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Wow. Just amazing.

To Jim Noble: Hostile comments--just read through it, if you can't tell the comments are hostile, then I can't explain it to you.

To the other poster: Most of my friends married in their late 30s and had children in their late 30s and early 40s. We all had careers and we enjoyed them. We did not regard ourselves as damaged goods--what makes you call them damaged goods? In retrospect the next generation is a little smarter, in terms of time, and maybe doing so in their early 30s. But in any case, all these women are interesting women with significant careers. Why should they forego that?

The problem to me is that as the writer of the book seems to be pointing out indirectly, men gained a lot more from feminism than women did. From my perspective, women still earn less on the dollar. Meanwhile, as she points out, men have a big pool of available fascinating women to choose from. Particularly true in big cities.

As for making oneself "saleable"--there's no point to being with a man if he can't offer security. Really. If women can offer themselves security, then a man had better sell himself too. As women talk among themselves, men would be horrified perhaps to hear. We talk about men's looks and virility and how it fades with time. We talk about their money. We talk about their success in the world. All this is important to us and increasingly important to women as they judge which men they want to be with. And I think that makes men really insecure and there is the resulting hostility.

At the same time, women are really insecure too, because we're living in a hybrid time. They want male protection/security but they want freedom to express themselves too. And there are no rules in this new time. So we each forge our own path.

It's called biology.

"Most of my friends married in their late 30s and had children in their late 30s and early 40s. We all had careers and we enjoyed them. We did not regard ourselves as damaged goods--what makes you call them damaged goods? In retrospect the next generation is a little smarter, in terms of time, and maybe doing so in their early 30s. But in any case, all these women are interesting women with significant careers. Why should they forego that?"

Like it or not, the fertility of both sexes declines with age and both, like it or not, consider prospective mates based on potential fertility as well as child-rearing characteristics (including money/security) even if both already have children. Fertility is less of a factor if both have children, and little if any of a factor once they're past child-bearing age, but it is a major, major factor when neither has children and both are under 40. We're hard-wired that way even if neither party wants children.

Then throw in demographics. The pool of suitable males (not available males) is so small for successful females over 35 who still want children that the author is right.

And, if children are desired, one of the spouses will have to sacrifice an early career for them. We're hard-wired so that this should be the wife - mothers are far more important to young children than fathers.

So most women flat out have to either choose between children and their careers, or make major, major sacrifices to have both which are perilous to their marriages. Biology means that much. Denying it produces the results this author describes.

>>At the same time, women are really insecure too, because we're living in a hybrid time. They want male protection/security but they want freedom to express themselves too. And there are no rules in this new time

There are two rules:

1) If you're getting the milk for free, why buy the cow

2) Why keep Maureen Dowd if you can have Catherine Zeta-Jones.

What a sad commentary. All about money and security. Oh--and the obligatory "freedom to express yourself."

Nothing at all about the quality of the relationship, or whether you and your interesting friends even care about, much less love, the units you have selected.

Gee, I can't imagine why some of the men, who have met some of the women, who are like some of you, might have some hostile feelings!

As for making oneself "saleable"--there's no point to being with a man if he can't offer security. Really. If women can offer themselves security, then a man had better sell himself too. As women talk among themselves, men would be horrified perhaps to hear. We talk about men's looks and virility and how it fades with time. We talk about their money. We talk about their success in the world. All this is important to us and increasingly important to women as they judge which men they want to be with. And I think that makes men really insecure and there is the resulting hostility.

If wimmin want a man they must learn that if they are part of the educational and financial elite, that they are gonna have to look down for a mate, just as men who are in the educational and financial elite often have to. Men often are happy with a simple minded little thing that looks good and adores them. Wimmin will have to learn to be happy with a Walking Love Muscle who worships them, but is too dumb to come in out of the rain.

A woman's chances of finding a man who has it all are about the same as a mans. Vanishingly slim.

SO9

From my perspective, women still earn less on the dollar.

Women and men who do the same work, for the same hours, with the same education and seniority, get paid almost exactly the same (the difference is >2%). This is well documented, you can go check it out for yourself if you wish. The old feminist chant of "59 cents on the dollar" (now revised to "76 cents on the dollar") is, and always has been, a lie-of-ommission because it ignores the fact that men, on the average, work longer hours and do more difficult and dangerous jobs.

Meanwhile, as she points out, men have a big pool of available fascinating women to choose from. Particularly true in big cities

Fascinating women in the big cities? Ha! WHERE? Not in Lost Angeles. Oh, perhaps some of these women are interesting from a fornicator's perspective... But a single, old-fashioned, abstaining-til-marriage guy will find the pickings very, very slim. I found my wife elsewhere.