Difference between a man's woman and a woman's woman

[sonnyday]

Today I heard one mum describe another as "a man's woman, not really a woman's woman" feel a bit stupid asking, but what does it imply and is it an insult?

I think the term "a man's woman" is truthfully just a rather bitchy way for some women to express jealousy about another woman. Generally it's used to describe attractive women who get on well, maybe flirt a lot, with men. So what?

I'm not sure which I am but I do know that it takes me a long time to make friends with women due to my background, and yet when I do these friendships become extremely solid and very long-lasting. All my "best" friends are women.

On the other hand, I grew up in a household overrun with men/boys. I had to fit in. As a result I have always felt, on first meeting people, far more comfortable talking to men than I do to women. This has nothing to do with flirting but everything to do with just knowing what makes someone else tick, and finding common interests.

However, I would definitely describe myself as a feminist too.

And for that reason I really don't like the term "man's woman" when it is used as a criticism from one woman against another. It comes from a place of insecurity, as far as I'm concerned.

I think I am probably a man's woman.

Mans woman
Mans' woman
Man's woman

I have worked with men for years, I would find it rather different to work with a bunch of women. Any women I get on with are like me boring bastards-- engineeringy geeks.

I very rarely socialise in a large group of women - the idea of a hen night would make me cringe. The only large group of women i speak to on a regular basis is you lot.

I am not a flirty batting eyelashes type of person though. You can tell those women who simper with blokes to get ahead at work - they are the lowest of the low.

I think I have described myself as 'not really a girl's girl'. This is definitely NOT because I want to steal people's boyfriends, am obsessed with my looks and can't be bothered with women but because I genuinely find it easier to talk to/make friends with guys.

For some reason, men seem to really like me. Women often find me a bit odd, I think. I have thought about why this might be and I think it might be something to do with the fact that I have the sense of humour of a 14 year old boy! I also tend to be quite jokey/bantery and I think this makes some women uncomfortable.

For example, recently I was at a kids party and there were some women from school there. One of was for some reason talking about how her dh had been watching the movie 'Team America: World Police' and being really sneery about it along with the others, laughing about how immature men were. I just sat thinking, 'but that movie is fucking ace', didn't say it out loud though!

I have a few really close girl friends who I adore but like someone else said earlier, large groups of women make me a bit nervous. The women I am friends with are 'men's women' like me. I don't find the term insulting but I don't categorise myself as the type of simpering hair flicker that is described here.

I disagree, UD, I've heard the expression used to excess by the (mostly sexist) men I've worked with. They seemed to think a "man's woman" would be gratifying company for them, but shouldn't be trusted ... and that we (female colleagues) should be protected from them!

I do like WWIFN's posts in this thread. One of my relatives is a beautiful & charming person - I want to like her; she says she wants to feel close to me ... she has no female friends, a fact she claims to regret. But I can see why.

I think some posters are talking at cross purposes here

There is a clear distinction (in my book, anyway) between a "blokey" woman who likes typically "blokey" things and feels more comfortable doing "matey" things with men rather than women. I would call them (for want of a better word) tomboys (shows age...)

I have no issue with that

and then the kind of woman that WWIFN described a few posts ago

Yes, am probably more a blokey woman in the sense that I like talking blokey things.

But then I dress in a really feminine way and can bore you all for hours about make up choices.

So who knows really. One thing I am sure about is thatI am NOT a flirt/hair flicker.

"Women's women" often get on very well with men, because they are not viewing them as a challenge, nor inwardly calculating their worth

They are more likely to have an equal kind of communication with men, because the sex aspect (or "what is in this conversation for me..) is taken out of it

So, I find the stereotype of a man's woman as having loads of male mates actually very misleading, because according to my own definition, it is the other way around

I didn't realise hair-flicking was such a crime
Perhaps I should wear it in a bun.

Getorf you sound like me. One of my girlfriends said I am the only person she knows who can be one of the boys (engineery geek type in overalls fiddling with sprockets) and one of the girls (cup cake baking mummy dressing up in feathers for girly dance show).
We are just ace versatile modern women!!

I'm a man's woman. I lived with boys in my 2nd and 3rd years of uni (then after until moving in with DP), most my friends are male and I find men easier to relate to than women on the whole. I can't handle too much emotion, 'hurt feelings' - unless rightfully hurt by broad standards, the idea of scrap books and sitting in watching SATC makes me feel ill...

I do have a group of close female friends I've had since school but they are essentially men's women too. None of us care that much about traditionally 'girly' things; we don't tend to get offended and often find 'girl's girls' dislike us - probably for being friends with men. It's a minefield.

There's an article on this in last week's Sunday Times.

I am finding all this less pronounced as I get older but can still always tell on meeting whether a woman is one or the other.

I'm not remotely a girly girl though- that does not mean the sane thing as a 'woman's woman' in by book. All that SATC and discussing bowel movements over frappuccinos stuff is a daft bunch of stereotypes about women anyway. I still love MN though, because it is full of women, not a bunch of cock-wavers.

I hate SATC, they are men's women by very definition

Scrap booking ? Well, I think I dabbled in that when I was 9

I don't dislike women who are friends with men. I am one of them.

But when the chips are down, I know where my loyalties lie.

Agree, any woman who loves Sex and the City/white zinfandel/obsesses about Louboutins or shite like that is a cliched version of woman.

Yeah I know that, sorry, but when I was at university - not so many years ago - the very girly girls who were to me women's women just happened to be that way. The scrapbook thing was like a pack mentality they had that kept them all together and I always felt a little pushed out of and I genuinely think that was because I became friends with most of the men in our halls who many went on to date. I'm not suggesting any jealousy - at all. I know the SATC bit is a cliche, I didn't mean all women's women love it, but to me it was symptomatic of the girly girls I knew.

Big groups of girls do scare me a little if I don't know them. I get on with men a lot better. I'm not sure of a better way to explain - sorry about cliches/stereotypes, was just my own experience.

God, they're awful - I wouldn't want to have anything to do with any of them. Any woman yakking incessantly about shoes in my company would get short shrift.

UQD - as one of few men around, does your continued interest in MN mean you are a man's man or a woman's man?

We still don't have any common ground on definitions, do we? I would have said the SATC mob were women's women because they enjoy the company of women more than men. I have only seen a few episodes of the programme but as far as I can see, they only want men for sex or coupledom not for friendship or because they have anything in common with them.

And, generally, do woman's men like man's women more or woman's women and vice versa. < head explodes>

And can I declare myself to be neither and totally neutral?

I don't think I am either. Like a poster above, I try to be a "people person" :)

I agree with niecie about the SATC girls, they don't have any friendships with men which have no sexual history or future, apart from with gay men. I would say when I define myself as a man's woman I have as many if not more friendships with men in which sex does not play a part at all than with women.

I think there's a difference between a girly girl and a woman's woman though...SATC I would put in the former category alongside Cheryl Cole and Marilyn Monroe...

HappiestBlonde, never forget you are among friends here

perhaps we should agree the very definitions are blurred as we cannot get a consensus

Oh no, not more categories!!

Girlwiththemousyhair - I think a lot of the women who have been categorised as a man's woman are in fact girly girls. Victoria Beckham, I believe was classified as a man's woman at one point but she is most definitely a girly girl imo - interest = shopping, clothes, hair make up, jewellery. Nothing in common with men I wouldn't have thought, even with a working knowledge of football!

"A woman's place is in the wrong"

Oh lenin, bitter hollow laugh, how right you are....

AF says exactly what I think. SATC (can't bear it, crass, crude and not very funny at all)

It's just a glossy version of Men behaving Badly (with bumps on their jumpers)

That's not women's women, it's what men's women want us to think a woman's woman is supposed to be.

hissy, you are messing my head up now !

I know, damned near messed my own up then too...

OI, MNHQ, where are the Bonfire Smileys????