"It is simple realism. More and more often I meet young guys just like this: overgrown kids who are their grim wives’ poodles. They sheepishly talk about getting a 'pink pass,' or a 'kitchen pass,' before they can leave the house. They can’t do this or that because their wives don’t like it. They 'share' household and child-rearing tasks equally - which isn’t really equal at all because they don’t care about a clean house or a well-reared child anywhere near as much as their wives do. In short, each one seems set to spend his life taking orders from a perpetually dissatisfied Mrs. who sounds to me - forgive me but just speaking in all honesty - like a bloody shrike. Who can blame these poor shnooks if they go out and get drunk or laid or just plain divorced?I’m the old-fashioned King of the Castle type: my wife knew it when she married me, she knows it now, and she knows where the door is if she gets sick of it. And you can curse me or consign me to Feminist Hell or whatever you want to do. But when you’re done, answer me this: why would a man get married under any other circumstances? I’m serious. What’s in it for him? I mean, marriage is a large sacrifice for a man. He gives up his right to sleep with a variety of partners, which is as basic an urge in men as having children is in women. He takes on responsibilities which will probably curtail both his work and his social life. If he doesn’t also acquire authority, gravitas, respect and, yes, mastery over his own home, what does he get? Companionship? Hey, stay single, dude, you’ll have a lot more money, and then you can buy companionship.
All right, I know, I’m a mean old man. But I’ve also been blissfully married for 30 years to a woman who wakes up singing. I think some of these young guys have been sold a bill of goods, I really do. I think they’ve been told what they’re supposed to be like and have sacrificed what they are like. Maybe their marriages are more 'fair' than mine but just looking at them, I think they’re miserable. And I suspect, deep down, their wives are probably miserable too."
-- Andrew Klavan, on the further meaning of The Macho Response, for Pajamas Media.
Typical. The writer chooses one model and then expects everyone to follow it, stating unequivocally that both the men and their women will feel better for this arrangement.
ReplyDeleteAs he correctly recognizes, this is the attitude of old men steeped in the patriarchy (actually he doesn't cover it that well but what's to be expected)
A lot of the manly men I've heard in conversation justifying the lack of involvement in keeping a clean house and tending to the children, showed not a macho bravery but a fear - doubt that they could cope with changing a nappy, or prepare a meal; get up in the middle of the night the next time the baby cries, and don't return to bed until its asleep.
Cutting yourself off from all this (not to mention being allowed in the maternity ward to watch the birth) is depriving yourself of any deep connection to anything but your own insecure manhood.
It's a fear of being challenged or contradicted; a refusal to grow.
I know lots of those kind of men. And I pity the women who got stuck with them.
Sounds like a beta male or a feminist just got their panties in a knot.
ReplyDeleteYou misspelled better male
ReplyDeleteMy punk ass can read fine. I was just taking the piss.
ReplyDeleteAtta boy.
ReplyDeleteWelcome.