WOMANIZING

What exactly is a womanizer. Well, it's not just a guy who has had a half-dozen affairs. It certainly is not a one-woman or two-women man. Franklyn Delano Roosevelt was not a womanizer, though he had a mistress during an extensive period of his adult life. She was possibly his only extra-marital affair. Presidents Kennedy and Clinton were notorious womanizers. Among literary lights., Casanova was a well known practitioner, though a lesser known Viennese author, Dr. Arthur Schnitzler, probably racked up a larger number of sexual liaisons. One dictionary defines a womanizer as one who "pursues women illicitly or excessively." Try defining "excessively." Having problems? One can never be too thin or too rich. What about too curious sexually? The dictionary definition falls short. A womanizer is a man who successfully makes a career of bedding down as many women as he can. It may not be his primary career; after all, one must make a living, and pursuing women can be an expensive sport. Still, it is a pursuit which requires dedication. Sort of like a gunslinger with many notches on the barrel of his gun.

Should you choose to keep an open mind, I offer an alternative definition. A womanizer is a man who takes care of the needs and desires of many women. It is a two way street. Both the physical and psychological relationship between a womanizer and his amours is extremely complex. Probably a little of each definition should apply.

Ruyard Kipling had it right. Though he was speaking of addiction to travel, his words could equally apply to addiction to womanizing. As I discovered later, both addictions are tantalizing.

"Speakin' in general, I 'ave tried 'em all —
The 'appy roads that take you o'er the world.
Speakin' in general, I 'ave found them good
For such as cannot use one bed too long,
But must get 'ence, the same as I 'ave done,
An' go observin' matters till they die."

Let's face it. There's tremendous B.S. on the subject of womanizing. Morality police loudly and repeatedly claim that there are unappetizing inequities between most womanizers and the objects of their attraction. The men are powerful, and the women usually young, romantic and foolish. That is the conventional wisdom, but it's bullshit, and doesn't hold up under strict analysis.

Power can be measured in various ways — physical strength, beauty, charisma, star quality, political status and money. The first term is usually used with reference to animals. The strongest bull gathers the most cows. The remaining terms apply to men. "Money" is often the key word, since most people visualize womanizing as rich old men seducing beautiful young women. The old "Bird in A Gilded Cage" refrain.

Money, however, is not a sine qua non for womanizing. On any high school or college campus, there are lotharios who, while not wealthy, garner the lion's share of young women. Jocks do particularly well. Even with mature men, while the power of money may be the fulcrum on which many relationships rest, it is not always the deciding factor. Robert, an English friend of mine, another womanizer, was always surrounded by adoring young women. This seemed odd, since he was short, stocky, bald and wore glasses. At first, I wondered what the magnetic attraction was. It eventually dawned on me. Robert loved women. He truly loved them.

Always polite, he opened doors and pulled out chairs. He expressed admiration for their clothes, their coiffures, their jewelry. He kissed hands, flattered and paid attention to their every word. And it was all genuine. He really loved women. You know what? Women instinctively recognize this quality in a man, and they return the attention and affection — in spades.

So much for the popular conception of the powerful male. As for the women being young, foolish and vulnerable, 'tain't necessarily so. Many of today's young women are a sophisticated bunch — tough minded indeed. There are enough of them these days to deserve a proper category — Alpha Women. The Anna Nicole Smiths of the world are aware that you can marry more money in five minutes than you can earn in a lifetime. So, whoever hits on whom, the responsibility goes both ways. Older men can be just as gullible as sweet young things, particularly if the young woman in question is sending out charmingly cute signals.. At certain ages, men too are subject to ego trips, particularly those which offer hope of recapturing one's youth. This is not a new reality. Call it manopause. Some mature readers may remember Marlene Dietrich in a 1930 movie called "The Blue Angel." For more recent examples, one has only to read the tabloids. There are plenty of young women aware of the needs of mature men. The day of the vamp is not over, though approaches are more subtle.

I had my own ego trip forty years ago. I was about to marry an attractive young lady twenty-five years my junior. I was reasonably prosperous though, in her eyes, I was considered super rich. When we approached her parents, her mother, a pragmatic lady, was enthusiastic. [Most women are much more practical than men.] Her father seemed uncertain. When pressed for his objections, he asked, "Do you think my daughter would still be interested in you if you did not have so much wherewithal?" I laughed and answered, "Would you ask me a similar question if I were very handsome, and she wanted to marry me for my looks?" It is perfectly acceptable for a man to choose a partner because she is beautiful. Why should a woman be considered a gold digger if she seeks a partner who is rich? Is the man called a "beauty digger"? If we condemn such relationships, shouldn't the blame be placed equally?

A good friend of mine, a very successful international businessman and a notorious womanizer, tells me that he hates the term. In the public eye, "womanizer" has a negative connotation, a faint whiff of fire and brimstone, an implication that one is doing something immoral, if not illegal. Note that there is no parallel term "manizer." ["Slut" has an entirely different connotation.] Still, the practice is certainly an equal opportunity occupation. This opprobrium probably originated either with women fearful of straying husbands or, more likely, from the macho concept that a woman is property and must be protected from lechery, i.e. other men's lechery. Whatever the source, in the opinion of this writer, the whole concept stinks. It is part of the recent subjugation of men to the growing power of women in our society, a subjugation which has slowly but surely been accelerating.

My friend claims, and I agree, that the subject of womanizing is rife with hypocrisy. Most men, regardless of their protestations, would become womanizers if they had the time, opportunity, exposure and wherewithal. Unfortunately, most of us work nine to five jobs in small offices or factories where opportunities for meeting available women are limited. In spite of this, enough men take advantage of this limited supply to insure that office romances are ubiquitous, as frequently illustrated in novels and movies. Men who move around and have wider exposure usually take advantage of their contact opportunities. Almost all pilots, traveling salesmen, railroad personnel, overseas workers and sailors (a girl in every port) womanize. Sports heroes and rock idols make sexual news every day. Incidentally, the same rule applies to mobile...