I got flak in my last video for suggesting that Rose in Titanic only thought of escaping from her situation rather than putting in effort towards making things work. People objected to the idea that she should because Cal is a monster.
Sure, he’s rich and handsome, and will save her and her mother from a life of poverty but he’s not kind or particularly attentive.
However the idea of women transforming men is a standard core part of female fantasy as we can see in:
- Pretty Woman
- 50 Shades of Grey
- Beauty and the Beast
In fact, I would argue that Beauty and the Beast is an underlying story theme that is so appealing to women that Pretty Woman and 50 Shades of Grey both are modern templates for the story of woman transforming, taming and domesticating “toxic” masculinity.
Women may feel that these days, every man should be a soyboy, but traditionally, it was through association with women in some kind of relationship and the familial experience that men softened up.
One of the key examples in modern psychology to back this up is the fact that on average men are more disagreeable than women.
This means that men are oriented, ON AVERAGE, more towards competition than co-operation.
And highly competitive people have more potential, ON AVERAGE, to achieve more and therefore to attain higher social status in whatever endeavor.
The competitive nature is what drives men to build large businesses and amass wealth as well as destroy their bodies to be successful in sports and other areas of life that lead to them being attractive partners for women.
There is a reason the “nice guy” stereotype isn’t particularly sexy to women, after all.
Obviously, this competitive nature doesn’t suit the family environment that women have traditionally sought to create and that’s why Beauty and the Beast type stories have always been popular to women, will continue to be popular and a core part of relationship progression even in modern times.
