Men tend to feel threatened women tend to feel guilty.

Cole’s line contrasts two stereotyped emotional reflexes he believed commonly appear in conflict: men interpreting challenge as a threat to status or competence, and women internalizing tension as personal fault. Read within the framework of late–20th-century evangelical men’s ministry (Cole’s primary arena), the aphorism functions as a diagnostic tool for communication breakdowns: one party becomes defensive, the other self-blaming, and the real issue goes unaddressed. Its significance lies less in empirical psychology than in pastoral counsel—urging readers to recognize these default reactions so they can respond with humility, clarity, and responsibility rather than escalation or shame.