Why assume the choices are limited?
Well, because she claimed to be good at “it”.
Maybe it’s my (possible lack of) knowledge of English, but I interpreted that as one “it”, not two "it"s.
Hemorrhoids?
You’re free to assume whatever you like. But in terms of who has the burden of proof for what position, in my view the default assumption is that an adult making legal choices for himself (or herself) is presumed to be acting competently, and it falls to the critic to adduce evidence to supoprt his claim.
I deny that we need to presume any such thing. If I see abuse, I assume abuse.
I see it’s the “taking us back to the 50’s” line that is usually trotted out by, usually, liberal leaning persons. What the hell does that mean? It seems nothing more than a failed dig at the concept of gender roles within a marriage.
Even though you might not like to admit this, generally speaking when persons are married they tend to perform certain gender specific roles. Usually, that means that women take care of the kids and the house while the man does all of the ‘dirty’ work. For example, men generally are tasked with keeping the car in good condition, doing yard work and deciding on how to invest money, while women are generally tasked with cooking, cleaning, buying food, taking care of the kids, paying bills and buying furniture or other cosmetic items for the home. These divisions hold up regardless of age. Gallup did a poll on this a few years back and found that this to be pretty true.
Your contention that partners might choose to divide the roles in more traditional ways but that it’s that way by choice more than any idea stemming from traditional gender is, simply put, absurd. Those “traditional ways” are that way precisely because it’s assumed that men are the breadwinners and women are the caretakers. If I were to walk into, I’d say, 90% of married households in America, I’d find that the men typically do those things which are generally ascribed to men and women typically doing those things which are generally ascribed to women. You cannot separate how something is away from why it’s that way-- especially not when the way something is is linked to gender roles which are pretty well engraved into society. Just because you think something is ‘archaic’ doesn’t mean it is.
Oh, and just so you know, Brazil said his wife works, though she doesn’t make as much as him (which is quite common in marriages, as men make more than their wife in approximately 78% of them). I just though you’d like to know that, since you seemed to be implying some kind of “stay-at-home-and-take-care-of-the-kids” idea for a woman (which is pretty much unfeasible these days as the cost of raising a family is generally more than what a man could make on his own).
BZZT. Did you actually read the words?
[QUOTE=brazil84]
Mainly because it’s my preference and also because most girls prefer to be led, although many will not admit it and are not even aware of it themselves.
[/quote]
brazil84 isn’t claiming that just A woman or HIS wife wants thing this way. His claim is that MOST women either secretly or openly want to be dominated by men.
Why twist the words in this fashion?
There may be “plenty” of women who want this kind of relationship, but those aren’t the words used by brazil84. His claim is that MOST women (actually, he uses ‘girls’ here), even if they don’t consciously know it, want to be in that sort of relationship and even appreciate it.
That’s beyond paternalism. It’s patronizing to women and certainly misogynistic.
Well, you’ll notice I did add “if it was even like that in the Fifties.” I don’t know. I wasn’t there. You’re right–it’s a stereotype. But I suspect it was a lot more common in the days before readily available birth control and the opportunities women have nowadays.
Wait a sec. “Deciding how to invest money” is “dirty work”? While I can see that it might be fairly common for the men to take care of doing work that requires strength, lifting ability, or just generally getting dirty, I don’t see why it’s inherently more likely for the men to do the investment decisions, especially in this day and age where many women are as educated as men (or in many cases, more so).
Maybe. I think your number is high for modern day families.
But you’re mixing apples and oranges. I’ll give you that in many married couples, the men do things like take out the trash, clean the gutters, and change the car oil, and women do things like take primary responsibility for the kids, do the cooking, and do more than half of the housework. But when you get into things like making investment decisions, these are not inherently a male province. Men are not necessarily smarter than women or more able to make investment choices simply because they’re men. Some individual men might be–just as some individual women might be. It’s simply not a gender-based skill.
Brazil’s situation is his own. Like I said before, I have no interest in suggesting how other people should live their lives. But I personally would find it impossible to live in a relationship where the man felt that he had to be the “boss” and have the final say in all important family decisions simply because he has a penis and I don’t. There’s nothing about men that make them inherently better decision makers (especially about families), smarter, or more qualified to lead than there is about women. It’s all individual. Some men are better leaders than some women, and vice versa. To assume the man is the leader simply because he’s the man is…silly, to me. And potentially very dangerous.
Yes, I did. Did you? I realize that the cool thing around here to do is to try to jump at the chance of playing “Gotcha’!”, but after a while it gets old.
You’re not all that sly. Really. You’re not.
Do you know what my response was to that comment? Here, I’ll type it out for you:
[QUOTE=Me]
Simple experience gives credence to this assertion. Few women want a guy who’s not really assertive, not all that decisive and doesn’t like to take charge of his situation. Generally, those are the kind of guys chicks rolls their eyes towards.
[/quote]
Nowhere did I pass that comment off as a personal preference or as pertaining solely to his wife. The comments I passed on pertaining solely to his wife or his relationship with his wife were explicitly stated to be about his wife or his relationship with his wife. The propensity of some of you guys and gals to sit around trying to find the slightest fault with everything some otherwise Conservative leaning person types out is nothing short of sad.
And see my response to that.
No, it’s not. Unless, of course, you’re going to straw man his words into meaning that a woman wants a leash strapped around her neck and dragged around everywhere the man wants to go. Which would be-- you know-- ridiculous and nowhere even close to anything Brazil ever typed out, especially considering nowhere has he ever endorsed such a relationship.
‘Dirty work’, which includes all the things that women generally don’t do or don’t want to do (i.e., physical labor), is not exclusive and doesn’t preclude other facets of married life. Anyway, if you consider the fact that the man makes the majority of the money in the majority of households (78% of them), it’s not all that hard to see why he’d probably be making the majority of the investment decisions. I’d be willing to bet that in a household where the woman makes the majority of income, she’s likely making the majority of the investment decisions.
See, this is the kind of thing that bugs me. Even if the man does make more money than the woman, that doesn’t necessarily mean that (a) he’s smarter or better about how to spend/invest than the woman, and that (b) he has any right to do so. Marriage is, ideally, a partnership. If the man works outside the home so the woman can take care of the kids, that’s a division of labor they choose to make. It’s not his money to direct. It’s the family’s money. The man making the investment/saving decisions might be a good thing if he’s an investment banker, but what if he’s a plumber? Plumbers can make a lot of money, but they don’t have (for the most part–I’m sure there are plumber investment whizzes out there, but I doubt they’re the majority) any built-in investment savvy that a woman doesn’t (especially if she runs the house–she could quite likely have a better idea of what’s needed to keep the family going than her husband does).
It really annoys me when people assume that just because the man in the family works outside the home and the woman doesn’t, that means it’s *his *money and it’s up to him to decide how it’s spent. I’m not accusing you of this, necessarily, but your post makes it sound like this might possibly be your opinion. I’d be interested to know if it isn’t.
Not trying to be sly or even trying for a gotcha. Just reading the words on the page.
The words brazil84 used are different from your interpretation. They do not literally say what you claim they do. That’s not a gotcha. That’s just reading the friggin’ words as written on the page, which you somehow choose to read differently than everybody else.
If you want to use your own interpretation of words, go ahead. But don’t expect your quite frankly odd reading to sound reasonable to anybody else.
Maybe the rest of the board is crazy and lacks reading comprehension. Or maybe it’s just you.
You clearly haven’t met very many blacks.
[/QUOTE]
It wouldn’t matter if I’d never met one in my life; what matters is that American conservatism is heavily dominated by white racists. Regardless of their other political opinions, it’s foolish to support your implacable enemies like that.
The world is complex. Approaching it with simple minded strategies is often subjectively easier a la the 80/20 rule. But civilization lies in the 20.
In my experience women in marriages with men who insist on 100% veto power are in most cases unhappy. The minority I’ve seen that accept such relationships also observe the tenets of a paternalistic religion.
I can certainly understand the position that assumes that said women made those choices “freely”. If that weren’t the case, then those not so conditioned would have a moral obligation to help form a society that educates them better.
Another Der Trihs Baseless AssertionTM. What are we up to now, a couple million at least, right?
:rolleyes: It’s only “baseless” if you’ve been living under a rock your entire life.
No, it’s “only ‘baseless’” if you don’t agree with Der Trihs? Am I right? :rolleyes:
OK. Assume away, chum.
Deny reality if you like. That won’t make the American right any less racist.
Earlier, you were correct in stating that you were not **Boss strain. **
If you had to be right about just one thing, that was a good one. You should be thankful.