Do men ever actually crave romance?

[AdelineL]

Not sex, not "the chase"/pursuit, but actual romance. Like holding hands, a makeout session with a long term significant other, buying flowers just because, etc.

As a woman, I love making his favorite food for dinner just because, or putting on lingerie before he gets home to spice up the mood. I get a thrill from a kiss on the head, the emotional closeness a pure expression of affection brings. Is this a purely female need? I am genuinely curious.

 

[Hipshot1554]

Maybe not exactly the way you described it, but I do enjoy closeness and alone time with a women I'm involved with.

 

[MsLead]

I know sensitive men that enjoy all that. Some like to look couply... dress in a similar style, hold hands, get teary with moving music, love the thought of love.... love kissing, love a woman trying to please by dressing or hairstyle...
That might not be usual...
Or maybe some men don't share their enjoyment of that?

 

[SimonDoom]

Absolutely. 100%. Making a good dinner for a partner, writing poetry, flowers and little gifts, surprises. I never get tired of cuddling and making out. Little surprises and acts of giving not only add spice but enrich a relationship. I like having little surprises done for me but I equally enjoy doing little thing surprises for my partner and seeing her response.

Romance does not come naturally to many men. I sucked at it as a young man but I've gotten better in middle-age, post-divorce.

My experience is that women really do appreciate romantic gestures, and they make the relationship more fun and more fulfilling.

 

[CandK_inSE]

Totally.

I absolutely love "romancing" my wife. Make her dinner, candles, all that. I'll get her flowers, cards, tell her that I love her. We'll hold hands in public. She'll respond in kind. She's surprised me in lingerie when I got home from work. She'll get me things, just because. We incorporate "date nights". We both love and crave romance.

That said, we both believe couples need to have wild, crazy times together too. We think that all women should be a total slut for her husband once in a while, slutty clothing, dirty talking, role playing, etc. Husbands also need to put their wives "through the bed" every so often as well.

Romance and love making, yes, absolutely, but once in a while, just pure animal fucking in necessary in any relationship.

 

[jehoram]

Not sex, not "the chase"/pursuit, but actual romance. Like holding hands, a makeout session with a long term significant other, buying flowers just because, etc.

Yes, some men crave romance...me, for one.

I once had a relationship with a woman who thought she was a romantic, because she loved the idea of falling in love with somebody. And she'd do all those things...cook me dinners, send me random gifts, and so on. But to her, these things were all just elements of a game she played, and when she tired of the game, all that came to an end.

It wasn't until after we broke up that I realized that I was the real romantic, because the relationship meant more to me than to her. Maybe I didn't play the game as well as she could, because of my relative poverty at the time (I was unemployed, didn't have a place of my own and was mainly crashing with friends), and it occurs to me now that she may have construed that as a lack of interest on my part. But that's water over the dam now.

True romance has always meant commitment, and that was hard for her. I think I can safely say that, in the intervening years, I've thought about her a lot more than she thought about me. So who was really the romantic?

 

[naughtymind]

Of course!

Who in their right mind doesn’t enjoy some romance? I mean seriously!?!? Speaking as a man, I absolutely love when a woman says or does sweet things that make me feel loved and appreciated. In knowing that, how could I not also take pleasure in knowing I’m making her feel loved and appreciated too? It’s fun planning surprises, waking her up with snuggles and whispering sweet things softly in her ear, cooking her a 5 star meal, giving nice massages, etc. I enjoy all aspects of love, intimacy and affection, and would not be able to have a relationship with someone who doesn’t. I find it mildly offensive that romance has become equated as an inherently feminine trait, mutually exclusive from masculinity somehow; what a silly notion!

 

[ToPleaseHim]

My partner is significantly more romantic than I am. I work at it because I know how much he enjoys it and how much it means to him.

 

[AdelineL]

Thank you all so much for your responses! I apologize for my cynicism - your responses really are reassuring

 

[Lucien_Al]

Not sex, not "the chase"/pursuit, but actual romance. Like holding hands, a makeout session with a long term significant other, buying flowers just because, etc.

As a woman, I love making his favorite food for dinner just because, or putting on lingerie before he gets home to spice up the mood. I get a thrill from a kiss on the head, the emotional closeness a pure expression of affection brings. Is this a purely female need? I am genuinely curious.

I certainly do and in my case, my wife doesn't have much interest in the romance side.

 

[Nezhul]

I wouldn't be surprised if less men craved it than women. Men are generally less emotional than girls.

The thing is... I think that what we call "romance" is putting weight, significance and attaching strong emotion / affection to less significant actions. And because women are on average more emotional - they experience romance more.

How different is touching/holding hands from touching waist or butt? How different kissing the neck is from kissing the lips?
I would argue that those things are on the same scale, only further up.

Men are less emotional and so they want stronger stimuli. That's why they appear to be more about sex and the rush of passion.

It could also be argued that men evolved to have less empathy. Their biological role is to fight and hunt, hurt others, which requires having less empathy.
Women's role is taking care of kids and others, that's how nature ensures survival of species. So they have more empathy, and as a result take more joy in kind gestures.

But that said, definitely they enjoy romance. They may be bad at showing it, but they like small touches and calm comfort just as girls do. Maybe just not as much as to make them look instantly ecstatic.
And of course they enjoy making their loved one happy. Just because it's less, or because our society punishes males for showing emotions - does not mean that simply holding hands is insignificant and doesn't make them enjoy it.

 

[skitzoid]

I had the romance and now I don't. I have no idea why she stopped but because of her stopping, I have lost interest in pursuing it. And that's a shame. She would dress in really sexy nighties and I would compliment her on her choice. We would hold hands when out. To get more daring, have sex in the open and daylight. For some unknown reason, she stopped. I have tried to bring it back, but loose interest after all I do fail, and no results. I don't believe age has a big importance in this. ( she's 59,,, I'm 69 ) Both in reasonably good health. And live by ourselves. It was so much fun to kiss all night and cuddle. Sex was the cherry on top of the ice cream sunday.

 

[TarnishedPenny]

In my experience, yes, but in a different way.

Generalizations are always suspect, but I think sex and romance and love are much more closely linked in women than they are in men. For men, they’re far more likely to be in separate columns on the menu, so to speak.

When, for instance, was the last time you heard of a woman accused of adultery reply, “But it was just a blowjob!” That’s a very male defence, for which a core assumption is that sex and love are distinct and separate things.

Men, I think, enjoy romancing their mate, not so much for the actual romance part of it, but for the ‘payback’. No, I don’t mean sex, but rather her appreciation of the efforts he’s gone to. I don’t think many women know how amazing they can make their men feel with a sincere smile and a thank you.

 

[Nezhul]

When, for instance, was the last time you heard of a woman accused of adultery reply, “But it was just a blowjob!”

Erm... did you actually hear MEN reply that?

Also, this may be a bit skewed because women are much harder and rare-er accused of things like rape or adultery. Our society and judicial systems seem to have an opinion that if there's any kind of sex - men are always willing participant.

 

[LWulf]

So, pure romantic gestures? Not something to be personally gained from? Just something to make her feel special?

Of myself, sure, many times in the distant past and even up to recently. However, rarely it seems do women like to get any of that, probably because they are used to gestures with strings attached. An alternative reason would be that they simply don't know how to accept them with grace.
The question being do I crave romance, as a provider of pure romantic gestures?

As far as receiving the same from a woman, I can't say. I've never received any (not seeking to play the violins, just a fact). Girlfriends always did it for ulterior motives (and therefore not "pure" romantic gestures), and a woman walking up to you on the street and offering a gesture simply hasn't ever happened to me.

Would it tickle me rosy if some girl did such?
Reply hazy, try again later.

 

[naughtymind]

The problem with these sorts of questions is that the discussion that follows usually ends up dredging through a lot of stereotypes about both men and women. I find those outlooks to be very limiting, and I do not subscribe to any such notion that “women want———“ or “men prefer ———“, “women don’t like———“ etc, etc, etc. Maybe some do/don’t, maybe even most do/don’t, but stereotypes and assumptions are also dead wrong in some cases for some people. There have been a couple of doozies on this thread so far....

 

[LWulf]

The problem with these sorts of questions is that the discussion that follows usually ends up dredging through a lot of stereotypes about both men and women. I find those outlooks to be very limiting, and I do not subscribe to any such notion that “women want———“ or “men prefer ———“, “women don’t like———“ etc, etc, etc. Maybe some do/don’t, maybe even most do/don’t, but stereotypes and assumptions are also dead wrong in some cases for some people. There have been a couple of doozies on this thread so far....

...or you could answer from your own experience, point of view. In that regard, sometimes stereotypes fit because that's all you have experienced.

 

[Sweet_Lara]

Physical gestures are fine, but I crave romance by words. So any of you guys who want to practice on someone ...

 

[naughtymind]

...or you could answer from your own experience, point of view. In that regard, sometimes stereotypes fit because that's all you have experienced.

I’m not sure exactly what you mean here. I did post my personal point of view earlier in the thread, and I agree that sharing a personal perspective is cool. The distinction I was trying to make is about when we take our limited personal experiences, maybe combined with what we’ve heard or read, and extrapolate that to make generalized statements about huge swaths of people. We are much more complex than that, and our gender is not even necessarily the biggest factor in what defines our personalities, preferences, thought processes, morals, etc etc etc.

I find it interesting to hear other people’s experiences and perspectives, but I find regurgitated stereotypes, generalities, and assumptions to be very limiting. I know, for instance, that my own preferences and sentiments regarding sex, romance, love, communication, relationships, etc, are all my own; they certainly do not represent all men, or even most men.

 

[LWulf]

I’m not sure exactly what you mean here...

Stereotypes (generalisms, etc) are based on people's personal experiences, rather than statistical, verifiable information.

 

[Bramblethorn]

I wouldn't be surprised if less men craved it than women. Men are generally less emotional than girls.

Men are every bit as emotional as women. They just get discouraged from expressing it in the same ways. How often do you hear about a woman getting so angry that she shoots up her workplace, for instance?

 

[TarnishedPenny]

Erm... did you actually hear MEN reply that?

Ask any divorce lawyer. “It didn’t mean anything - just a quick piece...”

 

[Nezhul]

Ask any divorce lawyer. “It didn’t mean anything - just a quick piece...”

That's different. I'm sure cheating women use the same type of justifications.

Men are every bit as emotional as women

Ipse dixit.
Men are designed by nature to need emotions less. And in fact, human male's biological role makes too much emotion into a detriment.
That doesn't mean that men feel nothing. "Less" doesn't mean "low". Also, men may be more succeptable to other type of emotions, but not the love, affection and care kind.

But sexes aren't equal. Only dummies would equal that they are. Sexes have vastly different needs, strengths and weaknesses in pretty much everything. None of them is inferior or less important - but it's an assymetric balance.

The odds of genders evolving equal emotional patterns, given the type of evolutionary influence that they went through as humanity developed - is next to zero. It would be a true miracle if we were the same.

Both psychological and even medical studies agree with that assessment - with Estrogen quoted as influencing emotional volatility in girls heavily.

Sure, there is a great deal of sociological influence on gender emotions. In women they are promoted, in men they are punished. But that's exactly the reason why over thousands of years, men would grow more stoic and calm. That said, when a man does have a breakdown - they tend to REALLY have a breakdown that doesn't end in a few hours of tears and destroying humanity's ice-cream reserves.

 

[Bramblethorn]

That's different. I'm sure cheating women use the same type of justifications.

Ipse dixit.

Oh dear oh dear. You are absolutely the last person to be chiding anybody else for ipse dixit. Just about every interaction I've had with you has involved you making unsubstantiated claims - like "men are less emotional than women", for instance. If you're going to pull that kind of thing out of your arse without backing it with evidence, you don't get to complain when other people adopt your low low standard of argument.

Men are designed by nature to need emotions less.

Nonsense. Nature doesn't "design" anything. It's not a thinking process.

Evolution adapts to circumstances, and while the general direction of that adaptation tends to move towards advantage, there's no guarantee of that in individual traits. It's useful for me to be able to eat both meat and vegetables, and evolution has given me teeth and guts which support that. It would also be useful for me to be able to see in the dark like a cat and to synthesise Vitamin C, but evolution hasn't given me those things, because it's an erratic kind of process.

Anybody with even a modicum of creativity can come up with arguments for why evolution should favour some particular set of traits. For instance:

- Men are more physically active than women, and energy use is proportional to the product of activity level and weight. Therefore, men ought to be smaller than women in order to economise on their energy production. This also helps them get into prey animal's burrows!
- Women spent hours each day pounding grain, so it makes sense that evolution should give them massive upper-body strength.
- Men are more likely to be carrying weapons and more used to using them, so they're the most likely to be killing their own kind. That being the case, they ought to have a shitload of empathy and compassion to prevent men from getting murderous.
- Women, on the other hand, need to make choices like "which of my kids do I feed when there's only enough food for one" where soft-heartedness is a liability. So women ought to be cold-blooded and callous.

...and so on and so on. It's really not hard to come up with a plausible-sounding evo-based argument for just about anything. But, obviously, not all of those arguments are actually as compelling in reality as they sound on the page. To figure out whether men are actually smaller than women, or if women have better upper-body strength, we need to get past those Just So stories and look at the evidence to see whether it actually happened.

You haven't provided a shred of evidence for your claim that men are less emotional than women, so there's no reason anybody else needs to take it seriously.

Both psychological and even medical studies agree with that assessment - with Estrogen quoted as influencing emotional volatility in girls heavily.

Whereas testosterone, famously, has no effects on emotions whatsoever ;-)

 

[Bramblethorn]

Ask any divorce lawyer. “It didn’t mean anything - just a quick piece...”

Yep. Plenty of folk who believe that oral (...digital, anal, withdrawal before ejaculation...) isn't real sex and doesn't count, or at least will make that argument to excuse themselves.