Anonymous wrote:
Anonymous wrote:
Anonymous wrote:
Anonymous wrote:
Anonymous wrote:
Anonymous wrote:Obviously it's a negative for relationships. That doesn't meant there aren't other positives. But for relationships, no. Now women don't need men and men don't need women.
Do you think relationships are better when they reflect “needs“? I think the fact that I don’t “need” my husband to support me financially, sign for any business deal I do, or give me permission for medical treatment makes our relationship much better. Is your hypothesis that in places where women do not have rights, relationship relationships are better? Because, at least a news reporting, there seem to be a lot of murders and suicides of women being abused.
The question one is it better for relationships. No. It's not. Men can get the sex they want by never marrying and women can support themselves and kids if they want them. Neither "needs" a relationship to get their needs met.
People should never need to be together. They should want to be together.
Except that was the point of the social contract between men and women that worked for eons. And now that's broken. Men can get sex whenever they want and women can support themselves. There really is no point to a relationship for most people. Soon there will be bots so men won't even need a real woman. You can decide if that's better or not.
I don't think this is true, because men as a group haven't done the work to become more balanced people, but women have. Men can't get sex whenever they want because it requires a woman to want to have sex with them (and women have more choice than ever now), and it seems like there are things a lot of men want and either can only get in relationships or vastly prefer to get them in relationships (kids, societal connections and belonging, stability, etc.). Women also seem to prefer getting these in relationships, though it seems on the whole, women who don't find marriage are better able to attain these things than men do.
I think of my BIL who is never married, quite bitter about it, and very lonely. He lacks a lot of social skills that would enable him to build and maintain friendships, doesn't really know how to make his home nice, and absolutely could not raise kids on his own. Then I think of the half dozen female friends I have who are also never married, but still have really lovely lives. They are financially stable and work to give their lives structure and meaning without a spouse. Several of them have had kids on their own and done a good job of figuring out how to make that work (often living near family to ensure greater stability, making enough to afford nannies and other supports to cover childcare gaps). Others instead focus on friendships, travel, and hobbies. They are all very happy. I think all of them would have been happy to marry IF they had found the right person at the right time, but they didn't and demonstrated a lot of resiliency in figuring out how to make it work for them anyway.
Meanwhile my BIL sits around angry at the world for not providing him with a wife to compensate for all his shortcomings. He wanted someone who would not only give him sex, but also children and create a comfortable home for him and manage his social life and cook his meals. He also would have needed a woman who would do all that while also earning an income, because he's a low earner who is often unemployed and would not have been able to support a family on his own. My MIL often laments his "bad luck" in not finding a partner but the truth is that I've never met a woman who would be willing to take all that on. He has had several lengthy and somewhat serious relationships but they don't last because he'll start out on his best behavior and then as he reveals himself to her, she realizes what she's taking on and leaves. One of his ex girlfriends was a single mom in her 40s -- she chose to stay a single mom rather than take on BIL as essentially a second dependent. More recently he dated a woman in her late 40s who never had kids and likely didn't have a ton of other romantic prospects. That one lasted two years but ultimately she decided she'd rather be alone than deal with BIL. And I've heard of other stories like this for other men. The women who reject them do fine even if it means being alone. The men don't.
The biggest problem with feminism is that some men have not stepped up to the plate and bettered themselves to make themselves worthy of women and marriage. When women have the choice to support themselves and be alone, it might not be their first choice but they can make it work and some even really enjoy it. And men suffer because before feminism, those women would have HAD to marry. Independence was not an option and they would have been really exposed and in danger of starvation or physical harm without a husband. That single mom especially would likely never have chosen to give up the protection of a husband, even one as burdensome as my BIL, because her prospects would have been so bad.
Feminism is a net positive for women in relationships because it has allowed us to choose, and offered us an alternative to marriage if we can't find a man we want to marry. For reasons I frankly don't understand, men have not seized the opportunity to make that same choice for themselves, and there are too many men (see the incel movement if you are looking for examples) still view access to women and a wife as a god-given right even though they've done nothing to earn the love of a woman.