Why Women Must Change Too if we are to Rescue Marriage

The Financial Times ^ | July 5, 2005 | Richard Tomkins

[Minn]

..not having children is a bigger, true sacrifice then having them.

If you don't change a few diapers, there won't be anybody there to change yours.

[HitmanLV]

Maybe if men (not all mind you) stopped ACTING like that, women would stop treating them like that. How about that?

Wise words.

[Kelly_2000]

LOL what are you saying it is quite clear:

"fem·i·nism (fm-nzm) KEY NOUN: Belief in the social, political, and economic equality of the sexes. The movement organized around this belief. "

[Enterprise]

"In practice there are a lot of extreme viewpoints concerning feminism this has led to a divergence from feminism to extreme and new perspectives.

This is a complete and accurate statement on the subject.

It's also poorly written.

[kharaku]

If American women (not all mind you) would stop acting like promisuous, selfish, self-righteous, tom boys, maybe men would stop treating them like that. (Just turning around the same stereotypical remark)

[Kelly_2000]

not at all :-P

[Tall_Texan]

It'll never happen. FWIW, I prefer the Christian model. Men, love your wives as Christ loves the Chruch. What did Christ do? He sacrificed his own life so that the Church may be established. Men, love your wives like that.

Women, obey your husbands as unto the Lord. As believers, we are to try as best we can to live the life God wants for us and obey His commandments. Women, obey your husbands like that.

Now, obviously, this is somewhat a generalization. You wouldn't ask a woman to stay with a battering husband or one who is addicted to drugs, etc. It helps to have two people committed to Christ so that the loving and obeying is easier to do during the tough times because you are honoring God even when you don't "feel like" being good to your spouse.

But this is the ideal God has given us and part of the problem with marriage today is not just that we are selfish but that we also enter into it for the wrong reasons. Something needs to make your spouse "loveable" even on the days when he/she is a major pain in the neck. The answer to that is to love them for the position they hold just as God loves His own not for how we behave but because of who we are in Christ.

Without that context, I don't see how as many marriages survive as they do.

[PayNoAttentionManBehindCurtain]

I'm not judging you. I don't know if you cannot make time for a child or won't make time for a child. I don't know anything about your circumstances.

Becky

[Jersey Republican Biker Chick]

Excuse the misunderstandings, but I have been preached at by many that I must go forth and multiply. I get real sick of it. But I do not feel selfish or shallow in any way!

[Conservatrix]

I hope things get better for you. You don't seem to be very happy.

Thank you, I do, too. As for being happy, it is not a question of happy. Life is stressful and I have had lots of dissapointments, that is all. I have to trod far.

[RHINO369]

Why does everyone seem to think more children are needed. Do you know how many of society's problems would disappear if people who shouldn't have kids, actually didn't have kids. I think we should coat welfare checks, and food stamps in Orthotrycycln

Also I think those here who have 6 or 8 kids are crazy. Wow imagine putting them through college 8kids*4.5years*20,000dollars/year*kid=720000 dollars! And 20000 is considering they are going to go to a state school. But if you raise those kids to be good people, then god bless you.

[PayNoAttentionManBehindCurtain]

LOL...alot of people who shouldn't have kids don't realize they shouldn't:)

Becky

[kharaku]

Social planning now eh comrade?

[HitmanLV]

Remember there is an enormous institutional support system that encourages (and some might say drives) this. Womens tv talk shows, magazines, their friendship network, conventional wisdom, etc. drives that idea: that women's 'concerns' in a relationship are more important than a man's concerns.

I'm 37 and I know many women of a variety of ages (23-50s) and most of them are not in fulfilling relationships. I know a lot of men in the same boat.

Like I have said many times, whenever I meet somebody (male or female) and they tell me they want a completely 'honest and open' relationship, I know that they have never actually have been in an honest and open relationship! Most people can't handle it - I find that men and women who say stuff like that really just want whatever springs from their fertile minds applauded, validated, and encouraged.

The truth is that a lot of concerns that women enjoy a lopsided benefit of (that is, they won't entertain a balanced and reciprocal responsibility to accommodate the man in their lives comparably, while insisting that their concerns are fully accommodated) is largely fueled by a lot of applause, validation, and encouragement by media, friends, acquaintances, etc.

What is remarkable is that a lot of those people giving the support clearly don't have satisfying relationships. You are what you eat, after all.

[RHINO369]

Social planning now eh comrade? Haha i was only joking about the birth control. The part about low populations isn't a control, just my observation

[k2blader]

Male sluts need to stop whining about the female sluts dumping them and start acting like men.

[HitmanLV]

I take a lot of heat from the women in my life (and a few of the men) by only dating younger women, usually between the ages of 23-28. The woman I am dating now is in her early 30s but we met when she was 29, so I grandfathered her in.

I'm 37 - I don't find women my age very attractive at all. The ones that are still available tend to be still available for a very legitimate reason: they don't radiate the kind of energy that appeals to me.

[Aquinasfan]

But it's also not a zero-sum game.

True. Remember Lester "Zero Sum" Thurow? Whatever happened to that MIT genius?

[Fawn]

Well then they shouldn't whine when they screw up the marriage.

Men screw up the marriage....not women. Women are programmed and capable of living alone.....men aren't. They always want the 'wife' and the 'single life' ---never grow up. Don't blame women...It's mens fault.

[chris1]

Other than a few Freeper women on here, MOST women in our age group want their needs all met while not feeling any sense of obligation to meeting the mans' needs. In fact, mens' needs are often diminshed and made to seem insignificant and laughed at.