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Bad Romance: Women are becoming more like men, but men are not becoming more like women

Maureen Dowd New York Times columnist September 7, 2025 — 7.35pm

When I wrote Are Men Necessary? two decades ago, the book’s title was meant to be mischievous.

Sure, men and women seemed in a muddle at the dawn of the millennium. As women climbed up, poking their heads into spaces long dominated by men, the shift in power affected romance.

There was an assumption that courtship rituals, where women “trapped,” “landed” and “bagged” a man, waiting to be chased and expecting to have their restaurant tab picked up, would fade as equality grew.

No more games, like the ones recommended by The Rules , the 1995 bible that told women t

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