Posted on 01/18/2013 2:05:46 PM PST by NYer
Fewer young men in the US want to get married than ever, while the desire for marriage is rising among young women, according to the Pew Research Center.
Pew recently found that the number of women 18-34 saying that having a successful marriage is one of the most important things rose from 28 percent to 37 percent since 1997. The number of young adult men saying the same thing dropped from 35 percent to 29 percent in the same time.
Pew’s findings have caught the attention of one US writer who maintains that feminism, deeply entrenched in every segment of the culture, has created an environment in which young men find it more beneficial to simply opt out of couple-dom entirely.
Suzanne Venker’s article, “The War on Men,” which appeared on the website of Fox News in late November, has become a lodestone for feminist writers who have attacked her position that the institution of marriage is threatened, not enhanced, by the supposed gains of the feminist movement over the last 50 years.
“Where have all the good (meaning marriageable) men gone?” is a question much talked about lately in the secular media, Venker says, but her answer, backed up by statistics, is not to the liking of mainstream commentators influenced by feminism.
She points out that for the first time in US history, the number of women in the workforce has surpassed the number of men, while more women than men are acquiring university degrees.
“The problem? This new phenomenon has changed the dance between men and women,” Venker wrote. With feminism pushing them out of their traditional role of breadwinner, protector and provider – and divorce laws increasingly creating a dangerously precarious financial prospect for the men cut loose from marriage – men are simply no longer finding any benefit in it.
As a writer and researcher into the trends of marriage and relationships, Venker said, she has “accidentally stumbled upon a subculture” of men who say “in no uncertain terms, that they’re never getting married.”
“When I ask them why, the answer is always the same: women aren’t women anymore.” Feminism, which teaches women to think of men as the enemy, has made women “angry” and “defensive, though often unknowingly.”
“Now the men have nowhere to go. It is precisely this dynamic – women good/men bad – that has destroyed the relationship between the sexes. Yet somehow, men are still to blame when love goes awry.”
“Men are tired,” Venker wrote. “Tired of being told there’s something fundamentally wrong with them. Tired of being told that if women aren’t happy, it’s men’s fault.”
Feminism and the sexual revolution have simply made marriage “obsolete” for women as a social and economic refuge, but this is a situation that should not be celebrated by feminists, Venker says.
“It’s the women who lose. Not only are they saddled with the consequences of sex, by dismissing male nature they’re forever seeking a balanced life. The fact is, women need men’s linear career goals – they need men to pick up the slack at the office – in order to live the balanced life they seek.”
A cross section of research data from the Pew Research Center for the last months of 2012 shows the alarming trends for marriage and child-bearing in the US. One report published in mid-December said that the latest census data showed “barely half” of all adults in the United States are currently married, a “record low”. Since 1960, the number of married adults has decreased from 72 percent to 51 today and the number of new marriages in the U.S. declined by five percent between 2009 and 2010.
Moreover, the median age at first marriage continues to rise with women getting married the first time at 26.5 years and men at 28.7. The declines in marriage are “most dramatic” among young adults. Just 20 percent of those aged 18 to 29 are married, compared with 59 percent in 1960.
“If current trends continue, the share of adults who are currently married will drop to below half within a few years,” the report said.
Moreover, the link between marriage and childrearing has become disconnected in the minds of the so-called Millennial generation, those between 18 and 29. While 52 percent of Millennials say being a good parent is “one of the most important things” in life, just 30 per cent say the same about having a successful marriage, an attitudinal survey found.
The gap, of 22 percentage points, between the value Millennials place on parenthood over marriage, was just 7 points in 1997. The research found that Millennials, many of whom are the children of divorce and single-parenthood themselves, are also less likely than their elders to say that a child needs both a father and mother at home, that single parenthood and unmarried couple parenthood are bad for society.
Could the fact that feminism has made a large percentage of US women insufferable witches have anything to do with it?
I’m 22 while my husband is 48. Guess there’s something to this idea.
“Just 20 percent of those aged 18 to 29 are married, compared with 59 percent in 1960.”
A truly disturbing statistic. Might have something to do with the media’s continual barking that “young people just can’t make it on their own”...
I think you have a case of correlation means causation.
I know I’m not getting married again. Burnt once in a divorce is sufficient.
Or to use an old adage- why buy the cow when you get the milk for free?
Ping!
Another change brought by the leftist ‘Progressives’.
Free sex is just more Free Stuff.
No restrictions, no stigma.
Babies? No problem.
No need to take responsibility.
The government will pay to kill them or to raise them.
Leftists want Change, Change, Change - kill the old.
And the sheep follow without ever thinking about where it will lead.
Is there really any aspect of life that Progressives have made better?
What is the end game - complete destruction of civilization?
Exactly right!
Men (covertly) have pushed "Feminism" to make satisfying their sexual needs much easier than ever. Used to be that women could "hold out", and land a husband, OR, believe that sex was an intimacy with a spouse, not THE WHOLE NEIGHBORHOOD or half the kids in a class she teaches....
NEVER has it been so easy for men to find "willing" women, at least as I've seen in 50 years of "observation".
Yes; women were made to THINK they are "in control of their own bodies" with the Feminism, but, in fact, they're being used and don't even recognize what's happened.
We wonder why families are not nuclear families anymore, but now the "norm" is where both parents work to pay the taxes and bills, yet, women think they've "advanced" from being stay-at-home Mom's, to "career girls".
Kids are maturing and marrying later in life.
I’m more concerned about single parents, and reduced population growth of the “Constitutional” demographic.
Men should take a serious look at the high honor of being a dad, and compare the worth of that to the effectively homosexual pattern of serial sexual liaisons and the life of a sterile drone.
Women should take a serious look at what feminism has really brought them*, and a serious look at mindless consumerism.
*Hint: look at the lives and faces of old feminists, and ask if this is what you really seek.
Just my two cents that are borrowed from the PRC.
It’s not just the feminist movement, but also the homosexual “rights” movement, which has disparaged marriage by trying to incorporate their perversion into it in a few jurisdictions.
Who wants to be associated with that lifestyle?
A travesty, but true. To back it up though, I look at The Pill and the fall of churches who came to embrace it. Seems The Pill and the resulting behaviors separated women from the church, as well as men.
The Catholics had that right and predicted the obvious. Flawed, for sure, and ignored by most of their own on that subject, the old Church is the only one of all of them left standing on the truth of the matter, and against birth control.
We Anglos are paying the price particularly.
main factors IMO:
Current moral state of females in today’s society makes many of them undesirable. No matter how pretty they look on the outside, if they’re a cheater or a biotch it’s not worth investing the time. Feminism didn’t help in this regard at all.
Longevity of marriage isn’t what it used to be and the cost to benefits ratio can be horrible if you get a bad one.
Cost of wedding.
Cost of child support if the marriage dissolves.
Alternate lifestyles. Pretty bad when you’re worried about whether your spouse is secretly bisexual or not and they have even more options to cheat.
Cost of living and money issues, Having to take care of another person if they dont pull their weight.
Responsibilities. Same comments as above.
And you wonder why a guy might not want to get married?...LOL
Women have become the men they want to marry.
I was going to say Bitches but I’ll go with it.
The point is the same.
Is that moron in the upper left flipping the bird??? He’s studying to be a dentist???? I wouldn’t let him work on my dog.
Yeah... but notice how the men are SMILING.... Two girls for eeeevvv-ry BOY!
Gosh, I wish I was back in college...
I see this turning into the friday night fight thread.
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