poor Evan Marc Katz. All he wants to do is make a very sweet living sitting around talking about himself and inventing little tips and tricks for how a woman can snag a man. 
But actually, as you can clearly see from the passage above on the importance of being passive, Katz has invented nothing - he is just regurgitating virtually every single thing that women have been told (and until recently compelled to abide by) since time immemorial. What a loathsome piece of work is Evan Marc Katz.