# "Don't make your husband hold your coat" -- Men, your thoughts? **URL:** \ **Category:** In My Humble Opinion\ **Created:** [August 22, 2006, 4:55pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/dont-make-your-husband-hold-your-coat-men-your-thoughts/369771 "2006-08-22T16:55:12Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 1
**Author:** ![a35362](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/3da27b/32.png) [@a35362](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/a35362)\ **Post date:** [August 22, 2006, 4:55pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/dont-make-your-husband-hold-your-coat-men-your-thoughts/369771/1 "2006-08-22T16:55:12Z")
This comes from a book Dr. Joyce Brothers wrote about 20 years ago about married relationships. She tells the story of how she won all that money on _The $64,000 Question_ or whichever game show it was, and they kept having her back, week after week. At one point she won a fur coat, and she and her husband would go to the television studio, and the game show people would make a big fuss over her, and help her off with the coat, and hand it to her husband to hang up, and whisk her away. Well, finally her husband decided he’d had enough of being treated like a valet and dropped this expensive coat on the floor, where it stayed, possibly getting stepped on, etc., until finally some kind soul hung it up out of the way. The moral of the story for married women is, I guess, “Don’t make your husband hold your coat” – which I take to mean, “don’t take him for granted.” Fair enough. But is she also saying, “Don’t surpass your husband in anything, because deep, deep down, his male ego probably can’t take it, political correctness be damned, and your marriage will pay the price in the end”? What say you, Doper men? Do you have strong feelings about your girlfriend or wife not showing you up at something/anything? How sensitive is the male ego these days? Was the late Mr. Brothers just a product of his times? I guess I’m particularly curious about the idea that men are men, dammit, and a couple of decades of gender role changes is not enough to change man’s essential nature. BTW, we women love you, you gorgeous, sexy bastards. ---
**Author:** ![Dunderman](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/ecb155/32.png) [@Dunderman](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Dunderman)\ **Post date:** [August 22, 2006, 4:58pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/dont-make-your-husband-hold-your-coat-men-your-thoughts/369771/2 "2006-08-22T16:58:47Z")
[QUOTE=a35362] Do you have strong feelings about your girlfriend or wife not showing you up at something/anything? [/QUOTE] No, as I’m not a Neanderthal. I’ve been beaten by then girlfriends at arm-wrestling, wrestling, heads-up poker right after teaching her the rules and short-distance running, and I’ve willingly admitted that the former Pricegal is probably smarter than I am. So far, my ego is unscratched. ---
**Author:** ![Skald\_the\_Rhymer](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/ecccb3/32.png) [@Skald\_the\_Rhymer](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Skald_the_Rhymer)\ **Post date:** [August 22, 2006, 5:03pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/dont-make-your-husband-hold-your-coat-men-your-thoughts/369771/3 "2006-08-22T17:03:57Z")
You seem to have forgotten to take into account the fact that Joyce Brothers is a moron. ---
**Author:** ![Cheesesteak](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/cheesesteak/32/3694_2.png) [@Cheesesteak](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Cheesesteak)\ **Post date:** [August 22, 2006, 5:09pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/dont-make-your-husband-hold-your-coat-men-your-thoughts/369771/4 "2006-08-22T17:09:20Z")
[QUOTE=a35362] But is she also saying, “Don’t surpass your husband in anything, because deep, deep down, his male ego probably can’t take it, political correctness be damned, and your marriage will pay the price in the end”? What say you, Doper men? [/QUOTE] I think it has more to do with letting others treat you like royalty and your spouse like the hired help. If the TV crew wants to fuss over my wife like she’s the queen bee, that’s great, just don’t drag me into the fawning as well. My wife is my partner, not my superior. ---
**Author:** ![Alistair\_McCello](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/58956e/32.png) [@Alistair\_McCello](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Alistair_McCello)\ **Post date:** [August 22, 2006, 6:22pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/dont-make-your-husband-hold-your-coat-men-your-thoughts/369771/5 "2006-08-22T18:22:49Z")
Not only would I say it is not off-putting I would actually go as far as to say that I find it very attractive when a woman is smarter than me in a field that I am interested in, or better than me at an activity that I enjoy. Of course this makes dating more difficult seeing that I am so damn intelligent and talented… and humble to boot! ---
**Author:** ![a35362](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/3da27b/32.png) [@a35362](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/a35362)\ **Post date:** [August 22, 2006, 6:25pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/dont-make-your-husband-hold-your-coat-men-your-thoughts/369771/6 "2006-08-22T18:25:18Z")
Um…“smarter than _I_,” not… d&r ---
**Author:** ![Alistair\_McCello](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/58956e/32.png) [@Alistair\_McCello](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Alistair_McCello)\ **Post date:** [August 22, 2006, 6:28pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/dont-make-your-husband-hold-your-coat-men-your-thoughts/369771/7 "2006-08-22T18:28:35Z")
> [@a35362](#): > > Um…“smarter than I,” not… > > d&r A thousand curses! Well… uh… does saying grammar is not a ‘field that I am interested in’ help me out here at all? Didn’t think so… ---
**Author:** ![wasson](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/w/4da419/32.png) [@wasson](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/wasson)\ **Post date:** [August 22, 2006, 7:14pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/dont-make-your-husband-hold-your-coat-men-your-thoughts/369771/8 "2006-08-22T19:14:10Z")
> [@](#): > > I think it has more to do with letting others treat you like royalty and your spouse like the hired help. If the TV crew wants to fuss over my wife like she’s the queen bee, that’s great, just don’t drag me into the fawning as well. My wife is my partner, not my superior. I think this nailed it. ---
**Author:** ![Skald\_the\_Rhymer](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/ecccb3/32.png) [@Skald\_the\_Rhymer](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Skald_the_Rhymer)\ **Post date:** [August 22, 2006, 7:22pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/dont-make-your-husband-hold-your-coat-men-your-thoughts/369771/9 "2006-08-22T19:22:00Z")
[QUOTE=Alistair McCello] A thousand curses! Well… uh… does saying grammar is not a ‘field that I am interested in’ help me out here at all? Didn’t think so… [/QUOTE] I’ll help you, amigo. A case can be made that “than” can be either a preposition or a conjunction in constructions such as above; which is to say, using it as a preposition, while technically incorrect, has a great deal of literary precedent and is the usual case in speech. In a formal context, you’d definitely want to write “smarter than I,” but the Dope is mostly informal, more like casual conversation, at least in this forum. Feel free to say “smarter than me.” But people who say, “Oh, that’s me,” rather than “Oh, that is I” are still wankers. ---
**Author:** ![stuyguy](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/ec9cab/32.png) [@stuyguy](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/stuyguy)\ **Post date:** [August 22, 2006, 9:02pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/dont-make-your-husband-hold-your-coat-men-your-thoughts/369771/10 "2006-08-22T21:02:20Z")
[QUOTE=Skald the Rhymer] You seem to have forgotten to take into account the fact that Joyce Brothers is a moron. [/QUOTE] Hey, what gives here? Why no love for the doc? What did she ever do to you, **StR**? ---
**Author:** ![Skald\_the\_Rhymer](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/ecccb3/32.png) [@Skald\_the\_Rhymer](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Skald_the_Rhymer)\ **Post date:** [August 22, 2006, 9:24pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/dont-make-your-husband-hold-your-coat-men-your-thoughts/369771/11 "2006-08-22T21:24:05Z")
[QUOTE=stuyguy] Hey, what gives here? Why no love for the doc? What did she ever do to you, **StR**? [/QUOTE] Actually I was just being a jerk, and for some reason I had conflated Joyce Brothers with Dr. Laura. ---
**Author:** ![Alistair\_McCello](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/58956e/32.png) [@Alistair\_McCello](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Alistair_McCello)\ **Post date:** [August 22, 2006, 9:39pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/dont-make-your-husband-hold-your-coat-men-your-thoughts/369771/12 "2006-08-22T21:39:50Z")
Whew, thanks for the save **Skald**. ---
**Author:** ![Skald\_the\_Rhymer](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/ecccb3/32.png) [@Skald\_the\_Rhymer](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Skald_the_Rhymer)\ **Post date:** [August 22, 2006, 9:45pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/dont-make-your-husband-hold-your-coat-men-your-thoughts/369771/13 "2006-08-22T21:45:20Z")
[QUOTE=Alistair McCello] Whew, thanks for the save **Skald**. [/QUOTE] You’re welcome. For future reference, though, you might just want to assume that inexplicable statements from me are the result of me being a jerk. 🆒 ---
**Author:** ![Kent\_Clark](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/kent_clark/32/105_2.png) [@Kent\_Clark](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Kent_Clark)\ **Post date:** [August 22, 2006, 9:47pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/dont-make-your-husband-hold-your-coat-men-your-thoughts/369771/14 "2006-08-22T21:47:21Z")
I think the moral of the story is that the name of Dr. Joyce Brothers’ husband is not “Mr. Dr. Joyce Brothers.” I suspect there are a number of married women on the Board who would do the same thing if someone took their husband’s coat, then handed it to them. ---
**Author:** ![Skald\_the\_Rhymer](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/ecccb3/32.png) [@Skald\_the\_Rhymer](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Skald_the_Rhymer)\ **Post date:** [August 22, 2006, 9:47pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/dont-make-your-husband-hold-your-coat-men-your-thoughts/369771/15 "2006-08-22T21:47:30Z")
[QUOTE=Skald the Rhymer] You’re welcome. For future reference, though, you might just want to assume that inexplicable statements from me are the result of me being a jerk. 🆒 [/QUOTE] Or that I sometimes respond to posts without thinking…fex, that response was really meant for **stuyguy** ---
**Author:** ![jimbeam](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/j/858c86/32.png) [@jimbeam](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/jimbeam)\ **Post date:** [August 22, 2006, 10:08pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/dont-make-your-husband-hold-your-coat-men-your-thoughts/369771/16 "2006-08-22T22:08:12Z")
[QUOTE=Skald the Rhymer] You seem to have forgotten to take into account the fact that Joyce Brothers is a moron. [/QUOTE] 😃 heh, made me laugh… whether she is or not I couldn’t say, probably not if had to guess, but it was still funny So what’s the question here? > [@](#): > > What say you, Doper men? Do you have strong feelings about your girlfriend or wife not showing you up at something/anything? How sensitive is the male ego these days? Was the late Mr. Brothers just a product of his times? That’s it huh? Do I have strong feelings about being shown up by a woman? why of course not, I mean I wouldn’t want my SO to be able to outwork me, you know she’d have to be a big muscular chick that could work out in the heat all day…not attractive (to me anyway) Could she beat me at say racquetball or some other “sport” Hey that’d be great. I like a good competition, no problems here. Intellectually superior… my wife made better grades than I did in college and I was on the Dean’s list every semester. I was proud of her. No problem. sensitive male ego…not when you’ve got a beautiful, intelligent, sexy woman standing WITH you. Product of the times? No more than today I think. They’re still out there. and what about you? Would you have a problem with me opening doors for you(both car and building)? How about being protective of you when there’s a crowd? (or anywhere else for that matter) Would it bother you if I took your hand while we were walking together? What about this one? If there’s an important decision that we need to make and we both discuss the situation and listen to each other’s opinion. I mean really listen and consider all the options but we really don’t agree. Would you have a problem if I made the decision (we have to make one) even though you weren’t in complete agreement with me? I wouldn’t if she made the decision either. What about you? Couples should compliment each other. You make each other stronger by combining the strengths that each of you possess. You should not make the other feel weaker. If so, then there’s definitely something wrong. ---
**Author:** ![jimbeam](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/j/858c86/32.png) [@jimbeam](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/jimbeam)\ **Post date:** [August 22, 2006, 10:18pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/dont-make-your-husband-hold-your-coat-men-your-thoughts/369771/17 "2006-08-22T22:18:11Z")
BTW I’ve carried coats and purses and sat in ob/gyn waiting and bought tampons and etc etc etc. Does/did this make me feel “uncomfortable”. Man go back to highschool and start over again, maybe you’ll get it right this time. Be glad you’ve got a woman to do those things for. AND ladies, don’t take advantage of the situation. No man wants to be treated like a damned errand boy, either. Honey go get this, go get that , do this, do that… he does it because he wants to, he does it because he loves you and he will do it if you ask. But watch it when your requests start sounding like orders. We really do love y’all but… well you know what I’m saying. That’s all. 🙂 much love~JB ---
**Author:** ![saoirse](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/5daacb/32.png) [@saoirse](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/saoirse)\ **Post date:** [August 22, 2006, 10:40pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/dont-make-your-husband-hold-your-coat-men-your-thoughts/369771/18 "2006-08-22T22:40:22Z")
[QUOTE=Skald the Rhymer] But people who say, “Oh, that’s me,” rather than “Oh, that is I” are still wankers. [/QUOTE] You’ve got that backwards; it’s just that the wankers are correct. I discovered in another thread that most dopers who were bullied as children not only stood up to the bully, but demolished him, knocked him across the room, even hospitalized him in some cases. I just got my ass kicked, which is probably why I am not as secure as most of the men here. When I was married, and worked at the same company my wife did, I have to confess that I felt a bit more than a twinge of embarassment when she was promoted to management, and became someone people in other departments talked about, and brought me to parties and functions that were hosted by Divisional VPs or the COO. So, yeah, somewhere down the brainstem we mortal men dislike that. We get over it, though. ---
**Author:** ![Mindfield](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/mindfield/32/19759_2.png) [@Mindfield](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Mindfield)\ **Post date:** [August 22, 2006, 10:45pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/dont-make-your-husband-hold-your-coat-men-your-thoughts/369771/19 "2006-08-22T22:45:00Z")
I don’t think it sounded like Dr. Brothers was suggesting that women not surpass men in order to protect their frail ego, but rather that in doing so, women (or for that matter, men) should not treat their mate as a lesser person for not being as accomplished. IOW, don’t hand them your coat like that’s all they’re good for. I know if I was that woman’s husband I’d do the same thing. Being treated like a butler in such an offhand manner as though it was my job would piss me off. Unless it _was_ my job. But I’d make a really crappy butler. ---
**Author:** ![Skald\_the\_Rhymer](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/ecccb3/32.png) [@Skald\_the\_Rhymer](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Skald_the_Rhymer)\ **Post date:** [August 22, 2006, 10:46pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/dont-make-your-husband-hold-your-coat-men-your-thoughts/369771/20 "2006-08-22T22:46:08Z")
[QUOTE=saoirse] You’ve got that backwards; it’s just that the wankers are correct. [/quote] How do you figure? You want a predicate nominative to end that sentence, which calls for the subject pronoun, not the object. Those who claim otherwise are wankers and shall be shot once I am god-king. 'Cept Amy Acker, of course.. [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/dont-make-your-husband-hold-your-coat-men-your-thoughts/369771.md?page=2)