Maybe I secretly really do "hate women"

That's a terrifying realization to myself. I have made that comment as a casual aside a million times in the past in order to vent my own frustrations about my failures in the dating world, but maybe it really is true. Maybe it's not the frustrations of a good-hearted guy down on his luck as I view myself, but the honest truth.

I've spent the last hour or so reading articles dealing with women voicing opinions in the internet and the amount of crap they have to deal with. Specifically, Margaret Robertson's post I found through Kotaku and one she mentions immediately in that post by a guy named Mark Sorrell.

And I feel like crap right now. I'm not the type of guy that ever sends unsolicited messages on X-Box or any other gaming medium targetting women. Or anyone, really. In fact, the only messages I send on X-Box Live other than ones to friends have been to opponents in a game I particularly enjoyed playing against. Whether I won or lost, when the competition was good and friendly, I make it a point to send a "GG dude! Helluva game" message or something along those lines. I believe we need as a culture to make a more concentrated effort to display sportsmanship online as we would in person.

But I know I've said derogatory things before. Just the other day, I was playing Left 4 Dead 2 with one of my only real life friends and a few people he knows. One of them was a girl, and immediately the flirtatious side of me came out. It wasn't in a direct way (I've learned better) but I was monitoring what I said an awful lot more than I usually do and was making a conscious effort to be more witty and funny than I usually am. I believe I made a lot of jokes about how the only type of women I could get were the really fat, blimp-like ones.

It was funny in context, but now that I'm looking at it out of context, I'm mortified by the sexism I've displayed. It's subconscious. I have a really low opinion of myself normally, so the way I self-deprecate is by making fun of obese women, by implying they are low enough on the worthiness meter in society even I could get with them and it would be welcome on their parts.

I'm better than that. God I feel so awful right now, but I guess I need to take heart in that. Hold on to this self-anger and utilize it to be a better man going forward, right? That's all anyone can do when they've been faced with an uncomfortable truth about themselves. So what I'm doing, with my eyes open, is telling myself I am better than that so when the opportunity to actually put it on display arizes, I'll go "I am better than that" and hold myself to higher standards.

At the end of the day, this is all I've ever really asked of anyone. It might seem like I ask a lot of people, because I'm a very opinionated a-hole most the time. But I'm ultimately an extremely forgiving individual. The person I whined about in my last post? I can legitimately say I hate her right now and am glad she's out of my life. But would I forgive her in a heartbeat if she decided to actually mend this rift? Absolutely. I'd  be wary for awhile, but I am an trusting enough person to say what the hell and go for it. I suppose the reason I am so hurt by her decision is she is not the same way.

I am getting off-topic: Let's talk about women on the internet for a second. Did you know women who express opinions for a living get hate mail based entirely upon their gender and nothing about the contents of their work? I had no idea. And some of the stories I've heard go as far as to say they've been mailed their own address (not publicly listed on any profile they were aware of owning online) along with vivid descriptions of horrific sexual fantasies these nutjobs want to carry out on said opinionated women. I'd spoken very, very briefly with my friend Jill about this, as she is a gamer into the Modern Warfare franchise specifically. According to her, she gets hate mail or sexual requests every round she speaks through the mic.

Considering how emotionally twisted I get from some of the things that occur to me in my life, I can't even imagine. If you're a male gamer, and you're reading this, I encourage you to examine your own behavior. Ignore what you perceive as the norm for a second. Let's throw away stupid ideals such as "It cannot be changed." We're going to Glen Beck this and ONLY talk about you. If my post gets even just one other person to examine their behavior toward other people, then this was the best 20 minutes (give or take) I've spent in the last month.

I suppose from an entirely selfish standpoint, I want it to be acceptable for "normal" girls to play video games. Let's face it; the perception is only nerdy girls or "fat, ugly" girls or lesbians or to sum it all up, "fringe personality" girls play video games when the truth is everyone in today's society plays them.

Anyway, I'll finish ranting about this topic later. Gotta run!

No, seriously, I hate that I love women.

This is probably the most misogynistic thing you'll read all day, and I apologize about that. I could pretend I was politically correct, but y'all know me. I leave politicking to people with no souls.

So, anyone who knows me or followed my blog when I originally started it knows there's a girl in northern California I care about a lot. The relationship has been entirely long distance, and I recognize that's probably weird to a lot of people I care as much about this person as I do because of that fact. Thing is, I didn't expect her to question it.

That stings on a level I have a hard time understanding. Let me go and explain the entire situation as best I see it.

About two weeks before the new Call of Duty came out, she text me saying "I'm bored!" I told her "I'm just chilling playing games on Xbox with some friends of mine. Join the party and come chat with us?" So she did. And things went pretty well for awhile. She got along with my friends. That made me happy, and hey it was a way to actually talk to her rather than texting all the time.

Fast forward to the release of the game. We all played it quite a bit that first week, and I'm a highly competitive guy. When I struggle, I get whiney. I'm not proud of it and it's something I work on constantly. However, it's super difficult when everyone on your own friend's list is harping on you. Friendly ribbing is part of the game, and for the most part I took it well and it didn't really bother me. But when it did start to bother me, I got vocal about it. One night, I told them "Okay seriously guys, enough is enough. Could you please tone it down and maybe not rip on me quite so much for a bit?" After about 20 seconds of silence, I just said "Fuck it, I'm done for tonight."

Then in classic brainless hurt emotional wreck Casey fashion, I shot her a text saying something to the extent, "I expect that kind of behavior from them, because they are just video game friends and I don't really know them. Plus, they occasionally throw in 'Just kidding' or similar messages to lessen the blow when it starts to feel really personal. But you? I expect you to at least acknowledge when I ask a request." She didn't respond.

She also didn't respond for about 3 days when I tried to hash things out with her.

She also didn't respond on X-Box Live anymore. She started inviting the other guys to a party, but set it to invite only and no one ever threw me an invite. Yes, they were all playing the game. Yes, I wanted to get in and play with them.

This goes on for like a week, then I get word from the girlfriend of one of these guys (this particular guy and his girlfriend are real world friends of mine from Las Vegas) she overheard the Cali girl, and I quote, "talking shit about me." When I asked further, apparently she told these other guys she didn't know why I cared about her as much as I did because it's all been long distance, and that I was a stalker, and things to that extent.

Wow, right? Yeah, I'm a stalker. Before all this drama went down, we were both talking about what Christmas gifts we were going to send each other. I'm pretty sure she in fact started that whole conversation. There's absolutely no reason for me to care as much about her when I was there for her to talk to into the long wee hours of the night and morning when her marriage was failing. Another fact: she told me I was the first person she called when the official decision to split from her husband went down, even before her own mother whom she lives with.

There are so many little things like that I can point to in this 2 year relationship. I'm pretty sure at one time she cared about me. So I don't understand how anyone who ever cared about another could just shut down so completely when the other is trying to find out what the hell is going on. I didn't hear from her in a week, she wouldn't return texts or phone calls or messages on other online services, and then I start hearing things which seem to confirm my paranoia? I think anyone in that situation would be trying to find out what the hell was happening. If it was reality as it seemed in my head, the situation was extremely fucked up. She basically stole my group of X-Box friends (by the way, none of them really talk to me anymore and I still don't know why they suddenly shut down toward me too) and then said some really hurtful things which suggest she'd been feeling resentful of my attachment to her for quite some time.

Finally, after leaving a few voice mails, she text me back saying she wasn't going to talk to me anywhere because I believed some "mystery source rumors." She wouldn't actually talk to me, but would argue with me via text. I hate that. When things are shitty, I want to TALK. When you can hear the other person, it makes it so much less painful because when reading the types of things that come out in arguments, they always sound way harsher than the vocal inclinations would let a person understand.

During the course of the argument, I felt like she wasn't directly responding to any of the things I had to say, and was just turning everything around on me. I'm the badguy for wanting answers. I'm the badguy for not being able to read her body languages from a thousand miles away to just inherently understand she wanted to be left alone. She didn't understand there's a responsibility people have to say the very simple things like "I want to be left alone today, I am not feeling well" or whatever. Like I wouldn't understand that. I don't understand the silent treatment, especially in this case because I still don't see what I did wrong.

Well, up til the argument came to a head. I may have accused her of treating me like her ex-husband and another guy who liked her a lot that both started treating her really poorly, and that this type of treatment is what leads people to do shit like that.

Do I feel I am wrong in this assessment? No. Should I have said it? Probably not. But then again, she can point out my flaws whenever she wants and I'm just supposed to grin and bear it and laugh it off or solemnly swear to be better, but if I point out any of her flaws, goddamn it I'm on her shitlist along with her ex-husband, this other guy, a former "best friend" female friend of hers, and a few other people she likely will never talk to again and will retain anger and hatred toward for years to come.

It's been two weeks since this all went down, and it still stings and makes no sense so I try not to think about it as best I can.

AND IF YOU'RE WONDERING WHY I AM LEVYING THIS SITUATION ON THE ENTIRE FEMALE POPULACE:

I've tried so hard the last two weeks to get out of my house to spend time with just a female friend. No agenda. Just want to spend time with the fairer sex. Shit, I'd spend time with anyone. I need out of my house. The only social interaction I've had recently circles around video games and football. Not that I mind either of those, but occasionally I need something deeper even if it's just delving into the problems of another person. I've sent a gajillion texts to gajillion people who normally respond when I try to say hello and absolutely nothing. People are going to blame it on it being near Finals, but really? You expect me to buy that? Go observe people in the wild for two friggin' minutes. Everyone checks their phones constantly, whether they are in conversation with friends or not, and usually clack out a reply. If any of them actually responded, I'd believe whatever they slung my way. Not out of ignorance, but because I believe in the naive ideal friends should trust their friends unless given a reason to distrust them.

And so I've had to sit with this guilt and anger and frustration of being alone, of losing one of my best friends I've ever had, of losing a girl I love, alone. I have had literally no outlet to even try and feel better about things. I haven't had a single day since where I haven't felt shitty about myself, because I've had no one to tell me otherwise. You can try and tell me all you want I should just buck up and tell myself I'm a good person and just role with it, but I'm too observant to believe those lies. Good, worthwhile people don't sit alone in their house for two weeks at a time when they are trying as hard as they can to get out and socialize. Good, worthwhile people have people who love them and seek them out to talk or do things with.

I'm a giving person, and no one wants anything I have to offer. This is the source of my endless low self-worth.