Posted on 11/19/2008 6:36:46 AM PST by AJKauf
Just how popular is Kay Hymowitz’s City Journal essay, “Love in the Time of Darwinism,” which decries the phenomenon of marriage-avoiding man-children? So popular that it was sent to me by no less than three different friends today (all males) and it’s been featured on two different traffic engines this week: Arts & Letters Daily and Real Clear Politics.
Her brief is actually a mild apology for a previous essay in which she reprehended the jaded and loveless men of my generation for, as she puts it here, “whiling away their leisure hours with South Park reruns, marathon sessions of World of Warcraft, and Maxim lists of the ten best movie fart scenes” instead of humming Cole Porter tunes and throwing their jackets over puddles in the street for their intendeds. Courtship is dead, and mankind may well be facing extinction given how many men refuse to grow up, get hitched, and start procreating. What happened to Cary Grant? He turned into Seth Rogen.
The question isn't "Why aren't more men getting married before age 30?" It's "Why are any?" ....
(Excerpt) Read more at pajamasmedia.com ...
Note: I’m female, married to a wonderful man I met in college a couple years ago, and have 2 preschoolers.
My observations are from those of my generation who bash guys, and then wonder why they can’t find a guy to stay around for the beating, with a ring on his finger and his wallet in his hand.
“I am young and single. The kicker is that even though there are good ones, there is no reliable way to tell the good from the bad anymore.”
I wish you luck and, yes, it really is difficult to find the good ones. But I recommend you try staying out of the sack. Communication and coming to really know someone is curtailed when the relationship just becomes an opportunity for sex. On the other hand, delaying sex is an excellent way to determine whether you have other areas of compatibility and whether your possible mate can handle delayed gratification (which is an incredibly important facet of marriage). As you socialize in public, as opposed to bedrooms, you will see how she treats and judges others, how she expresses her opinions, her intelligence, her willingness to listen and contribute to conservations, how she drives or thinks of other drivers, her notions of beauty or art, etc. What is so damaging to relationships these days is people seldom get to really know each other because the sex crowds out all other ways of communication and keeps the partners strangers to each other until it is too late. So, stay out of bed if you are truly hunting for a good person.
In my opinion, the real problem is nobody (even so-called conservatives ) wants to make any kind of commitment to anything these days.. Americans think way too much about self gratification and way too little about responsibility.
Real men “settle down”, just show us a “real woman” to do it.
Too freaking funny and too freaking true. The blond ‘spokeswoman’ just absolutely typifies ‘that girl’ the guys need to RUN from. The outgoing and gregarious personality is nothing but a cold calculated persona that’s angling to get ahead by whatever means necessary.
It takes a fairly discerning eye sometimes to tell the difference between the confidence of a mature woman, and the overconfidence of the gold digging former high school cheerleader who never actually grew up. The signs:
- The hot chick who never seems to be without her girlfriends.
- Always is dressed hot but never professional
- Has the car, the pad and the accessories but gives off no vibe that she works for a living, has any skills (other than the kneepad ones)
- Doesn’t seem to have any type of college degree (or a bull**** major), has a very vague job description, seems to have no set schedule, or, has a fairly low-level, somewhat dead-end job matched with WAY too much confidence
- Cannot articulate her ambition other than making lots of money and going to Vegas regularly.
- Always at the same social scene partying with the same people (like she’s in high school)
- Has a demeanor and body language to her like she’s watching and very aware she’s being watched. Every little detail seems to catch her eye like she’s very plugged into the slightest vibe or body language. Gives off that feeling that she’s working the room but trying to make people think she’s not.
- Uberconfident to the point of snarky when she’s in her pond, little-girl scared when she’s not.
- Seems like she has something to prove and wants you and everyone to know she’s worldwise and down with the game even though she’s past 25 and no one really cares anymore.
- Can spot guys with money in a heartbeat, and would look you in the eye with a straight face and tell you that the poor one of the identical twins is ugly while the rich one is hot.
Being 40 now I can spot it pretty quick. I can also say that the hot chicks don’t do anything for me anymore.
Nearly all my friends are married. Some with good marriages, some not.
I've noticed one consistent thing, those with good marriages have TWO people working hard at a good marriage, those with not so good, have at least one not working hard at it.
I get fed up hearing, primarily divorced, women say how they won't "settle" for someone who doesn't make or have good money.
I understand some guys are slugs. But money isn't an entitlement. I work very hard working in construction. Sometimes strenuous work, sometimes looong hours, sometimes brutally hot temperatures, sometimes bitingly cold temperatures. But I love what I do. I love the challenges. I love the sense of satisfaction. I make what most consider good money. I resent that some women feel they should be entitled to that simply because they exist.
I'm tired of women who constantly complain about their jobs. Or complain about this person. Or complain about that thing. They EXPECT life to be W-ONE-DER-FUL, and that a man is there to make THEM happy.
When I hear women like this I steer clear. I don't see someone who views life and happiness as something that must be worked at. I don't see someone who will stick things out when things are tough. I don't see a person who is content with who they are or what they have. (See my tagline) I see a cronic complainer as self absorbed.
I do know some decent women, its just that they're already married.
I guess thats why the other ones aren't.
Don't want to? Or is it a case of can't find a woman who is willing to be a partner instead of a prima dona? Please... It takes two to dance... Get over yourself and join the human race.
What was considered prudish and old-fashioned by the Sixties generation and beyond really does prove to be the best method of finding someone with whom you can spend the rest of your life: Stay out of bed. Mingle with other people and/or spend most of your time getting to know each other in public places. Delay gratification. Talk. Talk. Talk. Watch. Watch. Watch.
As for me, married 23 years and counting and the best is yet to come. Who knows, had we not made a commitment to a lasting marriage, we might have divorced in those first few stressful years as we established careers, had children, incurred debts, and rubbed off our personal sharp edges. People today seem too often unwilling to give marriage the time it takes to mature. They prefer their spouses to be perfect from Day One but a really lasting marriage comes from needing one another to feel complete. Perfect people don’t believe they need other people to complete them and never establish that healthy co-dependency marriage requires. I don’t need my husband to care for me financially, nor to fix things, nor to protect me, although he does all of that. I need him to feel whole. I need him to complete my memories, to share my life-altering events, to complete my sentences and know my thoughts without asking. I need him to smile at my oft-repeated lame jokes, to call me by some silly private nickname, and to put his arm around me in church. And I know that even were I to lose him (God forbid), I would still have his completing love. That sort of relationship takes decades to build and it doesn’t hold a candle to the relationships of my parents, married 59 years, grandparents, now gone but married 71 years. It is the ultimate in delayed gratification.
Same here. I've had the arm candy, that gets old reeeeal fast. Of course being a guy I'd love to find a hot gal. As long as her personality and charcter were as good as her looks.
Today I'd settle for someone I'd find pleasantly attractive, with a great personality and charcter. (A great personality and character can make someone more pleasantly attractive)
Huh... Trophy Wife? Are you mad...? The very LAST thing I'd want is a woman who left her brain in her other jacket, with "huge tracts of land" that are knuckle-dragger magnets... I'll pass. As to a "material transaction"... Excuse me, but what planet are you from??? Marriage == Poor House for a guy these days. Get a GRIP! I'm looking for a PARTNER, not a dictator, not a social experiment, not a cocktail waitress, not a French maid!! A PARTNER!!!
I think thre are a number of problems:
1. Too much free and pay to play porno.
2. Feminism wanted to distance women from men. They have succeeded.
3. Young men are no longer taught how to be men. I think they are taught how to be women, and it doesn’t work.
4. Men bashing is not only “less than optimal” for a young woman, it dooms them to a single life.
5. Corporations use up too much of an individual’s time. Too many of our profesionals have little time to date, except those with whom the work. About half of our women who are 45 and have master’s degrees have never had children. This needs to be fixed pronto.
6. Corporations discourage dating between employees through many different means. The legal and career risks for accidently saying the wrong thing to a young lady in whom you have an interest are entirely out of proportion to any wrong that may have resulted from an awkward comment (to which we, as men, are prone).
7. Several companies that I can name inform their hiring prospects that being married is an impediment to a career. Those companies (some of them well known to everyone on this board) deserve a bad, early death.
8. The consolidation of schools into mega-schools, huge, monserous caverns filled with children severely limit participation by men in sports. 35 football players to a team in a school of 7,000? Shut it down and no one will notice.
9. My doctor once told my dad that golf should only be available by precription. I feel the same about video games. One of the best things you can do is to keep your children from playing video games when young. If you can get them past he age of 18 or 19 without WoW, you have done them a great service.
10. Since when is watching sports on HD TV a manly pursuit? Why would watching someone else having fun be a testosterone positive activity? If you love a sport, play it, for Pete’s sake. If there are no leagues, start one. Be a man and mix it up.
11. If you, like me, were racked up by heavy sports in a well spent youth, try competitive shooting. You can be in a wheelchair, in your mid eigthies and can go to the firing line equal to other competitirs and can end up at The Nationals. Ladies, this means you need to get your guy an NRA membership and a rifle or pistol and give him the precious gift of time at the range.
12. Ladies! Suggest that your husband join a league of his favorite sport or one that he can play. Manytimes, players do not watch others play. I played football and rugby and don’t have the slightest need to see someone else play it. Sort of “been there, done that”, I guess.
13. We need millions of men to come in to our education system. We could start with e Marine drill seargants and go from their. Currently, our education system is a female dominated system that has increasing difficulty handling normal boys. And shut off the river of Ritalin. It should be used only as a last resort for very bad cases.
14. Use of the court system to charge chldren with imaginary crimes is heinous. If educators can’t handle children, they should leave the business. We used to get notes from our teachers to take home for our parents signatures. It worked well. If a prosecutor insists on prosecuting an imaginery crime, take him out of office, by election, by recall or by disbarment for malfeasance.
15. Zero tolerance programs in our schools have turned off a lot of men to the value of education and it’s showing up in enrollment figures for colleges, whose financial interest would be served by pushing this in the academic education community.
Just my tow cents...
DING-DING-DING. WE HAVE A WINNER!!!
Now, when are you running for my local school board?
DITTO
12. Ladies! Suggest that your husband join a league of his favorite sport or one that he can play. Manytimes, players do not watch others play. I played football and rugby and don’t have the slightest need to see someone else play it. Sort of “been there, done that”, I guess.
I enjoy going to a game every once in a while (once in a long while). Its about hanging with a friend or friends. Cheering your team. And hanging with friends.
I've never understood the guys who know every player of the home team, of ALL the sports home teams. Life begins and ends for them with how their team/s do/es.
Modern American women have no idea how to properly reciprocate a man’s feelings for her. All of the classic ways that this was achieved has been redefined as servile.
They DO NOT know what to do!
OK the trophy wife thing is something I see around me. None of these guys would worry about other guys taking their women.
Nevertheless, if you don’t see marriage first and foremost as a material transaction why is the first thing you’re worried about the material aspect, “Marriage == Poor House “ while equating a wife with a “partner”.
A partner is what business owners have. What about looking for a mate?
It is simple: The rules of society, thanks to the lib/feminist movement, have made marriage a losing proposition for the productive in society. And it is even worse if you are a productive male. Seen it both ways, though - have seen productive female friends get screwed paying alimony to non-productive scum ex-husbands).
Short version: Marriage has become a bad deal, with potentially short term benefits (married life), but certain long term costs (maintaining another’s “quality of life” indefinitely regardless of their contribution, often to the detriment of the productive person’s quality of life.
Shorter version: It’s the leftism...
You guys have never quite grasped that all of this is a two way street. After reading the comments here and at the PJM site it is no wonder that I have absolutely no desire in seeking a relationship again. Listen to yourselves, you are just as childish, selfish and self centered as the women you are berating-it truly is "all about you".
Oh, BTW...
Why do men love remote controls and computers? 1) They do exactly what you tell them. 2) If they don't you can fix them or replace them. 3) They don't spend all their time trying to change you. 4) You can turn them off and enjoy the quiet.
I have heard much the same thing out of many women I know, too.
*WTH? The feminists claim they don’t need men then ridicule men for not needing women.*
Right on. These are the same folks who hunted down the “Cowboy” like Siths hunting down Jedi, then write songs like “Where have all the cowboys gone?”
Or, as I tell my wife all the time: “Open your own d*mn door. Y’all burned those bras a long time ago.”
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