Excerpt from the New York Times: “The news that 51 percent of all women live without a spouse might be enough to make you invest in cat futures………”
So how’s that for a stereotype?
The fact that I have two Persian cats as my roommates should in no way be interpreted as factual support for such profiling.
Or does it? Ah hell, who cares?
Since I don’t want men to feel excluded from the “Single Minded Woman” discussion here’s a little something for them.
Point Taken from a Male Perspective
Lane Filler, reporter for the Spartanburg Herald Journal, SC objected to the fact that men were not mentioned or consulted in the NYT’s article reporting that for the 1st time more adult women are living without a husband than with one. So he called up one of Sam Robert’s key sources for the article, William H. Frey of the Brookings Institute, to discuss this omission.
Here’s how that conversation went.
Mr. Frey called the new statistic “a clear “tipping point” reflecting post 1960 trends associated with greater independence and more flexible lifestyles for women.
Mr. Filler countered with, “Everyone’s saying, women no longer have to marry for money, security and to have kids, and that explains these statistics. But couldn’t it just as easily be that men no longer have to marry to get sex, hot food and clean clothing?”
“That is another angle and you’re correct,” Frey answered, adding that while the marriage dip is generally seen as a female choice, it is obviously mutual.
In his article Lane Filler also had this to say “To read the story by Sam Roberts, you’d think men all over the country are chasing women on bended knee (which would explain their lack of success catching them), rings in hand, and gals are fleeing them, singing along to “I am Woman, Hear Me Roar” on their iPods and writing “I hate stinky boys” in their diaries each night.
My Counter Point
What time capsule are you in?
Remember the 60’s, the Free Love generation? It has been quite some time since men have had to marry a woman to get sex - hardly a recent development. Nor does a man have to marry to get a hot meal or clean clothes. That’s what laundries and diners are for.
I think it is unlikely one can be a woman in this country and not have heard the overused saying referring to marriage in the post 60’s era “Why should a man buy the cow when he can get the milk for free?”
I think these new statistics are saying that a lot of women are taking the cow off the auction block and mooo-ving on.
More women today are in a position of choice. According to the stats, many are choosing to take life by the horns and live it on their own terms.
And that’s no bull!
Read Part Ior Part III of the Happy Single Minded Woman
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February 5th, 2008 at 11:16 pm
Yes, and perhaps this whole “sex, hot food, and clean clothing” is precisely why women wanted more independence. Being in “service” to one’s husband is hardly a fulfilling life, and women have long known that. Besides, being married didn’t stop men from getting sex at home AND elsewhere.
I think the point is here that the first article was trying to make is that women no longer feel as compelled to get married and are enjoying the independence and freedom that men enjoyed for many many generations prior. The guy arguing that is totally missing the point. Men never really needed or wanted to get married as much as women (as far as the myth goes and his argument supports that) and the argument that the only reason they wanted marriage at all was to have sex and food is just bull. As if those are the only advantages women brought to a marriage. Yeah, maybe frontier wives, but even they were out there plowing the fields, moving cattle around, repairing their cabins, and taking care of the entire family including the animals while the husband had to be away (and likely picking up some sex on the side while he was in town trading). There were other reasons that it was beneficial for men to get married as well.
For one thing, men also wanted children to carry on the family name. The institution of marriage was best suited for child-rearing. Men also received financial and status advantages by marrying “well”.
The benefits of marriage for EACH sex varies with the time in history, but often the benefits for women were in direct correlation with how much women were being oppressed at the time. Women had to pursue their political agendas through their husbands, advance in society through their husbands, etc.
The one thing that guy is right about is that never in history have men been able to get so much free extramarital sex. Every sexual liberation movement benefits men more than it benefits women. Particularly this one, which is clearly focused more on men’s pleasure in its philosophy than on a woman’s. And this is our error, us women, for not demanding more for ourselves and refusing certain behaviors and requests.
But that’s another post, right?
February 7th, 2008 at 7:11 pm
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February 8th, 2008 at 1:37 am
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