Why many more men than women aspire for (semi) self-sufficiency?
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I just think it is in mans nature to be the protector and provider for the family whereas the female tends to be more about nurturing. Just a natural part of who we are as men and women. Not to say it can't be the other way around.
If you are a man looking into above average self-sufficiency, it's a serious matter to consider, more likely than not, you'll be alone. There are just not that many women into that stuff. And it's not just USA, it's pretty much universal female preference to avoid this sort of life, including less than developed countries.
Is it because women tend to look for a higher status partner, and somewhat self-sufficient life style is a definite sign of low status within any society? Or, it's because men who couldn't make it to the top (or even middle) in the rat race gravitate towards self-sufficiency offering them a chance of some sort of autonomy and self-respect? Unfortunately, that autonomy can't fool status conscious women
please do not take offense, but you don't see the women I know, or find groups that are looking for people in their groups.
1 group that I was in inside Wisconsin, we had a group of 18 people, 11 were women. shows how many women were actually involved in being prepared.
I'm not going to name names here because I'd get infractions for "insulting posters", but there's more manure being shoveled in some posts in this particular thread than there is when farmers start emptying their manure pits in late winter!!!
I'm not going to name names here because I'd get infractions for "insulting posters", but there's more manure being shoveled in some posts in this particular thread than there is when farmers start emptying their manure pits in late winter!!!
Mother of vinegar?
Ya''ll need to lighten up and that goes specifically for each one of you.
When the ratio of Manhattan and Alaska flattens out then we will all be compelled to believe that the call of the frontier will be answered equally. I know there will be a lot of odd goods that will like the change in the odds.
As second born on the wrong side of the tracks , fair was a used pair of baggy underwear on a good day where K-12 I was chaffed inside and out. So I'll fall asleep on the couch on the first minute on each and everyone's sob story.
Would of posted some how to on my home made rocket stove, charcoal making and nanny berry cider pumpernickel bread, and nanny berry silk pie with acorn crust( the complete recipe), but the most I see here is a 3rd party link. Nothin going on here. That's something to complain about.
I have been married to a farmer for thirty-five years. We are raising most of our food; vegetables, goats and chickens. My husband developed the small ten acre farm using horse drawn machines and hand tools. He does all the outside work as I have environmental allergies and am inside most of the time Spring to Fall. Although I don't garden I do wash, cook,bake, preserve and store our year's suppy of food. I took care of five children and raised them into responsible adults. I sewed our clothes, washed by hand until I had a wringer washer, mopped the house and cleaned without a vaccuum cleaner. I started a fleamarket and groomed dogs to bring in money.Other times I was nurse to sick family members and cooked for family gatherings, funerals and weddings. I also cleaned chickens and wrapped meat for the freezer after he butchered. I helped stack fire wood and haul it into the house.
My husband plowed, spread manure on fields as well as seaweed. He built garden beds, repaired the barn, made hay, raised goats and chikens,did the butchering, groomed, shoed and trimmed the horse feet. He mowed the lawn and fixed everything that broke.He also went into the woods and cut our winter's supply of fire wood and hauled it home with the horse and cart.
My husband valued my contributions and I valued his. He always told people one person could not do all the work. It takes us both to live this almost self-sufficient lifestyle. But we both love it even when we are dead tired at the end of the day.We don't try to keep score of who does what. We just work at what we each are best suited for to get the work done.
Considering that I know hundreds of women who do the homesteading lifestyle, I just think either you are looking in the wrong places or you have unreasonable expectations.
What women are not interested in is being free slave labor for a man whose idea of homesteading is to have a woman who will do all the food preservation, grow the garden, tend all the animals, do all the house cleaning and laundry, make the soap, candles, and clothing from spinning all the way to a finished garment, chop split, and stack the fire wood, and perform, on demand, all the personal relations stuff.
What is in short supply is men who want to do the work. Not many are out there plowing with a horse team, putting up hay with a scythe, and building a comfortable house using nothing but an ax. Instead, there are plenty of men who think they are homesteading if they sit out in their shop building knives from car springs. In short, they are doing hobby stuff while their wife works very long hard hours.
There is no reason for a homesteading life to be uncomfortable. Solar hot water is hot water on demand. There is absolutely no reason to be doing laundry squatted down at the river beating the clothes on a rock. The food should be 1000% better than anything bought at the market or in a restaurant.
But you are right, it is going to be difficult to find a wife who wants to live under a blue tarp and live like a Neanderthal.
In just about every farm in the USA, no make that every farm in the entire world , there is a woman doing the homesteading work. So I can't see where the idea comes from that women won't do the lifestyle.
Hey? Don't the Amish all have wives? Aren't their women doing homesteading work?
I don't know whether or not there are less women than men who actually want a life of self-sufficiency.~
"Self-sufficiency" means some thing different to every person you talk to, to me: it means being able to literally start out with nothing (like naked in the woods, with nothing but yourself) and still survive, how I survive is up to the circumstances I find myself in and my choices of how to handle the situations that arise.~
There is nothing more attractive and appealing to me than a woman who is or desires to be and truly makes an effort to be as every bit as self-sufficient and independent as I desire to be and strive for.~
"Gender" and "Gender Roles" mean absolutely nothing to me, I do not expect any thing of any one regardless of sex, but the kind of person you are will effect my view point of you: if you are lazy, then you are lazy and you are dead weight to me regardless of sex, and if you act like a pampered baby, then you are a headache to me, because I will not pamper you regardless of sex.~
"Being Self-Sufficient With Me" regardless of sex means to me that you want to and truly make an effort to, and eventually are capable of doing every thing that I do to be "Self-Sufficient", there are no "separate men-folk and women-folk activities" to me, that kind of thinking just doesn't exist for me as it is completely useless to me and it can end up being a hinderance if you are unwilling to leave behind your "sex separation" mentality.~
Last edited by ColorsWolf; 12-01-2013 at 03:41 PM..
I'll take a stab at the OP's question using my own opinion/experience. IF I were married to a self-sufficient man, I would certainly live that life with him. IF I were not attached, then I would live in "society" so to speak with all us brain-washed consumers because you know what, at least I wouldn't be alone! The types of men I personally have met who are into self-sufficiency, off-grid business, well they are loners. They want to be out in the middle of nowhere. I don't, sorry. I'd love to join a close-knit community of whatevers, but I just don't have any conception of what that would look like as I have never seen it. I'm sure it would quite some time to become a real, accepted part of such a community and I don't feel I can give up my healthcare, the clothes off my back, my savings account and all just to jump in caution to the wind. Not to mention safety issues for a young woman that is visibly alone.
That said, glad to be married to a semi-self sufficient type! We both work jobs and we both cook and mend. Okay that's a lie, I mend. I'm not the type to work 8-5 with 1 hour commute each way, and come home and shell peas. Neither is he.
My humble advise.... basil! Organic basil goes like wildfire at the farmer's markets.
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