At the risk of sounding like a very bad mid-eighties stand-up comedian, I'd like to get into a region of discussion that I've rarely touched on before: the battle of the sexes. Mind you, I'd rather get into the Battle of the Network Stars and watch a buxom Suzanne Sommers get into a water gun fight with Redd Foxx, but that would hardly make a column. In addition, it would undoubtedly come off as me being a chauvinist pig toward women of all description by speaking of the female form in such disgustingly physical terms. I guess when I hear a girl say that some guy has a "nice ass" it's just not the same as a guy saying that some girl has "nice breasts." FINE.

As I see it, the battle of the sexes has revolved around several key issues that we just need to resolve right here and now if humanity is going to survive into the next century. If we can collectively come to an understanding on certain things, then everyone will get married and there will be more babies than we know what to do with. I recommend that we dump the excess children into Lake Michigan. But that's a future column.

The first misconception that must be debunked in the name of gender peace is this notion that all men think about is sex. This is hardly fair. Not every guy has the mental capacity of Pauly Shore. In fact, I spend most of my time thinking about philosophy and metaphysics. I find Descartes' proof of God to be one of the most compelling ideas ever presented in the history of thought. It simplifies the entirety of over a millennium of philosophy into a few simple statements. Cindy Crawford does an especially good job of explaining it; sometimes I imagine her going through Descartes' God proof wearing a skimpy piece of lingerie that's completely wet and see-through, then when she gets to the part about how I think therefore I am, she drops the chalk and comes over to me sitting at my desk and grabs my pencil out of my hand and...well. I'm sure you see what I'm saying. There is far more in the average man's mind than SEX.

And men, we have to get over this foolish idea that women NEVER think about sex. It's just not true. Women think about sex all the time. It's just that when they think about it, they like to associate a story to it, and often period costumes as well. This explains why the romance novel market is geared entirely toward women and not at men. If romance novels were written for men, they would be approximately twenty pages long, and they would get read about one hundred times by the average male, let me tell you. The old adage is true: for men, sex is like putting a coin in a vending machine. Someday, a man will invent that vending machine and make a trillion dollars.

For women, sex is merely the culmination of hours (and sometimes days) of conversation, kissing, debate, grooming, and phone calls to their best friends. This extensive screening procedure is commonly known as "foreplay." Any and all errors committed by the male during this process can and will be counted against him in some fashion during the final act. These errors can effect the duration of the sex act, the procedures performed during the sex act, and often the likelihood of the sex act happening at all. It is important for the male to familiarize himself with the expected behavior in each area of the "foreplay" stage (being gentle, holding doors, lots of alcohol) so that the final sex act will be as complete and oily as possible.

So sex is taken care of. What about commitment? Everyone bitches and moans about this one, folks. "My boyfriend won't commit." "My boyfriend should be committed." "My boyfriend committed murder." The secret here is that men DO know how to make a commitment, just not to women. Men make major commitments: to their favorite movies, to a car or motorcycle, to Pamela Lee Anderson. What the woman in search of commitment needs to do is to equate herself with her male lover's favorite other object of commitment. If your boyfriend is obsessed with Star Wars, get those Princess Leia donut hair things going. If your boyfriend is in love with his car, get some tires and a fender. If your boyfriend is committed to Pamela Anderson, get a boob job. Commitment is a simple issue for men, if you talk down to their level. Always remember that the average male has a brain the size of a walnut; we need things spelled out for us VERY SLOWLY AND CLEARLY.

Men are stereotypically AFRAID of commitment, and many of them fill this stereotype well. These men need to realize that being committed to a relationship has many negatives (not being able to stick your penis into anything that breathes, losing your access to pornography, meeting your girlfriend's parents) but also many positives. For example, girlfriends are far easier to manipulate than your average woman. There are a whole set of obligations and emotions that go into each decision. If you want to go to a monster truck show and she wants to hit the ballet, just make her feel as guilty as you possibly can by acting like you really want to go, but making it clear that you don't want to deep down. Or you can spout on about how important monster trucks are to you, and she'll fall for the ruse and slip into your trap. Manipulation tactics in a relationship can also be useful to circumvent many stages in the foreplay process and speed up the road to sex.

Man versus woman. He versus she. Penis versus vagina. Testosterone versus estrogen. Will one side ever win? Probably not. And I for one wouldn't have it any other way; I like getting beaten around a bit every now and then. It kinda turns me on. So remember the bottom line in achieving gender peace is UNDERSTANDING. He needs to understand that she doesn't understand him, and vice-versa.