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.
Purely conjecture on your part.
Why play a game you can't win?
If today's teens want to truly rebel against us, they should start by honoring marriage,
I think there is a segment that is doing this.
"a lot of women do not like men very much"
"The reason marriage is waning is the women's movement."
The combination is nothing less than genocidal given the current population trends.
True, but I worked in law for 8 years in NYC and most of the women were either in an unhappy relationship, or in no relationship at all. A lot of men simply don't want to deal with a woman with a demanding career .
Yes, that is why it is a problem for the younger set. The point is, that it is not a "choice" anymore to marry someone who is less educated and lower paid than you are if so many men do not have good careers and are not going to college. It is supply and demand, and more educated higher paid women are demanding males that are paid better and educated better than they are, but males are reducing themselves making the available male pool smaller when it should be getting larger.
Agreed,
Just remember her's itches too.
It is because the feminist movement has provided tons of economic support and propaganda toward women and pulled support for males. Girls get a free ride and the boys can't even get money for college anymore.
I'm going to get creamed for saying this but marriage sure seemed to last longer when brothels were legal. It may be a terrible thought but Ms. Kitty may have helped keep the home on the range.
is it because women have a shelf life & don't realize it until they look in the mirror & see a stranger staring back at them.....
"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."
The making of an individual is a complex thing. I think we'd agree that genetics and socialization play very big roles. Men are genetically predisposed to compete, to be aggressive. Women are genetically not inclined to be agressive. You have already stated that you know of women who "now they are aggressive, run you off the road"
I would say that just as women are being socialized to compete, to be aggressive, to excel, men are being beaten down. Socialization is powerful. Look at the black culture, with stong dominating women, and absentee fathers. Not always the case, but it happens a great deal in black families... that is their society.
Until/unless society acknowledges that it is beating men down, you'll get more of the same. Men who have no self esteem and drop out.
So, take glee in kicking a man's a** all you want. But realize, beating them down won't help you, or your daughters, nieces, etc. Men are physically stronger, women are emotionally stronger, has been and always will be the case. We are meant to compliment each other in abilities, not beat the heck out of each other.
Males cant win if they dont try. If males dont apply to college, they wont go, they wont get the only high paid highly skilled jobs remaining after free trade eliminates all the other jobs in the next decade. It is the males fault that more women than men apply to med school, etc.
Considering every Fortune 500 company was started by a man, and every major invention furthering civilization in the last 200 years is man-made, it's not like men are worried about the new linebacker looking competition.
Like there's any possibility we'd be allowed to forget... as your post demonstrates?
Nope. Like most other societal problems women face, this is a monster of their own making.
You won't find a real answer until you are prepared to give up stroking your own ego while definng the problem.
I got one. When I've had a really hard day, she sometimes meets me at the porch with baby in 1 hand, and an open beer in the other.
I think my wife is timeless and I can't see her having a shelf life, but she still tries her hardest to drive me into being a john. She might even give me a lift and an allowance if it was legal.
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