It means “I want to live in a ranch and not a colonial”, and “I want to send our kids to School A and not to School B”, and so on, versus “I am the one who decides what house we buy” and “I am the one who decides where we send our kids to school”.
My hypothesis is that a woman is more happy letting a man think he made the decision while in reality he was manipulated or otherwise limited into making the “correct” decision than the reverse, because women don’t need to feel like they made the decision to the same extent, and what’s more important to them is the outcome. While sufferers of Male Ego need to feel the power of having “made the decision”, or at least avoid having it imposed on them, and thus have some inclination to trade the actual outcome for the formal (and imaginary) decision-making role.
Ah. I think you’re missing the part where we roll our eyes and mime a high five to our girlfriends when we’re done with the “discussion” we just “lost”.
We (I) certainly still feel as in control as the men feel in such a situation. Although perhaps, for large gender averages, we feel in control by controlling social interactions, whereas men feel in control from controlling things (cars, remotes, houses, etc.) Broad brush only, nuances and individualities need not apply.
