Thursday, May 27, 2010

Good girls let down by society?

It is possible for women to break free of the damaging ideas they were brought up with.

Eleanor Mills is a 39-year-old Englishwoman. She belongs to my generation, the one which arguably suffered most when it came to family formation.

The problem is that the women of my generation were brought up to value autonomy above all else. This meant pursuing an independent girl lifestyle right through their 20s. The emphasis was on careers, casual relationships, travel and partying. Marriage and children weren't rejected outright but were deferred indefinitely - they were well down on the checklist of things to do.

By the time these women were ready to marry and have children a lot of men had either opted out, grown resentful, adapted to a player lifestyle or married foreign women. Some women did manage to marry late in life and have a child or maybe even two, but many missed out.

Eleanor Mills tells much the same story from the female point of view. This, for instance, is the relationship history of one of her close friends:

There was nothing physically wrong with my friend. But romantically it just never happened for her.

She is an attractive woman and always had lots of offers — but there was always some kind of complication. As her 40th birthday came and went, it seemed motherhood was going to pass her by.

“The anguish of that was terrible,” she says now. “If I hadn’t had kids I would probably have turned into an alcoholic. I spent many nights looking into that abyss. I really don’t know if I could have coped with being childless: I’d always thought I would be a mum.”

What changed? “I got real. I always thought I wanted an exotic man who would open up a whole new kind of life for me. But then, having lived abroad, I realised I had the life I wanted already. So I found a nice man who wanted kids — the kind I had always avoided before — and it all worked out. Hooray.” Now, aged 44, she has two children.

She rejected many offers from family oriented men when she was young. It wasn't until she was 40 that she "got real" and finally accepted one - despite the fact that being married and having children was the most important thing to her.

I think she was lucky - very lucky - that a man would choose her at age 40 when there were other more youthful women to choose from. She was one of the fortunate ones to still get the husband and kids - but in a desperate, last minute kind of way.

Eleanor Mills is aware of the loss created by the deferral of marriage,  particularly amongst professional women of her generation:

This isn’t just about me. One in five females of my generation will never have children; and the Office for National Statistics reports that the more successful you are professionally, the less likely you are to breed. When I look at the women I know who at 40 are single and childless and don’t want to be, my heart aches for them. It is never the ones you’d expect. Many of my singleton friends are at the particularly attractive end of the spectrum; if you’d met them at 20, at university, and been told that at 40 they’d be — unwillingly — alone, you never would have believed it.

How does Eleanor Mills explain the situation? She rightly rejects the idea that it was just a case of women being too fussy:

I don’t think my single friends are on their own because they are too picky. I think it is because as a generation we were bred not to prioritise finding a husband and having a family. Unlike generations of females before us, we were bred to work. I was born in 1970, in the middle of women’s lib. My mother and her peers were conscious-raising and feminist ...

No one, not my family or my teachers, ever said, “Oh yes, and by the way you might want to be a wife and mother too.” They were so determined we would follow a new, egalitarian, modern path that the historic ambitions of generations of women — to get married and raise a family — were intentionally airbrushed from their vision of our future.

So, like the good girls we are, we set about achieving. The friends I am talking about here were my peers at school and university. Many succeeded beyond their feminist mothers’ wildest dreams.

But a career is not the same as family:

But now, and often too late, we are realising that no job will ever love you back; that the graveyards are full of important executives; that the only people you are ever irreplaceable to are your family.

As they stare into a barren future, many singletons wish they’d put some of the focus and drive that has furnished them with sparkling careers, worn-out passports and glamorous social lives into the more mundane business of having a family ...

If you want a family, that has to be a priority. My friends and I just assumed the right man would appear at some point.

It's interesting too that it's not just the men of my generation who feel let down in their efforts to form a family. According to Eleanor Mills, there are women who feel the same way:

At dinner with girlfriends the other night, the feeling was we’d been let down. That society, by leaving us to fend for ourselves and offering no guidance or advice on the crucial subject of finding a mate, had failed us. After all, throughout history, pairing off the next generation has been a key function of most societies, from Jane Austen’s balls to Indian arranged marriages.

She is hopeful that the younger generation has learned from the mistakes of those now in their 40s:

A fortnight ago I went to a wedding: the groom was my brother Theo. He is 29, his bride (who is pregnant) is 28. “You’re so young!” I yelped. Not really, they replied. Nearly all their friends are already married. Last week the Marriage and Wedding Survey of 2,000 women across the UK in their twenties found the ideal age for marriage has lowered to 26, with a first child at 27 (a decade ago it was early thirties). Perhaps the spectre of being a Bridget Jones-style singleton has focused their minds on getting hitched earlier; it is a positive shift.

I think it's honourable that women like Eleanor Mills are willing to warn the younger generation of women of the mistakes made by her own - and that she feels genuine sympathy for those women who have ended up unwillingly childless and unmarried.

The one thing still missing is a sense of regret for how the men of her generation were treated.

55 comments:

  1. I do think that the trend is changing towards more younger people focusing on family formation (I'm speaking of the under-30 set). The "dividing line" between that generation and the people who were the deferring generation is somewhere in the mid-30s. I know quite a few professional women beginning around 36 or so and older who are single and childless despite being attractive. It has to do with, as she says, not prioritizing finding a mate until "the time was right", which usually means "when I'm advanced enough in my career, have paid off my student loan debt, have done the traveling I wanted to do, and have had my fair share of casual relationships with men when I was at the height of my attraction". It's hard to be sympathetic, really, given the decision-making process involved, which was largely self-focused.

    I do think, though, that the pickiness issue plays some role as well. Some of those suitors in the 20s and early 30s would have been good mates, but the women in question were "holding out" for someone "better". That's pretty common. It's not an "either/or" thing, I think. In other words, I think it's true that women of our generation both deferred for other reasons *and* were picky about mate selection when mate candidates presented themselves. As the woman mentioned early in the article admitted -- she was waiting for someone exotic, not the normal, good guys who were proposing to her when she was younger. That's a case of being picky, I think, in addition to deferring.

    My girlfriend has a friend in a similar situation: very late 30s, very attractive, and very single. She has a list of required qualities in a mate that is as long as the tax code, and admits this. There isn't that much to be done about that, really. A good number of people for understandable reasons can't or won't mate select someone who doesn't meet their criteria -- and I think the more you have going for you in an "objective" sense (looks, education, finances, etc.), the higher your own criteria are going to be -- especially for women, who still today generally select at least slightly hypergamously, or at least wish to do so. So to me it isn't surprising at all that it's the attractive, successful women around 40 who are in the roughest spot -- not only have they deferred mate selecting, but they also have a longer than average list of "musts" because of their own qualities, status and so on.

    There's no silver bullet for that, but I think that the conventional wisdom that things get tougher in terms of mate selection as one ages is very true. That hits women harder than it does men due to the fertility clock, but it hits men, too. The older you are, the less flexible you may be, the harder it is to mold your life to someone new and the more set you may be in your ways and so on. Not that this applies to everyone over a certain age, but it does apply to many.

    It would appear that in the US at least, the golden spot for marriages to last is when they take place in the later 20s. Pre-25 marriages have quite high divorce rates here. Marriages between 26 and low 30s have relatively low divorce rates, and among those with university degrees and professional jobs, objectively low divorce rates. So the key appears to be to get married in the late 20s or early 30s and be a high-income, highly-educated professional if you want to maximize your chances of having a lasting marriage. Of course the fertility rate in these marriages isn't terribly high -- many have only one child, which of course isn't even replacement, and most will have 2 -- 3 is still not commonplace among that demographic. So you have more stable marriages, but a demographic that is also not replacing itself.

    ReplyDelete
  2. It's hard to be sympathetic, really, given the decision-making process involved, which was largely self-focused.

    Ditto here. I'll save my sympathies for people who deserve it.

    I found it strange that you titled the post "Good girls..." How can you say these spoiled, selfish people are "good girls"? Not only is their behavior usually atrocious when they are younger (they're not spending the time knitting, that's for sure), if they don't finally snatch Mr. Big, they often go on to have children out of wedlock.

    These kinds of women make my blood boil, to be perfectly honest. The same ones tell me all of the time, "You are so lucky that you found such a wonderful husband!" These are the exact same women who passed up guys like him, over and over again.

    Sometimes you end up with the man you deserve. In their case: none.

    ReplyDelete
  3. There's a "good girl" side to this in the sense that it was sometimes the more conscientious, self-disciplined young women who carried through with the programme.

    But, yes, it's true that they didn't exactly do it in a self-denying way. They acted in a coarse, self-indulgent and short-sighted way. So I think you're right to question the good girl tag.

    ReplyDelete
  4. More evidence that the branch of Marxism known as Feminism is a force for misery and destruction, that the idolatry of the Self in the heart of leftism/liberalism leads to the same place all idolatry leads: despair.

    These women might be best served by joining a culturally and theologically conservative Christian church. Certainly they won't benefit one bit by joining the "cougar" world, that's just another turn down the spiral.

    When I look around my church, the happiest young men and women are the ones that are married before they reach 30. They are also the couples most likely to be blessed with children.

    The left is busy murdering their future children in various ways. We can only pray that their idol-worshipping ideology will go away as well.

    ReplyDelete
  5. I know a plethora of women in this situation and they certainly ain't 'good girls'.

    That 4 out of 5 married and had children just goes to show that you can have your cake and eat it too.

    "...we’d been let down...fend for ourselves...offering no guidance."

    Have you actually ever told women that by delaying marriage they'd hit the wall childless? I have and had venom spat in my face.

    ReplyDelete
  6. Good post (as always), Mark!

    However, I do feel I should point out that the men of this generation are not blameless. I am in my late thirties and rarely came across a man interested in marriage. I recall asking one friend a few years ago why he wouldn't settle down just yet, and he replied that he didn't feel like it and that he would in his late thirties, but with a younger woman in her twenties. He and so many others simply were not willing to relinquish their lifestyle until the last minute, and then they would find a younger mate and ignore their own generation of women (as they generally can, as women often prefer older men).

    I have plenty of female friends who have always wanted to marry and have children (and been willing to sacrifice their careers). Some of them, very attractive women, have been ridiculed by men for being "maternal" and "clucky".

    My take on this is that both 'good girls' and 'good boys' have been let down by society.

    ReplyDelete
  7. Alte here. I think two of my posts are stuck in moderation.

    ReplyDelete
  8. It's a numbers game. It takes time and effort to go through the number of guys required to find that right one.

    I made a list of every guy I've liked, dated, talked to for an evening and got asked out or rejected (and didn't want to get rejected) etc etc from age 18 up and I'm like at 40. It's very frustrating!!! Especially when most people are like marrying the 1st 2nd or 3rd person they ever dated.

    I think some people do genuinely get unlucky?

    ReplyDelete
  9. Alte, there is no moderation. The comments should have appeared. I wonder if the blogger comments system is playing up.

    ReplyDelete
  10. Anon:
    "It's a numbers game. It takes time and effort to go through the number of guys required to find that right one.

    I made a list of every guy I've liked, dated, talked to for an evening and got asked out or rejected (and didn't want to get rejected) etc etc from age 18 up and I'm like at 40. It's very frustrating!!! Especially when most people are like marrying the 1st 2nd or 3rd person they ever dated.

    I think some people do genuinely get unlucky?"

    Hilarious. This is exactly the attitude that leaves women single and childless. There is no numbers game, and the successful marriages are the "most people are like marrying the 1st 2nd or 3rd person they ever dated" ones.

    ReplyDelete
  11. I don't have very much sympathy for the women in this post. I am the same age (born in 1969) and from the start I knew that what I most wanted to do was marry and have children.

    When I was about 21 a 30yo woman asked me what I wanted to do with my life. I was studying engineering, so she wasn't really asking about my career I don't think. I told her "to marry and have kids."

    "Don't you have more ambition?" she asked.

    "No" I replied, somewhat amused since the increasing divorce rate made it look to me like an ambitious project to marry and remain married until death, keeping an intact family.

    We all make choices.

    What was interesting though is that I would happily have married at 18 and my 23 yo boyfriend at the time was very suitable, being a family-oriented and good bloke with a good job etc. For whatever reason, he ditched me in favour of the woman who he married only a year or so later. They have 4 girls I think. I bear him no ill-will, but my point is simply this - I was willing to marry any good man who would have me and though I'm not the most beautiful woman, I'm pleasant enough (more so when I was young of course). The woman my ex-BF married is much the same - pleasant looking but not extremely beautiful. She is a good woman though.

    Nevertheless, it was impossible to find a man who would take me on until my husband came along and had the courage! It's possible I have some deep flaws which made me most unattractive to the average male, but judging by the lack of men in my circle who were married before me, I don't think there were very many family-oriented men in my circles (either in Church or at uni etc).

    I assume they existed, on the basis that men here claim they did, but I'm a bit skeptical that they were in the majority or even anything like it. I don't think young people of either sex were encouraged to marry etc. There were over 20 or even 30 young men I would gladly have settled down with from the time I was 18 until 25, but only my husband showed any signs of any real interest - for which I am very grateful! (I ought to point out too that although offers of marriage were very few - one only, in fact - there were many offers of casual sex). I don't think I was *very* picky, do you?

    I'm not sure society in general has encouraged marriage in young men very much even over the last 100 years.

    There is definitely a double standard which really does grate too. It has generally been assumed that young men would sow their oats, but young women ought to be chaste. Unless the young men are sodomising each other, then, it strikes me as odd that this double standard exists. After all, it's hardly fair to expect that the daughters of other men should provide practice for your son, nudge nudge wink wink - to the girls' ultimate loss and shame.

    The virtue of chastity is highly to be valued in both sexes, imo, and when it isn't, lots of dire consequences are on the cards for everyone really.

    ReplyDelete
  12. A woman's physical peak is from 14 to 25. I think "nature" intended her to produce most of her children in that age range. I really think waiting until her 20s for marriage is too long. Perhaps 18 is a good compromise. Men should be about 10 years older.

    ReplyDelete
  13. 18 to 25 is a good age range. Younger than that and she's too immature or uneducated to make a good wife, older than that and her fertility is starting to decline.

    ReplyDelete
  14. It's true that many men under 30 are not interested at all in marriage.

    There are many reasons for this. One is certainly the predominant culture of casual sex. If, say, 50% of young women are offering casual sex at early stages in relationships (or outside of relationships altogether), that pretty much ruins the market for the rest of the women who want to avoid that. It also ruins the market for the young men who are not engaging in casual sex as well, most of the time due to lack of access to it.

    The issue is how to create an alternative meeting market for young men and women who are interested in not engaging in the casual sex market which dominates the main meeting markets for young people. That's the difficult thing, for men and women alike.

    However, it is still a larger issue for women than it is for men, because of the fertility clock. Men also have decreasing fertility, but not as early and not as precipitously. It's quite possible for a man to wait until he's 35 or even 40 to get married and marry a woman of around 30 and have a couple of kids. Women can't really very easily do the same thing in reverse if they really want kids. That seems unfair, but it's one of the biological differences in play here and really can't be helped. In a very real sense, men can "afford" to bypass mating in the 20s and early 30s more than women can -- as much as that makes women angry.

    ReplyDelete
  15. 18 is a compromise age for marriage? Please. I mean conservatives have to be sensible if we want to have a social impact. Most eighteen year olds in this day and age are jerk offs. Do you think having them get married will seriously change that?

    On the point about chastity for men it is an interesting one. The assumption has always been that men's sex drive was higher with the consequence that men would be chaffing at the bit while women could take it or leave it.

    If you want a guy to be able to "handle himself" as a guy, be a leader, be able to assert himself and take care of a woman he has to have the confidence, so to speak, of operating in the presence of women without becoming a quivering jelly, which it seems is a likely outcome of chastity.

    Sleeping around isn't entirely the issue anyway, its the respect or otherwise for the other party which primarily matters. If you see the other person as merely a means of getting off then your relationship will be affected and your behavior will reflect a lack of commitment.

    ReplyDelete
  16. We're in an interesting situation where both women (and men arguably) are more sexed. But highly sexed women aren't that attractive to men because its an aggressive trait and less feminine. Promoting chastity as a solution for men though has the potential to undermine their hunter seeker competitive urge and leave them as drones.

    ReplyDelete
  17. Even though women may be waking up to the mistaken ideology of their generation, I think a significant improvement is unlikely while so much emphasis is on the end result. I think both men and women are focussing too much on career vs marriage vs single lifestyle vs family. Both sexes need to re-learn masculinity and femininity. There is no use men deciding they want to settle in their late twenties if they still lack the competency which Jesse has alluded to, and it's no use women being more maternal and family-oriented if they still try to wear the trousers in the family. The change needs to be fundamental, not needs-driven.

    ReplyDelete
  18. What changed? “I got real. I always thought I wanted an exotic man who would open up a whole new kind of life for me. But then, having lived abroad, I realised I had the life I wanted already. So I found a nice man who wanted kids — the kind I had always avoided before — and it all worked out. Hooray.” Now, aged 44, she has two children.

    Wow, what a catch for the guy! After a lifetime of this woman getting split open by jocks, now the dumb chump who was likely the butt of her jokes and mockery when she was in her prime gets the prize I’m sure he always dreamed of: fourth-hand stale goods. Marrying a woman like this is like driving a Trabant freshly pulled from a DDR scrap heap.

    When I look at the women I know who at 40 are single and childless and don’t want to be, my heart aches for them.

    Mine. Does. Not. I am waaaay past the point of sympathy. Seriously, I’m in my mid thirties, and thankfully, as a bloke, I won’t experience the same hormonal rollercoaster ride that is part and parcel for these Hear-Me-Roar harpies. It is profoundly offensive that a woman can expect to have the best of both worlds: that she can be looser than my shirt collar in her prime, and then fraudulently pass herself off in her desperate dotage. Screw you. You made your choice. Now live with it. I know I had to live with your choices, so you get no sympathy for your misery now. Two words: Sucked. In.

    My friends and I just assumed the right man would appear at some point.

    Ha! The only assumption you made that was correct. Unfortunately, he was never convenient enough for you – now you burn for his return. This is delicious. Really, I love reading about the misery of 60s radicals. This is better than sex. Oh, by the way, thanks for liberalising the sex market honey – I don’t need a wife to get some. Marvellous move on your part. LOL!

    ReplyDelete
  19. I do feel I should point out that the men of this generation are not blameless. I am in my late thirties and rarely came across a man interested in marriage. I recall asking one friend a few years ago why he wouldn't settle down just yet, and he replied that he didn't feel like it

    Like I said in my last post, “Oh, by the way, thanks for liberalising the sex market honey – I don’t need a wife to get some. Marvellous move on your part. LOL!”

    Simply put: I don’t need a wife to satisfy my hormonal urges anymore. Moreover, the kind of women this world is filled with has inclined me strongly to not want to marry any of them. The odds are, quite frankly, stacked against us men and in the favour of women: right from the moment of proposal, to the moment of property settlement, which is more likely than not. Why on Earth would I want to commit to that? Yes, I did spend a great deal of time wanting a family when I was in my 20s, but now I realise that on balance, it’s just not in my interest anymore. I’ve rationalised that dream away, which was painful at first, but the more I see of women in our culture, the more it becomes obvious to me that the choice I mad was correct.

    I have plenty of female friends who have always wanted to marry and have children (and been willing to sacrifice their careers). Some of them, very attractive women, have been ridiculed by men for being "maternal" and "clucky".

    Bullshit Alert!!! Bullshit Alert!!! Bullshit Alert!!!

    In my entire life, I have never, ever, ever heard a man pejoratively use the word “clucky” to describe a woman, and I know plenty of men, some of whom share my unflattering views about modern women. On the other hand, I have indeed heard women use such terms to describe their colleagues at work who’ve had to go on leave due to pregnancy. No, anti-natal forces do not emanate from men, but from the childlike utopian naïveté of “liberated” women of today.

    I made a list of every guy I've [blagh blagh] etc etc from age 18 up and I'm like at 40. It's very frustrating!!!

    Typical. If we’re not open wallets, we’re a generic commodity. Drafting lists? Gee, it’s a mystery why men run for the hills at the sight of you.

    It has generally been assumed that young men would sow their oats, but young women ought to be chaste. Unless the young men are sodomising each other, then, it strikes me as odd that this double standard exists. After all, it's hardly fair to expect that the daughters of other men should provide practice for your son, nudge nudge wink wink - to the girls' ultimate loss and shame. The virtue of chastity is highly to be valued in both sexes, imo, and when it isn't, lots of dire consequences are on the cards for everyone really.

    I lost my virginity at the age of 32. That is because I believed in all this romantic, chastity nonsense. I pined for girls and was a typical Beta in my teens and 20s, followed all The Rules. I know now that women are inherently liars and not to be trusted. At all. What the hell was I pining for? I’ll tell you what, a myth. This is all bunk.

    18 to 25 is a good age range. Younger than that and she's too immature or uneducated to make a good wife, older than that and her fertility is starting to decline.

    A young wife would not be a problem if female culture accepted male authority. It doesn’t. And modern men have abdicated their positions of leadership in society. (I believe Richardson was trying to coin the phrase sitzpinkler some time ago)

    ReplyDelete
  20. I have plenty of female friends who have always wanted to marry and have children (and been willing to sacrifice their careers).

    Hehehehe... I can't enough of that quote... women... who are willing to "sacrifice their careers" for family today. How very amusing. Hehehe.

    ReplyDelete
  21. Henry K, I'm sorry you're so bitter, but the fact is that there are definitely women out there of my generation (i.e. currently in their late thirties) who have always wanted to marry and have a family and been willing to put their career second to that desire for a traditional role. I have also heard men dismiss women for being too oriented towards finding a husband. If you want to dispute that, then you'll have to call me a liar. Oh, but then you think all women are liars, don't you?!

    The one thing I'll definitely agree with you about, though, is that the general promiscuity of women has left these 'good girls' out in the cold because men can get what they want elsewhere for less effort/ commitment. There are women out there who aren't liars, who don't sleep around, who value men who are men, and who genuinely are committed to an old-fashioned marriage and family. They even have quaint ideas like that men are stronger than women and should head up the family. I happen to be one of them: married in my early thirties (at the first opportunity), gave up a very promising career and earnings in the six figures (which my husband is never likely to earn), and am a stay-at-home mother. We do exist, Henry K, but I don't think any of us would be interested in someone as misogynist as you. (I'm anti-feminist, btw, and think that misogynist men are pretty rare and therefore use the term carefully.)

    ReplyDelete
  22. A female teacher friend once remarked to me in her twenties, "I wouldn't marry a garbage truck driver!" when I asked her what she was looking for in mate.

    Now in her mid 30s she'd be lucky if she could get one.

    ReplyDelete
  23. Old Hat

    No offense but you have no idea what guys go through. The difference between 'good' girls and promiscuous girls is infinitesimal. They both want the same thing, that which they can't have.

    Any girl can marry, the only question is for how much will they settle.

    ReplyDelete
  24. I'm female and in my early 50s. I think that the people in their 20s now will not only make better decisions based on having been raised by the messed-up boomers (my generation) but they will in some ways have better options.

    If you home school, you don't need to pay top-dollar to be in a "good" school district. And once you are a stay-at-home mom, a third or fourth child really doesn't cost that much to raise.

    I married as a teenager the first guy I ever dated. He NEVER shut up the women who preceded me. His fantasy was to find the woman who would embody all of the best qualities of all the women he had ever known. The 1970s culture of promiscuity didn't just mess up the girls, it messed up the boys as well.

    ReplyDelete
  25. Henry K, but I don't think any of us would be interested in someone as misogynist as you.

    Sweatheart, I’m not interested in whether they or you are interested. I myself no longer am, so that is just an irrelevant consideration. There was a time when I was interested, when I danced to your tune, but during which I was played like a cheep banjo. I learned from experience. If there are women out there who are genuine, and statistically there must be, I concede that, the population is so negligible that it’s just not worth the time and money invested in finding them. The cash I forked out courting entitlement princesses and other parasites of the fairer sex is enough for more than a healthy deposit on a house. If you believe that realising this makes me a misogynist, boo-freaking-hoo-to-you. I learned that lesson at the hands of your sisters, who, precedent informs me, are liars. Sorry to hurt your feelings.

    Actually, no, I aint sorry at all. Suck it.

    ReplyDelete
  26. It was the British immigration system that got me married at 24 - it said my fiancee had to marry within 6 months of coming here or she'd be deported! I think it worked out very well, it gave us the impetus to marry while we were young and in love, thus creating a solid bedrock for the future. However there was no such impetus towards procreation, my wife put off children for career development, and it was over ten years later our one child was born, with some difficulty. And with us middle-aged and ever-tired, child rearing has been extremely tough.

    My advice to my son is going to be: do get married in your early-mid '20s, to a young woman who wants a large family, and don't put off having children while you're young and fit.

    ReplyDelete
  27. Promoting chastity as a solution for men though has the potential to undermine their hunter seeker competitive urge and leave them as drones.

    Chastitiy is a virtue and means being pure of heart, primarily. It means, among other things that a man or woman will not look at another human being merely as an object of desire. Chastity does not mean the negation of sexual desire or the eradication of it. It means the controlling of it and the channelling of that energy into creative and constructive things. It means, ultimately, the respect for self and basic respect for others (based upon their humanity). It in no way demasculates men. On the contrary, it makes them real men. Their sexual energy can be channelled into all kinds of masculine activites.

    ReplyDelete
  28. If there are women out there who are genuine, and statistically there must be, I concede that, the population is so negligible that it’s just not worth the time and money invested in finding them.

    If anybody wants to see how many early feminists thought just before they launched their hell-spawned movement, just take a look at this.

    I fear that men will try to fight the feminist fire with a similar conflagration. Then, we will all burn.

    ReplyDelete
  29. Henry K, I think it's a real shame that you've met such money-grubbing women and that it's made you so bitter. The men I've come across on the dating scene were mostly pitiful feminists who expected a woman to pay her own way - I never had money splashed around on me, and nor did my female friends.

    Niko, I do realise how badly men have been treated. My husband and I discuss it frequently, and the fact that I read this blog should suggest to you that I do. Likewise, I think you need to realise that both sexes have suffered under feminism. The women I know haven't been able to "settle" for less because they never had that high expectations in the first place. The one thing missing, though, was men who weren't passive. One girl told me "If you want to go out with a guy in [name of city], then you'll have to knock him on the head and drag him back to your cave - guys here do not ask girls out!" Is it really asking so much of a guy that he make the first move??? Some of us just wanted a man who was a man, but they were few and far between... and that is part of the problem - men have swallowed feminism in almost the same numbers as women. And, as Johnathan Wolfe points out, if men just enter into a blame game then there's little hope for the future.

    ReplyDelete
  30. Is it really asking so much of a guy that he make the first move???

    Funny you should write this, as I've been thinking about the same issue.

    When I think back to my mid-20s when I was looking to find a woman to marry, the problem was not only that many of the most attractive women had deferred marriage for a single girl lifestyle and so were not selecting family type men.

    Another problem was that there were numbers of "girl next door" types who weren't very self-expressive.

    It was the height of grunge and there were lots of young women who dressed in a very plain, masculine style (boots, jeans, windcheater) with no feminine touches and who were very passive in their personalities.

    I tried to be open-minded toward such women but they never really gave me a "hook" - something that might pique my interest in them. I found them a bit boring.

    When I think back now I wonder if these women (just like me) were caught in the transition from a romance based culture.

    In a romance based culture, women are likely to at least attempt to dress and act according to an ideal of feminine beauty and goodness.

    But a feminist culture had rejected that as oppressive. Instead, women for a moment in history acted against these romantic ideals - and so dressed in a mannish and non-feminine style.

    So that particular "hook" was lost. The new "hook" was a more overt sexuality - but I'm guessing that lots of women were either not confident enough to carry through with this or just not suited in their personality.

    Maybe they still carried with them part of the romantic fantasy, that a man would appear, see through to the real them, and rescue them - like a princess waiting in a castle tower for the prince to arrive.

    Perhaps this works to a degree when men are self-confident enough to make cold approaches to women. But that wasn't me back then. Not only did I need a less mannish version of womanhood to get me interested, I probably also needed a little sign of encouragement - a flirtation of some sort - like a smile or a twirl of the hair.

    The reason for writing all this? I think parents need to take back some of the initiative in how they prepare their children for courtship. Young people aren't necessarily going to get it right, particularly when the cues they get from the mainstream culture are often so harmful.

    It's not enough for women to be passively good. They need to learn to express feminine charm. And perhaps young men have to be encouraged in their self-confidence in approaching women - to back themselves and to be resilient if rejected.

    ReplyDelete
  31. Agreed, Mark. I also found it interesting that when I moved to the States to live there were suddenly less problems. I found American girls were more aware of how to present themselves without seeming desperate and that American guys were much more confident in asking a girl out without first being introduced. My experience in Australia was that the women (who weren't super confident) did dress in a feminine manner but were very wary of men wanting just sex and /or seeming desperate and therefore didn't like to be too friendly... and that the men who were decent were too scared of coming across as male chauvinist rakes only interested in sex and/or desperate for a relationship with nothing else in their lives. A sad era of miscommunication, perhaps?

    ReplyDelete
  32. Fantastic great post Mark!!!

    In fact, if you want to expound more on that post please do. Cuz I would like to hear it.

    When I was in college I did dress up a bit more and even got a few dirty looks from women but it didn't really help, but I think it was situational.

    I do think that women need to dress better and I personally am trying to make a better impression (but it's hard especially when you live in jean and t-shirt culture.) In fact, me and my mother were picking out dresses but I said "where would I wear these things???? The grocery store?"

    I watch Bewitched all the time and sigh over what Samantha used to wear lol.

    But is it just dressing? Is there more to it than dressing?

    Men feel free to expound. I want to hear.

    ReplyDelete
  33. Is there more to it than dressing?

    Definitely. I think I was unlucky to be looking on campus at the height of both grunge fashion and third-wave feminism in the mid-90s. The girls really did dress in an unfeminine way - short hair, no jewellery of any sort, mannish clothes.

    I sympathise when you look at the beautiful clothes available to women but wonder at the opportunity to wear them. It's a little bit the same with me and suits. My wife is always appreciative when I wear a suit but there's so little opportunity for formal wear in modern life. At my workplace the men wear jeans and t-shirts - making me look dressy in my shirts with collars and more formal pants. There's no way I could wear a suit at work. Even at the church I attend there's a very casual standard of attire.

    I don't think you necessarily have to dress as impressively as Sam from Bewitched anyway. You just have to have a feminine touch that a man will notice favourably. Even if you're wearing jeans you could still have your hair done nicely, or wear a bracelet or earrings, or just a little makeup.

    Men notice too the way a woman walks and moves. There's a difference between a woman who walks in a heavy, masculine way and one who has a lighter, more feminine and more graceful way of moving.

    A woman's smile and laugh and vivacity can also greatly impress men. So too can little signs of needing a man's masculine protectiveness (but being overly helpless can scare men).

    Just as a man has to back himself, so too do women. Don't be made withdrawn and unexpressive by whatever imperfections you have. Try to be engaging, have fun/enjoy yourself in social settings and be at least a little more feminine than the other women you're up against.

    ReplyDelete
  34. "A woman's smile and laugh and vivacity can also greatly impress men. So too can little signs of needing a man's masculine protectiveness (but being overly helpless can scare men)."

    Are these qualities for sensible child rearing? Whilst these superficial things may attract people, they are not a basis for a rletionship.

    ReplyDelete
  35. That's true, but there does need to be attraction for a relationship of any kind to start and to last.

    One of the traps we sometimes let ourselves fall into is the trap of juxtaposing (1) masculine/feminine attractiveness against (2) suitable character for being a long term wife/husband, mother/father. They're not opposites or trade-offs *unless* what you find attractive in the sense of (1) is either the bad boy type (for women) or the Ho type (for men). When we write "down" the need for men and women alike to be with someone they are attracted to as being "superficial", we're kind of setting relationships up for failure, really. Human attraction isn't superficial -- it's just human. It's a key part of initiating and maintaining a relationship over time.

    To get back to what Mark wrote, I don't think he was suggesting that attractive women are the ones who behave like Hos or dress like sluts. Instead, he was describing a kind of femininity which is subtle yet clearly expressed, and not inconsistent at all with the kinds of qualities that would make for a good mate. Similarly, for men, if you act like a player you will have a higher batting average at the bar (and attract women for casual sex), but you can instead exude a different kind of masculine appeal which is more easily paired with responsibility and the kinds of qualities important in a long-term mate.

    This is a both/and type of thing, and not an either/or type of thing, I think.

    ReplyDelete
  36. Mark Richardson:
    My wife is always appreciative when I wear a suit but there's so little opportunity for formal wear in modern life. At my workplace the men wear jeans and t-shirts - making me look dressy in my shirts with collars and more formal pants. There's no way I could wear a suit at work. Even at the church I attend there's a very casual standard of attire.

    There used to be a standard at many workplaces that if a man wanted to get ahead, one thing to do was to dress "one level up", i.e. dress like his supervisor. Looking like someone of authority gives cues...

    My church has gone casual as well. I don't care, I still dress properly. A few other men are becoming a bit less slovenly, don't know if it's me or not.

    People are willing to dress up for a party. But not to go to a house of worship. So their priority is clear.

    Be an example of sober, seriousness about your worship, and some others may be led to do the same.

    ReplyDelete
  37. Re dressing up - I'd dress better if it weren't for the ironing. I hate ironing shirts, I'm bad at it, and my wife refuses to do any for me bunless it's for a job interview (so none in the past 5-6 years). I guess this is a moral failing but it's not one I can overcome.

    ReplyDelete
  38. My husband wears wrinkle-free shirts. If you don't spin them at a high rate, and hang them right up after washing, you truly don't have to iron them.

    I usually wear dresses, but one must select them carefully. They have to fit well and be make of a hardier material, if you want to wear them around the house or "at the grocers".

    ReplyDelete
  39. Alte2:
    "My husband wears wrinkle-free shirts. If you don't spin them at a high rate, and hang them right up after washing, you truly don't have to iron them."

    I have one Eddie Bauer wrinkle-free shirt - it does ok, except for the collar which still needs ironing to look decent. Most of my shirts were bought by my mother (a fantastic ironer) though, often Ralph Lauren, they need proper ironing and tend to hang unused in my cupboard, *sigh*

    ReplyDelete
  40. I fear that men will try to fight the feminist fire with a similar conflagration.

    True. Thing is, once you’re thrown into a creek, you got to start paddling. I don’t like this creek, but hey, I’m in it. What the heck else do you expect?

    guys here do not ask girls out

    Why should we? Really? Think about it… what’s the incentive for a bloke today to get involved seriously with a woman? I can’t find one. You can get sex anywhere. Marriage, in the context of today’s laws etc, is a total liability for the bloke. Who in their right minds would bother throwing themselves up to the risk of being with a woman in this climate?

    if men just enter into a blame game then there's little hope for the future

    Men are the ones that get all the blame. Don’t even try telling me otherwise. It permeates the culture from the surface right down to the core of the bone. It just gives me the shits that we have to be the ones to grit our teeth and bear it. Bugger that. It wasn’t us who initiated this and somebody’s at fault. I can’t see anything improving until there is a mass movement of women who have voluntarily accepted blame at the same rate as there was a mass movement of women who once denounced men categorically. A mass movement, not just a few female readers of blogs like this one.

    ReplyDelete
  41. What about the homeschooling movement? There's definitely a lot of hope brewing there.

    The good news is, I suppose, that the "better" women are the ones with the highest birth rate. So things will improve eventually, on their own.

    ReplyDelete
  42. My advice to my son is going to be: do get married in your early-mid '20s, to a young woman who wants a large family, and don't put off having children while you're young and fit.

    Better advice: tell him to get married in his mid-30s to a woman in her mid-late 20s.

    I had two kids in my 40s and I wasn't "too old and unfit" to handle it.

    ReplyDelete
  43. Even better advice: don’t marry and don’t have kids. Give the modern woman the husband she deserves: none. Keep you cash and enjoy life. In this day and age, women are a net liability. The advice given by others on this list works in a bygone era, or another planet.

    ReplyDelete
  44. True. Thing is, once you’re thrown into a creek, you got to start paddling. I don’t like this creek, but hey, I’m in it. What the heck else do you expect?

    Get out of the creek then.

    It just gives me the shits that we have to be the ones to grit our teeth and bear it. Bugger that.

    We were also the ones who were constantly sent off to die in battle and the ones sent off to work in foreign fields. Our lot will always be somewhat shitty, but we've always been proud of the fact that we're the ones who are capable of wading through it all. Instead of constantly tagging all women with the same bitch-whore brush, why don't you do something about your lot and actually try to meet good women? For crying out loud, your doing the same thing the feminists are doing won't solve any of your problems.

    What did Cartman (South Park) say about Chatroullete? You have to wade through a sea of dicks to find a good friend. And you know what, the good friend is worth it.

    But in your case, you'd probably denounce the concept of friendship after the first few dicks.

    Keep you cash and enjoy life. In this day and age, women are a net liability. The advice given by others on this list works in a bygone era, or another planet.

    Yeah, let's all sing and spend our way to extinction. This sort of nihilism is for those who are already dead before they drop.

    Better advice, bring what was best of the bygone era back. Even in little bits. The culture is in need of transformation; one does not have to accept it as it is.

    ReplyDelete
  45. Get out of the creek then.

    What a naïve and ignorant thing to say. The creek is the dominant ideology of contemporary society. You want me to find a girl living as a hermit? LOL

    why don't you do something about your lot and actually try to meet good women?

    Clearly you haven’t read my entire posts. I am in my mid thirties and have only recently (i.e. over the last couple of years) realised that all this is bunk. I’m over women. Any man who actually comites to a woman today is a schmuck.

    What did Cartman (South Park) say about Chatroullete?

    WTF? You’re actually appealing to a cartoon? And “South Park” no less?! LOL!

    Yeah, let's all sing and spend our way to extinction. This sort of nihilism is for those who are already dead before they drop.

    You assume that I value an interest in future society. I don’t. I don’t want to bring children into a world where they will be trapped between having to deal with the bitches of radical feminism on one hand and shariah on the other. Women mean nothing to me now, except for the occasional sex I get from them. I have adapted to their world. My needs are met. Thank you.

    ReplyDelete
  46. It's cheaper for men to pay $500 every now and then for a root with a hot magazine-cover standard model/high end escort than to attempt a romantic relationship with the attendant risk of divorce, accusations of domestic violence etc.

    In monetary terms its much cheaper I bet.

    ReplyDelete
  47. Even better advice: don’t marry and don’t have kids. Give the modern woman the husband she deserves: none. Keep you cash and enjoy life. In this day and age, women are a net liability. The advice given by others on this list works in a bygone era, or another planet.

    I have kids and they are a source of great pride, joy, and satisfaction. Yeah, they're a lot of hard work, too, but worth it. If you've given up on yourself, your country, and your race, do so in silence, and quit demoralizing everyone else.

    ReplyDelete
  48. anon:
    "Better advice: tell him to get married in his mid-30s to a woman in her mid-late 20s.

    I had two kids in my 40s and I wasn't "too old and unfit" to handle it."

    I've seen men get married in their mid 30s or later, it rarely seems to work out well. Plus I want at least 4 grandchildren.

    ReplyDelete
  49. I've seen men get married in their mid 30s or later, it rarely seems to work out well.

    Well, I am proof positive that it does, so there.

    There is a much better case for arguing that marriages of people in their 20s don't work out well.

    Plus I want at least 4 grandchildren.

    So? Marrying in your mid-30s doesn't prevent that.

    ReplyDelete
  50. I have kids and they are a source of great pride, joy, and satisfaction. Yeah, they're a lot of hard work, too, but worth it. If you've given up on yourself, your country, and your race, do so in silence, and quit demoralizing everyone else.

    That's well put. Henry, I understand how you've come to your current state of mind. I was similarly unimpressed with the state of womanhood when I was dating in my 20s. But I stubbornly kept at it, met my wife and now have a couple of kids. Having kids is a high input/high output arrangement - i.e. you put in a lot of work but you get a lot of satisfaction out of it. Like most people I have no regrets making a commitment to being a father.

    Better advice: tell him to get married in his mid-30s to a woman in her mid-late 20s

    It's not that this can't work out, but it's hardly ideal. I married in my mid-30s but I do regret not having shared my youth together with my wife - and I know that she has the same regrets. I regret too that I'll be a much older and less active grandfather by the time my grandchildren come around.

    It's true that the divorce rate is much higher if you marry in your teens. But it declines significantly from the early 20s. Personally I think the mid-20s is probably the ideal time for men to marry. You should be settling into a career by then and your adult personality should be formed.

    ReplyDelete
  51. Mark R:
    "It's true that the divorce rate is much higher if you marry in your teens. But it declines significantly from the early 20s. Personally I think the mid-20s is probably the ideal time for men to marry. You should be settling into a career by then and your adult personality should be formed."

    Marrying at 24 seemed to suit me well, even though it was nearly 3 years later that I completed my PhD and got my first professional job - would have finished a bit quicker if we hadn't moved away from my University to prioritise my wife's career.

    But like I said, I do regret that we didn't have a child for 10 years after marrying. It meant we got to have a pretty cool social life for several years once we were here in London, but that was never a big priority for me. My wife wanted to get well established in her career before reproducing, but I think it was too long. Most of all, it would have been good to have children while I was still 100% healthy; as it is I can't carry my son on my shoulders because my right shoulder is buggered up now by twisted pelvis/spine, which problem started in late 2000, 3 1/2 years or so after we married.

    ReplyDelete
  52. If you've given up on yourself, your country, and your race, do so in silence, and quit demoralizing everyone else.

    I haven’t given up on myself. I’ve given up on women. Why should I be silent while your right to asinine pontificating about the values of being involved with women goes unquestioned? Idiot.

    ReplyDelete
  53. asinine pontificating

    It's not asinine. If Western men give up on their women and fail to marry and reproduce then the whole tradition is sunk.

    I was very angry with feminism in my 20s. But I decided the best revenge would be to marry and have children and enjoy a traditional family life and, in the longer term, to work to build up a political opposition to feminism (so that my son doesn't have to go through what I went through).

    That's what I've done. It's still possible to achieve a good marriage, though it requires a man to judge a woman's disposition to family life well and to maintain a strong position within the family.

    Nor am I exceptional. Most of the families in the neighbourhood are just like ours. There's a whole suburb of us. So far, of the couple of dozen couples we've met, we know of no divorces.

    The tradition may still be lost of course. But at least we're giving it a chance.

    ReplyDelete
  54. I haven’t given up on myself. I’ve given up on women.

    LMAO! Sorry, chief, but a man who says he has given up on women is saying nothing else but that he has given up on himself - specifically, on his ability to attract and retain a decent, attractive woman.

    Why should I be silent while your right to asinine pontificating about the values of being involved with women goes unquestioned?

    Because your masochistic nihilism adds nothing to the discussion and serves only to discourage men who have not given up on themselves, their race, and their country.

    ReplyDelete
  55. There's no doubt that many women were 'duped' by Feminism into waiting to have kids and a family until it's too late.

    That is, if by 'duped' they mean they actually believed they could do whatever they want, demonize and use men to their hearts desire, take all the good jobs and education they can away from men in the form of quotas, belittle every aspect of masculinity, drive men out of the family, and skew the law to the point where there is literally NO benefit to marriage for men, and incredible risk...and would STILL have men line up for them once they were done having kids with the local biker club...

    It's sickening behaviour, and there's no way women would put up with behaviour from men that is similarly disgusting to them (women typically LIKE the philanderer, so a direct comparison is invalid).

    I'm not exactly lacking in attention from the female sex - in fact I'm one of those men you have to 'hit over the head' before I even know a woman is interested, yet I get lots of opportunity...

    And yet I can't find women that are in ANY way interesting except in bed. And this is, 100% COMPLETELY the fault of Feminism and women in general.

    Feminists and women have literally reduced the value of the typical woman to that of her vagina.

    Not men, women.

    Simultaneously men have had nearly every single benefit to marriage taken away.

    Assurance the child is his? He's a Bastard for even asking.

    Fidelity? It's an outmoded concept that belongs to 'Teh Patriarchy'.

    Security knowing you have a partner to help with the 'thin' as well as share in the 'thick'? When things get thin, she leaves, takes what's left, and gets some 'thick' from the next guy...and ex-hubby gets to pay for it all.

    There is not one single aspect of Marriage that has not been completely gutted of value for men, by Feminists.

    Not a single one.

    Maybe all these women who 'realized' Feminism was all about female entitlement only AFTER they were no longer benefiting so much from it just might want to step up and help the men they've been exploiting all their lives...

    But so far, all I see is more complaining that men won't 'man up'.

    To that, I give a hearty 'screw you' to every Feminist alive, and to my generation of women (I'm 40) I say:

    You remember when you were doing the older men cause they were great in bed compared to men your own age?

    Well, 20 year olds sure are nicer to sleep with than you guys are.... Karma is a bitch hey?

    Stew in it, wither up, and blow away.

    ReplyDelete