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“Dating, Rom-Coms, and other Clichés”

This article is written by a student writer from the Her Campus at U Mich chapter.

While browsing through “The Cut,” a site parented by New York Magazine dedicated to women, I happened upon the incredibly absurd article titled, “How I Tried to Lose a Guy in 10 Days.” Of course, we’re all familiar with the film. Some of us *cough, me* even distinctly remember Kate Hudson’s gorgeous yellow gown at the end of the film.

For those unfamiliar, the cliffs-notes version finds Hudson’s character reluctantly assigned to the disastrous task of dating and getting dumped by Matthew McConaughey though all along they were meant to be because she conveniently loved sports and fit all the gender norms he needed and yada yada yada

In “The Cut,” Julieanne Smolinski hilariously recounts her journey to emulate, to the best of her ability, the same. Here’s what she spent her ten days doing:

“DAY ONE: Calling Too Much

DAY TWO: Ruin Sports

DAY THREE: Girl Things

DAY FOUR: Chick-Flick Marathon

DAY FIVE: Food Issues

DAY SIX: Nagging about Cigars

DAY SEVEN: Being terrible at Sex

DAY EIGHT: Stevie Nicks

DAY NINE: Make Composites of What Our Kids Would Look Like, Get Him a Dog, Take Him to a Fake Therapist, Get Him Punched in the Actual Face

DAY TEN: We Physically Separate by Several Thousand Miles”

Did Smolinski learn anything from this? Well for one, it taught her gender roles are far less strict than the two-star Rom-Com from pre-Oscar Mathew McConaughey would lead us to believe. The poor guy from the article turned out to actually like Stevie Knicks and didn’t mind “chick-flicks,” and hopefully it’s always been an intuitive feeling that you should under no circumstances EVER make a composite of your future children (that’s simply terrifying).

The moral of the story here is to stop trying to decipher what he/she should be doing. Take your love fern and societal expectations and pack ‘em away. Luckily, Smolinski and Kate Hudson did this so you don’t have to.

 

See original article here.

Robyn Green is a junior majoring in Communications with a minor in Entrepreneurship. She currently serves as a Chapter Advisor for Her Campus with aspirations of working in Advertising after graduation.