Men Are from Mars, Women Are from Venus

Oh yes! And some interactions make you want to take the next spacecraft and zoom out to where you belong. John Gray’s book attempts to hold you back on earth before differences transform into conflicts.

Takeaways
• Respect differences and give people their space.
• Don't give unsolicited advice. Everyone has an idea on how to solve their problems unless otherwise specified.
• On Mars when they say they’re thinking about nothing, they actually mean they’re thinking about nothing!
• Pay attention when people talk because sometimes all we need is a listener as an excuse to sort out our thoughts and put them out into words.
• Little things can mean a lot especially when it comes to sharing chores, being appreciative and giving gifts
• Don't take words literally during an argument or when the othere person is upset.
• Martians and Venusians speak different languages. Martians give clear cut information while Venusians may speak with or without clarity depending on their mood.

Readers don't digest
• Men like to fix their problems and women like to talk about it?!
• There are 12 kinds of love. Martians need trust, acceptance, appreciation, admiration, approval and encouragement while Venusians need care, understanding, respect, devotion, validation and reassurance. I think earthlings need it all.

Although the book is a bit sexist, most men and women I know fit into Gray’s stereotypes and it is safe to add that the book provides insightful info on communicating effectively with members of the opposite sex to get the results you want.

Catchy but quite stereotypical. The contrasting perspectives discussed are great to consider, but they are choices.

My main problem with this book is that it is based on assumptions and not facts. Men are not all the same, women are not all the same. This is a false narrative that is driven by presumptions on how a Man or a woman supposed to act. We are living in the 21st century for crying out loud, how are these 'hints' even relevant? There should be NO book that addresses tips on how to understand men or women! Why you ask? THEY ARE ALL PEOPLE WITH DIFFERENT PERSONALITIES! The only thing you can study are the "GENERAL" assumptions or what TYPICALLY happens in DIFFERENT circumstances.

Men do this because they are strong. Men are not weak. Men cannot get emotional. Women are the only emotional ones. Men wants a woman who knows how to cook. Woman wishes that a man will understand her more and not prejudge based on assumptions. The reason why a man does not call you back right away is because he is not interested. You should only date six months before you are ready for marriage.

THIS IS A LOAD OF BULLSHI..SHUT YOUR MOUTH! I don't care how educated you are or how well renowned you are, Men and women are not all the same. How in the blue hell was this even published? Sometimes I wonder if these books are even given a second glance when you study the people around them.

Men are from Mars, Women are from Venus? B.S! How about Men are from Earth and Woman are from Earth... WE ARE TWO DIFFERENT SEXES living in the same planet! There is no "golden rule" on how a woman or men act in relationships cause they are all wired differently!

*soap box over* sorry this type of content annoys the hell out of me. I don't even know I wasted time reading this.* .

کتاب خوبی بود... البته کتاب رو زمانی خوندم که بالغ نشده بودم... اما کلیتش هنوز یادمه... واقعا گاهی دنیاهای ماها چقدر با هم متفاوته... نمیدونم اینی که میگم ساختگی هست یا واقعا اتفاق افتاده، اما جمله ای از فروید هست که میگه: بعد این همه سال کار و تحقیق و تجربه جواب یک سوال رو نتونستم پیدا کنم؛ اینکه زنها چی میخوان
؟

Back in 1992, when “Men Are from Mars, Women Are from Venus” was first released, it was a revolutionary book but now in 2022, it’s outdated, even kids know that Men and Women think, communicate and react differently. But is Green’s assumption that all men are the same, all women are the same right?
Actually, All Green’s focus was on the gender's role and didn’t include any other factors. Moreover, he was so much repeating himself all over the book. However, he still offered some useful tips for healthy relationships.

Idiotic sexist drivel. Catch a rocket back to Mars, Dr Gray.

n  Love: User's Manualn

Do you remember the bunch of books Bridget Jones used to carry about in order to make sense of her weird and chaotic life? One of them was just this one, Men Are from Mars, Women Are from Venus, and because of its longish and kinda stupidish, funnyish title, I assumed, when I saw the movie, it was merely an amusing invention to go with the giddy thirtish female character (as you can see I’ve just discovered magic of the “-ish” suffix in the economy of the text).

So imagine my surprise when I found the book was real (hey, in my defense, what I recall happened some eight years ago!) and very famous (according to Wikipedia it sold millions of copies). Meanwhile I’ve heard and read a lot of allusions at and quotes from this book but although I bought it by mild curiosity from an antique book store several years ago, I’ve let it collect dust on my to-read shelf, for it was always another book more inciting to choose. Until now, that is.

I have to confess that, since I am not a great believer in such magic recipes, I’ve never come round this kind of relationship guides until now – they seem to me a little fraudulent in their pretense that they can solve major problems of the human soul and/ or behaviour by providing some general advice similar to those that help you understand how to make work a certain device. Consequently, my motivation for reading has been right from the beginning mere curiosity and a suspicion that, with such a title, I would have fun. Which indeed I’ve had, but when all was laughed and done, I found it, unexpectedly, quite sad. What a difference between this book, with its pitiful pretense of psychological study and great books on the same subject (although not “practical guides”) like Denis de Rougemont’s Love in the Western World for example. And if you think I am unjust by comparing grapes and tomatoes so to say (for everybody takes care not to compare apples and oranges) I will tell you that this is the very core of the problem: for such a book to gain an almost religious halo, it needs readers without much psychological depth, who think of themselves only as machines waiting to be fixed, should the right tool be found.

My daughter has been playing for many years now a computer game called Sims. If you are not familiar with it, I can tell you it is about a virtual family you grow up, build a home for, send to work and so on. Some time ago she told me, amused, that once she forgot to send one of them to pee and although he had become increasingly uncomfortable he couldn’t go to the bathroom by himself, he had to wait (and grimace, and dance, and lose self-esteem points) until she saw him and directed him to the toilet. Doesn’t it seem to you lately that we live in a Sims society, waiting to be told when, how and what to do? Helpless when let alone, unable to understand the others, unable to understand ourselves anymore without a self-help at hand. In aching need of statements like “A man sense of self is defined through his ability to achieve results” or “A woman’s sense of self is defined through her feelings and the quality of her relationships” which we don’t bother even to verify, so they seem the answer to all the problems.

And the sadness of all this it is that nobody thinks it demeaning to find oneself reduced to a mere stereotype: man is action, woman is feeling, man is silence, woman is talk, man is a rubber band, woman is a wave, etc., etc., etc., on the contrary feeling strangely comforted to be offered universal solutions like Love Letter techniques (oh, yes!), scoring boards, emotional tables and even a “Venusian/ Martian phrase dictionary” which teaches you how to speak your man/ woman language:

“We never go out” translated into Martian means “I feel like going out and doing something together. We always have such a fun time, and I love being with you. What do you think? Would you take me out to dinner? It has been a few days since we went out.”

I won’t bother to talk about the platitude of the above-quoted “translation”, but I cannot help expressing my dismay that millions (millions!) found it useful in improving their relationships, as though otherwise they could not understand a hyperbola or a hint or whatever. Besides, the book is full of such pearls of wisdom, many beautifully framed to easier be found in the rush of a matrimonial crisis:

When our partner resists us it is probably because we have made a mistake in our timing or approach.

Or:

Not to be needed is a slow death for a man.

Or:

Never go into a man cave or you will be burned by the dragon!

Nor will I talk about the kind of ridiculously mixed metaphors the book is full of (I’ve just given you an example); I will only jump to the final chapter with its involuntary humour, chapter that pretends that this is the one and only way to keep alive the magic of love. What magic? Love is not, to use a Stendhalian appellation, passion or vanity, it is not mannered or physical. Not anymore. Love is a tank of gas which any Venusian expects to be filled by her Martian. Correctly, I mean. Whence the utility of this book. To whom it may concern.

Author's take on this subject is interesting.