Posted on 10/28/2011 5:09:34 AM PDT by Kaslin
Kate Bolick stares out at the world from the cover of The Atlantic magazine. She's wearing a black lace evening dress. "What, Me Marry?" asks the headline. She isn't smiling.
In fact, she isn't smiling in any of the photos that accompany her several thousand-word essay on singleness, marriage and the changing nature of dating and mating in America today. Bolick, 38, is groping toward accepting the idea that she may never marry. She badly wants to convince herself -- and us -- that older ideas about "unhappy" spinsters are silly cultural baggage best dropped off at the curb. And yet, there are those glamour shots -- Bolick behind the wheel wearing a fetching red dress; Bolick in a gold evening gown holding a glass of champagne; Bolick in a black cocktail dress -- but her expressions range from pensive to sad -- never happy.
Bolick seems genuinely conflicted about marriage. The daughter of a committed feminist, she marched off to third grade "in tiny green or blue T-shirts declaring: A WOMAN WITHOUT A MAN IS LIKE A FISH WITHOUT A BICYCLE." She recalls that when she was cuddling in the back seat of the family car with her high school boyfriend, her mother turned around and asked, "Isn't it time you two started seeing other people?" She took it for granted, she writes, "that (I) would marry, and that there would always be men (I) wanted to marry."
So sure was she of the limitless romantic opportunities available that at the age of 28, she broke up with a wonderful boyfriend. They had been together for three years. He was "an exceptional person, intelligent, good-looking, loyal, kind." Why did she discard him? "Something was missing."
Ten years later, she writes somewhat (though not entirely) ruefully "If dating and mating is in fact a marketplace . . . today we're contending with a new 'dating gap,' where marriage-minded women are increasingly confronted with either deadbeats or players."
There is a great deal of interesting data in this piece. According to the Pew Research Center, 44 percent of Millennials and 43 percent of Gen Xers think marriage is becoming obsolete. As of 2010, women held 51.4 percent of all managerial and professional positions, compared with 26 percent in 1980. Women account for the lion's share of bachelors and masters degrees, and make up a majority of the work force. Three quarters of the jobs lost during the recession were lost by men. "One recent study found a 40 percent increase in the number of men who are shorter than their wives." Fully 50 percent of the adult population is single, compared with 33 percent in 1950.
But these trends, however interesting, shed only an oblique light on the problem of the decline in marriageable males. Bolick edges closer to the truth in her discussion of sex.
"The early 1990s," she writes, "witnessed the dawn of the '"hookup culture"' at universities, as colleges stopped acting in loco parentis (actually they relinquished that role in the 1970s) and undergraduates . . . started throwing themselves into a frenzy of one-night-stands." Some young women, she notes, felt "forced into a promiscuity they didn't ask for," whereas young men "couldn't be happier."
According to economist Robert H. Frank, "when available women significantly outnumber men . . . courtship behavior changes in the direction of what men want." And vice versa. If there's a shortage of women, the females have more power to demand what they want, which tends to be (surprise!) monogamy. On college campuses, women outnumber men by 57 to 43 percent.
But economic analysis can take you only so far. Men's capacity to insist upon promiscuity rests completely on female cooperation. And women have been foolishly compliant for decades.
They've conspired in their own disempowerment, not because they love their sexual freedom (though a few may), but because people like Gloria Steinem and Ms. Bolick's mother convinced them that the old sexual mores, along with marriage and children, were oppressive to women.
The resulting decline of marriage has been a disaster for children, a deep disappointment to reluctantly single women and unhealthy for single men, who are less happy, shorter-lived and less wealthy than married men. The sexual revolution has left a trail of destruction in its wake, even when its victims don't recognize the perpetrator.
That does indeed sound like you have a problem, although sometimes Aspy men can project an aura of “not giving a damn” that is alluring to women.
Of course, it could just be that you got lucky and found an atypical woman. Grats! ;)
Well said wolfman...
—I know a couple of Navy retirees who were stationed on Okinawa and ended up marrying Japanese ladies.
The wives dote on their husbands, the husbands lap up the attention and both husbands and wives are well satisfied.—
That describes my marriage, though I found my wife at my 25th high school reunion, 14 years ago.
But, you see, we dote on each other. I was married to another woman for 20 years that very much fit in with most of the problems in the “ten reasons not to get married” list someone posted here. And she basically decided, “Hey, I’m not really happy, and I can keep the kids, the house, a LOT of money for a long time, and not have to live with that bum.” and she pulled the trigger out of the blue. We were evangelical Christians heavily involved in the church for 18 of those 20 years. Didn’t matter. That is why the Fred article I posted rang so true for me.
My wife and I now have enjoyed 13 years of HONEYMOON. I honestly did not know a marriage could be filled with this much pure JOY! I thought it was only the stuff of movies, but we have lived it and are living it! And it is because we both love he Lord and understand that our job is to please our spouse, not search for ways they can please us. We have actually had our own “Gift of the Magi” moments, and laughed long and hard about it.
But I ramble. Bottom line is that I was able to find an “old fashioned values” girl to marry. But the US produces very, VERY few of those. Most men will have to leave the country to find it.
The problem with porn is the same as with other short-term-long-term trade-off distortion technologies.
Sex (and associated stimuli) is supposed to feel good in the short term because it leads to a good long-term outcome (children).
Porn (much like contraceptives) short-circuits this system and decouples the short-term good (pleasure) from the long-term good (children).
This in turn creates much emotional confusion amongst men and women. In different areas, video games, drugs, etc. create the same kinds of decoupling problems, disassociating reward from actual outcome.
As an aside, women of course also have porn - much of the stuff that you find marketed to women (magazines, romance novels, daytime TV, soaps) fills the same role. As female porn is less visual and focuses more on fantasizing about the seduction and less on the sex act itself, it flies under the radar to a larger degree.
Having been born a female, I have to disagree a bit here. My husband is sweet and kind and he wasn't repellent to me, in fact I had to convince him to chose me over a couple of other 'easy' girls. Of course, that was 30 some years ago when being 'easy' was still looked down upon. Even though my husband is 6'4", blond and blue eyed and makes six figures no one would confuse him with an alpha male; he's a computer geek of the first order.
Oh, let's just go ahead and make a S.W.A.G.
Could it be that he just "too nice"? IOW: What she was missing was someone being mean, over-bearing, abusive, and rough.
In spite of the "sexual revolution", more women than will admit are attracted to the A$$holes of this world.
And several guys I know had their wives leave because they went bankrupt or careers were stagnant.
And what MOST men want is a loving relationship with a woman who doesn't spend most of her life pi$$ed off. They are becoming rare.
Certainly a lack of happiness and warmth - Maureen Dowd's younger sister?
Are you saying that my fiancee is fat? I mean, I’m by no means a beanpole at 6’2” 300 lb, but she’s over a foot shorter than me and less than half my weight.
/sarc
Well, they’re talking about a sexual revolution. Since that sort of thing rarely ever happens in the middle east, we’re apparently talking about a western/American phenomenon.
I hoped that this was obvious, but I suppose clarification is necessary.
In other contexts, I've seen it expressed differently:
(1) Alpha: someone who attractive women are willing to sleep with even without commitment or financial support.
(2) Beta: someone that attractive women are not sexually attracted to, but will keep around for financial support.
After my divorce, an interesting thing happened. I was DONE with women. I was “whipped” by my ex, as most american males are. Well, the attitude changed. I gave up all the “metrosexual” “thoughtful male” stuff and started just being myself. I made no apologies for my maleness and this is the weird part. Suddenly women were interested in me. Lots of them. Too many of them.
My point: It’s not so much that the woman likes the “cad”. Rather, they seem to like a man who is A MAN and makes no apologies about it. Sure, you treat your woman with respect and dignity, but you don’t cowtow to her and you don’t “give in” to get along. The latter shows disrespect. You respect others but you also respect YOURSELF. As Brian Tracy says in one of his books: A loser smiles to please. A winner smiles when pleased. Men need to take much more instruction from that. Don’t be an a**hole, but don’t be a lapdog either.
A simple illustration: My wife LIKES that when she cooks something that I don’t like or she thinks she burned, I tell her (if she asks). There are two reasons she likes this: First, it means that when I say I like something she knows I mean it, and can more appreciate the compliment. Second, and more importantly, it is a TRUST and respect issue. Sometimes she knows darned good and well that she burned the heck out of something. If I say it’s fine, she KNOWS I am lying. And lying damages trust and also shows a lack of respect.
One other thing: We know our roles. They are spelled out for us in the bible. We’ve discovered that if you just follow the rules as outlined in the owners manual, the marriage will serve you very well as you serve each other.
I’m not going to get into our sex life except to say that I kinda weep for the average married American male. I was one of them. I talked to a LOT of them. I know how it is for a lot of men. It should not be that way. It is one reason Porn is so popular. And the only thing these men can do is to BE A MAN and let the chips fall where they may. This means dump the porn and start serving your wife as the bible instructs you. What she does is her responsibility, but I will tell you this: One of two things will happen. Either she will change along with you (praying for he couldn’t hurt) and you can find yourself, as I have, in marital bliss beyond what you ever thought possible, or she will divorce you. That brings opportunities of its own that can STILL bring a very positive result. And the bible does instruct you to “let her go” if she so desires.
If nothing else, you will gain your self respect and be a more positive influence on those around you and live life more fully and productively.
Yup. That’s pretty much it.
And in a year or two, will be again (brief reference to the economic meltdown).
—...there isn’t any financial reason for them to stay so they hit the road.—
True. And why a Godless society is doomed. If money is the only thing keeping them there (and it often has been for centuries), there is not much “there” there.
That said, I think of a wedding as being given a brand new car. If you know it is the only one you will ever have, you will take good care of it and it will last a lifetime. If you think you can trade it in at will, you may treat it like a rental and trash it to the point that it is a beater in a couple of years. At least when women NEEDED the income, they made some attempt to keep the marriage together and sometimes even enjoy it. ;-)
I am encouraging my daughter to go into engineering when she gets old enough to go to college.
Great post and spot on! I’ll add one tangible. I tell young people thinking of marriage that if they cannot remember a time when their future spouse ever sincerely apologized for something, run, don’t walk from that person. They are narcissistic and will blame you for all the problems that befall them in life.
—My comments about sex had to do with the social environment where sex sex sex is everything.—
I dumped hotmail for gmail because I got tired of being presented women in bikinis every time I opened my mail.
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