She has to make choices. I caution against being guided by her dreams about life with a man, his pledges of commitment, or perhaps their mutual intentions. She will do better deciding beforehand the choices to be made—regardless of who the man is—in these critical stages:
· Dating is for fun. Courtship is for involvement. Engagement is for mutual examination. Church-going is for generating and improving devotion to each other. Does she know how she will handle each? How much time she will need? More importantly and when necessary, can she convince him of her rightness?
· Pre-conquest is for generating his respect for her and shaping his thinking into more closely matching hers. Does she see this as her opportunity to shape forever their relationship?
· Conquest is his reward—aka return on investment—for investing himself in her hopes and dreams. Did she remain chaste long enough for him to even learn her hopes and dreams? Will she yield on lust, intentions, promises, commitment, or devotion? Can she tell the difference?
· When she yields sex, it releases him from his quest to conquer her. He changes to having an owner’s expectations, but will it be to her advantage or disadvantage? Can she tell ahead of time? For sure?
· Marriage to him adds another mission to his life. Does she know what she has to give up in exchange for his independence?
Love-aholics and women desperate for a man can’t keep a man. Foolish women, much like adolescent girls, let love dominate their thinking. Love can’t be relied upon to successfully pick and keep a mate who will stick through thick and thin, raising kids, and providing comfort. For example, where do in-laws fit in? That’s next.
Hi Mr. Maligned,
I have left critical comments here in the past and happen to stumble upon your site again. One thing that was not previously clear to me is that you have been married 54 years, which means you have been married since the mid-1950s. This explains a lot.
You are out of touch. You are a product of your time. Sure, you view sex as some sort of conquest whereby the woman “yields.” My mother tells me that was a common view among men of your era. But men of subsequent generations are different.
I grew up in the so-called “Generation X.” Are there some men who view sex as a conquest? Sure. But there are plenty of men in my generation who actually respect women, including those of us who participate in sex without apology.
Marriage was a raw deal for women in your era. That’s why the divorce rate was so high in the 1960s and 1970s.
Your Ladyship Laurie,
I’m okay being “out of touch” with the things you cite. Could you be the same regarding the world outside your window?
I have pro-actively defended your criticisms with a new article everyday for over two years. If you wish, you can catch up. I suggest you start with the Recent Comments cited in the right column on HOME page.
Guy
Dear Laurie,
I am sad for you. It is apparent that you have not yet recognized the continual demise of our culture: increased violence especially against women and children; continually increasing divorce rates which means children no longer have the necessary benefit of both parents at home; an upward spiral in a government dependent lifestyle, i.e., welfare recipients; continually increasing unnatural sexual behavior among humans only; and on and on.
Mr. Guy is clearly describing the cause and the cure – and it all rests on healthy families. You forget that history puts things in perspective for us. The state of America today is beginning to look like the end of the Roman empire. Is that the direction you seek? The end of the American dream?
And the current divorce rate (plus the “failed shacking-up” rate plus the one-night stand rate plus fatherless children rate) is so good? So much better than in the 60s and 70s?
More likely, the divorce rate was driven by young couples who thought they could “have it all” (whatever “it” was, however “it” was defined at the time), and most likely fueled by problems with couples having premarital sex and not properly screening their marriage partners, etc. Same as today; except so many people don’t even respect marriage or hold it in such low esteem that they don’t even bother to get married, so when they end the relationship, there isn’t even a divorce that can be counted.
Laurie, perhaps divorce rates in the 60′s and 70′s were high is because thats when feminism begand to take hold. Feminism has changed the way women veiw men and visa versa, and has had a catastrophic effect on their relationships and on the family unit. Sir Guy merely lays out male nature for us, women used to understand them, not so much anymore and it’s been bad for everyone all around. Womens’ nature is the same today as it was a thousand years ago and “gasp” as it was in the 1950′s. I know it’s true, look at the cover any women’s magazine and it’s emphasis is on relatioships with men, cooking and decorating magazines excluded. And it’s sad that you can’t evem go to you’re Mom for the straight skinny because she does’nt know either. Read Guy’s posts with an open mind and really look at things honeslty. And by the way, how do you know the men you have sex with respect you? Based on what? Because they said so?
If anything, the fact that he has been married that long should make any person, especially a christian, pay really close attention to anything he has to say. I am a young adult, and know better than to think that this generation is doing better than others past.
Dear Laurie,
So marriage was a raw deal for women in Guy’s era? Right. Women didn’t have equality so much as they had superiority in the minds of men and society at large. A lot of this feminism detritus was hatched in the minds of a handful of upper and upper middle-class, educated women who were so self-absorbed that they decided to deconstruct society because misery loves company. I grew up in the 50′s in a blue-collar neighborhood where the women reigned as queens over their households and lives. They were so happy to have the Depression and the war behind them and to be settled in their own homes with their “modern” conveniences. They could be home with their children, enjoy the fellowship of other women, and even rest when they needed to. They cherished those homes and their families, as did our very present fathers. As a Catholic, the Church was our third parent, and so we had a solid sense of identity, and of being loved and protected by our families and the surrounding community. Look, a tree is known by its fruit. Does today’s hedonistic, anything-goes society make children more or less stable and well-adjusted than 50 years ago? Is there more or less sexually transmitted disease? What about the fertility rate? Isn’t it great that so many women are staggering around now with broken bodies, broken bank accounts and broken hearts? That they have to submit to strangers who are their bosses in the workforce all day, just to come home and rush through as much laundry, shopping, meals, dishes, homework, kid’s baths as they can in the evening? They fall into bed, jump up the next morning, haul their kids off to some caretaker and do it all over again, looking forward to their lousy two weeks off a year – and nowadays, you are rarely left alone by your boss when you are home or on vacation, because of cell phones and the expectation from your employer that you are always on call. And you know all those men who so respectfully participate in sex with you? Actually, they have been taught by you that you owe it to them, without apology.
Well-spoken, Gail!
I’d like to thank Gail for such an articulate, well thought out reply to Laurie’s comments. Certainly Laurie is more than entitled to believe as she wishes, & conduct her life as she sees fit.
But I can’t help thinking that her perspective is a rather skewed one. She claims to be part of such an enlightened generation, when in fact that generation has merely put a new, & even more disastrous, spin on things.
You are not, Laurie, respected because you “participate in sex without apology”. I can’t congratulate you, or your partner, just because you view sex as simply one more thing in this life to enjoy without commitment. You bypassed a man’s hardwiring: all that means is that you didn’t require the best of his masculinity…..& you didn’t present the best of your femininity.
I predict that one day men like Guy will be looked to, by the culture at large, for guidance & assistance about the better way for men & women to behave with each other. Of course, this is likely years away……unfortunately, as a society, we haven’t yet “bottomed-out”. I pray that I live long enough to see a turn-around!
B.
Gail, you’re so right!
Great job Gail!
Oh dear, I got busy and missed all these comments. There is a lot to say in response but I will confine myself to three points.
1) It is irrelevant whether men secretly “disrespect” women like me or think we owe them sex. The point is that in my experience the men I dated did not treat me with a lack of respect. So it is not universal or hardwired for men to mistreat women who have sex.
I think it is degrading for women to pander to men who categorize women as either “sluts” or “nice girls.” I have been labeled a “nice girl” before, and it didn’t exactly make me jump for joy. I don’t want the approval of someone who would viciously tar and feather another woman as a “slut.” It is presumptuous for any man to think he is entitled to cast judgment on a woman’s sexual choices, especially if he is engaging in the exact same behavior. It doesn’t matter to me whether such men “approve” of me, because even their approval is degrading, implying as it does that I need their approval.
2) It is a vicious fantasy to believe that the modern feminist is a broken woman, crying, “Oh no! What have I done?”
Yes, yes, of course we work at stressful and difficult jobs. If work were easy, it wouldn’t be work! That’s the whole point of work. And don’t forget, the difficulty and stress of work is the source of much of its value. I get a fat paycheck because my work is difficult and valuable. My fat paycheck means I am not under the thumb of a husband. The difficulty of my work means I am respected in the community and it means that I have sense of accomplishment. In short, it makes me happy. I note that when men do the same exact job I do, no one says, “Oh, that poor man, I feel so sorry for him. He must be so miserable and exhausted.” They say admiringly,, “Wow, Charlie is a really great a guy, a real go-getter.”
I am also typical of my generation of working women in that I have waited until a fairly advanced age to have children. As I result, I may not be able to conceive. (My husband is unable to have children without medical intervention, but at this point if we seek medical intervention, my age may pose a problem too.) Should that make me an object of pity? Of course not! Like any woman in our society, I have always been perfectly aware of the “biological clock.” I deliberately chose to place other priorities above conceiving my own genetic children. While my husband and I may seek fertility treatment in the coming year, I still view myself as “childless by choice.” If it turns out we cannot conceive a biological child at this point, that is completely fine because that fact is a consequence of deliberate choices we made, choices I am very grateful to have had the freedom to make.
I guess it is tough for me to see older, childless couples struggling with infertility as some sort of horrible, sad consequence of feminism. These are people (my husband and myself included) who made their choices — and who still have lots of options for having children, even if not biological children. I have no patience for women who claim that feminism made them wait too long to have children.
Feminism doesn’t force women to do anything. It merely gives us more freedom to construct our lives as we see fit.
WOW.. I know these comments were around 3 years ago, but i’ve just heard on average American women are spending around 24,000 dollars a year on dates! And guys are playing them cheap. I CANT BELIEVE IT! Wheres the mystique Ladies? And now, with the fiscal cliff @ 1/1/13, couples making over 450,000 a year will be taxed more. It looks like its time for the ladies to go home and be housewives. It just may be too expensive for her to work