Emotional insecurity | Unlearning the Fear

My recent venture (re-venture) into the world of online dating has me wondering about one thing: insecure men. I have come across a great number of insecure men who wear their insecurity on their sleeves and use it as a launch pad from which to fire thinly-veiled insults and hostile remarks. I wonder how these men have become so insecure.

We are bombarded with advertisements–commercials, billboards, newspaper and magazine ads– portraying the perfect woman. On a daily basis, women are told they should be thin, should cook and clean, should always look flawless, wear make up, have shiny hair– and many more attributes, to be desirable to men. It’s difficult to look in the mirror and love yourself if you absorb all of these media messages.

Now I’m sure men also experience this, but not to the same degree. So it makes me wonder, why are there so many insecure and hostile men out there? It has been my experience that when men are insecure about themselves, they project it on others and in a defensive and aggressive manner, try to bring others down. I’ve recently started to think this could be attributed to rejection. Men likely feel rejected more often than women (again this is based on personal experience and assumptions I’m making based on these experiences so I could be wrong). I have often been the one to thank a guy for a date but say I didn’t feel a romantic connection. I get the sense that this is how it typically goes–the guy is up for another date, but the woman isn’t. If that’s true, then I can see how rejection might occur more often for men, and how perhaps this could affect their sense of self and their self-esteem.

Still though, I feel like it’s a big leap from feeling rejected to becoming an insecure, hostile, defensive person. I haven’t met many women who exhibit these characteristics, though I’ve never been romantically involved with a woman so perhaps that would be a different story. I’m just not sure where this insecurity comes from, and more importantly, how to identify this red flag before getting involved with someone.

A university professor of mine once warned against using insecurity as an explanation for anything. He argued that insecurity is such an all-encompassing blanket term that it can be used to explain everything. In that sense, it really explains nothing. I just don’t know how else to explain this. I think self-hatred is also a viable contestant but it’s a stronger term and I wouldn’t feel comfortable applying it to others.

In any case, I would like to know how to identify these traits. It’s a combination of insecurity and being mean-spirited–there’s something there about turning your insecurity around and using it, like a sharpened dagger, to assault someone.

As I continue down this path of online dating, maybe it will become more clear to me. Maybe patterns will emerge and I’ll learn how to spot the warning signs without having to endure a painful first date, or an awful relationship that unknowingly brings me down. If I do, I’ll be sure to share any wisdom I gain. For now, it’s back to living and learning.