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Women who prefer their men rugged may be dismayed to learn that Metrosexual Man will not die. Literally ... well almost. A new scientific study has concluded that guys in touch with their feminine sides are generally much healthier and likely to live longer than their macho counterparts.
Not that Metrosexual Man will have it all his own way. Presumably there will always be stress-fuelled moments when exfoliating scrubs are a tad harsh, or the designer sofa fails to arrive. The Metrosexual Man might even dice with death, forgetting to take his B-vitamins because he's so busy empathising with his girlfriend, all the time noticing that (tut tut) it's high time she booked in for a little dermabrasion.
All in all, though, it's no surprise that Metrosexual Man is in such good nick: he's a smart cookie, a creature of the modern world, who knows how to look after himself. And that's why all you women out there are full of admiration for him. And, ironically, why you're still slipping the slobs your phone numbers.
First of all, no one is suggesting that women like macho pigs. This is a total myth. No sane female wants to go back to the dark days of soul-sapping machismo, when for most men, being in touch with their feminine side meant copping off with "birds" by pretending to dig Carly Simon, or, circa New Lad, Alanis Morissette.
Still, these pathetic historical attempts at inter-gender "empathy" illustrate how keen men are to be what women want, or at least an approximation of it, in order to get what they want (sex, of course, or at least an approximation of it). It also displays how, against all evidence, men do listen to women, perhaps a bit too literally. And so it came to pass that the female gender asked for, nay demanded, Metrosexual Man.
Not literally, of course. Women just wanted a new breed of guy, so we made him up in our heads - putting him together, a bit like a psychosexual Mr Potato Man. We wanted something still identifiably male, but well-groomed; sexy, but in touch with his emotions, and not forever poring over lady-bits; a true mate, but high-earning, and house-trained.
What women couldn't have anticipated was that these guys would start springing up, straight as anything, but nicking our skin plumpers, opining on soft furnishings, and generally invading Girl Turf.
Things have calmed down a bit now, but a few years back it was like Attack of the Jude Laws (still the ultimate metrosexual). Worse, this Ideal Evolved Male we'd dreamt up - well, we didn't fancy him much.
Could it be that post-feminism has created its own Frankenstein's monster? The man who is so like a woman he's unfanciable? After all, it isn't only the obvious MMs we're talking about - metrosexuality has spread like a virus through other, more innocent, men, who probably never dreamt that one day they would evolve into nearly girls. Recently, the British papers reported how a man dialled the police in tears because his wife wouldn't have sex. I'm no scientist but this appears to be a hybrid of "macho" and "metro", leading to a whole new term, "machosexual".
Another machosexual incident occurred when Amy Winehouse's ex, a street-wise rocker himself, tearfully emoted on MySpace about how, when he saw Winehouse with her new beau, he was "shaking like a leaf". He added he'd stopped writing songs about her "because I've covered all the emotions".
Meanwhile, Winehouse is swaggering around town, pissed, epic, glorious - wholly female, but also like the worst (best) kind of dick-swinging man you could imagine.
Maybe this is the point. It's very nice for Metrosexual Man that he is destined to live longer. But with women like Winehouse around, will he want to? For just as men have evolved - to suit women, it seems - females have also evolved, to suit women, too.
And this new breed of women are not going to take kindly to Metrosexual Man, or even Machosexual Man, gently insisting they put down their whisky tumbler, stop vomiting on the coffee table and get a good night's sleep. It may even come to pass that men begin daydreaming wistfully of a new breed of woman, who is sexy but house-trained, sensitive, and not forever ogling man-bits and so on.
However, as any woman could tell these men - just in case we're listening, be careful what you wish for.
- Observer