When Did Kindness Become a Transaction?

I've been thinking about kindness lately. More specifically, I've been thinking about what we expect in return for it.

Over the years, I've had people come to me when they were going through difficult moments. Sometimes they needed advice or encouragement. Other times they needed practical help, including financial help. Whenever I've been in a position to help someone I care about, I've tried to do what I could. That's not something I consider particularly remarkable. Most of us have needed someone at some point in our lives, and I've been fortunate enough to have people show up for me too.

But something has bothered me for a while, and a recent conversation brought it sharply back into focus. There are women who have become so accustomed to men attaching expectations to kindness that when a man offers to help them, they sometimes wonder what he expects in return. And yes, sometimes that expectation is sex.

Think about that for a moment. Imagine already being vulnerable enough to need someone's help while somewhere in the back of your mind you're also wondering whether accepting that help means you've unknowingly agreed to something else. How did we get here?

Men, I think this is a conversation worth having among ourselves.

I'm not interested in painting all men with the same brush, nor am I suggesting that manipulation, exploitation or selfishness belongs exclusively to men. It doesn't. Human beings are complicated, and anyone can treat relationships transactionally. But there is a particular dynamic involving men, women, sex and vulnerability that I think we should be mature enough to examine.

When did another person's vulnerability become an opportunity? A woman is struggling financially, lonely, experiencing problems in a relationship, or simply going through a difficult period in her life. Maybe she needs transportation, somewhere to stay, assistance with something important, or just someone to lean on. Somewhere along the way, what appeared to be kindness can quietly become a negotiation she didn't realize she had entered.

"I did something for you. What are you going to do for me?"

If an expectation was attached from the beginning, perhaps you didn't actually give anything. You negotiated without telling the other person there was a contract.

There's nothing wrong with attraction. There's nothing wrong with wanting sex. There's nothing inherently wrong with two consenting adults deciding what kind of relationship or arrangement they want with each other. Consent changes that entire conversation. The problem begins when someone's need becomes leverage. When you deliberately use another person's vulnerability to gain access to something they otherwise wouldn't freely give you, we're no longer talking about generosity. We're talking about power.

Maybe this belongs inside a much larger conversation about what we've decided manhood looks like. We spend plenty of time talking about what makes someone a "real man": money, strength, status, cars, houses, women, authority, being a provider, being respected. Maybe we've overlooked some quieter measurements of strength along the way.

What do you do when you have the ability to take advantage of someone? How do you treat someone when you're angry with them? What do you expect in return when you help someone who may have nothing to offer you? Who are you when nobody would ever know what you did?

Maybe strength isn't always demonstrated by what we can acquire. Sometimes strength is having the opportunity to exploit someone's vulnerability and choosing not to.

There's another part of this conversation that concerns me deeply: boys are watching us. They're learning from the men around them how adulthood works. They're watching how we talk about women and how we handle rejection, disappointment and anger. They're learning what we believe money entitles us to and whether helping another person somehow creates ownership over them.

Those boys eventually become men. What are we teaching them?

I don't have some grand solution to offer here. I'm asking questions because I think they're questions worth asking. When did kindness become something that needed repayment? When did helping someone become an investment from which we expected a return? When did someone's difficult moment become an opportunity to get something we wanted? And when did simply being good to another human being stop being enough?

Sometimes there shouldn't be another sentence after, "I can help you." Sometimes you help because you can. Sometimes you give because somebody needs it. Sometimes you show kindness because you remember what it felt like when somebody showed kindness to you. And sometimes being a decent human being means doing something for another person knowing there will be absolutely nothing in it for you.

No leverage. No access. No hidden expectations. No debt hanging over someone's head.

Just one human being helping another.

Maybe that shouldn't feel remarkable.

Maybe the fact that it sometimes does should concern all of us.