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What Is a Man?

Every year, Esquire asks, "What is a man?" Well, guys, we'd like to tell you...

Mar 30, 2010

courtesy of Paramount Pictures

Every year, Esquire explains the rules that govern masculinity with its "What Is a Man?" feature. Given the importance of this question, we thought we should get a second opinion and asked some of the funniest women in the country. Here's what they had to say...

courtesy of Paramount Pictures

What Is a Man?

A man is someone who will not stand for a gentle high-five. When faced with a flimsy-five, he must repeat the action again and again until he is satisfied with the strength, loudness, and redness caused by the forceful vertical meeting of two hands.

A man can do nothing but fumble and cower in the formidable shadow of his arch-nemesis, "The Bra."

-Jen Kwok

Courtesy of Mary Evans/20TH CENTURY FOX/Ronald Grant/Everett Collection

What Is a Man?

A man is unapologetic, unless he knows you are mad at him, in which case he is busy.

A man is someone who, at some point, will sport a handlebar mustache or secretly wish he could.

A man goes through toilet paper at a surprisingly slow rate.

-Alison Rosen

AMC/Kobal Collection

What Is a Man?

A man thinks you are "crazy." If you call him more often than he likes, you are crazy. If you don't return his phone calls as often as he'd like, you are crazy. If you move on quickly after your breakup with him, you are crazy. If you mourn for a while and stay single, you are crazy and clearly still obsessed with him.

A man is needy. He needs you to be a lady in the streets, a freak in the sheets, and a mommy/babysitter the rest of the time.

-Sara Benincasa

Courtesy of Giovanni Rufino / The CW

What Is a Man?

A man is someone who has five or fewer friends, and can only say five or fewer words to each friend at a time, resulting in a maximum of 5x5x4=100 words exchanged amongst a group of men in any given social situation.

A man thinks the ability to go on and on about different types of Scotch is a marketable skill set.

-Jen Kwok

Courtesy of Fox Television

What Is a Man?

A man is like disco night at the bowling alley: fun or just depressing? It's a matter of perspective.

Men have crazy-extensive DVD collections and use store-brand dandruff shampoo, even if they don't have dandruff.

-Jamie Lee

Courtesy of Warner Bros/Everett collection

What Is a Man?

A man is unable to discern whether the men around him are good-looking because to do so would quite obviously mean he is gay. This does not apply in situations where the man actually is gay, in which case he's unable to leave a tanning salon with anything approximating normal skin pigment for a human being exposed to the sun.

A man is someone who does not concern himself much with styling products geared to specific weather conditions.

-Alison Rosen

courtesy of HBO/Everett Collection

What Is a Man?

A man will never be as good in the sack as your favorite battery-operated device. But you can't kiss a vibrator. Or, well, you shouldn't.

A man does not date a girl who's 25 years younger than him. But my ex-husband does.

-Carolyn Castiglia

Columbia-TriStar Television / Courtesy: Everett Collection

What Is a Man?

A man secretly believes he could win the Nathan's Hot Dog Eating Contest — if only he just trained really, really hard.

A man considers making nachos an art form.

-Jen Kwok

Courtesy of the Everett Collection

What Is a Man?

A real man is a woman's best friend. He will never stand her up and never let her down. He will reassure her when she feels insecure and comfort her after a bad day. He will inspire her to do things she never thought she could do; to live without fear and forget regret. He will enable her to express her deepest emotions and give in to her most intimate desires. He will make sure she always feels as though she's the most beautiful woman in the room and will enable her to be the most confident, sexy, seductive, invincible.... No wait... I'm thinking of alcohol.

-Chelsea White

Courtesy of Mary Evans/20TH CENTURY FOX/Ronald Grant/Everett Collection

What Is a Man?

A man should never outshine his date at karaoke.

Real men cry. But not just about sports. In fact, not ever about sports.

A man is strong. A man is fierce. RuPaul is a man.

-Carolyn Castiglia

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