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I think it was the first time I'd actually listened to what he had to say in years. He said that he was angry with me for always putting work first and angry with himself for not being able to find a job. He said he didn't appreciate being treated like a nanny-slash-housekeeper-slash-gardener. But what alternatives was he offering?

We separated a few months later.

Well, sure.

HE objects to the way YOU treat him, and it's up to HIM to "offer" some "alternative" ???

Pardon moi, your majesty.

Ah...there is the rub. The answer is yes, he had to make the offer to an alternative. Kinda like when my mom told dad she was going back to work. Dad didn’t tell her to go back to work, she had to offer the alternative. If he wanted something different then he needed to communicate that need and take the responsibility to initiate the change in the relationship.

Men are usually(note I said usually), embarrassed if they don’t make as much of themselves as their wives. My ex-husband was always struggling to keep up with me and I never took him to any company functions lest I’d have to explain his work status. In my case, I put him through college, let him leave home for 10+ weeks to try a new career thousands of miles away, and he still wouldn’t/couldn’t(?) be happy with himself or his life. He didn’t seem to have what it takes to succeed. His perpetual unhappiness led him to the road of cheating with women of a “lesser class” ahem...

Yes, that was the final straw after 14 years of his nonsense.

How are things today? Good question. You are correct that feminism has created a whole set of lonely women. I have been divorced 11 years now and have only had a handful of real dates. I have found those men to be so emasculated that they are a turn-off and they have found me to be too brazen, harsh, and independent.

He said that he was angry with me for always putting work first and angry with himself for not being able to find a job.

With unemployment below 5%, this guy couldn't find a job? What he really meant to say is that he couldn't find a job in the extremely obscure and competitive field of "film making," where there are very few employment opportunities, and that he was unwilling to adapt to the real world and find a real job, even if temporary, while waiting for the door to open in his chosen field.

As Charles Darwin said,"In the struggle for survival, the fittest win out at the expense of their rivals because they succeed in adapting themselves best to their environment." This guy's wife dumped him as a result of his inability to adapt. Hopefully, his gene pool has come to a dead end.