I'm still formulating my thoughts on the experience, but I wanted to get a chance to spark some discussion here about this, get some input.

I was out with a plate the other night, she's become a regular, been seeing her for a few months. She knows we're not exclusive, but she doesn't go into detail when we bump into people we know, it's just too complicated for most people.

We ran into an old friend of hers who gleaned that we were seeing each other, and she started gushing- "oh don't you love her? She's the best! You have the best lady here!"

She then proceeded to tell me that I should "better show my appreciation for having such a wonderful woman" and that I'm "lucky to have her."

It's an interesting insinuation, and clearly spoken out of turn, since it hinges on premises she couldn't possibly know about having just met me.

But what really interested me about the interaction was that she was very demanding that I should compliment her more because that's what a guy needs to do to hold on to such a beautiful lady and so on and so on.

She continued "my boyfriend used to be like that, but we had a talk and he understands now how important it is to compliment his beautiful girlfriend. He's good at it now.."

He was standing on the other side of the bar looking rather defeated.

This was as blatant of an example of the feminine imperative I've ever seen, no doubt about it.

I thought it was intriguing how thinly veiled it was- it was saying out of the two of you, one of you has value, don't forget it. It was in my face, giving obvious peer pressure to either make amends for not appreciating her enough, or make an excuse for my behavior. It was an attempt at shaming me into submission and conforming to the very beta that women forever demand men become.

She asked, "don't you think she deserves more compliments? She says you never compliment her.. you should compliment her more!"

I responded with a straight, "You know what my take on compliments are?"

"What?"

"I say and do..." pause ".. exactly what I want to say and do," pause "when I say and do it."

She just looked at me dumbfounded for a second and finally responded, "well I don't think that works.. women need affirmation.."

At this point I didn't respond, and instead just kept a straight face and allowed an awkward silence. She eventually broke the silence and changed the subject.

My plate was dumbfounded, almost embarrassed to be called out, because it's true, I don't compliment her at all. She knows she's hot, why the fuck would I inflate that fucking ego? But she was angry because I don't conform to these rules and she likes it and this bitch came over and put a light on it.

I am still trying to figure out the entire strategy here. Surely this chick isn't that calculated, but she was incredibly manipulative with her phrasing and was able to make my plate squirm.

I think she got what she wanted, but I'm not sure what that was. Was she proud that she snagged a provider and wanted to rub it in other people's faces? Was she regretting her boyfriend's betaness and wanted to give her own ego a few extra pumps?

What drives this feminine imperative, what causes this to happen? Is it entirely a selfish drive to help one cope with her own lot in life, inadvertently creating the feminine imperative as it stands?

There are a lot of details here I'm most certainly going to ponder- but I thought I'd throw out this experience and see what you guys thought.

Edit I appreciate everybody's views on how to handle said situation, but what I'm really curious about is why this situation happens, what factors cause this, what details and results drive this behavior.