Posted on 07/05/2005 5:31:57 AM PDT by Bon mots
Is marriage, as a social institution, doomed? As recently as 50 years ago, it was the norm for people to get married and have children. But now, at least in the west, we are seeing record numbers of people divorcing, leaving marriage until later in life or not getting married at all. In Britain, I was amazed to learn the other day, the proportion of children born outside marriage has shot up from 9 per cent to 42 per cent since 1976. In France, the proportion is 44 per cent, in Sweden, it is 56 per cent and even in the US, with its religious emphasis on family values, it is 35 per cent.
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I suppose we must blame the rise of selfish individualism. People are a lot less willing to sacrifice their independent lifestyle and become part of a couple or family unit than they once were. And if they do marry, the importance they place on their right to a happy life leaves them disinclined to stick around for long once the initial euphoria has worn off.
I wonder, though, if there is another possible explanation: that, frankly, a lot of women do not like men very much, and vice versa? And that, given the choice, a lot of women and men would prefer an adequate supply of casual nookie to a lifelong relationship with a member of the opposite sex?
Choice, after all, is a very recent phenomenon. For most of human history, men and women married not because they particularly liked one another but out of practical necessity: men needed women to cook and clean for them while women needed men to bring home the bacon. It is only in very recent times that women have won legal independence and access to economic self-sufficiency - and only recently, too, that men have been liberated from dependency on women by ready meals and take-away food, automatic washing machines and domestic cleaning services.
During the times of mutual dependency, women were economically, legally and politically subservient to men. This had a number of repercussions. One was that, lacking control over their own lives, women could justifiably hold their husbands responsible for everything, resulting in what men around the world will recognise as the first law of matrimony: "It's all your fault." Second, while men ruled the world, women ruled within the home - often firmly, resulting in the age-old image of the nagging wife and hen-pecked husband. And third, understandably resenting their subjugation outside the home, women took pleasure in characterising their oppressors as selfish, insensitive, lazy, lying, feckless, incompetent scumbags.
Fair enough. But in the last 30 years, relations between men and women have undergone a greater change than at any time in human history. Women have not reached full equality yet, but they are getting close. And now the economic necessity for getting hitched has died out, marriage is on the rocks.
What can be done to save it? My interest in this was provoked by an article I read online last week by Stephanie Coontz, an author of books on American family life. In The Chronicle of Higher Education, she said an important principle was that "husbands have to respond positively to their wives' request for change" - for example, addressing the anomaly that women tend to do the larger share of the housework.
So, husbands have to change. Does this sound familiar? Of course it does, because it is another repetition of the first law of matrimony: "It's all your fault."
I could quibble with Ms Coontz's worries about the uneven split in the male/female workload. In the US, according to the latest time-use survey from the bureau of labour statistics, employed women spend on average an hour a day more than employed men on housework and childcare; but employed men spend an hour a day longer doing paid work. While this may be an imperfect arrangement, it hardly seems a glaring injustice.
But my point is this. Yes, men must change; indeed, they are changing, which is why we hear so much about new men and metrosexuals and divorced fathers fighting for custody of their children. But are women so perfect, or so sanctified by thousands of years of oppression, that they cannot be asked to change even the tiniest bit, too?
If economic necessity is not going to bring and keep men and women together in marriage, then we are going to have to rely on mutual affection and respect. And there is not going to be much of that about as long as women - assisted by television sitcoms and media portrayals in general - carry on stereotyping men as selfish, insensitive, lazy, lying, feckless, incompetent scumbags, even if some of them are.
So, my timorous suggestion is that it is time for women to shrug off the legacy of oppression and consider changing their approach to men and marriage. First, with power comes responsibility, which means it is now all women's fault as much as men's and, hence, the end of the blame and complain game. Second, if women are to share power in the world, men must share power in the home, which means that they get an equal say in important decisions about soft furnishings.
Most of all, it is time for the negative stereotyping to go. I know women will say: "But it's true!" If so, then marriage certainly is doomed.
But whose fault is that? If you treat all men as selfish, insensitive, lazy, lying, feckless, incompetent scumbags, you should not be surprised if that is what they turn out to be.
Homeschooling can only work where two parents are very committed and capable. When you can't teach someone how to tie their shoes h.s. cannot work.
And in a weak moment, a christian will blame Satan for problems far more complex than what said christian can understand.
It is crystal clear that that more and more girls and women are expressing sexist opinions towards men, like wearing "I love me" and "men are dogs" t-shirts, and men are being turnoff by this.
I know, I was just being a wiseguy! ;-)
I don't disagree that they don't go looking for the oppurtunity I'm saying that it's a moral failure to go for it when the oppurtunity arisies. Being morally flawless in the absense of temptation is no challanging feat. Your morals are what is supposed to make you say NO.
Women need to get over themselves and realize that sometimes life sucks and you need to deal with it. No crying, no complaining, no shrinks, no pity parties, just deal with it.
Life is not fair, but unless people are prepared to drink the Kool Aide and end it, life goes on and you must deal with the reality you are dealt.
When a person realizes that so long as they have their limbs, etc etc, life begins to look a lot better.
I always wonder how feminists can rationalize the illegality of prostitution, since their argument for abortion is at odds with it.
Don't they whine something like this, "Keep men's laws off our bodies..." and other such drivel?
What about a woman's right to choose to sell herself?
There are web pages out there that are of the opinion that this is part of the feminists' plan to control men's access to sexual relations. It will only be done on women's terms. Terms dictated by the feminists.
I thought it was an interesting digression anyway...
(Hey, and you didn't get flamed. I'm on fire for my posts!)
I think unless you are an amazing teacher and patient person private school is vastly better than home schooling.
I know this is going to get me a shit storm, but home schooling is probably the worst way to educate a child. If you have a crappy school public school send them to private. Most home schooled kids end up in a public highschool because their mom's can't teach them Chemistry, Physics, US History, Calculus etc etc, and when they do its a disaster. The kids are terrible at socializing, and are usually werid. There were two home schooled girls at my Highschool and they were not right socially.
I agree that succumbing to temptation is a moral failure. That being said, I don't think it has much to do with 'trust' and 'morals' as a lot of folks insist.
LOL
That is a good point. This generation of males is choosing to be less than their parents. Though, I dont know why the daughters are so motivated and entering professions, college, and their own businesses at record levels, and the sons are not apparently doing anything.
Could this have to do with all the male-bashing that is institutionalized in America? Trying to feminize men? Rambunctious boys are put on Ritalin. If a boy has energy, DRUG HIM QUICK! He might upset someone.
Men are portrayed as dull idiots on television, especially commercials. Women are pushed into roles they cannot handle. They are attempting all kinds of work that they have no business doing.
The left and feminist society is trying to turn our girls into men and our boys into women.
I fear what the future may bring... from ritalin to estrogen therapy for cryin' out loud... who knows!
2. Immigrant males are males.
The point is, that native born american males are the ones without ambition, who are not going to college, who are not starting therir own busineses, who are not going into the military, who are not getting high paying jobs at the factories.
Yes, I know immigrant males are trying very hard to succeed - but that is a different group and does not compare with when I went to high school, and all the males either went into the military, went to college, or got good high paying jobs at factories and easily supported a non-working wife and 3 kids.
It seems to me that this is no concern to you, whereas I believe it should be.
It is a concern to me, but there is nothing I can do about it, most people are in favor of free trade. That large pool of males who left high school and got good high paying jobs with lots of beneifits and pensions and medical insurance, etc, that enabled them to support a non-working wife and 3 kids doesnt exist anymore.
When I went to school , only the male flunkies and drop outs got poor paying jobs at stores or hamburger joints - yet today, it is so common to see young men working at flunkee poor paying jobs with no benefits and no pension plan.
I am not wishing, I am observing. It is the young men who are making the choices to not go into the military, to college, or to high paying factory jobs.
I think what is more on topic though is that feminism has encouraged more women to cheat, and more women to engage in immoral behavior. The first law of feminism is that men are the ultimate evil, the second law is that women must beat men at everything men do.
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