Today's men, she argues, see no good reason to grow up. In days of yore, they knew they were expected to provide for a family; today, single parenthood is accepted and one-night stands are celebrated. The culture at large doesn't expect much from men; neither, it turns out, do women. When it comes down to it, why not slack on the couch?
Wednesday, March 23, 2011
Link of the Day
Read the whole thing, for sure. Here's an excerpt.
Subscribe to:
Post Comments (Atom)
8 comments:
"Second, if you expect nothing of men, they'll likely deliver nothing ..."
That can pretty much be said about everybody.
When I was looking for a husband, I had no patience for men my own age. They seemed to aimlessly wander without ambition. It was very unattractive. I wasn't looking for a fling or hook-up. I wanted a husband, provider, and father. At 25, I went on the second date of my life, with the man I would marry (eight years my senior).
I look at "couples" out in public. The women generally look nice, presentable. The men have their pants hanging down to show off their box shorts, and some kind of stupid looking baseball cap with a flat brim.
My first thought is always, "do 20 something women have no self esteem, that they would allow themselves to be anywhere near these complete loosers?"
Ivyan, I'd be interested in your take on why it was that the guys were aimless.
MN, I'm with you. I see these gorgeous, well-dressed young ladies hanging out with scrofulous toads and wonder what the competition for good men must be like that they could only manage to land a date with some kind of Neanderthal with clothes.
One answer is that a lot of the steady, responsible men (particularly the ones who are a bit shy) put off seriously dating until after they've finished their education, started earning a living, and gotten themselves a bit established [1]. These guys frequently end up marrying women who meet them at least half-way in the whole courtship thing (as in, they will take a little initiative and call *him* sometimes.)
Meanwhile, women who have been taught that they are supposed to just passively accept one of the guys who aggressively pursues them, end up with the kind of guys that spend a lot of their time pursuing women. That is, guys who have nothing else of importance going on in their lives. The women then think the selection of men is lousy, when they have actually just put themselves into a situation where they mainly come in contact with lousy men.
[1] That's pretty much what I did. Which is why I didn't get married until I was over 30.
Coming from me, this will mostly pertain to the population of men I considered to be potentially dateable (educated Evangelical Christian).
Mostly I agree with the article. In general, women expect less from men and men don't have to work as hard to get a woman. As a result, they *don't* work hard.
Even the young men who wanted to get married and start families weren't in any hurry to do so. The bar has been set so low by the secular culture most of them were content to just hang out and have fun with girls. They stacked up a lot better than their peers and knew it. It left many of us gals in the position of needing to pursue the men, rather than the other way around. I think they liked the attention of being pursued. In this situation, they risked little for female attentions.
This frustrated me to no end. Girls were laying their hearts bare, making it plain to whom they were attracted, hoping to be requited. Often they just made utter fools of themselves. I hated to see my friends subject themselves to such indignity.
Women are simply throwing themselves at men. Why should they grow and change when they're being told how fabulous they are?
I think as they age though, some men start to draw more of their identity from doing well at work and develop more of a drive. From that came my preference for older men.
Post a Comment