You are completely overthinking it. I readily acknowledged it is reductive. And my example was an example, a vibe. I do not, in fact, fish. Nor consider desert dwellers to be less masculine or something.

A typical male experience in a hetero relationship is that women are overly fussy over many things, I think most of it is culture (a generalised fear of a catty mother in law not considering you not good enough for her son causing a fear of losing your partner) so when we hear “men are simple” we don’t hear “men are stupid” but “finally, someone who understands the pointlessness of having seasonal napkins”. If you wanted to say “men are stupid” you’d have said “men are primitive”, it’s not hard to tell apart. We do, in fact, have social and contextual awareness.

Are there men who are totally into decorative towels? Sure, but if we hedge everything with “but not everyone does that”, “of course, all people are unique and different” then communication becomes a chore. It’s like hearing “sunscreen is important” and insisting “of course, if it’s winter that’s a different issue, we wouldn’t want to essentialise weather to be carcinogenic”. Come on.

And our interaction here, ironically, falls into a similar pattern. “No, really, it’s fine that we don’t have decorative towels” – “There must be a deeper meaning behind this, a social force, someone pulling his strings, why would anyone not want to have complex things like decorative towels, what is the meaning of this, am I on top of the situation”… no. He meant what he said, exactly that, and nothing more: My hands are dry, the towels didn’t make them dirty again, that’s all I need from a towel. I want my pants to have pockets so I buy them with pockets instead of worrying whether they ruin the silhouette and agonising over compromises. There’s a lot of freedom in simplicity. That inner mother in law, though? Of course everything is complicated, how else would she be able to drive you crazy.

I’ve got a song for you.