“Where are all the men?”

“Why won’t they commit?”

“Marriage is out; men aren’t even looking to settle down.”

Or so goes the conversation for women worldwide.

But the good news, according to this article in GenerationJ.com, is that men are looking for wives. Unfortunately, there’s bad news too: they’re also looking for whores.

According to author Adam Harmon, this tension finds its roots in the story of Adam and Eve and in the mostly untold legend of Adam and Lilit:

Lilit became the prism by which western culture perceives sexually active women. This archetype is responsible, in the past, for labeling specific types of women “witch” and for blaming, today, many rape victims for the violence they have endured. Eve, on the other hand, represents the polar opposite. In spite of all the bad press she still receives for liking apples, the sexual aspects of Eve are mostly repressed. Eve remains the celebrated Wife who was most explicitly loved during the Victorian Era. This image of Eve, already adjoined to that of Mary by the medieval Christians, resulted in wifehood being stripped of its sexual content. As if all proper women should, like Mary, conceive without actual sexual relations.

Harmon makes sure to tell you that guys aren’t the only ones ‘typing’ the ladies. He says that the “Marriage Material”/”Just For Fun” typing is also something women engage in. But how does this archetyping impact dating today?:

[…] the guy is deciding “which is she?” Is she Whore of Wife? This is not always a conscious deliberation. Mostly, it is an instinct dependent both on our emotional needs at the time and the way the woman fits into our personal typing of Whore and Wife. (Personally, you all look the same to me.) Once that decision is made, the guy will treat you according to the way he thinks your type wants to be treated.

Madonna/Whore complex is nothing new to an English or art major. And with today’s tweens admiring Paris Hilton, it may be clear which direction tomorrow’s women will be heading in.