Men: would you be willing to purchase an engagement ring for a woman?
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Anonymous
Bahahaha! Just admit it, you're really cheap. |
Anonymous
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This OP is cracking me up with all his judgmental smugness.
I'm the PP who suggested that there was a distinction between the kind of cheapness that causes men to resent big-ticket items like engagement rings and frugality, which is a pattern of minimal spending overall. I'm glad you thought it was magical, but you actually could not have me personally pegged more wrong in the rest of your condescending post. So while we're being judgmental and condescending, here are some questions for you. Given that you are not interested in the traditional trappings of engagement (aka the ring), do you have similar feelings about the institution of marriage in general? Did you have a marriage ceremony? Do you wear a ring? Do you and your wife have the same last name, and if so, whose name is that? If you have children, whose last name do they have? Who is their primary caregiver? Since you have openly stated that you enjoy making out with men at parties, why were you interested in marriage at all? What appealed to you about that institution given that it contains many WASP-ish qualities (since that's the worst thing you can come up with to say about anyone)? Also, how did you find this site, and when did that happen? You seem to have a very skewed perception of the population that lives here, if you think that there are a lot of men of your age (which I'd assume is under 35 based on your derision towards "old" people) in marriages with queer women that also involve kissing men at parties. Some forums obviously skew one way or the other, but I would hazard a guess that outside of the political forum and the explicit forum, the majority of posters are women between 35 and 50 whose straight husbands bought them some form of engagement ring prior to proposing. |
Anonymous
No flaming, many have wasted time. You probably hoped things would get better. On the other hand now you could have a bright future with maybe a great partner. I would suggest getting a good lawyer, get whatever assets you can and I'd 86 him out of my life. I'd make that a priority, kids or not. |
Anonymous
OP - the freedom to choose is a key part of modern feminism. We feminists are fighting to determine for ourselves what it means to be a woman or have a gender or how gender and life roles are defined, practiced, etc. You seem to get this in terms of defining for yourself what it means to be a man, a feminist, a polyamorous person, etc. You also seem to insist that your wife have the power to define herself as straight vs queer vs lesbian, etc. That's great and that is part of the promise of choice in feminism. But, where I think you are going astray is you seem to want to impose your non-ring buying definition of feminism on others. That is not "feminism" IMO (recognizing here that no one has appointed me the arbiter of feminism ...) Beyonce is a feminist, even though she wore fuck me Barbie candy pink stripper platform heels to the basketball game with her man. I would never wear those as I attach them to the imposition of all kinds of sexist norms. But, more power to Beyonce for rocking the world however she sees fit. Your friends can buy rings and be feminists too. The symbolism of the ring is determined only by your friend and his fiance, and frankly I doubt you have have deep enough knowledge of their relationships and psyches to accurately pass judgment on whether their ring purchase comports with "feminism" which anyway you do not get to define for others. Feminism to me is about equality. But, we do not need to be identical to be equal. Since ideas about what it means to be a woman (or a man) in today's society are becoming more flexible, I think the best that we can hope for is that people are able to discuss and negotiate gender roles openly and find a person (or people) who agree with our ideas. |
Anonymous
"Most important: does she want *you* to be happy, even if that requires basic gender egalitarianism in how you approach getting married?" |
Anonymous
Duly noted. From a young woman, thank you. Will heed this advice. |
Anonymous
Yep. |
Anonymous
Answers to your questions: 1. I like the idea of lifelong commitments to a single primary partner, whether we call that marriage or not. 2. Had two marriage ceremonies, one Hindu one Jewish. (we're both atheists, but hey, fun times) 3. We both have wedding rings, they cost about $15 for the sterling silver and then we used a lathe to make them. 4. No kids yet. The plan is that if we have kids, I become a full time househusband. For kids' last names we'd like the idea of hyphenation, except that then if a hyphenated kid marries another hyphenated kid you end up with Spanish-royalty-length names before long. Might go with my last name because easier to pronounce for the widest variety of people, might go with her last name b/c less WASP-y and thus we're doing our part to accelerate the browning of America, might come up with some creative solution we haven't thought of yet. 5. Frankly, it's a little baffling to me that you would associate sexual non-exclusivity with a disinterest in committing romantically to a single partner for life. But like so many of my age cohort, we have a monogam-ish marriage, which works pretty great -- usually involving partners who we're both into, shared between us without either of us having side meetings with that person. Actually had our first three-person Valentine's Day this year, with mind-blowingly good sex. But look, making out with a dude at a party is just making out with a dude at a party, you could go for near-total monogamy and still consider that to be fine. 6. What appeals to me about life partnerships, marriage included, is that I'm a very emotionally generous person who loves very deeply, and finding a person who's absolutely perfect for you and then learning and growing with that person over the decades sounds like the most beautiful and meaningful possible way to live one's life to me. Been married 7 years now and every day is better than the last. 6b. 'WASP-y' is indeed just about the worst thing you can say about someone, but marriage is fun and wonderful enough that even white people can't ruin it. 7. Been on the site for about half a decade now. Like a lot of my age cohort, I think we learned about the site from the hilarious Washington City Paper expose ( http://www.washingtoncitypaper.com/articles/40290/dc-mommy-fight-site/full ). Like a lot of us, I grew up on smash-mouth internet forums like 4chan, and so felt right at home with the culture here. |
Anonymous
| So how is your love life going OP? |
Anonymous
^ You are a loser OP. Everyone in the thread thinks so.
But it's cool I'm sure you get that a lot. |
Anonymous
If you think I'm a loser... ...and yet I'm clearly better at life than you... ...what does that make you, exactly? |
Anonymous
More great comebacks from the class nerd. Keep it coming, bozo. |
Anonymous
Wow what a bully. Does this make you feel good? |
Anonymous
Your soon-to-be-ex husband sounds awful, but it also sounds like you're missing out on some basic logic. It wouldn't make sense to guess, based on his suggesting you spend your money on things that communally benefit both of you, that two decades later he's be going in the exact opposite direction by failing to meet your common obligations to your kids. If you were trying to read anything into it, it'd suggest he'd be awful by pushing you both to downsize massively to pay for what the kids need. But hey, tell yourself what you need to. |
Anonymous
First off, since when is 'nerd' a bad thing? Nerds are awesome and I pity anyone who wouldn't/couldn't describe themselves as such. Secondly, even if you thought a nerd were something negative, then let's use your own logic for a second... if I've gone from being 'the class nerd' to the guy with a great job, perfect marriage, amazing friends and family, and way more/better sex than you, wouldn't that mark me as someone who's amazing at life? |