Any Man of Mine

The word 'narcissism' gets thrown around a little loosely these days. It has become a buzzword we have detached from any consistent definition in order to dehumanize people and behaviors we do no like under the justification of pathology. So believe that I am not speaking lightly when I say that this song is an almost perfect example of narcissism. Shania Twain cowrote the song with producer Robert John "Mutt" Lange, who by this point must have known Shania is a raging narcissist, and could hardly believe she would go along with this bombastic public admission of her inadequacy as a human being. Prepare yourself, because if you didn't hate Twain as a person before this, you're about to.

This is what a woman wants

Right away, please shut the fugk up, Shania. You are not allowed to speak for anyone but yourself. You do not get to drag every other woman down with you as you reveal your toxic personality to the world

Any man of mine better be proud of me

Even when I'm ugly, he still better love me

This song was everywhere in 1995 when it was released. Even until the turn of the century you were still hearing it on a regular basis on tv commercials for compilation cds, in malls and other terrible places to shop, and at weddings and other family and friend events where music was being played. As such it informed the attitude of an entire generation of young women towards themselves and their romantic partners. And this, my friends, is why every time you have met an unstable woman online since MySpace began - she has pasted that Marilyn Monroe quote about being loved at her best and worst. Yeah, I know, it feels like we just cracked a pretty big code there, but unfortunately we got a lot of wackadoodle left to get to before we can celebrate.

And I can be late for a date that's fine

But he better be on time

This is not just a problem because you have double standards, it is a problem because you clearly do not respect this person's time, and are basically announcing that you definitely plan to make them wait a lot in the future, no matter how much that situation might make them experience stress and anxiety. In a good relationship you might realize this tendency in yourself, and find some kind of reasonable compromise while you work to correct it it to your best ability. It is absolutely not fine to think or act like this.

Any man of mine'll say it fits just right

When last year's dress is just a little too tight

You should find a man who is not concerned with size and shape in the first place, or be willing to stay fit. If you are a superficial person looking for specific physical qualities in a partner, and you expect them to maintain those standards, you better damn well do the same for yourself. If you want someone to get out of shape with, which the exceedingly high expectations for a partner you declare throughout this song does not suggest, then a mutual surrender of vanity and high standards is the only reasonable way forward.

And anything I do or say better be okay

When I have a bad hair day

I am confused about whether it is okay to not be okay with anything she does or says if it is a good hair day. Is this some kind of loophole where Shania allows you to treat her like an actual human being, rather than some shitty Greek goddess?

And if I change my mind

A million times

I want to hear him say

Yeah (yeah), yeah (yeah), yeah, I like it that way

Definitely no. You are an adult. You make up your fugkn mind like one. Being a mature human is not about making the right decision, but about gracefully following through on whatever decision you do make. And that you not only want someone to humor the crippling neurosis you are so proud of, but to actually cheer it on, terrifies me that you exist in the same world as the rest of us.

Any man of mine better walk the line

Better show me a teasin' squeezin' pleasin' kinda time

I need a man who knows, how the story goes

He's gotta be a heartbeatin' fine treatin'

Breathtakin' earthquakin' kind

Any man of mine

"Man of mine." Ownership. Possessiveness. Precisely the wrong attitude to bring to any relationship. People are not property, and the person who you are supposed to love and support for the rest of your life should be the very last person you would subject to the cruel indignity of your infantile subjugation. "Knows how the story goes" essentially just brazenly admits that you want a person who is willing to completely conform to some storybook myth of romance, but I can tell you for an absolute fact that 'that guy' is not going to be of the breathtakin', earthquakin' type. Storybook romance guy is going to be a super dud, and you're going to break up with him right away, and he is going to eventually go on a livestreamed shooting spree while his incel friends from 4chan cheer him on in real time. If you want a powerful, dynamic hunk of a man - that man is not going to put up with your lifelong dedication to toddlerhood. And I would pray to a God I don't believe in right now if I could be done with this emotional holocaust of a chorus, but I have one more thing to say. There is a reference to Johnny Cash's 'Walk the Line' which is a song about always wanting to cheat on your wife, and being in a constant struggle with yourself in order to manage that impulse. That guy is eventually going to cheat. You do NOT want a guy to 'walk the line' unless you have agreed to have an open relationship regulated by a silly charade of fidelity.

Well any man of mine better disagree

When I say another woman's lookin' better than me

How about, in the first place, you just don't say that. You don't perform some dishonest dance of self-deprecation so you can fish for compliments, or make the person you love blatantly lie to you because your vanity and pride cannot accept there might be people in the world more attractive than you.

And when I cook him dinner and I burn it black

He better say, mm, I like it like that, yeah

Did you know that burnt food is carcinogenic? I hope not, Shania, because otherwise you are asking some guy to blatantly risk cancer just because you are so neurotically averse to any suggestion of failure. You want the person you supposedly love to die miserably simply because you don't have even a pinprick of humility in the entire arsenal of your personality? You fugkn psychopath!

Ooh, ah

Woo

Ooh, ah

You gotta shimmy shake

Make the earth quake

Kick, turn, stomp, stomp, then you jump

Heel to toe, do si do

'Til your boots want to break

'Til your feet and your back ache

Keep it movin' 'til you just can't take anymore

Come on everybody on the floor

One two, a-three four

Hup, two, hup, woo

Mmhmm

If you want to be a man of mine, that's right, woo

This is what a woman wants

This is the line-dancing breakdown, where especially good line dancers, if that is even a thing, strut their stuff a bit extra. It has nothing to do with the rest of the song, but it insured it would be played at every single event where line-dancing occurred for the next century. It is the type of brilliant marketing that makes you realize Shania is compulsively ambitious, impenetrable to critique and willing to do whatever it takes to get what Shania wants. Classic narcissist.

If you ever thought this song was some sort of well-adjusted statement of girl-power, then you should immediately reconsider everything you have ever thought about womanhood and relationships and being the kind of person who doesn't deserve to end up dead in an Arby's dumpster dressed like a cartoon version of a country singer.

post script....
I should have read some more biographical information before writing this, instead of doing so immediately afterwards, where I learned how hilariously ironic this shit is. Shania eventually married the co-writer of this song, 'Mutt' Lange, who is a legendary producer and musical figure. He is considered to be a control freak, a trait strongly associated with narcissism. So this song was written by two people with some major personality flaws. To make matters worse, as it turned out, Mutt really was a 'walk the line' kind of guy, who did indeed cheat on her several times. And he would have gotten away with it, if he hadn't eventually gone and done it again on a bad hair day.

LYRIC SOURCE