Girls don't call boys

Ah, if only those poor women had followed my mother's advice. How much better off they would be.

I am of course talking about the girls of ABC's "The Bachelor." In this week's horrific finale both women finalists who, along with dozens of other women, brazenly threw themselves sexually and otherwise at Jason Mesnick in front of millions of American viewers all season were again humiliated.

Melissa because she was dumped by Jason, also in front of millions of people, after their six-week "engagement." Molly because she was first dumped but then essentially won the "final" coin toss with Mr. Loyal, who proceeded to make out with her while the sofa was still warm from his dumpee. (Chances of Molly and Jason lasting? Somewhere between zero and none.)

News reports are that millions of women are furious with "The Bachelor." I say forget the jerk and consider my mother's advice: "Girls don't call boys." Period.

Long before the hit book and film, "He's Just Not That Into You," my mom had it right: If a man is worthy of you he will pursue you, and only you. If he doesn't, you don't want him anyway.

(To this day I've consistently, if laughingly, informed potential suitors that my mother would turn in her ashes if I "violated" her dictum. The good ones don't mind!)

But times have changed. Any mother of a teenaged son today will tell you about the aggressive girls who pursue their boys. I can tell you about the aggressive single women my age pursuing men. And I'm not talking about subtle hints, charm, and openness to a pursuit or even, for a time and if there are some extenuating circumstances, some gentle nudging within a relationship: I'm talking about full boar, sex charged male hunting.

It doesn't get much more extreme than several women utterly degrading themselves by sexually pursuing the same man in front of millions of American viewers.

But whatever the scenario, here's why it won't make most men or women happy even if it does occasionally "work" for a time: in the end a man is (gasp!) designed to naturally pursue the woman he loves, and a women to delight in being pursued by the man she loves and can look up to in return.

Not to put too fine a point on it but the reverse is, to varying degrees, pathetic.

Historically it was up to a man to make his suit (as in a court of law) to a woman as to why she should come into his household and under his government and protection, to consider a very old fashioned view of things. This is where the very term "suitor" comes from.

Whatever the modern iteration, it seems to me that if he's not naturally and eagerly making that suit, he's not someone a woman would, or should, find attractive. It doesn't mean he's not a good guy, or wouldn't be good for another woman he chose to pursue -- it just means that he's not good, or good enough, for her.

Flash forward and the social engineers can say whatever they want to, but here's why we know these instincts remain part of us: Line-up 20 married couples and ask how they fell in love and became engaged. Nineteen of them will have a tale of how he initiated the romance. Mostly you'll hear stories of how he pursued her, risked all for love, etc. She'll often talk about how she wasn't sure at first, but he wore down her resistance. Or, if she was sure, that she "let him chase her until she caught him" as my mom would say about my dad.

Surely the stories aren't entirely true, but even that's a clue as to how we are hard wired to want them to be.

Want more proof? We would cringe to actually hear stories from the wife of her begging and pursuing her husband to marry, especially if there is some truth there (it's degrading) -- but we love those stories coming from him (it's manly).

So, my three daughters and I watched these women in the humiliating, heart-breaking fright-fest of "The Bachelor" finale.

And at the end of it I looked at them and very simply said, "Honeys, a word to the wise: girls don't call boys."

-- Hart hosts the "It Takes a Parent" radio show on WYLL-AM 1160 in Chicago.