How can I support my husband when he is out of a job?

Tags

helping, job loss

Emily asks the following:

My question for you is this: how can a stay-at-home wife and mother best support her husband when he’s out of a job? I’ve tried at various times being helpful (as best I could, though I’m not sure it was received as such) and staying out of it entirely. I’ve also suggested finding a job myself – this, I think, was a mistake, or at least the way I phrased it was a mistake. My husband definitely took it as criticism of his abilities. My current strategy – keeping my mouth shut and staying up all night worrying – is neither helping nor particularly healthy, I imagine. We’re not facing eviction or anything yet, but we are burning through our retirement savings. Is there anything (aside from scrimping as much as possible) I can do to help the situation, or is this simply a ride-it-out and trust moment?

Help during a time like this can be difficult, to say the least.  We tend to think that help has to be a very active thing.  That if we are not doing something, and something big at that, it can’t be help.  Especially when we are afraid because when we give into our fear and help in a way that makes us feel better, that usually makes this situation worse.

When it comes to our husbands, especially in this kind of situation, help will often look very different than we think it should or even want it to. I don’t think it wrong for a wife to offer to go back to work in this situation, but as Emily said, wording is very important.  Timing as well.  It should be brought up as one option of many and mentioned once for him to consider and then not brought up again unless he truly wants to consider it.

There are those who will try to convince you that not wanting his wife to work is weakness on the man’s part.  This is typically not the case.  A husband wants very much to care for his wife, to provide for her and their family.  The  drive to want to do this on his own is a strength.  A strength we should never belittle or try to take from him. It is part of his masculinity and not for us to define, especially when we are afraid.

First, the easy stuff to help with.  Scrimp, scrimp, scrimp.  Find cheap recipes to make for meals, including making your own bread.  There are some very easy bread recipes out there (look into sourdough and try to find a starter from a friend that you don’t have to buy.  Also, no kneed yeast breads). One can make a loaf of bread for less than a dollar a loaf and the taste is out of this world.  If anyone has any ideas for inexpensive family recipes, leave them in the comments.  Use your grocery store circulars.  One can find really good deals in those from time to time.  Ask friends for their Sunday paper’s coupons that they don’t use and get online and print coupons from there (if it’s cost effective.  Take into account the price of paper and ink to do this). Lastly, depending on where you live, look around your area for fruits and greens that are wild.  Things like plantain leaf, purslane, and dandelion greens are amazingly healthy and right out your front door.  It might seem unorthodox at first, but it’s one of those things you might not stop doing.  They are very tasty. Drive less and walk more, if possible.  This is one of those things that can have a double duty as, if your husband comes with you, you can spend time with your family, keep it fun and light and enjoy each other even in this difficult time.  Again, please leave any other ideas in the comments.

Now, lets get to the help that he really needs from his wife.  In this situation, the help that a husband needs, more than anything else, is to know that you trust him and aren’t afraid.  He needs to know that you 100% support him and trust him to get a new job so he can continue to do his job of leading his family.  He is feeling like he failed, dejected and afraid.  He doesn’t want you to know any of that, at least not all of it so he will put on a strong front, for you as much for himself.  Nothing can take down a vulnerable husband faster than a wife who is afraid and is trying to take control of the situation.

So, what does a wife do?  First and foremost, she learns to let go of the fear.  This is the most difficult thing for her to do.  You’ll have to fake it at first, but lying awake at night worrying is going to wear on both of you.  Even as you’re faking it, your husband will have an inkling that you are afraid, that little bit you can’t hide in your eyes.  You must work to be truly not afraid.  You must work to put your trust completely in him, so much so that you are literally 100% unafraid of this situation.  The way in which this will build him up and give him confidence is not in me to describe.  But your complete faith in him will drive him to do whatever he can to get back on his feet.

If your Christian, PRAY.  Give your fear to God.  All of it. Remind yourself, that even should the very worst, come.  You will still be together as a family.  Nothing can pull you apart as long as you don’t let it.  This should be a huge comfort to you, because no matter what, you will be together.  Have faith that God will pull you through and trust your husband implicitly to do that.  He won’t be able to do it without you.  Also, find that which brings joy to your life.  When the fear is poking up, put your entire focus on that thing.  If you like to garden, plan your garden.  In your head, make the most beautiful garden you can and plan every inch of it. Find something like this that you can force yourself to focus on.

So, how is this, what many people will see as passivity, truly helping?  It seems as if we are doing nothing and if we aren’t actively doing something everything will fall apart and we will fail. Or the things that we can do, the scrimping and making our houses a home, are simply secondary and doing nothing to directly effect the situation.  Don’t make this mistake.  We are wives and the very best and most direct thing we can do to help in this situation is to let our husbands know that our confidence in them is unwavering. That they are literally our knights in shining armor.  Let them be that.  This is not passive, it is not wrong and it is not weakness.  Rather, the ability to let go of our fear is a true feminine strength.  Strive for this, this feminine strength that with practice we can find and do not let others convince you it is weakness.  As when you do find it, the masculine strength it can inspire in your husband will amaze you.

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Stop Being So Afraid

Tags

fear, femininity, masculinity

Yup. From Fight Club. All the women and fear images were about weak men fearing strong women. This one made the most sense.

In our misunderstandings of what it is to be Man, we’ve come to fear masculinity.  We see it as brutish and severe and something to be contained.  Only, it’s not on us to contain.  It’s not on us to decide, from our feminine minds, what masculinity is.  And because we’ve done that for the past several decades, we now have an underlying fear of men.  In some cases, this fear is healthy.  Only, we’ve carried it so far as to have some fear of our husbands as well.

We fear their decisions that would be different than our own.  We fear what they might do to our bodies should we give them freely.  We fear their confidence, their expectations of us, we even fear their respect because we don’t truly understand it.  We even sometimes fear their word.  It’s time to stop this.  These men are the ones who have vowed to love and cherish us, forsaking all others, for the rest of their lives.  They deserve our trust and our understanding.  Not only our understanding of them personally, but our understanding of what it is to be a Man.

Some will say, why should we do this? Why shouldn’t they be more like women and understand us?  We’ve tried that now.  We’ve tried it for at least 4 decades and it isn’t working.  Women are reportedly more unhappy than ever before and men are (understandably) fleeing from ever getting married.  When we strive to understand masculinity and our men (as much as we can.  There are things that will always be beyond us), our families, our children and we as women tend to be happier.  When there are times of needing feminine perspective, it is time to go to other women.  To go to them to learn what is going on.

What exactly are we afraid of?  Our friends not understanding why we don’t talk badly about our husbands?  Why we choose to care for them?  Being vulnerable to the man we vowed to spend our lives with?  I understand that there are a few occasions of men taking advantage of this vulnerability, but how often does this really happen, and do we truly fear this from a man that many women have spent years and years with, with no sign of any trouble?

One of the things I was trying to get at in my last post (and I’m not sure I did), is that there will be times when we stand back that our husbands might get stern, or unequivocally make his expectations known, or do something else that might frustrate or anger us or cause fear.  It might take us by surprise, but in these instances, is it really out of his character?  Or is it the way he treats those he keeps close to him because he respects them?  Leaders have expectations of those who follow them and sometimes, especially if those expectations aren’t met, he may get stern, to man or woman.  This actually is a sign of respect, from a man.  It means he knows you are capable.  If you weren’t, you wouldn’t be there.  Respect to a man does not mean, he won’t hurt my feelings.

Do not fear masculinity in your husbands, sons, brothers, fathers and other trusted men.  It is this that draws us to them and we should not try to hinder that drive and we should certainly trust them enough to not fear them.

** Yes, there are those who have broken that trust.  I understand that.  The question is, why and is he working to rebuild that again?

The Whole Duty of a Woman

I was watching Alton Brown’s Good Eats last week when in passing, it mentioned this book.  It was written in 1696.  The author is listed simply as Lady.  I am trying to read it, but in truth, it’s not an easy read.  In part because the lower cases “s” looks very much like a lower case “f”.  In one sections talking about the how God is Wise, I keep reading the word as wife.  It’s not conducive to understanding. Anyway, my plan is to put some of my favorited parts of the this book up here.  To begin with just the cover page (with different spellings attempted to be left intact):

The Whole Duty of a Woman

Or, an infallible

Guide to the Fair Sex

Containing, Rules, Direction, and Observations, for the Conduct and Behaviour through all Ages and Circumstances of Life, as Virgins, Wives, or Widows with Directions, how to obtain al Use and Fashionable accomplishments suitable to the SEX.  In which are comprised all Parts of GOOD HOUSEWIFERY, particularly RULES and RECEIPTS in every Kind of COOKERY.

1. Making all Sorts of Soops and Sauces

2. Dressing Flesh, Fish and Fowl; this last illustrated with Cuts, shewing how every Fowl, Wild or Tame, is to be trust for the Spit: Likewise all other King of Game.

3. Making above 40 different Sorts of Puddings.

4. The whole Art of Pastry in making Pies, Tarts, and Pasties

5. Receipts for all Manner of Pickling, Collaring, etc.

6. For Preserving, making Creams, Jellies, and all Manner of Confectionary.

7. Rules and Directions for fetting out Dinners, Suppers, and Grand Entertainments.

to which is added,

BILLS of FARW for every Month in the Year, curiously graven on Copper Plate, with the Forms of Tables and Dishes, and he Shapes of Pies, Tarts, and Pasties.  With Instructions for Marketing.

ALSO

RULES and RECEIPTS for making all the choicest Cordials for the closet: Brewing Beers, Ales, etc.  Making all Sorts of English Wines, Cyder, Mums, Mead, Metheglin, Vinegar, Verjuice, Catchup, etc. With some fine Perfumes, Pomatums, Cosmeticks and other Beautifiers.

I’ve tried to keep some of the formatting, but you really should look at this page for yourself.  I think this book is going to be fascinating.

If anybody knows what Mums (I’m thinking not the flower), Metheglin, Verjuice or Pomatums are, I would love to hear from you.

My Choice

I’ve been reading a lot lately from some comment forums that the whole point of feminism was to bring to women the gift of choice.  Their choice to work or not, vote, get an education, own property, etc.

The Education Gap since 1880’s. I’m not sure when women weren’t allowed to go to school in the West? (H/T)

A lot of women have been writing how their choice has been to be a mom, and that is why they are anti-feminist. One of the first comments on these threads is usually something along the lines of, well congratulations on your dream.  Feminists made it possible.

Women aren’t feeling like being a mom isn’t acceptable for nothing.

Every time I hear someone say that feminism is about validating every choice a woman makes I have to fight back vomit.

Do people really think that a stay at home mom is really on equal footing with a woman who works and takes care of herself? There’s no way those two things are the same. . . .

Having kids and getting married are considered life milestones. We have baby showers and wedding parties as if it’s a huge accomplishment and cause for celebration to be able to get knocked up or find someone to walk down the aisle with. These aren’t accomplishments, they are actually super easy tasks, literally anyone can do them. They are the most common thing, ever, in the history of the world. They are, by definition, average. And here’s the thing, why on earth are we settling for average?

If women can do anything, why are we still content with applauding them for doing nothing? . . .

Now, I actually agree with her about the part that it’s not a huge accomplishment to have kids.  Most women can and it is what our bodies are made to do.

You will never have the time, energy, freedom or mobility to be exceptional if you have a husband and kids. . . .

It’s because women secretly like to talk about how hard managing a household is so they don’t have to explain their lack of real accomplishments . . .

Women will be equal with men when we stop demanding that it be considered equally important to do housework and real work. They are not equal. Doing laundry will never be as important as being a doctor or an engineer or building a business. This word play is holding us back.

Now, I’m not terribly interested in dissecting this article.  It’s pretty obvious.  Many feminist will come back and say, well this is just one women and most feminists just don’t feel this way.  This is not what real feminism is about!

But some very well known old school feminists felt the same way.

A parasite sucking out the living strength of another organism…the [housewife’s] labor does not even tend toward the creation of anything durable…. [W]oman’s work within the home [is] not directly useful to society, produces nothing. [The housewife] is subordinate, secondary, parasitic. It is for their common welfare that the situation must be altered by prohibiting marriage as a ‘career’ for woman.” ~ Simone de Beauvoir, The Second Sex, 1949.

No woman should be authorized to stay at home and raise her children. Society should be totally different. Women should not have that choice, precisely because if there is such a choice, too many women will make that one.” – “Sex, Society, and the Female Dilemma,” Simone de Beauvoir Saturday Review, June 14, 1975.

[Housewives] are mindless and thing-hungry…not people. [Housework] is peculiarly suited to the capacities of feeble-minded girls. [It] arrests their development at an infantile level, short of personal identity with an inevitably weak core of self…. [Housewives] are in as much danger as the millions who walked to their own death in the concentration camps. [The] conditions which destroyed the human identity of so many prisoners were not the torture and brutality, but conditions similar to those which destroy the identity of the American housewife.” ~ Betty Friedan, The Feminine Mystique, 1963.

[Housewives] are dependent creatures who are still children…parasites.” ~ Gloria Steinem, “What It Would Be Like If Women Win,” Time, August 31, 1970

“Feminism was profoundly opposed to traditional conceptions of how families should be organized, [since] the very existence of full-time homemakers was incompatible with the women’s movement…. [I]f even 10 percent of American women remain full-time homemakers, this will reinforce traditional views of what women ought to do and encourage other women to become full-time homemakers at least while their children are very young…. If women disproportionately take time off from their careers to have children, or if they work less hard than men at their careers while their children are young, this will put them at a competitive disadvantage vis-a-vis men, particularly men whose wives do all the homemaking and child care…. This means that no matter how any individual feminist might feel about child care and housework, the movement as a whole had reasons to discourage full-time homemaking.” ~ Jane J. Mansbridge, Why We Lost the ERA, 1986.

“[The] housewife is a nobody, and [housework] is a dead-end job. It may actually have a deteriorating effect on her mind…rendering her incapable of prolonged concentration on any single task. [She] comes to seem dumb as well as dull. [B]eing a housewife makes women sick.” ~ Sociologist Jessie Bernard in The Future of Marriage, 1982.

There are more (and here. The first link does an excellent job of dissecting how feminism is not about choice).

Growing up, I always wanted to be a stay at home mom.  My mother was for several years and I wanted to give this to my kids as well.  I went to college because I was taught that I needed a degree to fall back on just in case my husband and I were to divorce. So, I did that and also came away with my MRS.  But, I always knew I wanted to stay home.  This desire has evolved as I’ve aged and it’s become a bit of a dream of mine to become that Matriarch one reads about.  The strong woman who helps to guide those around her, who loves tremendously but firmly, who isn’t afraid but is at the same time, soft.  Whose children go to her for comfort and wisdom and whose grandchildren run to her for hugs and cookies.  Now, I have a very long way to go in achieving this dream and it’s one I plan on spending a lifetime reaching for.

Do I work at this because I think it’s the hardest job in the world?  No, because it’s not.  Do I do it because I think there is some kind of glory in it?  No.  I do it because it’s mine.  I do it because it’s my dream and this is what I want. I want to give this to my kids, to my family, and to my husband.  I used to worry what other people thought about this at times (though I’ve been lucky in that no one has ever said anything to me), but no more.  This is my choice, my dream and I’m going to do it for me and mine.

**Does this mean I expect other woman to follow suit?  No.  My point here is that there are a lot of women who are afraid of this choice and who find themselves thinking there is something wrong with them for wanting it.  Being a wife and mother can be an incredibly noble pursuit if you work at it.  If it’s what you want, then make it yours.

Women in the Workplace – and at Home ~ G. K. Chesterton

Tags

G. K. Chesterton, women

Originally published in The Illustrated London News, 18th December, 1926.

The recent controversy about the professional position of married women was part of a much larger controversy, which is not limited to professional women or even to women. It involves a distinction that controversialists on both sides commonly forget. As it is conducted, it turns largely on the query about whether family life is what is called a “whole-time job” or a “half-time job.” But there is also another distinction between a whole job and a half job, or a hundredth part of a job. It has nothing to do with the time that is occupied, but only with the ground that is covered. An industrial expert once actually boasted that it took twenty men to make a pin; and I hope he sat down on the pin. But the man making the twentieth part of the pin did not only work for the twentieth part of an hour. He might perfectly well be working for twelve hours – indeed, he might have been working for twenty-four hours for all the happy industrial expert generally cared. He might work for the whole of a lifetime, but he never made the whole of a pin.

Now, there are lingering still in the world a number of lunatics, among whom I have the honour to count myself, who think it a good thing to preserve as many whole jobs as possible. We congratulate ourselves, in our crazy fashion, whenever we find anybody personally and completely doing anything. We rejoice when we find remaining in the world any cases in which the individual can see the beginning and the end of his own work. We are well aware that this is often incompatible with modern scientific civilization, and the fact has sometimes moved us to say what we think about modern scientific civilization. But anyhow, whether we are right or wrong, that is an important distinction not always remembered; and that is the important distinction that ought to be most remembered, and is least remembered, in this modern debate about the occupation of women.

Probably there must be a certain number of people doing work which they do not complete. Perhaps there must be some people doing work which they do not comprehend. But we do not want to multiply those people indefinitely, and then cover it all by shouting about emancipation and equality. It may be emancipation to allow a woman to make part of a pin, if she really wants to make part of a pin. It may be equality if she is really filled with a furious jealousy of her husband, who has the privilege of making part of a pin. But we question whether it is really a more human achievement to make part of a pin than to make the whole of a pinafore. And we even go further, and question whether it is more human to make the whole of a pinafore than to look after the whole of a child. The point about the “half-time job” of motherhood is that it is at least one of the jobs that can be regarded as a whole, and almost as an end in itself. A human being is in some sense an end in himself. Anything that makes him happy or high-minded is, under God, a thing directed to an ultimate end. It is not, like nearly all the trades and professions, merely a machinery and a means to an end. And it is a thing which can, by the constitution of human nature, be pursued with positive and unpurchased enthusiasm. Whether or no it is a half-time job, it need not be a half-hearted job.

Now, as a matter of fact, there are not so many jobs which normal and ordinary people can pursue with enthusiasm for their own sakes. The position is generally falsified by quoting the exceptional cases of specialists who achieve success. There may be a woman who is so very fond of swimming the Channel that she can go on doing it until she breaks a record. There may be, for that matter, a woman who is so fond of discovering the North Pole that she goes on doing it long after it has been discovered. Such sensational successes naturally bulk big in the newspapers, because they are sensational cases. But they are not the question of whether women are more free in professional or domestic life. To answer that question, we must assume all the sailors on the Channel boats to be women, all the fishermen in the herring fleet to be women, all the whalers in the North Sea to be women, and then consider whether the worst paid and hardest worked of all those workers were really having a happier or a harder life. It will be at once apparent that the vast majority of them must be under orders; and that perhaps a considerable minority of them would be under orders which they did not entirely understand. There could not be a community in which the average woman was in command of a ship. But there can be a community in which the average woman is in command of a house.

To take a hundred women out of a hundred houses and give them a hundred ships would be obviously impossible, unless all the ships were canoes. And that would be carrying to rather fanatical lengths the individualist ideal of people paddling their own canoe. To take the hundred women out of the hundred houses and put them on ten ships, or more probably on two ships, is obviously to increase vastly the number of servants and diminish the number of mistresses. The only ship I remember that was so manned (or perhaps we should say womanned) was the ship in the Bab Ballad commanded by Lieutenant Bellaye: [Note: The lieutenant is the hero of Gilbert’s “The Bumboat Woman’s Story”. He is so loved that numbers of young women disguised as sailors stow away on his ship.] even there it might be said that the young ladies who sailed with him had ultimately rather a domestic than a professional ideal. But that naval commander was not very professional himself, and it will be remembered, excused his sailors from most of their duties and amused himself by firing off his one big gun.

I fear that the experience of most subordinate women in shops and factories is a little more strenuous. I have taken an extremely elementary and crude example, but I am not the first rhetorician who has found it convenient to discuss the State under the bright and original similitude of a ship. But the principle does apply quite as much to a shop as to a ship. It applies with especial exactitude to the modern shop, which is almost larger than the modern ship. A shop or a factory must consist of a very large majority of servants; and one of the few human institutions in which there need be no such enormous majority of servants is the human household. I still think, therefore, that for the lady interested in ships the most supreme and symbolical moment is the moment when her ships come home. And I think there are some sort of symbolical ships that had much better come home and stay there.

I know all about the necessary modifications and compromises produced by the accidental conditions of to-day. I am not unreasonable about them. But what we are discussing is not the suggestion that the ideal should be modified. It is the suggestion that the ideal should be abolished. It is the suggestion that a new test or method of judgment should be applied to the affair, which is not the test of whether the thing is a whole job, in the sense of a self-sufficing and satisfactory job, but of whether it is what is called a half-time job – that is, a thing to be measured by the mechanical calculation of modern employment.

There have been household gods and household saints and household fairies. I am not sure that there have yet been any factory gods or factory saints or factory fairies. I may be wrong, as I am no commercial expert, but I have not heard of them as yet. And we think that the reason lies in the distinction which I made at the beginning of these remarks. The imagination and the religious instinct and the human sense of humour have free play when people are dealing with something which, however small, is rounded and complete like a cosmos.

The place where babies are born, where men die, where the drama of mortal life is acted, is not an office or a shop or a bureau. It is something much smaller in size and much larger in scope. And while nobody would be such a fool as to pretend that it is the only place where people should work, or even the only place where women should work, it has a character of unity and universality that is not found in any of the fragmentary experiences of the division of labour.

For more of G. K. Chesterton’s works, see here.

Submissive Does Not Mean Less

A new commenter, Jean, has left a comment on my last post that would be better addressed here.  I’m going to break her comment down to better make my points but will be quoting it in it’s entirety.  Here is the original.

I know that many of you will attack me for my opinion, but this article, the video, and some of the comments here have really upset me. I didn’t realize that people actually devalued women and our purpose like that. This is unbelievable. I did not write to start an argument, so I will not reply back to anyone.

We don’t devalue women.  We believe that women’s value is much different from men’s, not less.  To be very clear right from the get go, your understanding of submission is wrong.  Submission does not equate to doormat.  It equates to second in command.  A Queen to his King or First Mate to his Captain. This is not the position of a doormat.

But here is what I needed to say:

Marriage is not just about submission. A video from a woman telling how she is submissive is so not necessary, unless there is also a video with a husband telling how he honors and sacrifices his life for his wife. This practice sets a dangerous precedent for young females to follow. These young females see older women as the wise females, ones who are supposed to make sense. But some of us don’t have much, and in fact, some of us are downright foolish. Women ought to know better than to allow themselves to focus on submisson only, unless they will also tell men what their roles are. Why would a woman make a video about submission? What is the purpose?

The whole of society tells men what is expected of them every single day.  To such an extent that society regularly thinks them fools with the smarmy and much smarter wife running the show.  It’s degrading and things like this are the norm.

As to women looking to wise older women, I truly hope you are correct.  Only, what most older women are telling their younger counterparts today is anything but wise.  It is not wise to tell women to put of marriage past their most fertile years (many, many women yearn for children only to find out they waited too long). It is not wise to tell women that sleeping with as many men as they wish is ok (most women are NOT happy doing this and many will privately admit so.  WE AREN”T MEN).  It is not ok to teach women that men value the same exact traits in women that we find attractive in men.  Men value pretty, kind, helpful and fun in the women they commit to though they will have sex with simply sexy.  Most are not too interested in committing to snarky, hard women.  Intelligence, while it has some value is not that important to men.  They would rather have a less intelligent woman who respects him than an intelligent woman who is full of disrespect and throws her education up like a wall.

You ask the purpose of making this video?  To help women to understand that what they think of as submission is not true. Many find that through submission their marriages are vastly happier and healthier.  They find that their men are happier and stronger and many discover their lost femininity and find real peace and joy.

When a man marries a woman who comes into their relationship having a successful career, her own residence, and her own money in the bank, then that woman is “allowing” him to lead, because before the marriage, she was an independent woman and was not looking for someone to “support her”, contrary to what men alwys say. She can really live without a man . . . Men are not doing women favors by marrying them. Men, you all have got to stop telling lies on women, that “we are looking for someone to support us”. This is soooo lame and sooo untrue. Men are not the only ones with jobs.

Of course women can live without a man and of course women have jobs. Everyone sees this everyday.  The question is, how do most women prefer to live?  Support is not merely monetary.  But even if we are talking simply money, most of the time if someone stays home, it is usually the wife (because she wants to) and he fully supports her and the kids.  If she does work, because of women’s work preferences, he will often make more than her and therefore make her quality of living much higher than it would have been should she have stayed single.

. . . Besides all that, women do not get much out of marriage, because we do all the work. The men get the sex they so desperately want, they get someone to dominate, someone to cook meals, someone to raise the couple’s children, someone to do all the laundry, and someone to do the housework. If women are to do all the submission stuff, yet all the physical work, then, what the heck is the purpose of a woman getting married? Women are better off, staying single.

If you think that sex, laundry, cooking, raising children, and housework is all there is to the work of marriage then you are sadly mistaken.  Do you think the responsibility of a leader is so easy?  That making the life changing decisions that will effect the most important people in one’s life are made on a whim?  That men are so callous as to just flippantly dominate without thought to those whom he loves more than himself?  No.  The laundry, the housework, the support, the cooking, raising the children, and the sex (you make it sound like a chore) are easy compared to the responsibility of a good leader.  They are easy compared to the daily grind most men contend with on a daily basis at their jobs, to their other responsibilities around the house (things do not get fixed around the house themselves). These days, given what marriage has become (which is nearly nothing as divorce is rampant and the man loses his children and half of everything) and what is expected of a husband with the lack of expectations in a wife, it is men who are arguably better off staying single.

What the woman is really looking for when she marries, is someone who can be a loving, respectful partner with her and appreciate her for all her qualities and all the things she will be able do with him in the marriage. Marriage is not about serving a man. He must be kind to her, and treat her like she matters, because she does. What wife wants to have sex with a cold, selfish, distant, unloving husband? His attitude and approach does matter. Women have to be a part of all decisions in the relationship, especially the ones that affect her. In fact, a husband cannot just make decisions and shove them in the wife’s face.Those decisions that profoundly affect her and her body and emotional comfort, must be discussed with her anyway. Stop treating women like doormats and sexual receptacles, because women are more than that.

I am trying to figure out why you assume that I think men should be “cold, selfish, distant, and unloving”?  This is not the definition of dominant.  You are conflating it with domineering.  I agree with you that women are looking for exactly what you say.  But respect is to be earned.  It is not given just because one is female.  It is up to women to find a man worth marrying.  To find a good man.  It is not up to men to become what women expect of them simply because women say they want that.  There are so many men out there today who would give women exactly what you are describing, only women aren’t attracted to them.  Because they give women exactly what they say they want.  They are nice and then they are ignored.  How many women do you know that lament that they are attracted to “bad boys”?  How many lament the fact that they have found a “good man” only to not be attracted to him at all?  Women are attracted to dominant men.  This is exactly why books like 50 Shades of Gray have sold millions of copies.

You say that the wife HAS to be a part of every decision, but I say that it is the man who chooses who he wishes to spend his life with.  If she insists she must be part of every decision, he might just decide to find someone else.  However, if she is respectful, if she is kind and doesn’t disrespect and nag, she may just find that her husband wants her to be a part of the major decisions of their life because she has shown the fortitude and intelligence to help.  Again, I am amazed that you would think that a man would just make a decision and throw it in his wife’s face and that you simply assume from a short post that I think women are doormats and sexual receptacles.  You have come in here with a lot of presumptions, which the majority are simply wrong.  If you had watched the video, you would have seen that Mrs. Bure stated the same exact thing.  You say women are more than that.  I say women must prove it, just like we expect men to prove themselves to us.

Stop telling wives that we have to lift up husbands up, unless you tell husbands to lift their wives up. Be fair and balanced.

Most husbands do lift up their wives, well above them and then their wives resent them for it.  A supplicating husband is one who is disrespected and unloved by his wife.  This is the majority of marriages today because of how many times men have been told since birth to lift up and respect their wives.  I say it’s time for women to learn to love and respect their men.  To learn how to lift them up and support them, till death do they part.

If you really are curious as to how I think a husband should treat marriage, I was asked about this before.  

For further refutation of other commonly held misconceptions of submission, please read this excellent article.

To commenters, Jean came here upset but remained quite civil, even though she was clearly upset.  I would ask the same of all of you.

Spot the Differences

One woman who wishes to marry someday, but not too soon and another young woman whom recently married and is utterly grateful for everything her husband has ever done for her (my sincere congratulations and very best wishes to you Allamagoosa and Night Sky Radio).

Contrived happiness vs. true peace and contentment. There is no comparison. Many women today will read Allamagoosa’s post and think she is meek, weak and losing herself. First, she very likely does not care what these women think. There’s no reason for her to. Second, her strength is astounding. Some women can’t see it, or they refuse to see it. But the strength to put someone else before you in life and the happiness it can bring is beyond my ability to describe. It’s time for women to wake up to this fact again.

On the surface, the first woman seems strong and daring to young ladies today. Seeking to fulfill your every want is not strength, it’s reckless. It might feel like freedom, until you are no longer able to find the things in life you wanted because of the past choices you have made. Might she marry? Sure, she might. But the chances of it being to a man whom she will adore are slim. The happiness she seeks will slip through her fingers because she puts her wants first (there are no needs in what she speaks of).  The anxiety that she speaks of, that something might be wrong with her, these feelings are often not a bad thing. Do not dismiss them out of hand because they are uncomfortable. Follow them to the end as they will help you to improve.

Happiness and peace are possible, but they won’t just come because you want them to. These require effort. They require gratitude, and they require not only the ability to see what a man has done, is doing and will do for you but what you have done, are doing and will do for him. If it’s not enough, it’s time to change.

**UPDATE:  I just read this from Elspeth.  Beautiful, poignant, and very relevant.

Disagree with it? Ban It!!

Tags

banning, feminist, humiliation, loyalty, submission

Feminists are up in arms in Spain over a new bestselling book there.  This book, which they assert will “promote gender violence”***, is all about wifely submission.  Their solution to this?  Ban it.

Spanish feminists tearing copies of Cásate y sé sumisa – Get Married and Be Submissive. Something tells me the authoress doesn’t mind that these people spent their money on these books.

The book, written by Costanza Miriano, promotes

“loyal obedience, generosity and submission” on the part of the new wife and offers nuggets of advice for the newly-wed on how to please one’s husband.

My frustration knows no limit in these feminists who, first off think so very little of men and who secondly, think that qualities such as these will inspire men to beat their women.  How many men are truly angered by loyalty, generosity and submission (though, this is false as the doormats feminists believe submissive women to be are not really any of these things. Rather, they are driven by fear)?   Are there men out there who beat women?  Yes, but truly, how many?  And how many would feel the need to hurt a woman who treats him with loving respect and genuinely cares for him?

Mrs. Miriano, the books aurthoress.

Mrs. Miriano agrees:

“It’s true, you’re not yet an experienced cook or a perfect housewife,” she writes. “What’s the problem if he tells you so? Tell him that he is right, that it’s true, that you will learn. On seeing your sweetness and your humility, your effort to change, this will also change him.

Thankfully, the Archbishop Francisco Javier Martinez, who published the book, stood up for it and firmly stands behind it.  Further, he shows the feminists for the hypocrites they are:

[Archbishop Martinez] insists that the furore surrounding it is “ridiculous and hypocritical” in a society that allows abortion, which he argues is a much clearer example of violence against women.

The article does publish one passage that will make most women uncomfortable,

“We [women] like humiliation because it is for a greater good.”

though I have to wonder two things.  One, is this an accurate translation or was The Telegraph sensationalizing and two, given the stories many of us have read around the Sphere, is there some truth to the assertion that women like humiliation?  I don’t see it, but I’m not firm in that thought.  I tend to think that some submissive women will put up with humiliation if it is for the greater good, but not like it.  Also, I think a lot of women will put up with humiliation if they think it will get them what they want.

As always, the feminists show their true colors in calling for the banning of this book.  There is no tolerance but for what they believe.  However, I find a lot of hope in the fact that this book is on the bestsellers list.  Are young women waking up to their womanly potential?  I will not lose hope.

*** Gender violence.  Was this decried by these Spanish feminist?

My deepest respect and admiration go out to these men.  From the bottom of my heart, I thank them all.

The Advantage of Youth

Tags

femininity, hypergamy, masculinity, youth

Rollo had an interesting piece up this week entitled The Curse of Potential in which he discusses how many men today are not meeting their full potential due to the fact that they are trying to walk the line of security vs. increased status with the women in their lives.

In it, Jeremy states:

My only problem with this perspective is its applicability to a more traditional scenario where women actually do capitalize on their youth and beauty by marrying very young, to younger men. In such a scenario, the women are gambling to a much greater degree, marrying men decades before they’ve had time to build up to their potential.

If, hypothetically, the vast majority of women in America started locking in good mates in their very early 20s, would hypergamy simply flare up less and allow the men to reach greater potential? Is there a natural suppression to hypergamy when women marry younger? . . . .

I tend to think there’s actually an (as-yet unquantified in the red-pill universe) affect on women when they marry younger. I think that without years of fending for themselves and being lonely they see less benefit in jumping ship for the perceived mega yacht nearby. Their self-defense mechanism remains unused and hence they see the man they are committed to as more valuable. I would term this something like husband-goggles, but that sounds kind of silly.

To which I responded that what he is talking about is hypergamy satisfied.  He then asks:

By what mechanism is hypergamy satisfied through a woman marrying while young (and valuable) to a younger (likely lower-value) man? I can’t see it.

I do think Jeremy is onto something when he asks if there is more of a natural suppression of hypergamy when women marry younger.  Younger women are simply not going to be as experienced in the world and are going to retain more of their natural vulnerability.  They will have more of the wide eyed wonder and innocence and as they become more experienced with the world (and with men) they begin to lose this.

Matt Forney had a very good article recently, The Case Against Female Self Esteem, that delved more deeply into this.

In order to love someone else, you need to be emotionally vulnerable, more so women than men (as girls are attracted to confident men). You need to be willing to open yourself up, to give yourself over to their judgment, to risk being hurt and rejected. Without this emotional openness, any relationship you have will never go beyond the infatuation stage. But girls today are told to erect gigantic walls around their hearts, cutting them off from an crucial part of their humanity.

I believe that the younger the woman, the more she will be able to be emotionally vulnerable.  She will not yet have had too much time to build the wall up around her heart (though it seems that this wall is being built at an ever younger age).  Because of this vulnerability and the potential for greater innocence, a masculine man with potential will be more likely to keep her that way.  Without having built up this wall, the less likely she will need a man who has already realized his full potential because he will better be able to dominate and lead her without having yet reached his full status.  His not yet full fledged masculinity will still be strong enough to hold her gaze to him as he works to meet his own potential with her help.  In essence, while not fully realized, his masculinity and dominance will  be enough to satiate her hypergamy because she doesn’t have the experience or the hardness that comes with knowing more and more masculine men.  This masculinity in all it’s potential will keep her enticed and wanting more, from him.

Unfortunately, today with easy divorce and women being encouraged to always be happy, what could have been a wonderful marriage is so easily dropped for the imaginary greener grass.  Not only does this make hypergamy much harder to satiate, it has taught women to wait and lose a big part of themselves that will make seeing the potential of a man far more difficult, if not impossible.

There is something else going on here as well, that the traditional young woman did not have going against her that Matt gets further into.  Women have given up their natural femaleness for masculine self esteem and confidence.

[Women are] encouraged to derive self-worth not from their inherent feminine nature but from their college degree, their job or the other illusory trappings of achievement in a man’s world.

This male confidence not only aids in building up the wall around her heart, it requires a more dominate man to break these walls down.  It would take a man with far more maximized potential to have any way of breaking through the masculinity she has created in herself to bring her back to the feminine in which she must be for her hypergamy to be satisfied.  Hence so many women wanting the man who just gets it.  These few men are the ones lined up for as they are the only ones who are able to be dominate enough to break through.  However, these men are not interested in versions of themselves.  They are interested in young women willing to have the confidence to be feminine, who are willing to be vulnerable and admit they not only want a man, but need a man.

One of the most commonly repeated tropes of feminists and manboobs goes something like this:

You should be happy that women nowadays are independent, because it means that they’re with you because they WANT to be with you, not because they’re dependent on you.”

This is a fundamental violation of the relationship between men and women. Part of our identity as men based in women needing us, if not necessarily in a material sense, then in an emotional one, though material and emotional vulnerability often go hand in hand. That female insecurity is a crucial ingredient for unlocking our inner masculine instincts. If a girl needs me, feels that her life would end if she were to lose me, I’m doubly inspired to be there for her, to shield her from the cruelty of the world. Frankly, it’s pretty hot. If she just wants me, could take me or leave me, my gut response is one of apathy. “Yeah, whatever babe.”

It is that female insecurity that younger women have greater potential of possessing that will bind her to a man who is not yet realized but has the great potential to do so.  As this insecurity diminishes through experience and through seeking out male confidence for herself, hypergamy is going to be ever more difficult to satiate and it will take the most dominant of men to break through and while these men will be willing to add to her life experiences for one evening, they will be falling in love with the feminine girl who in unafraid of being vulnerable:

I was thinking about a couple of my past relationships when I had this epiphany; the girls I’ve loved the most were the ones who were the most insecure, the most emotionally vulnerable.

It’s Going to Get Worse Before it Gets Better

Tags

false pregnancy, revenge

Gentlemen, I urge you to be careful.  Sex is no longer (and hasn’t been for a long time) just a fun thing to do because you can get it.  Given the lack of discouragement and punishment, women are going to further lengths to get back at men, because they can.  Now, women are selling positive pregnancy tests on Craigslist.  What ‘s more, the women selling the test are completely unafraid to come right out and say they do not care what people use them for.

Another New Jersey mom writes: ‘Wanna get your boyfriend to finally pop the question? Play a trick on mom, dad or one of your friends?

Scrolling through the site, there appears to be no shortage of sellers- and many are aware that their customers could be using the tests for dubious reasons.

‘I’m pregnant and will sell you my positive pregnancy test for $20,’ one woman on Manhattan’s Lower East Side writes. ‘I don’t care what you need them for.’

If something like this happens to you, I would highly recommend going out and getting your own pregnancy test and making her take it again in front of you.  Surprise her with it if you think she will not use the bathroom in your presence.  Stand outside the door while she goes in a cup and then administer the test yourself.  It’s very easy to do.

When, by God, are women going to start focusing their anger on the people who are really giving other women a bad name.  I can tell you, for the majority of people, it is not men.