Once upon a time there were women. Real women. They were docile, pretty creatures in frills and lace, and they were never assertive. We saw them in ads for kitchen products and vacuum cleaners and on sit-coms such as “Leave it to Beaver” or “Mayberry RFD.” And we wanted them all.

For some reason Jen White’s article “Oh ladies, what in the world have we done to ourselves?” still has some sort of validity even with critical thinkers and intellectuals such as the readers and editors of a college rag such as the State Hornet. Am I the only one who finds this not only amazing but also sad?

Don’t mistake me for a misogynist. Women have earned their liberation. They have earned and enjoy a freedom now that undreamed of in the past. A short observation of women at the Library Quad or the River Place center will show a stunning variety of personal expression by the female students of today. From dresses to skirts, shorts, jeans, blouses, T-shirts, tank-tops, heels, sandals, tennis-shoes and even occasionally the girl (especially around mid-terms or finals) wearing PJs and some funky slippers and every combination of the preceding make up the wardrobe possibilities of the modern college woman. Every color of the spectrum, every fabric ever known to (wo)man is available for their choice of personal expression. And this is, to quote the newest resident of the federal penal system, “a good thing.”

There are more aspects this long-time coming liberation of women than just fashion choices. Women are now free to be themselves, to live outside of the narrow little box of feminine ideals that had so long imprisoned them. They no longer are expected to be the meek, mild-mannered, prone to fainting, lilies that once were trapped in kitchens and bedrooms.

And yet, in this atmosphere a woman such as Jen White has the temerity to castigate men for escaping the narrow box that society has imposed upon us. We, as men, have our entire lives been told what is “manly:” one wears boring clothes in boring colours, one sublimates any emotions except for anger, one keeps personal hygiene to a bare minimum, one is not creative nor seeks to define oneself outside of one’s own predetermined role of defender, worker, macho grunter, scratcher and spitter.

If ever a man should be so bold as to practice hygiene such as get a manicure or prune overaggressive bodily foliage … or God forbid, actually consider wearing something other than baggy jeans and a T-shirt or a boring suit femanderthals such as Ms. White will be there to snear and call such a miscreant a “metrosexual,” “sissy,” or worse.

It is time for men to be allowed and to allow themselves to break free of the drab, narrow, emotionally unhealthy and overall revolting definition of masculinity that society has foisted upon us. You can still be a man and seek to improve your appearance, express some sort of creative fashion sense and be emotionally healthy and open. It is time that women grant us the same latitude for self-definition that they themselves rightfully expect.

Men, be yourselves and if she doesn’t love you for it– **** her! She never wanted you anyways, she wanted the Marlboro man and you just got in the way.