And so, the recession drags on. Nobody feels it more oppressively and relentlessly than the men who have been cast out of all those industries they called their own.
In downturns past, there was always the certainty that, as nasty as things are right now, this too shall pass. Eventually, the pain will subside, the wound will heal over, and things will return to normal.
But, for men, and the power they've assumed as a right of gender, this one is different. Sometimes global events have a way -- like a nudge over the crest of a hill -- of accelerating things already under way. Normal is a new and, for many, very confusing place.
Laws and changing times have conspired for decades to siphon off male power. Women got rights that had long been denied. Place in society became less a matter of force and position than information and communication. Pick a measure -- education, managerial jobs -- and women, in most cases, have blown past parity and assumed the lead.
Add in a recession where 75 percent of the job losses were by men, and there are implications at every point where genders meet -- from the conference room to the bedroom. One of the murkiest of implications, however, is in the living room. What happens to the power structure of families that for centuries has been built -- at least in the confines of their castle -- around the supremacy of an alpha male?
There is some interesting study behind that question.
Working with families my whole career, I've seen that power is drawn from different sources. It might flow to the one who has the most knowledge of a topic -- how to fix the hot water heater. It might be likeability. Some family members are just more popular. It might be fear. It might be the ability to reward. For most families, all of that can play a part, and all of it is in motion.
But, researchers Robert Blood and Donald Wolfe argued in the 60s that there is a super-platform. They called it the resource theory of family power. What you are inside the family is what you are outside. Power is a function of income, prestige, education and other conveyers of worldly status. For most of our history, all of that has tilted toward men.
As the rise of women and the economic decline of men have kicked out those pillars, what happens to the power platform so long enjoyed by dad?
Philosopher Eric Hoffer said, "Every new adjustment is a crisis in self-esteem."
Crisis? It's too early to tell. But there are early indications that the adjustment to a new balance of power has certainly not been kind to self-esteem of men who find themselves on the short end of the seesaw.
An Emory University study has found that rates of depression in men is reaching that of women, who have traditionally been the higher risk group. The probable causes: job loss and insecurity have combined with the muddling of male roles, colliding directly with the embedded notion of the man as the breadwinner and boss.
Another piece of evidence is the dramatic increases in women who make more money than their husbands, giving "the resource theory" high ground. In a telling New York magazine article called "Alpha Women, Beta Men," Ralph Gardener did extensive interviews with couples where the economic balance of power had been flipped. His conclusion: "Neither the newly liberated alpha women nor their shell-shocked beta spouses seem comfortable with the role reversal." One woman talked about the relationship toll that comes with giving her non-working husband "an allowance."
We've adjusted to so much. Why not this? Ten years ago, cell phones were for talking, and a kid named Mark Zuckerberg was in high school. Clearly, we incorporate shifts in technologies into our lives a lot more readily than we do shifts in gender roles and expectations.
Both men and women are going to have to find a way. Some have made the adjustment seamlessly. For others, the seams may be coming apart.
The family shifts in gender power are a slow-rolling revolution that events have given powerful momentum. If there is one thing that history has taught us about revolutions: they don't go backwards.
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Men in charge was a dominant pattern in society. It was called patriarchy. The Alpha female in charge of home is one aspect of the way families now function – within patriarchal society. There might also be Alpha females married to Alpha men, both with high-powered careers. But this Alpha female's life at home won't be the same as the man lacking a career.
I don't imagine most Alpha females at home "make efforts to demasculate/disempower men in order to advance their own situation in the relationship/careers." In fact, this sentence takes in so many different scenarios that it's impossible to look at critically i this space. You are claiming such women act with intention, where in earlier times much of men's behaviour was unintentional, based on the idea that women were inferior, for one thing, and on another, that women's sexuality needs to be controlled.
Sometimes, the person or group with power do not recognize that they are abusing their power. They see it as their 'right.'
At the same time, what some females do not want to recognize and/or admit is that this whole Alpah female/have it all sort of mentality is actually going to undermine advances that women seek for the simply fact that men understand that dynamics of childbirth and sex that women hold in their hands and body.
Noticable shifts in shared parenting and stay at home dads has brought another dynmaic to the mix that men and women alone have to confront and deal with. It would be in the best interest of long term advances and civility between the sex that females in positons as primary income earner not allow their new found economic power/control go to their heads and abuse their power.
Seems that some women make efforts to demasculate/disempower men in order to advance their own situation in the relationship/careers. Those men who choose to or must become primary care givers are stil men and those women who cross that line of respect a man being in the same way that some husbands will disrespect the dignity of a stay at home mom. Empowering one another is a better relationship than the alpha/betta non-sense going around these posts.
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Sometimes I think people are really trying the be considerate but failing when they know your busy with kids in a Store or Mall so striking up a long conversation requires a lot of work on their part while your dealing iwth the kids too.
Each Parent has their own quarks about raising kids and your there wanting to help and be a friend but feeling awarkward at the same time afraid to help with the kids .
I know I did not like anyone to lay a hand on my kids unless they were in danger.
Friendships can be hard with and the path of least resistance it so easy to follow .
So people avoid you and you feel Isolated. It happend to men and women; welcome to the club.
Of course, there other women with jobs, or who are single, who will look down on women who were stay-at-home mothers, not seeing them as good enough to have on their committee as career women, or women currently married to homeowners. Yes, being patronized. Some even refer to such women as 'breeders', a behaviour I have spoken out against in other article forums. But it isn't a word used personally. I imagine it only applies to some women - those more vulnerable and isolated.
As a Vietnam vet you have probably experienced some of these behaviours. Others will be totally alien to you. I am talking about women and not-so-well-off women particularly, after the marriage is over. Feminists ralk about women's rights, but when it comes to the majority of women struggling for survival, they're just not there. They're too busy with their careers, their husbands, their homes and pets, and 1 - 2 children.
She was going a little nuts, I jokethat we just enjoyed the sex and did not notice all the kids piling up for a while. We have 6 and wanted 7 but we stopped.
Oh I met my share of weird people even married one who claimed to want kids. But after I got all her bills paid off she let it slips she had a fully Hyst 2 years before she ever met me. And a few others with strange views of Relationship. As a Father I fear for my sons at times after seeing the spoiled little brat girls they bring home.
Women with jobs, or who are single, might patronize such housewives and stay-at-home mothers, and that's a shame, as they are performing a valuable service. The medical system doesn't seem to have much use for them as they grow older.
I know Vietnam vets can relate to some of this, except I am talking about women's relationships with men, as well as with the wider world.
and Construction Jobs .
They built over 3 Million more homes than there was a Real Market for.
The False Economy created by the Sub Prime Lending created a False Demand for Housing and with one Fraud feeding off the other Fraud.
In the 1950 al homes bulit had a workshop or space for one. But many today have chosen to hire people to do things or to just toss things if they quit working well and buy mew ones. So they never learned to repair things or how to maintain things.
Nothing like having a planer, routers, 2 table saws - one with a dado blade. Drill press, band saw, table sander, electric grinder/wire brush, wood lathe, compound miter saw, Tap and die set and lots of hand tools. I've been making some really nice things and fix everything. It's good to know I can make my own parts.
The thing to remember is not to let your neighbors in on it because doing them all favors is like a full time job.
Watch your tools.
I take a hammer and break off all the little legs from my tools, so I know they can't walk off .
Friend of mine called to borrow a couple of tools, I knew he had .
It turns out his kids have been stealing his tools and giving them to thier Moms new Husband, an excon she had married.
So the guy is not only living off his kids child support he now has the kids stealing .
Men have helped create the need to put a Value on their work.
I know our house is owned jointly by my wife and myself though she's never paid anything on the mortgage or done any of the renovation work it's required. Those jobs were all done by me. If we were to separate half would be hers. I'd call that getting paid. That alone is worth $100K paid to her.
Contemporary relevance? Post WWII ushered in technological advances and innovations that created huge surpluses of free time which had to be used for something other than house chores. Men returned to the work force subsequently returning women to homemaker status. This is the crux of the matter and a turning point, it couldn't be like it was in the past. We didn't have running water, washing machines and other time saving conveniences in our ancient agrarian societies - this was the modern industrial age and women had their fair share of it all.
So what is the problem now? Mans reluctance to relinquish position to their historically complementary counterpart OR women's push to portray men as being a problem that needs to be eliminated? OR What?
Nowadays, there are all sorts of groups and volunteering for women. No, I don't think it's the mod cons that led women to the work force. Even women with servants wouldn't have unless they wanted to. Taking holidays today involves more travel and cost, so a higher family income is needed. There's never enough money, but for the two-income family, life can be pretty good.
I think it was the mindset that made the difference for women, that thought that women were as good as men (and thus could vote, for starters), not just having spare time on their hands so could go to work. Now, it's about women working alongside men to make money and have control over their lives. It's about rights. I’m sure some men have concerns about the sexual aspect of their lives – at home and on the job. It may be more about women discovering their sexual power and real power in today's world of freedom, thinking it's fine to use it at will, with no thought to the consequence.
Men should be reluctant to relinquish their position. So, instead of taking it out on the more vulnerable, they should go after the ones with real power.
She would buy into all that Newer, most improved and lastest con game so easy.
But once I showed her how to buy rental cars and just have the transmission rebuilt would only cost $3,000 but last over 5 years with very little maintance
They usually say "I'm going shopping" and Not "I'm going to buy a (_______)" then they come home with bags of stuff because it was all so pretty.
Men usually know what they want and have a clear objective. They go to the store find what they want and get the hell out of there as soon as possible.
I could walk the entire store and come back to find my wife still standing in the same aisle looking at the same things. It's insane.
That was also the only period of time in the entirety of human history that virtually half the adult population of a society was allowed to be economically non-productive -- ie the American housewife. That's not to say she was lazy or anything, but her ancestors who mostly lived on farms or ran businesses with their husbands and children no longer had to do that. Indeed most everything they used to make was now bought with a wage her husband earned by being economically productive.
Long story short -- we're simply heading back to a time when EVERYBODY has to be economically productive in order to support a family. That short time when folks didn't was just a little blip in the context of history.
Do you know how much it costs for day-care or daily babysitters? Not to mention everything else mothers at home do. Yet women would rather work than stay home and get referred to by people like yourself as non-productive.
What words. The women on these Farms were up before the men to cook and prepare food for the men to take to the Feild. She was Milking the cows, collecting eggs and cutting off meat then cooking it .
After they ate she cleaned up, got the kids dressed and ready for thier day. Fed the animals. did the laundry many times carrying the water to.
A man could not afford to pay servants for all the labor he got from a good wife who often worked hours after he had gone to bed making sure everything was ready for the next day.
She did all this was an Inheirted Knowledge of her role in the family mostly without questioning the demand put on her.
It is not a Right it is something that is innate and in fact it is not confined to the male species, there are dominant females that keep their men in tow with the ring in the nose. I don't have a problem with that. If the man is meek and wimpy that is all he can be - he'll be dominated by women and men.
That is what tribal "Rituals" were intended to do, sort out the Alphas.
That aside the mistake most people make is in linking employment with self worth. If you understand a family as a team it there should be no connection between the alpha of the team (regardless of who it is) and who contributes what.
I've always found it disrespectful and a indicator of the societal failings of our country that the contributions of someone who raises children and keeps a home is considered to be nigh worthless compared to, oh say, kissing your bosses ass in a pointless endeavor for 40+ hours a week.
Perhaps you'll say that NOW that men are having to do this work I see value in it. I can tell you that is not true, but you've no way to believe me so I'll just leave it at saying, should we still keep promoting this idea anyway?
Well gentlemen now you know why women are so often depressed.
There is nothing more depressing then staying at home with kids the entire day, every day for several years. It's like being in jail with your jailer being a small child who in addition to denying you freedom want you to love him.
But what's even worse is to be in that position because you can't find a job. Then in addition to everything you have a stress of looking for one, and you feel you can't really argue with you spouse about expenses because you are no longer bringing the bacon. It destroys your overconfidence in no time.
What's more until you experience it you really don't understand how awful it feels.
I realize women today are expected to work, no matter what kind of work that may be (including prostitution if some feminists have their way), but largely that's because liberal feminism has been partly responsible (as well as the economy) for such changes in thinking about women and work. And that still holds true. If motherhood and stay-at-home mothering were seen as a valuable contribution and a viable option to an overpopulated workplace, society would be better off. But no, middle class women who are married to middle class men and form the top part of a two-tier class system of working people, aren't going to give up their dual income that easily. And that leaves the lesser jobs to those couples farther down the ladder, still struggling, not to mention underemployed and unemployed individuals.
Many women today have as much power as men did years ago, except men back then supported their wives. Today, high-powered women want to keep the money, and the power, and to hell with the rest.
Also, as long as the people you want staying home are mothers rather than fathers, a lot of women aren't going to believe that your motives in proposing this are noble.
There has been so much feminist hype claiming that men and women are equal that their differences must not be being recognized. Men do still feel protective towards women. After all, it is still women who give birth. And it is so ingrained in our culture, that men must look out for women (they might be pregnant, who knows!). They might know, rationally, that the breadwinner role is in the past, but that is one basis of masculinity, and hard to discard.
This discussion that men are "losing power" is really just the females' self acknowledgement that what they really want is power, not equality. Perhaps previous generations did not provide access to the freedoms that they should have for women.
I haven't seen any Men's Workout World businesses - it is sexist. But I see Woman's Workout World all overthe place. I don't see bars advertise Men's night out - but I see Women's night out all the time. I don't see men needing to go shopping to cure the hardships of reality. But women fuel the overspending on clothing and have supported hundreds of clothing stores that all sell the same crap.
I do see men cutting the grass, cleaning the garage, building basements, and enjoying some time, occassionally on a golf course. But mostly, I see dads watching their kids at soccer games, basketball games, and teaching their kids how to manage money, take responsibility, and be the best they can be.Why there is a segment of women that want to knock that, I don'tknow. But it does get frustrating to always be lamented in the general pop culutre media, where hype and fluff rule the day.
Sure there's are "Men's Workout World" businesses - they are called "Joe's Gym" and stink of sweat. Having a woman walk through the doors brings the whole place to a dead halt.
"Woman's Workout World" was established for women who want to exercise without guys standing around watching, drooling like they're watching a porn film, because it's embarassing.
Bars don't have "Men's night out" because the men are there every night. They have "Women's night out" to bribe the women in, so they can use their presence to lure male customers away from the competitors by implying more women present might raise the odds of them getting laid.
As for "needing to go shopping to cure the hardships of reality" what do you think supports all those hardware and sporting good stores and sports car dealers?
I'll agree with you absolutely that the average man is doing his best to work hard, take care of his home and raise his kids, but most men are doing that in partnership with their wives, who are doing their best to work hard, take care of their home and raise their kids. Men and women don't have to be in competition, and articles like this one don't help much since they seem to be based on an underlying meme of women are doing okay so men must be miserable/men measure their status by whether they can grind women's faces into the dirt.
If there is an inequality of power between two groups, one has to lose power to get to equality.
Is that hard to understand?
"I haven't seen any Men's Workout World businesses - it is sexist."
Women need a place to workout where they are not constantly being evaluated by males.
Males have no similar need in regard to women.
"I don't see bars advertise Men's night out - but I see Women's night out all the time."
That is a marketing strategy designed to attract men.
(sigh)
women).
Yes, women know you love them. But they will use that against other women to get what they want. And what they want isn't going to make the world a better place. It's not male bashing to say that some men have a hard time of it, and some men may be getting far more than their fair share of the ill-treatment.