Inspired by this thread, where **Shagnasty **is sharing his experience of dating. My question is not directed to him but to dopers in general, so I talk about him in third person. He shares the following:
It seems to be common practice especially in the USA (?), but also not too unusual in my parts of the world, that the man is paying the bill when dating, because he is a man and she is a woman.
I honestly don’t understand why. The tradition – which we probably all are aware of – that the man pays the bill, is that for hundreds of years or more the man is self supporting and the woman is not. (Or is supposed to be etc.) She is either “payed for” by her father, or by her husband. She lacks an economy of her own and are thus unable to pay for herself. So if a man wants to show that he can provide for her, he has to cough up. She lacks the money to pay for her own bill (does not have a job, waiting for a man who has), and he also needs to show that he in fact can pay the bills, to be an attractive candidate and so on.
But obviously and thankfully that is not the case anymore. Most grown up women who are dating men have a job, many times with high salary. Back to the Shag man: “I have been going out with high-earning women for years … while paying … and it is usually very expensive.”
(I’m joking with the user name, it is in good faith, no insult intended and hope it is OK.)
For the life of me I don’t understand this. If I – a middle aged man with a good income – was dating a woman, a professional in some line of work or another, it wouldn’t occur to me to spontaneously pay for the dinner. *If *I payed for the dinner – because I’m a man – what I’m saying to her is:
“Of course, as a woman, you do not have an income. Therefore I pay, being a man, who provides.”
Isn’t that an insult to both of us?
I came to think of this specifically when I talked with a young man in my own country who told me about his internet dating, and even though this is Scandinavia and everything – he seemed to habitually paying for the dinner and the drinks!
I can understand that you do so occasionally for a friend or even under certain circumstances for a stranger, and of course you hold up the door for a woman (just like you do for a man), and so on, but paying for the date because you are a man, and accepting it because you a woman, as a standard routine… I honestly don’t get it.
There are two grown ups at the table, with jobs and money in their wallet (for the sake of the discussion), who are having a good time together. They can have sex, be polite to each other (being a gentleman) and try make the other feel good in every way. But if I on the first meeting treat you as a person who are unable to pay for the meal… that would make me feel as if I was insulting you. “Since you are a woman [reaching for the wallet]…”
How do you accept that, as a woman? Or do you?
