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All I can say is that the two stay at home Dads I know who are success stories, with pretty high earning wives...even the artist who technically does earn money from his work at home, but I guarantee that caring for seven kids is more WORK than the art gigs.... As far as I know, they have healthy marriages and sex lives. But they actually do a lot of actual work. No one would say that they don't pull their weight. One of them I know what the wife does, she is a nurse, and she works a lot of long exhausting hours.
I have, in contrast, known men who were between jobs, or retired, or trying out self employment from home, etc who, for instance picked up a pot or drinking habit, sat around and goofed off, worked on "tinkering" types of projects that didn't really accomplish much besides pass the time for them, or got really involved in video games. One whose wife told him that she expected him to keep the house clean, just started yelling at the kids to do the cleaning after school...while he sat around playing video games all day and evening and weekend. Well, if the only way that they know how to functionally contribute, is to earn a paycheck, and if not earning a paycheck, they aren't going to do a good job of keeping up the home, then YEAH there will be anger, resentment, conflict, tension, and probably no sex.
So in cases I've observed outside of my own little sphere, there are more of the second type, than the first. And I also know of cases where the guy was doing the second thing, and when the relationship was on the rocks, CLAIMED that the wife was just mad he wasn't making money, and that it was about money, when in reality it was her being mad that he was acting like a child...actually worse than a child, since children at least go to school. Would that man feel emasculated because the wife was constantly yelling and nagging? Maybe. But if he made more of an effort, maybe she wouldn't have to. Guess we'll never know.
Before I will even consider the question of whether a wife can respect a husband, or whatever else, with the man in the "domestic" role, I need to know if he's actually doing the job as well as she would if she were doing it, or if he's just doing what he thinks he can get away with, and is upset when it doesn't fly.
My own skepticism is that no matter what a guy does at home, its just not going to be valued by most women. Whether he works hard or not, its going to be treated as him "tinkering" around the house.
My own thinking is that women can stay at home with the kids or work outside the home with childcare and both of those arrangements can work, but if a man is not going to work, a divorce is in that guy's future.
I am also pretty skeptical of the duration of relationships where women are out earning men. I think you Sonic, have a much better chance than most because I acknowledge you have really strong relationship skills. But its sort of like a guy marrying a woman 20 years younger than him. Some people can successfully pull it off, but I am not in a hurry myself to date some woman less than half my age living in the Philippines.
This is what I am trying to figure out, how common is it for tasks to be individualized in relationships.
It depends. There are some tasks which pretty much nobody enjoys. Couples could either alternate these, do them together, or individualize and specialize. There are other tasks which maybe one person enjoys and the other does not - these are obviously individualized. And then there are some tasks/activities which both people enjoy, and can do together.
Chores can obviously be a problem in a relationship if there are seriously mismatched expectations, but if both people are putting in an effort and communicating I think these things work themselves out naturally. And if you have a relationship where one person feels put upon and like they are shouldering an unfair burden, I think that's a symptom of deeper issues not the root cause.
Which is why I say that gender roles are a non-issue to me in dating and relationships. I like doing what I like doing. I look for a partner who shares and/or complements those preferences and needs. Maybe that lines up with "traditional" (according to which culture's tradition, anyway?) gender roles, and maybe it doesn't. Who cares? What difference does it make?
If my gf asked me to make her a sandwich, I'd make her one. And if I asked her to make me a sandwich, she'd make me one. Most likely, we'd make our sandwiches together, because we both enjoy cooking. Her kitchen isn't a subway franchise; there isn't such a large volume of sandwich-making going on that specialization for maximum efficiency is the only objective
Feminism has been more successful than I think has been popularly acknowledged. Starting in grade school, young girls start to outperform young boys. They are better students, require less discipline and do better in school. As they age they gap between girls and boys widens. Women are more likely to graduate from high school and more likely to go to college and graduate school. Women out earn men in 147 of 150 cities. They are more likely to assume professional and managerial positions. They less likely to get hurt or injured at work, they are less likely to get in trouble with drugs and alcohol and as a consequence they are likely to live longer than men. They also control more wealth then men.
I don't begrudge women their hard earned successes, but I think its fair to state that gender roles are in the process of a great deal of change of flux right now and I think that is having impacts in dating.
I also want to pick up here a discussion that was started by Moongirl about gender roles and dating, that I thought was interesting but was deleted for being off topic on another of my threads. Basically I want to continue that discussion here.
The bolded two lines are not believable. The vast majority of CEO's are still men. Male techies tend to earn more than women in the same positions. And studies have shown, that even though girls may do better in school that boys these days, boys still get more attention from the teachers, even if it's negative attention, like scolding for acting out.
My own skepticism is that no matter what a guy does at home, its just not going to be valued by most women. Whether he works hard or not, its going to be treated as him "tinkering" around the house.
LOL! That's pretty funny considering that for EONS, what a WOMAN did at home wasn't valued by guys!
So, apparently, what EITHER gender does at home, isn't valued, PERIOD.
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My own thinking is that women can stay at home with the kids or work outside the home with childcare and both of those arrangements can work, but if a man is not going to work, a divorce is in that guy's future.
Possibly. But again, men divorced women when women stayed at home. So is it REALLY about gender, or how much we value work done in the home by either men or women?
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I am also pretty skeptical of the duration of relationships where women are out earning men. I think you Sonic, have a much better chance than most because I acknowledge you have really strong relationship skills. But its sort of like a guy marrying a woman 20 years younger than him. Some people can successfully pull it off, but I am not in a hurry myself to date some woman less than half my age living in the Philippines.
The bolded two lines are not believable. The vast majority of CEO's are still men. Male techies tend to earn more than women in the same positions. And studies have shown, that even though girls may do better in school that boys these days, boys still get more attention from the teachers, even if it's negative attention, like scolding for acting out.
How many of those CEOs were married men who died before their wives did leaving really wealthy widows? If you look at the other side of the income distribution, men are more likely to be homeless and go to jail than women and their are a lot of these men. When things go wrong for women the go to women's shelters, with men they go homeless.
Testosterone levels are declining, millennials are having less sex, fertility is declining, marriage is on the decline, divorce on the upcline. These aren't societal problems I'm inventing out of thin air. The research and stats are there to prove it.
Really? Do share the research and stats. In the meantime...
Testosterone is declining for several reasons:
1. Humans have put so many endocrine-disrupting chemicals in the air, on their food, and in the water that there is no escaping it.
2. People insist on eating meat from animals that are diseased and shot up with antibiotics and hormones.
3. Obesity lowers testosterone and a lot of men are fat.
4. Sedentary lifestyles lower testosterone. See item 3, above.
In other words, it has nothing to do with gender roles and women's empowerment.
Marriage is on the decline because young women do not need men for food and shelter. This is a good thing, compared to two generations ago when women put up with all kinds of abuse because they were dependent on men.
And the divorce rate has been declining and has been at record lows in the US for people younger than 55 for a couple of years now, although there may be an uptick when the numbers for the COVID era come in as domestic violence increased during the pandemic.
How many of those CEOs were married men who died before their wives did leaving really wealthy widows? If you look at the other side of the income distribution, men are more likely to be homeless and go to jail than women and their are a lot of these men. When things go wrong for women the go to women's shelters, with men they go homeless.
And WHY do you think that men go homeless and don't go to a shelter even though there are shelters available?
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