These specialists denied that women were deferring motherhood in order to pursue other ambitions. Their evidence was not very strong, but it was interesting. They drew on some research into attitudes toward motherhood amongst women aged 30 to 34.
The research showed that nearly all women want to have children:
We found that almost all the women we interviewed wanted to have children. Only 20 (less than 4 per cent) had decided they definitely did not want to have children.
However, a very large percentage of women aged 30 to 34 did not have the number of children they wanted:
However, many of the women (80 per cent) had fewer children than they desired. The women were still of reproductive age but when asked if they were likely to have children in the future, more than half (54 per cent) said this was unlikely because of circumstances often beyond their control.
What was stopping them? Mostly the lack of a husband:
Those who did not have a child said the main reason was not having a partner, or being unable to find a partner willing to commit to fatherhood. Very few women wanted to have a child while single.
The conclusion of the researchers is that:
Our research suggests that the selfish, career-focused woman who chooses not to have children or delays childbearing is a myth.
But that's not a logical conclusion to draw. No-one doubts that once women get into their 30s that they want to get married and have children. The issue is what women are choosing to do in their prime childbearing years in their 20s. Are women in their 20s taking motherhood and family formation seriously? Are they selecting men for being good husband material?
What do the female specialists recommend to fix the situation? They want men to be educated about the dangers to female fertility of delayed motherhood:
education for men about female fertility and the risks to their partner's health of postponing childbearing.
But that leaves out the first part of the problem, namely women finding a willing husband. So the question is what can be done to help these women find a family oriented man to marry. And that requires women to think through the reasons why there might be a shortage of such men, including the following:
- Do women in their 20s respect the more family oriented men? Do they pay attention to these men?
- Do women defer a serious consideration of marriage and children until the age of 30? If so, aren't they habituating men to a bachelor lifestyle?
- Is there a distinctive and respected role for men in the family as husbands and fathers?
- Are divorce rates too high? Are young men likely to fear the ease with which a woman might use divorce laws to remove them from the family whilst keeping them to their financial obligations?
We can't live forever on the social capital of the past. When men were raised to have some pride in masculinity; when they were given an honoured and responsible place as husbands and fathers within a family; when they had a tradition of their own to perpetuate; and when they were rewarded emotionally and physically within marriage - that's when a culture of marriage was likely to flourish amongst men.
The current culture is too emasculating and rewards men for being players rather than fathers. It's inevitable that some men will become demoralised and fall into a more self-oriented lifestyle, leaving women more vulnerable to remaining single in their 30s.
This issue isn't going to go away. Nor will it be fixed by a simple educational message. A more promising option is for groups of people to start self-consciously modeling a different set of values, in which the conditions for a healthy family life are better understood and respected.
Very good article (by that I mean post).
ReplyDeleteYour points seem bizarely obvious. If a guy said "I want a hot stunna" would anyone be sympathetic to an attitude form him where he expected it to just fall into his lap? No he'd have to start working. Why should men just arrive when women want them or because they want them? Why don't you make yourself appealing, not just physically, to men and I'm sure you'll get married.
ReplyDeleteJesse, thanks.
ReplyDeleteI thought this comment from the article in The Age was good:
I am in my late 30's and have just had a baby and I can observe in myself that it is a bit unnatural to be having a baby at the end of the fertile period in my life. I wonder if we haven't lost site of nature - I became fertile at 13. I don't think women should blame men about not wanting to be in relationships to have children. It is an elaborate mating dance that goes on too long - it might be good for women to be honest and say - I don't want to be in a relationship that won't sustain children and family. It would change the dynamic - sounds old fashioned doesn't it. It just looks like the years of changing partners, attracting new partners etc etc is for a specific purpose that isn't being fulfilled.
There's a tie in here:
ReplyDeletehttp://www.smh.com.au/lifestyle/celebrity/anna-faris-sex-by-numbers-20111010-1lgfr.html
Do you think 20 is a lot of partners for a woman to have slept with?
I don't believe there is an acceptable or unacceptable 'number' - it will vary for each person. Broadly, I think it is healthier for the relationship to have at least 'slept around a bit' so long as it is safe and respectful. Either way, I don't think it should be gender biased - which for some dinosaurs it probably is.
Chris B | Port Melb - October 10, 2011, 11:29AM
Nuff said.
20 partners? its way too much. who would want something/someone that much used up? i would say to that person to keep getting partners like that cause it will be the only thing she will ever get . no man will take the risk of making her his wife and mother of his children , specially with the current marriage/divorce laws that we have wich are extremely bad against man . such a woman as made herself a undesirable Partner.
DeleteLets toast the dinosaurs.
ReplyDeleteBy the time many women hit 30, the men that could have provided for them in the past are either taken or off the market. At 40, it's very hard for a male to consider the commitment needed to raise a family. Women literally are disregarding the best, most productive years of men for careers or lifestyles. And unfortunately when they are ready to settle, many realize those same, yet older men are rarely going to give up their independence to work for a family. Not saying it's impossible, but women will have to work even harder to get men to agree to it.
ReplyDelete"They want men to be educated about the dangers to female fertility of delayed motherhood"
ReplyDeleteHa! Might as well warn buildings that birds might be flying into them.
the most funny thing about that sentence is the fact they think we man actually give a damn about it. do they actually think we will go " awwww poor them " lets marry them so they can have what they want .im a man not a father/ provider on demand . respect me as a man or bug off. woman should get it first.
DeleteGreat website. Heard about it, just started reading. I am an aging bachelor, going into my forties now. Everything you say rings true, methinks. Sometimes I cruise the singles websites like Plenty of Fish, and the women, all in their mid thirties to early forties, say things like, "I like to travel and be spontaneous; I'm looking for a partner in crime." Many of the women have tattoos up and down their arms reaching up their neck.
ReplyDeleteI don't really have any expectation of starting a family, for I don't know what has happened to women, they are alien to me. My parents, my grandparents and my ancestors followed a traditional catholic courtship pattern. The sad thing is my parents did everything right in raising me. I have a career, I have money, and I have never been in trouble with the law. I do not know the situation in Australia, but here in Canada, we cannot replace ourselves. If present conditions persist, we will have no choice but to open the floodgates to immigrants.
Excellent website. Let's me know I am not alone.
No Tim, you're not alone. I'm 40 and in the same predicament. Know what's funny? I eat at a local Chic-F-Let sometimes and there's a group of young ladies working there who's parents immigrated from Moldova. 4 or 5 or them I think. To say they adore me is an understatement. My parents being immigrants from Europe has something to do with it and so we share a commonality. And in their quest to try and pry info out of me, they see a man who is just as lost as they are. I guess that's why they like me. They aren't like their counterparts at all. And they realize that western culture is detrimental to them to the point they're scared and they should be.
ReplyDeleteIt’s amazing how many Modern Womyn when they are in their twenties arrogantly preach that “men do not have any right to marriage, girlfriends, sex, or even relationships” (“they are not rights, they are PRIVILEGES…”).
ReplyDeleteBut when these same self-entitled harpies reach their thirties and the ‘baby rabies’ starts hitting hard, they hypocritically and ceaselessly complain about how ‘good men’ do not want to marry them -- as if they have a ‘right’ to marriage, husbands, and families.
Well, this is the world that they have created through their own actions -- and they are welcome to it!
Bed. Made. Lie.
Me -- I joined in the 'Great Escape' from the modern marriage prison camp and have Gone My Own Way.
Good post. It applies to the educated parts of the US just as well.
ReplyDeleteMen are aware of the fertility gap. Women don't seem to be. Its simple math. Fertility tanks at 35, peaks at around the early 20's .
Ergo if they want three kids spaced 3 years apart, they'll have to start no later than 25, tops.
However unless women are willing to settle and stay settled in those twenties and stop trying to shop up to a more Alpha guy you'll probably never have as many kids as you want.
By the time women are 35 and ready to settle they are sexually much less desirable and carry so much emotional baggage that being involved with you is a hazard. The legal system is an outright menace
Men also don't want those women nearly as much and there is not one thing. legislative or otherwise that can change that part of nature.
And BTW for many men this does not apply to the wife, if she takes care of herself. You see men have blinders for the women they love and they'll see you in your prime long past its reality.
Settle for a good man before 30 , stay with him in honor and have your family. Otherwise do without. Its not complicated.
Hi Mark,
ReplyDeleteAs a very infrequent poster I thank you for your insights.
What I'm curious about is why the main stream media (msm) always approaches these and similar issues with full blinkers on and only ever look at these issues from one point of view. At best it's sloppy journalism as it's as simple as using google to find a counter view.
Is this way msm outlets are dieing a slow death? Journalistic laziness of not even getting a second opinion on an issue?
I like your idea of being a small community group that lives a traditional life-style, but is that workable? I mean you have modern laws and it would only take one bad egg to rip it apart. It's also very hard to model something that is inherintly private. (Except to your children.)
Is the answer to end no-fault divorce or at least to allow fault divorce? While that wouldn't help on the female side of things it would help to restore male faith in the system.
How would you even go about getting something like no-fault divorce on the political radar?
Anonymous:
ReplyDelete"By the time women are 35 and ready to settle they are sexually much less desirable and carry so much emotional baggage that being involved with you is a hazard..."
Women these days don't have just 'baggage' -- they have FREIGHT.
"You can't change a whore into a housewife", goes the saying. Modern Womyn have proven by their own actions that they would rather be the whores of 'romantic bad boys', thugs, and criminals, instead of being the wives of good honorable men. The most appropriate and just action is to make them live with their choice.
Our research suggests that the selfish, career-focused woman who chooses not to have children or delays childbearing is a myth.
ReplyDeleteI simply cannot believe that the conclusion drawn is EXACTLY the opposite of the conclusion that should have been drawn. How stupid do they think people are?! I feel like Winston Smith. Holy Cow!
The reason this article even made it into publication is because people want to cling to the notion that women always act out of the purest motives and that men are dogs.
Have there been any studies establishing that young men are aware of the dangers men face from divorce and that this awareness is what is making them uninterested in marriage? I keep seeing this cited as a possible explanation, but I haven't seen anything showing that young men are actually thinking this way.
ReplyDeleteIt's easy for us older men who have gone through the wringer to see what can go wrong. But I sometimes wonder if we're projecting our own feelings onto younger men.
""It's easy for us older men who have gone through the wringer to see what can go wrong. But I sometimes wonder if we're projecting our own feelings onto younger men.""
ReplyDeleteAs a fairly young man [mid 20's] I can tell you that the biggest mental blocks to young men getting married are:
1. Lack of financial security, men are staying at university and in low level jobs for much longer.
2. Fun. Being a single guy in his 20's with a disposable income gives lots of chances for highly enjoyable hedonism.
3. Lack of decent women to settle down with. Aside from the religious good looking 20-something women from decent families these days are either concentrating on partying, career or lashings of both. To settle early with someone good looking requires a working class girl with limited education; which can be a little boring to those of us that enjoy conversation.
"Want" does not equal "making a priority". What people have done this far in their lives is a better indicator of their priorities than what they say about what they want.
ReplyDeleteTim, thanks.
ReplyDeletethe women, all in their mid thirties to early forties, say things like, "I like to travel and be spontaneous; I'm looking for a partner in crime."
In my time it was common for women to describe themselves as quirky. I still don't know why they thought that their best quality.
Tom wrote:
What I'm curious about is why the main stream media (msm) always approaches these and similar issues with full blinkers on and only ever look at these issues from one point of view.
The media tends to be left-liberal and left-liberals often assume that men are the dominant class who get to have what they want as an unearned privilege. That's how many left-liberals explain inequalities in society.
So the assumption is that it's women who need to have their wants tended to as they are the suppressed class.
Also, the emphasis in liberalism is on being autonomous, which means choosing for yourself without external constraints.
But that makes it difficult to openly have expectations of others, as that would operate as a kind of constraint on choice.
For instance, if a man were to say that he didn't like women getting drunk, throwing up and wandering around in skimpy outfits at 3am it would be interpreted as an attempt to place limits on women.
So how can you then make relationships work? What feminists have done is to frame what they want in political terms, for instance by stating that men must do X in order to allow women greater autonomy as a matter of social justice.
That's how (feminist) women get to place claims on men. It is just assumed that men will go along with such demands as part of the larger political project.
When things are framed this way, then men simply don't have a say.
It has only been the falling away of men in education and jobs which has started to lead to some interest in how men might experience things.
I like your idea of being a small community group that lives a traditional life-style, but is that workable? I mean you have modern laws and it would only take one bad egg to rip it apart.
There would be a right of exit. The bad egg would be free to leave. And the community wouldn't break the law. Let's say you managed to have an independent school, perhaps a church parish, some cultural groups, some independent media (e.g. a weekly community newspaper), and some kind of overarching community organisation to which the men, in particular, would be expected to contribute.
If you struck the right balance (some strong underlying values without expecting too much conformity) I think you'd attract people.
The problem is getting the first 50 or so people gathered in reasonably close proximity - that's not easy, not because everyone is content with the way things are, but because people feel isolated and that leaves them feeling daunted and intimidated.
They will move when there is something more solid to move to, but that then leaves the issue of who is going to create something.
@Mark...
ReplyDeleteThe media tends to be left-liberal and left-liberals often assume that men are the dominant class who get to have what they want as an unearned privilege. That's how many left-liberals explain inequalities in society.
I believe it's much simpler than this. Follow the money.
Media, ever reliant on advertising revenue, is in the business of selling. Women, controlling something like eighty percent of discretionary spending, are the media's primary customers. The filler between the ads is the honey and it pays to ingratiate oneself with the customer. Tell them exactly what they want to hear.
gwallan said...
ReplyDelete""Media, ever reliant on advertising revenue, is in the business of selling. Women, controlling something like eighty percent of discretionary spending, are the media's primary customers. The filler between the ads is the honey and it pays to ingratiate oneself with the customer. Tell them exactly what they want to hear.""
That sounds so cynical it must have some truth it.
Hi Mark, James and Gwallan,
ReplyDeleteThanks for your thoughts on the why the liberal media is the way it is? You've caused me to think about it more.
I've long been a fan of not blaming something/someone as evil when stupidity or laziness would get the same result.
Thinking out loud here:
I regularly see signs of the msm being stupid/lazy. Everytime there is something in the news that I know about, it's almost right. Therefore, it is reasonable to assume this trend continues across all reported areas.
As liberalism is the dominant thought in the west at the moment, the stupid/lazy thing is to only report that.
Clearly feminism and interest groups (aided principally by the pill) were able to change the dominant thought in Australia to what it is now.
How do you change it back? People being people they will chose the hedonistic/lazy option whenever they can and be unlikely to change back from this lifestyle. As a christian I can only see two ways this can happen on a wide scale (Australia wide):
a. A massive growth in Christianity occurs and people go counter-culture and start following the bible. or
b. The whole system collapses under its own weight and out of the ashes a new civilisation begins.
Am I being overly negative?
Mark, the more I think about your traditional community, the more I like it. I had a brief look at your Eltham Traditionalists site.
I've always been partial to that kind of idea. I don't know much about Eltham. Is it possible in that area? What are property prices like, employment opportunities, how much of it is surrounded by non-traditional people? How many people within the community are non-traditional?
I would think starting somewhere fresh and inviting/accepting suitable people and growing like that would be more workable. (AKA a greenfields project is easier then a brownfields one).
I've always liked the idea of rural tasmania because it cheaper and more isolated.
Your thoughts?
Thanks James. It is true that my bum crevice is permanently affixed to the boundary between reality and cynicism.
ReplyDeleteThanks James. It is true that my bum crevice is permanently affixed to the boundary between reality and cynicism.
ReplyDelete""I don't know much about Eltham.""
ReplyDeleteMiddle class, slightly left leaning but swinging. Very artsy area with a history to match.
""What are property prices like,""
Unreasonable, but it is a middle class area in Melbourne so hardly surprising there.
""employment opportunities,""
Reasonably strong local economy with V.good public transport to city and elsewhere.
""how much of it is surrounded by non-traditional people?""
Lots, but nearby Diamond Creek and Wattle Glen are filling up with house after house full of socially conservative tradies and their families. At least three of the blokes i went to school with plus more that I have heard about.
""How many people within the community are non-traditional?""
Lots of lefties, but also a more educated general population so on average more politically informed.
Man I must be bored... I sound like I'm trying to sell Eltham!
Just a few points "off the top of my head" and speaking from a man's rational point of view with as little emotive input as possible.
ReplyDeleteMost men would willingly settle for a young, fertile, beautiful, intelligent, chaste and rich wife. Now, that would be their fantasy model, whether achievable or not.
However, those ingredients rarely come in one package, so let's start with priorities because most ordinary men wouldn't easily land such a prize, unless the potential suitor was filthy rich, causing many women to throw all their hard-fought principals aside. (Women "love" the security factor that money brings with it)
Anyhow, young and chaste may be your choice of a life-partner, or maybe beautiful and intelligent, or fertile and young. But whatever your choice represents, if trust and respect are missing from the whole equation, you're doomed from the beginning.
Women and cars are often seen from the same light.
Would a man prefer the brand-new model of car fresh from the factory, or does he settle for a used model that was used and abused, thus declaring it as "damaged goods", and thus treating it with less respect, other than if he'd bought the new virginal model?
If we didn't know until now, men and women are polar opposites when it comes to decisions, especially when this mate-seeking topic arises.
The "hard to control" urge to pro-create (sex) is very strong in youth, thus clouding good common sense that leads to many emotional disasters that were highly preventable if the big head on your shoulders overruled the little head placed below the belly button.
Of course, women are born with the same urges, sans the external organ.
It's indiscriminately submitting to these big or little urges, and giving them more attention than what they deserve, is a major factor that makes us, or breaks us.
P.S.
This whole feminist movement didn't just happen by accident. If you conduct a little research into the subject, you'll discover it's part of the Marxist cultural programming agenda.
If women kind find husbands it's probably because women have taken all the jobs.
ReplyDeletePlenty of guys in their 30s who can't start a family because they don't have much money.
I would think starting somewhere fresh and inviting/accepting suitable people and growing like that would be more workable. (AKA a greenfields project is easier then a brownfields one).
ReplyDeleteI think you need a whole lot of brownfields in order to get a greenfields up and running.
Why? There are lots of people discontent with things as they are. But they are nearly all looking for something solid to attach to, rather than being willing to build something from scratch. So if you went alone to a rural area, it's unlikely that many people would be willing to follow.
So a better aim is to make contact with people in your own area, get to know them, encourage similar things in other suburbs and then when you have sufficient resources you could consider a greenfields option.
I don't know much about Eltham.
James has summarised it pretty well. It's a good middle-class family suburb, lots of trees and parks, house prices have risen over the past few years, the older generation are a bit trendy lefty but the younger families seem to be less so.
(James, we should get together some time!)
Thanks for the info guys.
ReplyDeleteAll very true.
I suppose nothing worth having is easy. And a traditional life in a traditional community is worth having.
Why would a man want to get married to a woman who sees him as a "last resort"?
ReplyDeleteAll he is doing then is agreeing to be told, every day, how he does not match up to the man of her fantasies, and therefore deserves divorce, cuckolding and alimony.
THAT's the reason men are not getting married to these women.
They made their choices ...
so the only thing for these women to do after,
is to condemn men for choosing to be with younger women ...
by saying things like "all men are rapists".
One of the major reasons women cannot find husbands is a man wants a woman that he can respect when he walks down the street. If a man is aware that his girl is a used up white skank that has been the local ghetto thugs sewer receptacle why would he not feel ashamed of her. Men will not respect a whore and that will never change.
ReplyDeleteWhat a chauvinistic lot of male comments on this site: I suppose because it is Australian? I was born in Australia but thank God I grew up in a much more egalitarian society. I had just thought to check this site out since it is from my birth country and I should not be surprised to see that you guys are still stuck back in the Victorian era, just as the rest of the world stereotypes you as being.
ReplyDeleteThese comments about women of 35 being physical turnoffs, having too much emotional baggage by then, and being whores??? I have looked at least 10 years younger than my age throughout my adult life, am known to be extremely attractive, and am also a serious Christian who does NOT have any sort of baggage since I won't sleep with a man before marriage. I normally have much younger men going after me thinking I'm their age; men my age think I'm too young for them. I've only had two boyfriends in my life, but that was since the numerous other potentials did not with to respect my wishes to not sleep myself around with them, which, needless to say, I stuck to. I believe that apart from genetics, my lifestyle is a good part of why I look and also seem so young and what you'd call "pure".
My problem is that despite being extremely attractive, or so I am constantly told, it is very difficult for me, as a Christian, to find someone to marry who does not expect some sort of appetizer first. I would have been ready to marry back in my 20s, but it was impossible to find anyone serious on university campuses, and it still is as a graduate student and international traveller. My experience is that women mature much faster than men, many men never mature at all, and therefore many of us females would have been happy to have married at any time in our adult years but finding a male who wanted the same was just about impossible. However, since I'm still young (I obviously don't age as rapidly as your stereotypes inform you), I still plan to do so. And meanwhile, although I had not chosen to make my life of travels, university and career take the place of a marriage or postpone my marrying, I enjoy my life very much. And this life DOES NOT involve ANY baggage, unless you can call living and travelling abroad experiences and extensive education "baggage".
What is more, considering from the comments what is out there in the male field, at least in Australia, I'd never have married any of you chauvanists or verbal abusers. Why would I waste my intelligence and talents on the likes of jerks or "wankers" like you?
" I have looked at least 10 years younger than my age throughout my adult life"
ReplyDelete===============================
Yeah well, almost every woman says this, it doesn't count - at 35 for marriage and kids you are NOT still young and virtually none of what you have read is chauvinistic - just realism which doesn't compute with you because you have been raised in a feminist world.
I've just re-read the comments and am surprised I never responded to female anon.
ReplyDeleteFemale anon's comment is based on a contradiction. She calls us dinosaurs and then explains that she is unmarried because she adheres to a traditional morality that is no longer followed in modern society. That makes my head spin: she thinks you can criticise someone for not getting with the times and then defends herself on the basis that she is out of step with the times.
Here's something else that is odd about her comment. The main argument made in the post and comments is that it would be better if there were a culture of marriage and family formation rather than one of deferred commitments. That's something that someone in female anon's position ought to welcome - she hasn't done well at all in a culture of casual relationships. And yet she thinks that we are the enemy and modern "egalitarian" culture her friend.
year mate I think this woman has something but I all so think ween the jobs done and she has had her kids and theer gone so would you only you would be out in the cold and still having to pay and she would be off again over seas on you monie.
ReplyDeletegood luck
ReplyDeleteUnfortunately, most women are too picky and need a man who drives a solid gold Porsche and owns several mansions across the US and Europe. They're the ones who're single beyond 40...I personally know a few such women.
ReplyDeleteWhen I sought to get married, I found energy vampires, mostly. Men over 40 or so start getting intuitive, though they don't call it that. When women don't understand, is that men can go Templar. The Knights Templar were warrior monks. Sex was forbidden to them. My nephew went out with a feminist for a while. I explained to him exactly what hells she would create for him, with many examples from real life. He listened, and dumped her. Listen to Tom Leykis on youtube, if you doubt this. I am deeply intuitive. If I can't trust a woman 100%, I have as little to do with her as possible. I was using a cloak of invisibility long before Harry Potter was ever dreamed of. I love my daughters deeply, and do all I can for them. I love my wife deeply, and put as much happiness into her life as I can. If, for some reason, she leaves, or passes on, I will not replace her. I will simply go deeper into Chi Kung, and my spiritual studies. Go to most any spiritual seminar; 80% of the attendees are women, and almost all of them are looking for their "soulmate", who will love them just as they are, even with the extra 90 lbs they carry, the emotional baggage, the antisocial behavior the engage in, their unwillingness to listen, or contribute much to a relationship. I smile, and say nothing. They don't want to hear anything from me. No, let them watch Steve Harvey, telling women they really can find a good husband, with two kids at home, being out of shape, and all the other fairy tales that the media fills women's heads with. My father told me long ago that the only reason to get married is to have a stable environment for children to grow up in. That hasn't changed. Other than that, there is absolutely no advantage to a man, to be married, none, and many, many mines just waiting to go off. An older friend of mine, 62, a really nice guy, went out with a woman, 30, who had 3 kids, and her own home. She wanted a husband to help her raise her kids. Very nice woman, I'd have considered her myself. He didn't want to. What does it say, that a woman like that couldn't get a guy twice her age... women don't seem to understand that men who have been prey, for a while, get just as smart as any prey animal, if they survive. Every man who gets eviscerated in divorce court, and hung up to bleed out, is an object lesson to at least 100 other men. There is a way for men to avoid the pain of divorce: don't get married. Be a bad boy, to some extent. That's what most women want, anyway. Or, better yet, go Templar.
ReplyDelete