Kate Bolick on Refusing to Settle (Part One)
"Recent years have seen an explosion of male joblessness and a steep decline in men’s life prospects that have disrupted the 'romantic market' in ways that narrow a marriage-minded woman’s options: increasingly, her choice is between deadbeats (whose numbers are rising) and playboys (whose power is growing). But this strange state of affairs also presents an opportunity: as the economy evolves, it’s time to embrace new ideas about romance and family — and to acknowledge the end of 'traditional' marriage as society’s highest ideal."
In the cover story for the November issue of The Atlantic, which just came online, 39-year-old writer Kate Bolick explains why she hasn't gotten married and why many of her friends haven't either. It's terrific. Read it, and then please come back, because we interviewed Kate about it over email.
EZ: I've been thinking about the story a lot since I finished reading it, mostly in three ways: What does it mean for us in general? (What comes after marriage?) What does it mean for you? (Are guys going to hit on you more or less? What will your hate mail look like?) And what does it mean for me? From the broad to the personal, which I think the story itself does beautifully. And while I was reading I kept wondering — if I were a guy, how would I be feeling right now? So that's my first question: What do you think an unmarried man's takeaway would be? Or, what might his experience be while reading?
KB: Edith, I am so glad that you like the piece. Thank you. It's really your cohort I had in mind when I was writing it. I wanted to let younger women know that it's completely normal and okay if they're not married just yet — that this is where history has brought us. As for the male reaction: Honestly, I have no idea. What do you think? Imagining myself into a man's head is beyond my abilities (maybe if I could do that I'd be a novelist?). It certainly was my intention to make it clear that not all women are obsessed with marriage and children, as in my experience men assume that of every single woman they meet. (In fact, I think these rigid assumptions we all have about one another — what men want; what women want — are a symptom of how confused we are about changing gender roles.) I'm sure I'll get tons of hate mail about how I'm an uppity bitch, or funny looking, or whatever, and that's why I'm single. I've received one (faux) marriage proposal already, from a friend who wants me to try to sell this as a book for the big bucks as he thinks it'll be his only chance to marry rich.
EZ: Haha. Congratulations! But yes — I agree that one of the piece's strengths was its ability to communicate well that all women aren't obsessed with getting married. And that the current marriage model isn't working/fitting for a lot of people. But for people who want to have kids and raise them with someone else, I wonder what the next alternative for love/sex/reproduction is. Because it seems like for women there's currently two options: Option A, which is dating, marriage, kids (and divorce and remarriage, etc.), or Option B, which is every other nontraditional alternative, where it's everyone for him/herself, trying to figure out what fits. Option A being pretty clear, and Option B being wide open.
I know you weren't tasked with finding a new model or refining that Option B — KATE, fix everything! — so much as you were with explaining why you and lots of other single women haven't wanted to marry anyone. But by the end of the piece, when you're visiting Ellen in the all-women enclave (and hanging out with Denean), it seems like one more-solidified version of that Option B that you present is of some women having their most meaningful, lasting relationships with other women. Is that an accurate read?
Also, how were Ellen's cigarettes?
KB: Where to start! Okay, firstly, I'm putting aside Option A/Option B for now, because that's a whole conversation (and one I'd love to have).
As for The Woman Question: I definitely became intrigued by the fact that strong female networks are mighty things. But what drew me to Ellen and the all-female enclave in Amsterdam was precisely that it wasn't an active, intentional community (or no more so than your standard New York co-op). It was like a non-commune: just 106 people who all happen to be female living in an apartment complex and only vaguely interacting with one another — yet taking a benign comfort in knowing that they're not alone. That struck me as really, really nice, and really un-American. Ellen described how the day after she moved in she saw a procession of women carrying a coffin out of one of the houses and tossing rose petals; turns out one of the residents had died. It struck her, and me, as such a lovely way to go. Everyone always harps on getting married because they don't want to die alone — but we all die alone! Yet few of us die in a shower of rose petals.
As a nonsmoker, all I can say is that Ellen looked so cool rolling those cigarettes. WHY do cigarettes make people look cool? I've been mooning over old photos of Joan Didion recently and envying what a fantastic prop a cigarette makes.
EZ: They really do. It must have something to do with the fire. A tiny fire wand. And the shower of rose petals!
I also loved the part in the piece about the early 20th-century NYC ladies who've "gone off-script with unconventional arrangements" ("Susan Glaspell, Neith Boyce, Edna St. Vincent Millay — they investigated the limits and possibilities of intimacy with a naive audacity, and a touching decorum, that I found familiar and comforting. I am not a bold person. To read their essays and poems was to perform a shy ideological striptease to the sweetly insistent warble of a gramophone"). (!) It made me want to read more by/about them. Can you recommend a starting point? And what were the arrangements?
KB: When I moved from Boston to NYC in 2000 my father gave me Christine Stansell's American Moderns: Bohemian New York and the Creation of a New Century, which had just came out, as a going-away present. It's a fantastic book, and it hugely influenced my relationship to the city. I'd only ever known about the black-turtlenecked, Beat-inflected Village of the 1960s; that there was a pre-Bohemia in the late 1800s and early 1900s blew my mind. The more I read about the period, the more enamored I became. As an extremely naive, inexperienced, and unworldly New Englander at large in Gotham, I found it shockingly and even transcendently easy to relate to the Victorian struggle toward modernity.
I particularly identified with a Boston-born journalist and novelist named Neith Boyce, who wrote a column for Vogue in 1898, when she was 26, called The Bachelor Girl, about her decision to never marry. Her voice was smart and sassy, but it wasn't tinny and cheesy the way so many of our chick-lit heroines are — there was dignity to it. Turns out the whole time she was writing the column she was being ardently courted by the anarchist labor writer Hutchins Hapgood. She finally relented and agreed to marry him on the condition that they have an open marriage. (Disclaimer: In 2001 I wrote about it for Vogue, they ended up killing it, and the Observer generously ran a truncated version in 2003, but it's not very good. I confess to it only out of morbid over-honesty.)
Boyce and her contemporary Susan Glaspell, a progressive playwright who wrote about gender and relationships and founded the Provincetown Players, fell into obscurity after they died, though not the passionate Edna St. Vincent Millay, of course, who can be thumbnailed by her poem "First Fig": "My candle burns at both ends/It will not last the night/But ah, my foes, and oh, my friends –/It gives a lovely light!"
EZ: Neith! I just looked that name up, because it's amazing, and see that it's also the name of an Egyptian goddess. (Goddess of weaving, hunting, war, and death.) And going by that Observer piece, Neith actually seems like kind of a pain in the ass! I hope she was at least having fun.
Speaking of fun (smooth segue), are you having fun? And what was a particularly fun part of researching this story?
Also, if they made it into a movie, about a woman going around the world doing research for a story about not-marrying, do you think that at the end they'd have her meet some perfect guy on the plane or something? (… But then there could be a twist ending, where the perfect dude got up, and it turned out to all be like The Sixth Sense!)
KB: Or … What if the surprise ending is that I'M ACTUALLY MARRIED??!
It happens that I'm on an airplane right now (in-flight wifi is my version of heaven) flying back from week's vacation in Tecate, Mexico — which was very, very fun, thank you.
Doing that story was the most fun I've ever had doing anything in my life, from start to finish. My brother's joke is that the Atlantic called and said, "Kate, will you run a marathon — right now?" and I said, "You bet! Let me just pop out and buy some sneakers!" So I can't even isolate one single aspect. Speaking of singles, however, and of smooth segues, I did find it really, really satisfying to take a good look at why I and so many of my friends are still unmarried, which is a topic we sit around talking about plenty, but that I'd never taken the time to put into a historical context.
Which brings me to a concern I'm having about our interview: Should I talk way up at the start about how mine is NOT a story saying there are no good men left? I'm terrified of people reading it that way — when in fact the reality, as I see it, is much more subtle and complex. Statistics are indeed showing that more men are struggling now than in the past, which is a result of vast economic forces, as well as social ones (Christina Hoff Sommers wrote very presciently about "The War Against Boys" in 2000). And this is serious, and needs to be paid attention to.
But the argument that there are fewer "marriageable" men than in the past relies on an archaic definition of "marriageable": husbands who are higher-earning, better-educated, have more status, and are taller than their wives. (The "taller" thing keeps cropping up — just because it's a very concrete and measurable thing.) The very good news for everyone is that women tend to be much more flexible in what they find attractive, so they'll love and marry men in spite of any new so-called "failings." And who knows — perhaps even prefer them? I for one have never been drawn to the "traditional" catch — the captain of the lacrosse team, etc. — but I know I'm weird like that.
A darker aspect is that this new power balance/imbalance means men are having to grapple with feelings of inferiority that they're not quite accustomed to, and this can be hard on couples, particularly in a world that almost presumes women will have inferiority complexes. Too, the studies around how men behave when they have the demographic upper hand is sobering — less committal, more promiscuous, etc. — but women have to keep in mind that female attitudes abet that dynamic. There was a great little piece in TheRoot.com a year or two ago about how if women want to find their Obama they need to start changing what they look for, as once upon a time Obama was just a scrawny guy with big ears and too-short pants, but Michelle knew how to see right through that. Same goes for this whole "neo-concubine" thing that I describe Susan Walsh talking about; for that big man on campus to be bedding seven women in rotation, he's got seven willing playmates, all of whom, I'm willing to bet, are ignoring huge swaths of the male population for his meager crumbs.
Laptop battery is dying! Must sign off.
EZ: If you want to, by all means! I think that was sort of what I was getting at with my first question, although I don't think people will read it as "there are no good men left," when the tone is so warm. But if there's a takeaway sentence you do have in mind, I'd be curious to know what it is! (Or is the whole concept of a takeaway sentence too simplistic for this?)
(But the Steinem quote about becoming the men we wanted to marry I also find really interesting. No particular question there, just — yeah. Uncharted waters.)
Next: Part Two.
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"But by the end of the piece, when you're visiting Ellen in the all-women enclave…"
Excuse me, I'll be in my bunk.
@melis Scoot over and stop hogging all the covers.
'ardently courted by the anarchist labor writer Hutchins Hapgood' is a good combination of words
@TrilbyLane He wasn't bad-looking, either.
@TrilbyLane I also approve of the fact that they Egyptians had the same god for weaving and death. Efficient!
@Edith Zimmerman edited to add HELLO, NURSE.
@melis Death and weaving: they loom over us all.
@Cawendaw
You have a warped sense of humor.
@atipofthehat don't let the smell waft.
Dang, there aren't any good weaving puns weft.
@laurel dammit, you got it right! I'll show myself out.
@laurel Twill just have to keep trying!
@liznieve
You certainly are thin skeined.
@atipofthehat She couldn't feel any worsted.
@annepersand
She's just treadling water now.
@atipofthehat I get the feeling that you're just spinning your wheels at this point.
@annepersand
Sorry, I seem to have lost the thread.
@atipofthehat It's okay, we wove you anyway!
(Did I break it, I think I broke it.)
@annepersand
We're tightly knit!
@atipofthehat Wool-ed you guys stop? It's not funny.
@TrilbyLane Fine, I guess I'll just shuttle off this mortal coil.
@erikonymous Out with you, riff-raffia!
@Edith Zimmerman Re: last paragraph, spelling s/b Steinem!
@TrilbyLane Death and weaving, together 4ever? That's just warped.
Need to go read this article but from this interview it seems like the piece is not so much about "not settling" (the Atlantic doing penance for that Gottlieb garbage from 2008) as it is about detecting a shift in cultural mores where single women are comfortable with being single (or not married, at least) well into their 30s but culturally we're not comfortable with that. Yet. Which ok I guess yes would be not settling.
As a happily coupled person, I really wish there was a culturally sanctioned option other than marriage for committing to raising children together and throwing rose petals on each other's coffins. So, next time: Option B! What is it?
And I look forward to reading the comments because I feel like the smart Hairpinners will have much to say about this.
@julia True! I was sort of calling back to that Lori Gottlieb piece with the title of this interview, but it was maybe overly convenient, because doesn't quite do Kate's piece justice. Part two, Option B, plus a better title!
@julia meh…move to France and do the normal thing and don't get married to your partner? or make that more normal/IRS-friendly here?
@Lucia Martinez seriously. I'm in Italy not France but it's the same here. The vast majority of my friends in serious multi-year living together sharing a mortagage relationships are not married and ALL except one of the couples that have children live together and are not married. In all honesty, I personally would like to get married before I have kids but none of my/his prospective in-laws really seem to care all that much. They're way more focused on the grandkids thing.
I really enjoyed the article but I felt like the committed and living together but not married thing was kind of artifically ignored. Like your choices are either single or married and that's it. I mean pretty much all lesbian/gay committed relationships would fall in that basket.
@julia I agree completely. America is so isolationist and our system of marriage just reinforces that. Having a nearby family support system is a luxury now. That said, you pretty much have to get married if you want to share benefits. I know so many couples who didn't particularly want to get married, but did because they desperately needed to get one person on the others insurance. It's totally counter-intuitive.
@julia But isn't living with someone and deciding to have children with them basically making the same commitment as marriage, just without a ceremony? I think the article's argument about how hard it is to find someone still applies if you sub in "finding someone to cohabitate and raise a family with" for "finding someone to marry."
@julia how can we make a thing like shacking up, not getting married, but still getting to have a giant party where everyone dresses nice and getting presents? do i still have to have rings and paperwork?
@julia Not sure if someone has posted this yet, but this was Amanda Marcotte's response via Slate re: the tendency to fit people/relationships into boxes: http://www.slate.com/blogs/xx_factor/2011/10/11/_marriage_market_theories_are_simply_inadequate_to_explain_the_s.html?wpisrc=twitter_socialflow
@julia That's how I've always seen it. I wear a wedding band and so does my "whatever" (as one women once said to me, unsure of what to say, looking at us together), and call him my husband whenever I feel like it (mostly when deterring unwanted advances, or speaking to the UPS and other male service people). In jury duty I described myself as in a commonlaw marriage, though I'm not quite sure if I was accurate — I just don't consider myself single. But I had intended, for all intents and purposes, to be single — though not promiscuous or anything, just single and autonomous — into my old age. This relationship was quite unexpected, and it's actually quite nice. But didn't meet the right guy till I was 43 and quite happy alone.
@Nina Kauffman@twitter Thanks for the link to the Marcotte response, I thought it was really good. Hear that, economists? You don't know everything!
A darker aspect is that this new power balance/imbalance means men are having to grapple with feelings of inferiority that they're not quite accustomed to, and this can be hard on couples, particularly in a world that almost presumes women will have inferiority complexes.
My last two serious relationships have suffered, to varying degrees, from this. It's been difficult for me, as a woman who is both ambitious and already fairly successful, to negotiate life with a man who is neither of those things (or who is one but not the other). There's also another thing that happens, which is that OTHER people butt into your business and pass judgment in a way that's hurtful to both the man and the woman in an "unbalanced" relationship.
I dunno at all what to make of it or do about it (but that lady commune sure does sound attractive). But yeah. I get this.
@Jolie Kerr I get this, too. I've learned in relationships to broach the career topic early and often. I never intend to not be working, and seriously working at that. I've had to end serious relationships with men who I realized had no intention of having a wife working outside the home (it's kind of amazing they still exist, right?). On the flip side, when in relationships with guys who make less money or depend on me in some concrete way (like right now), I have to consciously stop myself from joking about it. Yeah, it's a shitty thing to joke about anyway, but I've realized men pretty much never ever EVER find that shit funny.
@Jolie Kerr, annev6 Me too. Am at the moment more successful career / moneywise than my dude, used to be the other way around, and it is definitely a little more complicated this way. He is thrilled and enthusiastic for me, but since he IS ambitious for himself, it is hard for it not to also make him feel insecure. I… really have no clue what to do about it, other than be nice. Sigh.
Another thing I struggle with is ending up with someone who doesn't give me the option of not working for a period of time if I so choose (that choice would be so that I could stay home with children, not because I want to sit around eating bonbons, which I realize I don't need to tell you fine ladies, but you know).
And then there's the whole "marriage is a bum rap for women" thing, which is only made MORE difficult to sort through when you're making more money than the man you're with.
Seriously. Lady commune. It's the only answer.
@Jolie Kerr
I feel betrayed. I never expected you to be the one to declare WAR ON BONBONS !!!!
@Jolie Kerr Gawd, do you remember the Ariel Levy piece on the separatist lesbian commune movement? Because two minutes into the comments on the Atlantic, and I was ready to grab the dental dams we don't actually use and head for the womyn hills.
@Jolie Kerr @Nicole Cliffe check your evites, I'm starting a Hairpin sex commune.
@melis I'll start hoarding OxiClean now.
@Jolie Kerr I totally get that. Until I started dating my current boyfriend (bear with me, this isn't going to turn into an essay on how great my boyfriend is), I seriously didn't know that guys that did not give a shit about the career stuff existed. It had seemed to be such a serious problem for every other guy I'd dated seriously or even casually – they worried (aloud!) about a future with me because I was driven and knew what I wanted out of a career and who was going to watch the babies? And the ones that weren't worried about the fact that I like my career tended to be screw-ups with dollar signs in their eyes. I know that saying "In this day and age" is overdone, but seriously, what the fuck? Some of us are really into having a successful career, and some of us aren't – we're no different than men in that way. But why is it that there seems to be such a small fraction of men who are normal about this? It's a real question. Does anyone know? I know some of it's a macho thing, but I feel like there must be more to it. Is it seriously because they are worried about who will watch the babies?
Oh, won't someone please think of the children?
@Jolie Kerr This has been a real problem for me too. I keep dating guys for whom my career and success are a serious issue and it makes me really frustrated, this notion that I should feel guilty for busting my ass, or should somehow tone down my ambition so a dude can get his dick hard. It also depresses me because when I am at home, I want to be at home. I just want to be a girl, making out on the couch with a boy, while Pretty Woman plays in the background.
@FoxyRoxy Of the two I mentioned, I've had one for whom my career/success (esp. relative to his) was an issue, and another who seemed content to let me be the driven one, while he just kind of plodded along in his dead-end, ho-hum job. Can't say which is worse. And to make matters even more complicated, I have a deep, personal commitment to the domestic arts. So the end result is that I'm the breadwinner, the homekeeper, the nuturer…. In my weaker moments, when I'm not being the best Jolie I can be, I get angry and resentful that I'm bringing everything and my partner – who isn't really a partner at all – isn't bringing anything.
Anyway! This has been fun, but I'm going to go cry in the ladies room now.
@Jolie Kerr: I was all set to leave an incredulous, "there are still men out there that have a problem with women and their careers?????" type of comment, until I realized that, ultimately, one of the main reasons for my divorce was the different priority assigned to our respective careers. And how that affected the notion of "taking care of" someone, and how differently we interpreted and executed that phrase.
GAH.
@Jolie Kerr Have y'all read Flux by Annie Lammot? Her deomographic is admittedly narrow (straight, college grads only, very few minority/multi-cultural women) but she does present a nice variety of scenarios in what I felt was a fairly objective story-like manner. I get sidetracked when I start adding in heavy technical feminist theory to the equation, so this quick read was comforting in terms of just seeing different options in action all across the country and internalizing that they are all open to me. Helped me get over one of those dude-could-not-handle-my-independence relationships at least…
@Jolie Kerr Many a man doesn't feel that drive to be the Best Man He Can Be because he's privileged as all hell already without trying – why bother? Some folks say that a lady slacker is a feminist icon and I get it briefly, but I also think we can all do better than that. Just cause we can finally relax like a man can doesnt mean we need to give up. I'm talking about some taking account of privilege, and from love sharing it with the world at large and a partner or family specifically. Obvs I'm not talking at you Jolie but at lame dudes who stay greedy or small. I made your brownies last week and they were delicious. You're my kind of lady!
@Jolie Kerr Honestly, the domestic arts aspect of this is what I would find more intimidating. When the same kind of intensity is applied to that kind of stuff as an involved career, there are a whole lot of expectations. I've been in situations where I felt like more of a disruption to the ideal than a participant in what was happening. But this is probably irrelevant, as I am unmarriageable.
@Jolie Kerr Yeah, I'm very very casually seeing an unemployed slacker who hasn't… worked a day in the year since I met him. I don't care that he didn't go to college or any of that. I do care that he doesn't do jack shit ever and then complains that I'm "too busy," and he complains that I have to work while we hang out. I also care that he never ever pays for shit, not once, like dude, buy me a diet soda already, just one, and fine, whatever, I can afford it but it would be nice once in a while to go on a date with a dude who treated me. I am, despite the career success, totally down with being wooed and all that. I like being a girl, setting aside all the intellectual stuff about feminism etc. It makes me so resentful that it is hard to find a guy who just doesn't care about work stuff, doesn't expect me to make him feel less mediocre because he values himself, and has a work ethic no matter what that work is. So, yes I think I need to go cry too because I'm comfortable being single but I like the idea of marriage, or at least the idea of partnership. I don't want to have to compromise and yet I do, all the time. I hate it.
@FoxyRoxy THAT THAT THAT THAT THAT. THATITY THAT. ALL OF THAT. *sniffle*
@Jolie Kerr I have to confess that I lament my otherwise-lovely unambitious bf because I get jealous of other ladies (gay and straight) who seem to "match" their S.O.s better, and I wonder what vibe I'm sending off that I couldn't find someone I had more in common with. (That said, I could get past the ambition thing if he understood why it makes me crazy that he left a broken lamp on our front stoop for four days.)
@Jolie Kerr "A darker aspect is that this new power balance/imbalance means men are having to grapple with feelings of inferiority that they're not quite accustomed to…"
This is true. As an aging single guy, there is a deep sense that I have failed to live up to my parents' example. I love them both and consider them strong role models, so adapting to this new way of life can be tough.
@FoxyRoxy
It hurt me to read that. Stop casually seeing him, right now! You need to read this Milton Glaser quote that I posted a few weeks ago and get that toxic drain out of your life.
There's a difference between having an unambitious boyfriend and being cool with that, and having an unambitious boyfriend that you secretly resent. You are not getting your needs met in this relationship.
@Jolie Kerr I am ambivalent about this. Because on the one hand, I am ALL DONE with men who resent me for doing the things I do as well as I can do them. On the other hand, ambitious and successful in his career isn't exactly something I spend a whole lotta time concerned about. Maybe I should? I don't know.
Being with someone who is committed to being the best person he can, in whatever way is right for him matters. That probably means career? But maybe not.
Mostly, though, I feel really reluctant about this career work ambition stuff because… seriously? Who in this economy can even be sure they'll be able to establish and continue a career? And if anything is becoming obvious to me in higher ed right now (as a journeyman professor trying to finish, not some hot shot with stars on her horizon, which means I want to do as well as I can, but I am not going to be in a position to judge…)… education and the other paths to successful careers are becoming harder and harder to access for lots of people, including men…
Agh. I don't want to keep dating slackers who are resentful because I'm a journeyman professor hopefully moving on to other things soon. But I also don't want to be a person who expects her partner to make such and such and income, or want to be all promoted and stuff.
I want a partner who loves himself and wants to do well at living his values, and to have values I feel are compatible with mine, and who is a partner so we can be in each other's corners.
@Jolie Kerr and @AnthroK8… THIS. A big part of the reason my last two boyfriends broke up with me (that I didn't quite get at the time) was that their own careers were nonexistent/falling apart and they were majorly freaked out about it… They dealt with it by essentially blaming me for all the problems in their lives and breaking up with me.
Now on my list of 'what I want in a man' is 'Likes job or taking steps to find a job he likes'.
@Jolie Kerr Me too. I got a great, secure job that pays relatively well for someone my age (mid twenties). My husband, on the other hand, is a couple of years older and became a victim of the recession after a terrible couple of years at an awful job. He's a perfectly confident, independent feminist man, but he harbored some quiet, unconscious insecurities about not being the breadwinner and provider. During his unemployment, we spent a lot of time pillow-talking about masculinity, what it means to be a man, and what it means to be a husband. Those topics are often ignored (or dealt with in "men's rights" groups… ugh) and I think that's why a lot of men feel like they're up shit creek when they lose their grip on their career.
"for that big man on campus to be bedding seven women in rotation, he's got seven willing playmates, all of whom, I'm willing to bet, are ignoring huge swaths of the male population for his meager crumbs."
I'm glad she addressed that in this interview. I always face-palm when reading about college hook up culture. I find those articles tend paint the women as innocent girls who've fallen victim to sexual culture, instead of grown-ass adults who need to grow their asses up.
@annev6 I don't think people in college need to be grownups. Isn't that what college is for? Being mostly a legal adult with almost zero adult responsibilities? Good times.
@annev6 AhhhhIloveyourpic
@annev6 Yeah, as a guy who went to a college with a 60/40 gender split and STILL couldn't hook up to save his life, the part on the Pareto principle was actually strangely comforting, in a 'you are not a freak' way.
@annev6: Do college kids actually date anymore, or is that an adorable relic from earlier decades?
(I'll feel old whatever the answer.)
@Bittersweet I think you're marginally older than I am, and there was hardly any dating when I was in college, at least among my friends. (Class of '95.) And there was a ton of hooking up. So.
@Bittersweet I just graduated in May. Either you couple up the first week of freshman year and are basically married for four years, you hook up, or you're celibate.
@Four Horsemeals of the Eggporkalypse I just graduated, too but I think the fourth option is that you hook up with a friend and then it turns into more. (or you pretend it didn't happen, it could go either way when you hook up with friends)
@Bittersweet I dated in college, and I graduated this year. A lot of my friends thought we were weird for it, though. And all of the college couples I knew are broken up now.
@Lily Rowan College is the uncomfortable time of your life where you learn the hard way that you can't get away with your teenage bullshit anymore because you aren't a teenager. Basically. Or at least, it should be. I have friends who are in their very early 20s who I do give a little lee-way to, behavior-wise. But at the end of the day I always remind them that there are kids younger than they dying in Iraq and Afghanistan right now, so maybe they should gain some self-awareness/responsibility?
And I say that in the tough-loving way that only a person who was a total fuck up in her early 20s can.
I'm going to have to read this at home, because it sounds like she is talking about me, precisely. Atalanta was totally my childhood role model — go off for adventures, make a friend, see what happens later.
Well, it's later.
Wowza, what an article. I'm 26 and with a guy I think is awfully special. But, I'm in no rush to marry mainly because I feel I can't get married until my career is established, and in economy that might take some serious time. I'm mellow about this, we're having a lovely time, but the economy is definitely a huge looming life controlling godzilla like thing, isn't it. I think if I was raking in the big bucks (um, any bucks?) right now I'd definitely be feeling closer to marriage o'clock.
@halfheartedyoga YES. This. Except I am 29 (30 in 2 1/2 months!) and feel the same way. We're both broke and busy right now (grad school) so why would I be in a rush to get down the aisle? But that doesn't mean I love him less than my friends who are opting to get hitched in a hurry. It's silly.
@halfheartedyoga I'm in the same boat–but what is it that makes us think we need to establish our careers before we get married? I don't think it's a bad thing at all, but it seems like something that men are not (as) concerned about. Are we worried that our value will be seen as less in the workplace once we are married because they are assuming we will leave soon for having kids? It's hard to figure out.
@beanie: Yesssss. It's one thing to wait 'til your career is more established to have a baby (and take time off), but no company has ever held my relatively early marriage against me in promotions and advancement.
@halfheartedyoga Absolutely. I wouldn't ever consider getting married if at least one of us (that would be myself and my hypothetical boyfriend) didn't have complete economic stability. There's just no way I would consider marrying if we were both just scraping by. This just adds to my stress of "omg why don't I have a bf, am I never going to get married, am I never going to have a baby??" because before all this needs to come satisfaction in my career and economic stability. Right now it feels like I'm still at the base of Relationship Mt. Everest.
@beanie Interesting – hadn't thought of that aspect of it before. My best guess for me is that it has something to do with me being totally cool and comfortable with me before I fully align my life with somebody else's. I know I'm a snowflake that's a permanent work in progress, but right now I'm too stressed out about being broke and not done with my degree yet to be the level of unselfish I'd like to be in a marriage. Does that make sense?
@halfheartedyoga EXACTLY. I'm 22 and I always figured I'd start seriously thinking about marriage (or hell, DATING) when I get "settled in my career"–which honestly? Probably won't happen for eons, if at all.
@beanie This is an interesting angle Beanie, think that could be some people's experience. For me, that is not it: its more the sense that n my head marriage is about building a life together but I don't feel right now I have the basic building blocks of my own (economic) life in order.I'm working toward it. ) And to me it doesn't feel right to start talking marriage until I feel I'm REALLY on my own two feet. It's not that my boo doesn't support me in all this – he totally does and vice versa I hope. But I feel like inviting him to officially share the journey at this stage isn't so appealing (for either of us! He's at the same moment in his life for sure). Rambling – does any of this make sense?
@halfheartedyoga No I think it makes a lot of sense. In my case I still have points where I'm completely embarrassed about how bad I am at saving/paying all my bills on time and it makes me feel like not an adult and not ready to get married. Obviously it's different for every situation, but I feel (and this is just me) that when I went on interviews and they found out I had a serious boyfriend (which honestly they shouldn't have been asking in interviews anyway!) that they saw me as more of a liability and that is shitty. And I've read articles (on Glamour, but still) that says wearing an engagement ring hurts you in interviews. What it boils down to, it seems not to hurt men as much and that is what I hate.
This is a fantastic article and it makes me want to jump off a bridge.
…And marry the first man who catches me!
@melis
Don't marry that hunky firefighter that caught you! He didn't even graduate from college. Guuuuurrl, you worked hard (and paid through the nose) for that MFA in creative blog commentary.
@Tuna Surprise Nothing like stifling my snorting laughter in the office.
Loved the article. I've been reading more and more of these "modern marriage" articles and, as a 24 year old, it starts touching nerves. I happen to be with a mature man I find marriageable (and who shockingly wants to be married one day, to someone), but I do notice how other men his age seem to be completely freaked out about even discussing marriage. Why is it such a scary prospect?
And for the record, Kate, I think you're gorgeous.
@lafleur Yeah, I know it's not super relevant, but she's gorgeous.
This article is great. I think if more ladies focused on lady-lady relationships more dudes would shape up. Not that that is the reason to spend time with ladies, that would be cynical and gross.
My reality check to myself and other single ladies tends to be: "Are you okay right now? Then why would it be so terrible if you continued to be okay like this indefinitely?"
@Gnatalby See, but there's a difference between being ok with something now and being ok with doing it forever. Like, my job is ok NOW, I can deal with it, but if I knew I would have to stay in this job for the rest of my life I would lose my freaking sh*t. The thought of having to do this monotonous, unfulfilling work forever makes me almost start to hyperventilate a little. THEN AGAIN, that is part of what scares me off from the Institution of Marriage, because that is, literally, sentencing yourself to doing the same thing forever. I think part of the appeal of being single is that theoretically you are open to things changing, new things happening to you, developing yourself as a person. If I had to be me, now, forever, that thought would be really weird and depressing.
@Gnatalby I love when articles about marriage (and the failing/ reimagineing of the institution) actually address OTHER relationships. It reminds me of that epic "Ask A Lady" answer which said, in part "Don't even come at me with your kyriarchy" and (paraphrasing) "Strong female relationships are the best way to endure the jerk circus." Which is one of the truest things I've ever read. I've never been as profoundly lonely as I've been when I've had no friends or have had no access to my friends.
The other point I think this article makes which is really good is – aren't we putting a lot of pressure on marriage? It shouldn't be the whole of your emotional life!
So basically, make friends! On the internet where it is easier!
@WaityKatie I hear you, but I think it's always going to be daunting and scary to check in with you "okay-ness" in the future versus the present. I'm 35 and single–plus I've never really had a serious relationship. If you had told me at 22 or 23 the facts of 35-year-old me a would've freaked. the eff. out. But as it is, if you ask me how I feel today–and especially as I look back on what I've done or haven't done from early 20s til now–I feel okay. The irony is that I still get freaked out by the indefinite singlehood status. If 45-year-old me materialized right now and said "Guess what, you're/I'm still single." I would feel the same way that 23-year-old me would've felt about my current self. Aaannd now I've entered Dr. Who levels of timey-whimey talk, so I'll leave off.
@SuperGogo I'm in pretty much your same situation! (35 and single without serious relationships). I think the panic of the "foreverness" in that respect comes from that phrase "STILL single," which makes it seem like we've just been standing in one place for the past 10 years, or that nothing has happened to us/we haven't changed at all in those 10 years. The way I'm single now is so different from the way I was single at 22, and I imagine, the way I will be single at 45 (if it turns out that way). But everything about the way I live life has changed in that timespan. So I think it's the thought of stagnation that is so terrifying, rather than the thought that OMIGOD I FORGOT TO FIND A MAN or whatever.
@WaityKatie Exactly! The feeling of being perceived as standing still (and secretly worrying that this is Truth) is one of the hardest elements. Sometimes I dread catching up with friends–even with dear ones–because I know the inevitable "What's new with you?" question will come up. Of course, replies about work, trips, family are all acceptable responses, but I have a hard time not hearing this question as an inquiry into any romantic milestones: Dating, No-Really-Seriously-Dating, In Love, etc.
@WaityKatie I don't even have much to say that you haven't already said, but please know that I feel exactly the way you do. I was saying in another post that I feel like I'm standing at the base of Relationship Mt. Everest. I won't get married without being personally satisfied. Which means finding a new job that isn't soul crushing and that doesn't have me living check to check. Which means finding a guy who somehow bucks the trend of me dating wishy-washy manchildren with no goals. Which means entering into a marriage that the pragmatic side of me assumes will end in total misery. Which means deciding we are financially stable enough and mature enough to have children. Which means accepting that I will be responsible for another human the rest of my life.
Basically I am losing my shit right along with you. xoxo.
@momentisaflower Heh. Yes, it does all seem impossibly overwhelming. A few times I have pondered all my "non-negotiables" and imagined the pool of potential partners winnowing to an ever-tinier droplet. (i.e., someone who doesn't want kids, doesn't care about traditional marriage, won't make me move out of the city, likes art/music/books, is ok with me not being under 30, doesn't feel insecure when he suspects I might be smarter than he is, is attracted to redheads/non-skeletor body types/curly hair, doesn't mind that my family is seriously f-ed up in clinical ways, shares my sense of humor/perspective on the world AND is someone I like and am attracted to). Freaking impossible, and then if somehow I did find this unicorn, I still don't know how to make Long Term Relationships happen, so I'd probably screw it up, right? I don't know how anyone finds anyone!!
@highjump So true- I loved the point Kate made that putting all of your happiness eggs in any basket- and for many people, men and women alike, that basket is marriage- is unrealistic. Shouldn't it be liberating that we live in a time where marriage ISN'T a requirement for women? That we are capable of sustaining ourselves independently and finding happiness/ contentment outside of a partnership should serve to strengthen a connection we find with another person because our happiness isn't wholly dependent on that person.
On the other hand, one of the things I find the most challenging in my own life is NOT using the lack of a relationship as a scapegoat for my own unhappiness. Discontent really is the human condition; that is, no matter the things we achieve in our lives, or how much we possess, we will always want more, and it is easy to think, "I would be happy, if only I had a successful relationship/ better job/ more money…" It's inevitable that if we succeed in obtaining the latter two, we'll look to the former one as a solution to our endless yearning. I just keep telling myself that the fact is that even if I have an endless pile of money, a spectacular dream job, and a loving partner, I will always. Want. More.
Although I wouldn't really complain about the endless pile of money.
@SuperGogo @WaityKatie – I cosign everything you both said, so hard! As in, I actually teared up a little, not because it upset me so much as because it felt so exactly true.
I may start making up increasingly outrageous responses to "So what's new with you?" to see if anyone catches it. It'll be my own secret game of Two Truths And A Lie, or something.
@highjump Pssssh, who ever met anyone of quality on the internet?
@WaityKatie Why are all of those things non-negotiable? Don't you have to be open to changing a bit when you get serious with someone? I'm in a similar demographic/situation (same age, dated people but no serious LTR in a long time) and I've realized that I just don't know. Right now, I'm just trying to find people I like spending time with and going from there. Maybe I'm one of those people who ends up with someone that seems completely different but it works somehow. Or, I could just be the crazy uncle. At a certain point, we have to trust our communication skills and the wisdom or our advanced age to know that we're being treated properly. Beyond that, whatever works, you know?
@alannaofdoom !!!! I SO know the I'm-getting-verklempt-because-this-is-exactly-how-I-feel sensation. It happens to me a lot here–seriously, my god, some days Hairpin is just like therapy.
And your Two Truths and a Lie idea is a brilliant way to deal with the dreaded "what's new" question! Come sit next to me and we'll dream up a few responses to get the ball rolling.
Friend of SuperGogo: So what's new with you?
Me: Oh, nothing much. I just got back from a volunteer trip to rescue lemmings though, and it was great! We caught all the lemmings and strapped tiny little parachutes to their backs, so when they all ran off the cliff, their chutes open and they were saved!….all except little Renaldo, who's chute didn't open. Poor guy. *sniff*
@MrComment Well, I mean, how would you suggest I negotiate away my desire not to have children? Or my body type? Or my crazy family? I called those things non-negotiable because essentially, I really can't change them. I can't change who I am to make a man love me. The only one of those I could really change would be living in the city, and really, yeah, I could possibly change that and probably shouldn't have led with it, but it's kind of shorthand for the type of life I want to have.
@WaityKatie Yeah, you can't change who you are to make a man love you, but you also don't have to feel like changing would make you more likely to have a man love you. Maybe some guys aren't into your look, but maybe they just hadn't realized they were into it until they met you. Maybe your crazy family has made you smarter about people and more sympathetic. It seems like there's a tendency to see people and their desires as static and think "Here's what I want and expect. Here's what they want and expect. Does it fit?" I think people change more than we think and rarely find themselves in the place they expect to be in the future (or if they do, it's pretty boring).
When you've been single for a long time, it's easy to look back on it and reinforce to yourself that there's some reason why. Then every awkward moment in a relationship becomes evidence of your lack of experience instead of just one of the awkward moments that happen in relationships. I don't think it's necessarily helpful to meet a guy and ask yourself "Is this the one in 6 billion unicorn who can handle all of my shit?" I think it probably works better to say "Here we are. I feels good right now. Let's see where it goes."
As I said, I struggle with this too, but that's what I'm trying to do now.
@MrComment That is true, and quite wise. I think I fear being judged on a checklist probably mostly because I have done so much internet dating in my time, and those interactions have been extremely checklisty. To the point where you feel like you're sitting there being interviewed for a position that you don't even know if you want. It would be nice to be able to get to know people more organically, with fewer relationship-expectations, I just haven't figured out where to find that. It's just that after years of being chipped away at and being told I'm too much this and not enough that, or it's "so disappointing that I don't want kids," or "wow, you're a big reader, aren't ya?" and all the other dismissive and ridiculous comments you get via the online dating freaks that you kind of get flinchy. Which is why I stopped online dating…
@momentisaflower Also losing it a tiny bit. I'm ok now but I'm not ok doing this forever, in fact I'd be ok for things to change OH TODAY.
And back when The One I Thought Was The One broke up with me because of his own inferiority complex about his job (see earlier comment), I felt like I'd been sent back to Relationship Kindergarten while I watched all my friends graduate from Relationship University (ie get married)…
@WaityKatie @SuperGogo Hey-o! 38 and single here, plus living in DC = the worst place on earth to date, because, hello slimester-politicos-who-bang-interns.
Anyhoosies: I have a kick-ass career, and am so proud of what I've done with my life. And I have even bigger ambitions for what I want to do next. But ya. Have never found an appropriate partner for that. I supposed I could've settled for some Ok relationships along the way, but didn't. And at some point realized the scary (is it? does it have to be?) truth that there is No Guarantee that I will ever find someone to be that partner for me.
With that I vacillate between sad, mopey insecurity to strong security in my identity as a lady with an excellent career AND strong friendships & great fam (love that part!). I'd love to have it all. But I may not get it. So in the end – what matters most? I know that I could not have / would not have survived with guys who weren't a) ambitious in their own regard b) ambitious in wanting an ambitious partner.
I am glad, as always, to read that other Hairpiners have similar experiences / life trajectories.
@alannaofdoom Me too! Or three, or four.
I'm part of a very traditional community back home, and it's astounding how LITTLE I get asked, what's new with you? Folks know I'm not married and popping out babies. What else could I POSSIBLY have to share about my life? Never mind my excellent career, travels, etc. How could any of that matter, really?
@LittleBookofCalm Hear, hear. The eggs in a basket bit – what a powerful social script that one is and I feel like women constantly get sold a bill of goods with that one.
I was shopping for wedding cards this weekend, and so many of them were about marrying your best friend, your everything, your I'd-be-nothing-without-you. YIKES. And wtf? Depending on one human being for your emotional, physical, social, financial well-being = hello Betty Drapers of the world… What an effed-up web of lies that all is.
@WaityKatie The online dating thing is frustrating and arbitrary. It's pretty easy to feel disposable, when I think it's mostly about timing. I still find it to make very little sense. It's just very difficult to get and keep someone's attention, and there are a whole lot more people just waiting on that screen. But it's definitely not going to work if you don't let yourself get your hopes up a little bit… At this point, I've learned not to take it personally and find it slightly better than nothing.
@WaityKatie Happiness starts with "what you see is what you get." That's been my attitude since my thirties. I used to change everything for men, wardrobe, studies, you name it. One day, I just said, "enough." What you see is what you get. Love me or leave me. Love me, then leave me, please (to some). You know where I learned this attitude? From men! I have been very happy ever since adopting this attitude. People have told me all my life that I'm too this or too that, that if I don't change I'll never marry. Well, for one thing, I didn't care if I ever married. And for another thing, I eventually met someone who loves me as I am. He probably wouldn't fit in with most women's "checklists", though. But he's perfect for me! The best thing that ever happened to me. I mean, the best human.
@carolita It's frustrating, because I feel like my "checklist" only has two boxes on it: 1. am I attracted to you? and 2. are you nice to me? I haven't yet found any overlap between the two items on it, unfortunately. Whereas, most of the guys I've dated have had extensive checklists, begining with "where did you grow up/what social class are you from?" and continuing all the way to things like "are you good at parties?" But your philosophy is a good one!
As a single mother by choice who is successfully self-employed and in many ways deeply personally gratified, I've outgrown a model of marriage that merely fulfills a need for financial stability, social respectability (ha!), or one-stop-shopping intimacy. If I ever marry, it will be for soul, which does feel worthwhile.
I admit I keep myself at a distance from the stink of smugness that comes from some coupled folk, who may be afraid of catching my Scary Aloneness, or, as the article suggested, may find their identity as *Special Because Married* threatened by such a different choice. I think single mother stigma is somewhat like gay marriage stigma ONLY in that the basic fear seems to be that somehow Our Holy Institution will be undermined if there is success outside that model. My understanding is that in many ways, a traditional marriage works better for men than for women anyway; men have more health and social benefit from it than women do, and marriage can keep women from exploring the world as fully as she might otherwise. Maybe that model needs some undermining, for women's sake in particular.
I would love to believe that as a species, we are getting closer all the time to making soul and love-based choices instead of mindlessness (marry anyone immediately!) or greediness (man whore!) always.
@but i'm a bird. My goodness, so much to think about in this article. As a single mom deeply satisfied with singledom, it was lovely to read about the various configurations of child-rearing collaborations over the centuries. This one sentence really irked me, though: "(Evidence suggests that American children who grow up amidst the disorder that is common to single-parent homes tend to struggle.)" Um, right. My parents have been married for over 50 years (usually unhappily) and yet I have always "tended to struggle" because of growing up in an atmosphere of unrelenting tension, always waiting for an argument to break out and trying so hard to keep from causing one. My daughter does not live under that shadow and she is so much more emotionally healthy than I was at her age–or until my 40s, really. Also, disorder arises from the personalities involved, not the marital status. So I call bullshit on that parenthetical bomb right there.
@meaux I know, it hurts to read things like that being so casually (parenthetically even!) reinforced. My sons are among the healthiest people I have ever known. what comes (one assumes) with single-by-choice is Intention, which the wealthiest, most educated, privileged married parents often leave behind. we all need support no matter who we are. yes, a single person at the head of a house carries a lot of responsibilities alone, and that can breed chaos, but like you said, so can emotional entanglements and feuding priorities and silent oppression. I truly wish more women knew that single motherhood can be a very good road, one of many Option Bs. love to you and your daughter xx
Is this a place where I can ask about "fear of commitment" men have in a serious way? What is it specifically a fear of? Why does it exist when study after study has proven that committed relationships actually benefit men more than they benefit the women supposedly lusting after them?
Is it a real thing? Is it a thing cowardly men say during break ups? In my dating life, I've encountered men with this fear, and when I've pushed for an explanation, all I've ever gotten back was stuttering. Anyone have better luck?
@franceschances I think for a lot of men, 'fear of commitment' means fear of fully investing your heart in someone and then getting ditched. They're afraid of shaping their life around a partnership that then falls apart, so they shy away from making the commitment in the first place. That's how it's been when I've encountered it, at least.
@paddlepickle This is where I'm lost trying to figure out if "fear of commitment" is a great lie. Because I totally understand the thing you're describing – that is scary! But if the response to that is "…so I'm going to break up with you before that happens," either the men I've dated are crazy or lying to let me down "easy."
@franceschances I think it can be a 'let me down easy' excuse but it can also be real (and yes, it is crazy!). For instance, my last boyfriend broke up with me because, being 15 years my senior, he was tortured by the idea that because I was young and had 'more time' I was going to hang around for maybe a few years and then ditch him for someone else when he got old. Dude wasn't kiddin', he was freaked out about it and couldn't get over it. But I think some guys latch onto it as an easy excuse, too.
@franceschances I've observed that men are 'afraid of commitment' until they aren't. They wake up one day and decide "it's time to find a wife," and then they immediately implement that goal. I have observed it time and again, it's like an alarm goes off when they hit a certain age (varies anywhere from 30 to over 40) and their whole perspective switches. This is why you can't take it personally when someone hands you the no-commitment line and then 2 years later meets someone and instantly commits. He flipped the switch, and the new chick was standing in the right place when it happened. That's it.
@WaityKatie
As a happily unmarried lady who has been the Last Stop on the Uncommitted Train for several exes (none of their wives are much fun — oh are they clingy and dependent), I would endorse this thesis.
@franceschances After some soul-searching conversations with a few of my friends who are considered "players" (ew), I think you are on to something. The thing is – it's all insecurity, to the point where they're afraid to be themselves around a woman because if she found out the "real" guy, she'd get bored and leave. So instead, they date 10 different women at once so no one gets bored, and if they do, there's 9 in the background!
The solution? Date grown-up men who are secure in themselves. Easy! Right???
@lalaland "The solution? Date grown-up men who are secure in themselves. Easy! Right???"
If I ever find one, I will be sure to do so.
@franceschances – Fear of commitment differs a lot amongst the dudes I know. The whole marriage question…
…a lot of people I know don't care one way or the other – but I'm a liberal guy with friends I met in art school living in NYC. Some really want to get married and have a wife/kids/tradition. Some want to be players forever. Some are in long-term relationships they anticipate/hope will probably last their whole life, but will only get married if they want to have kids, for mostly legal reasons. Some hate marriage and never do.
Fear of commitment hits on a lot of the things you ladies said. There's another thing though, which is a darker, more sad excuse.
Men _freak the fuck out_ at the thought of "ohmygod i will never get funky with a new vagina again". Every. Single. One. Every man I know has had a massive struggle with this when he got into the relationship he hoped would last forever.
Almost none of them are cheaters, and they deal with it by gawking like a 13 year old boy when out. But it's a thing we don't feel comfortable discussing with our ladies, and we just internalize. We don't think it's right, or that we deserve the privilege to continue hooking up with people when we're in it for the long haul. But it's biological, and it's real, and it terrifies us.
When we're in a long relationship, around the 3-6 year mark depending on the dude, it hits really hard. It generally is super severe for about 3-6 months, in my experience (well, of seeing it in friends, I've never had one that long). It leads to them picking petty fights / exaggerating legit issues with their partners, and of being overly defensive when women pick fights / raise legit issues with them.
And then they start to cope with it or they break up with them over a non-related issue. Even when they accept it and learn to cope, it still rears it's head a lot. But the "fear of commitment" in a long thing which is overall very good often is tied into the "fear of never being able to discover if that cute barrista always matches her underthings".
I'm sorry. I hate admitting it, but we can't change who we are – only whether or not we act appropriately in response to these urges.
@Hooplehead Please let us know where he came from, if you're successful!
And @everyone else, these have been some great insights. lalaland especially turned on some lightbulbs regarding one particular ex. Insecurity, indeed!
@leon.saintjean Thanks so much for your answer! Here's my thing – women have this exact same fear! It's fine and normal!
I think this brings us back to the article, and different kinds of relationships. Maybe if men experiencing this fear felt comfortable discussing this feeling with the person they're with, they'd discover they didn't need to be afraid at all. There's polyamory and there's one night only deals, and only if I'm there too, and only if I never hear anything about it ever.
Not that this will always work out, of course, but the strategies you describe (and acknowledge the shittiness of), guarantee that the men involved will never know.
@leon.saintjean For me it wasn't that I was scared of only one vagina or I wanted my sexual options kept open. I went through my early to mid-20's with an avoidance of commitment, not so much a fear.
I enjoyed being single because I wasn't ready to share my life with somebody. Looking back, I really pissed away some good relationships with great women. But without going through that period of my life, I woudn't have been ready for being married and 100% committed.
It really is just a matter of when you are ready, and a lot of men are taking longer to be ready.
From the article, it would seem that a lot of woman are going through the same process.
@franceschances – I know communication is good, but I don't see many of us openning up on this one. While I've always figured women feel it too, I feel, for me at least, like "I don't know if just your dick forever is good enough for me; I mean, I want it to be, but the idea of it scares me," is something I ever want to hear.
I'm newschool on a lot of things, but I dunno. I feel wrong and too much like my bluecollar dad and grandfathers sometimes, but I just can't emotionally get on board with 100% openness. I'm not talking Don Draper secrets or being allowed to carouse with strange ladies on a boys night out, but….I dunno. The article hits on it very well I think. Wanting to be a new age modern man and being able to be one are sometimes on some points different. I want a woman who has a career, but like Jolie's point, I couldn't stand not having a career of my own which could provide for a family if we wanted one (our decision) and if she wanted to be a stay at home mom (her choice). I wouldn't feel inadequate if she made more than me, but I would be a wreck (a potential Walt White) if I couldn't at least provide the option. I don't know if that is right or wrong, but it is how I feel.
@leon.saintjean I definitely understand what you're saying about it being super uncomfortable to say. And I hope that if I ever end up saying that to a man, I find a slightly more tactful way of putting it!
But if you're at the point where you're going to break up over this issue, why not put it out there? Sure it's a hail mary pass, but even if it's incomplete and leaves Coach Taylor's hair all dejected on the sidelines, at least you know you gave it your all, rather than some worn out excuse.
@franceschances As a card-carrying dude, let me try to tackle this one. I think the fundamental thing to understand from the get-go is that men approach dating in completely the opposite way that women do. What women do is they deduce – they take a given pool of men who are attracted to them and winnow it down further and further until the most optimal man remains. For men, our singular goal in life (pretty much) is to EXPAND that pool of potential partners as much as possible – we're working in exactly the opposite direction. Which of course is not to say that women don't try to expand their pool as well, but when we're talking about serious relationships, those are the two predominant dynamics at play.
Perhaps a casino analogy would help – women are trying to place the perfect bet while men are just trying to amass chips. And what marriage in this context represents is cashing all those chips in. Is it "no new funky vagina" fear or fear of emotional suffocation? Sure, but I don't think men are unique in feeling those things. What is unique to us, though, is that loss of motivation. If I'm not amassing chips and raising my status to deserve a better and better partner, what am I here for? That loss of biological imperative is crippling, because its how men by and large define ourselves. "Fear of commitment" doesn't even scratch the surface.
@franceschances
Not to mention how irrational, lonely, and sad it is to sulk, pick fights, and break up with someone you love simply because you're afraid to say "whoah, the future is scary, isn't it?" and hear "OMG YES IT IS!" in return.
@franceschances "Leaves Coach Taylor's hair all dejected on the sidelines" is the new phrase I am going to use constantly.
There's another version of the commitment-phobe man, I think, and he's the one who has been married before (or else in a very serious long term relationship), and it ended quite badly, so now he actively chooses people he could never actually fall for. There are women like this too, to be sure, but I have a few close male friends who are doing this and hoo boy, it just seems to make them even sadder as time goes by.
@Brandon Larson@facebook I ask this question seriously – what benefit does expanding this pool of potential partners give? I understand the ego boosting benefits, too be sure. But you're saying they're so great that they're better than a loving adult relationship? How so?
@franceschances: "leaves Coach Taylor's hair all dejected on the sidelines" is really working for me.
I'm a dude, and I'd like everyone to know that I DO NOT agree with Brandon Larson@facebook's assessment of male approaches to relationships. In fact I think it's callow and pathetic. I'm not trying to mass chips (women? what?) over here! I really just want one great chip.
That being said, I've also been dumped enough times by hearing "You're a great boyfriend; I just don't want to be in a committed relationship," to suspect it's time to retire the notion that the storied Fear of Commitment is not something unique to men. Either it's a real thing, and it affects men and women both, or it's a totally cowardly (or, at best, feelings-not-hurty (?)) smokescreen.
@lalaland I live in Portland. Men like this are like unicorns.
@graffin Thanks Buddy!
@Brandon Larson@facebook i appreciate that your description is true for you, but it's not true for all men. is it even true for most? i dunno.
i do know that it doesn't apply to my partner, and in fact, i would say your description of "how men are" applies much more closely to me (or at least it did before we hooked up) than it ever applied to him. i have known him for years (before we got together, even) and he was never interested in finding a better partner. he was only interested in becoming a better man, and having a better relationship with the partner he had (his first wife).
of course, when that didn't work out, he DID end up with a better partner (me!) so maybe i'm full of it. but yeah, talk about the reductionist division based on gender. i'm not buying it.
@leon.saintjean I think women are also moving more in this direction, hence the huge shift in gender roles in relationships. I do think it's less about sex with women, but in the same vein of trying to preemptively avoiding dissatisfaction in life, as home life is less and less what women want to govern their personal satisfaction.
@franceschances CLEAR EYES. FULL HEART. CAN'T LOSE.
@erikonymous thanks for saying that, dude.
@franceschances Expanding the pool and a loving adult relationship aren't mutually exclusive – in fact exactly the opposite. You need to do one to arrive at the other, and we all fluctuate between these modes depending on relationships. When this becomes problematic, though, is at the point when they do become mutually exclusive, and the thought of never returning to that biological preset is an awful feeling.
@erikonymous Sigh. Hysterical reactions like this is why men and women can only rarely have honest conversations with each other. To be clear, chips are not women in my analogy, status is – men seek to amass it more indiscriminately than women do in order to maximize their options. This is why I refer to "potential partners" rather than simply "notches on the bedpost". But "callow" is a really great word, so thanks for that.
@momentisaflower I live in LA. Trust me, I know. Then I found one, and it still boggles my mind. "Do you exist?" I'll ask him sometimes.
@Brandon Larson@facebook What? Status is women? What are you even talking about? You are not being clear at all.
Stop speaking for all men. Status is bullshit. Stop generalizing about men and women. Stop using biological determinism (and gender binarism, to boot) to enforce your feeble (not to mention sexist) argument. I'm emphatic, but not hysterical (another word you should perhaps learn the etymology behind).
@Brandon Larson@facebook Ok so I saw all the biological determinism and such in your original comment that other people pointed out, but decided to overlook that and try to engage in an "honest conversation" between a man and a woman. But then your response to my question makes no sense and doesn't answer my question, AND you call a Hairpinner hysterical?
Now I get it, an honest conversation is the very last thing you're interested in.
@paddlepickle I disagree – I think for most dudes there is no fear of getting hurt involved, there is a fear of losing freedom and of missing something better.
@franceschances As far as I've worked out, it's because they're afraid to say they'll do something (ie be with you) and they won't be able to get out of it later on. They always want to be able to walk away because they're frightened they won't be able to do exactly what they want to do – you'll somehow stop them.
Incidentally, this is why commitmentphobes get into relationships over and over – they need someone else to fulfil their pattern – they don't actually want to be single all the time. People who want to be single STAY SINGLE.
This is why I think commitmentphobia is one of the dumbest fears around because there is very little in life you can't get out of if you really want. People escape jail, abusive families, and murderous dictatorial regimes all the time, if you don't want a monogamous committed relationship don't get into one!!!
Kate Bolick! Christine Stansell was my thesis advisor! Be my friend, please!
Oof, I realize that I may be particularly cranky today, but can I just say that all those little losers in the comments to the Atlantic article are NOT invited to my Lady Commune. This article was great and honest, which of course means it's terrifying to 80% of the internet.
@amuselouche 80%? My, but we're generous.
@amuselouche i deliberately didn't read the atlantic comments and thought: "the hairpin will talk about this in a way that doesn't make me want to stab myself in the forehead."
@blahstudent That was a good decision; I made the mistake of reading them and it was a total buzzkill after reading the article (which was awesome).
@r to the r Jesus, those comments brought light to just how small of a bubble I've created for myself to live in. Pretty, shiny bubble: I love you and I refuse to leave! (except to live in the lady commune)
@amuselouche Yiiiikes, the comments! A woman is talking about her life on the Internet, somebody better put that bitch in her place! (Me, bitter about Atlantic commenters? Whatever would give you that idea?)
@amuselouche Hah! I just posted the following on my fb, about 20 minutes before getting to this part in the comments:
"here's an interview with the author (with far better comments than on the atlantic mag website)"
"But the argument that there are fewer "marriageable" men than in the past relies on an archaic definition of "marriageable": husbands who are higher-earning, better-educated, have more status, and are taller than there wives. (The "taller" thing keeps cropping up — just because it's a very concrete and measurable thing.) The very good news for everyone is that women tend to be much more flexible in what they find attractive, so they'll love and marry men in spite of any new so-called "failings." And who knows — perhaps even prefer them? I for one have never been drawn to the "traditional" catch — the captain of the lacrosse team, etc. — but I know I'm weird like that."
What I found from my experiences is that not only do some men expect themselves to be the Lacrosse-captain-MBA-Don Draper looks-type of marriageable, but that the older generations (my parents' age and above) have this ideal too. Which means that any deviation from these gender norms of male is the breadwinner typical head of the household thing are met with confusion and sometimes disdain by some people my parent's age and older, which is so fucking frustrating. So my fiance is hyphenating his name with me, and will probably be a stay at home dad when he goes back to school in a few years, and is okay with not being the "Head of the Household," and that means I'm a feminazi boner killer. And that to some of these people, I should have stuck it out for a more "marriageable" man, which means a man with prescribed Alpha Male tendencies who won't put up with any of that equal division of labor shit.
I love that this piece was written in a warm way, not in a Katie Roiphe way or a "WOMEN OVER THIRTY HAVE A HIGHER CHANCE OF GETTING HIT BY LIGHTENING THAN GETTING MARRIED!!!!1!!" way! Thanks Kate Bolick and the Hairpin!
@bonnbee My live-in man-friend is also not the typical "marriageable man" and that perplexes everyone, especially my father who thinks that I should have settled down with a nice lawyer by now. We're fine with any income discrepancy between us, but everyone else still seems hung upon it. I find it highly insulting to both of us. (For example, my father has even asked who is going to take care of me. I thought my $100K education was supposed to do that.) Not sure what to do about it, except to tell everyone to deal and STFU about it already.
Anywho, I'm 32 and he's 35 and we're in no hurry to get married because, like…why? Things are cool the way they are.
@bonnbee but katie roiphe just wrote an article about combating stigma about being single and a mom, which is pretty similar to kate bolick's as far as its focus on turn of the century romantic bohemians. i actually thought of the katie roiphe article while reading this one, and in a non-outraged way.
http://www.slate.com/articles/double_x/doublex/2011/10/shaming_the_single_mom_do_we_all_secretly_think_single_moms_are_.html
@bonnbee "What I found from my experiences is that not only do some men expect themselves to be the Lacrosse-captain-MBA-Don Draper looks-type of marriageable, but that the older generations (my parents' age and above) have this ideal too."
I'm 25 and my father is the Captain of the Lacrosse Team, Don Draper type. I've found in the past year, since I've been dating a wonderful dude, that that "Lax Captain/Don Draper" ideal has been internalized in me also, despite seeing my mom's unhappiness at being a stay-at-home wife and mom. My boyfriend is amazing, and very successful in his career for his age. We work in completely different industries and I make 50% more money than him–and he's a year older. It has taken me nearly this full year that we've been together to set aside those "can I really be with someone who doesn't make more money than me/isn't captain of the lacrosse team/isn't a Master of the Universe" thoughts and realize that this dude and I have something very special, and that I don't even really want that for myself! I am really. fucking. good at what I do and I want to keep at it, and as long as I do, I am going to be the bigger earner, by far, of the two of us. He isn't only not the traditional "marriageable" type man; I am not the traditional "marriageable" type woman, and that's the way I want it.
@bonnbee I never thought I would be the type of person who wanted the manly-man type. I hate cocky macho dudes, but jesus I'm sick of dating manchildren. I know that's a brutal term that is offensive (no matter how much my girlfriends and I laugh and commiserate over our experience dating these type of guys), but that's honestly the norm here in Portland. Guys without goals, who won't call a date a date, who show up for dates in pants with holes and want to take a walk rather than take you out to dinner because they're broke. My internal feminist is horrified by my desire for chivalry and manliness.
@bonnbee I *totally* agree… except that I'd say it's not limited to our parents' generation.
I get plenty of flack and looks askance from my peers for being married to a younger man who makes a little less money than me. We see the comments here on this very site.
I think that it's internalized oppression. When women participate in that system, they're losing. So they constantly rank themselves against each other to make sure they aren't the *worst* losers (because leaving that system would be too much of a risk).
@momentisaflower Me too and Christ I'm glad to hear another feminist say so (the horror at the desire for chivalry and manliness, I mean). So fucking sick of trolling through profiles of man-boys the same age as me (29) who aren't sure if they want kids and their picture is of them yahooing at a mate holding a drink while he does a backflip, so sick of turning up to a date with a guy in his oldest pants and then he rambles on about how he hates his job but has no idea about what he'd like to do. I wish I could show them the profiles of the 35 and 40 year old dudes who openly write in their profiles 'I want to get married and have kids' and say THIS IS YOUR FUTURE BUCKO.
@momentisaflower
I think you are conflating general maturity with masculinity. You don't like dating manchildren because they are *children*. The behavior that you described is not the behavior of feminine men, it is the behavior of males who were brought up by wolves and lack the basic acquaintance with common courtesy required to woo literally any woman. And associating "ambitious" and "successful" with masculinity also isn't really helpful. Those guys aren't losers because they aren't masculine, they're losers because they're immature and selfish.
@momentisaflower To me the problem with the way a lot of people use "manchild" is that it often lumps together things which are really signs of immaturity, like emotional immaturity or not having given any real thought to what you want in life, with other things that are basically just personal quirks and lifestyle choices, like your example of wearing ripped clothes. If your type is more traditional so that you're personally not attracted to guys who don't dress nicely or would rather take a walk than pay for a meal out, then sure, don't date them, but you can't really say based on those things alone that they're immature manchildren. Outside of a dating context, if you had a female friend who was, say, a bohemian artist or a geeky starving grad student, and she wore worn-out clothes and preferred not to eat out with you because she was always low on funds, would you judge her as harshly?
@Hypnosifl But it's not the dudes who say 'I am a bohemian artist' or 'I am a geeky starving grad student' who do this stuff. I would expect ripped/old clothes and general lack-of-direction-y-ness about their lives, or I wouldn't be surprised by it. I get annoyed when someone who holds down a perfectly reasonable job turns up to a date looking like they actually made an effort to look as awful as possible. (and just because you are a student/poor there is no reason not to look neat and tidy if you've got it together enough to be dating, plenty of people have managed it including me.) (God I sound horrible I know but I'm really not horrible I promise!!! Just saddened at the lack of care factor in Modern Life)
@Hypnosifl @sevanetta
Hypnosifl, you raise good points and when I reread what I wrote I realized it didn't come out exactly how I intended. Once I'm comfortable with somebody, I've no problem with things like appearance. My last bf used to use Cat-5 cable as a belt for heavens sake (ok, that was a little embarrassing lol). It's really just the initial effort that I'm referring to as Sevanetta talked about. To me it's just a reflection of how much of a chance there is that we might actually go further than a first date. A walk would actually be fine if the guy sought to make it special somehow by planning an awesome route or something. Anyways, this is mostly coming from the ridiculous number of crappy dates I've been on in the past year where I've had guys leave to call their girlfriend that they neglected to tell me they're in the process of breaking up with, or informing me that they deal drugs for a living. A girl just wants to feel a little special sometimes
@momentisaflower Yeah, I mean probably with most of the guys who seem not to be making an effort to put their best foot forward on a first date, it really is some combination of laziness/jerkiness/immaturity (especially the "I don't want to look like I care too much" brand of immaturity) rather than them being natural eccentrics or bohemians or whatever. Since you're the one who's been out on dates with these guys you could probably tell the difference between the two…
This was a great article, but whenever I read these articles it seems to be coming from the perspective of "I always assumed I'd get married, but then I didn't…what do I do now?" Which is a legitimate perspective that many women share, but for me, I always kind of couldn't picture myself being married, I was violently opposed to the idea of being a Wife and Mother like my mom was (sorry mom), so when I went through my 20's without getting married, that wasn't a surprise at all. And now when I read these articles, I think, wow, that woman likes exactly the same type of guys I like (skinny and nerdy), AND she's a "relationship girl" who knows how to have committed, long-term relationships, so…that person is definitely going to get married someday. She just is. And if the hypothetical skinny and nerdy dude had to choose between me and her, I wouldn't have a shot in hell. She's got the relationship thing figured out, but just hasn't met the right person YET. She will. There isn't really a "man shortage." It's just a matter of matching people up with other suitable people, which sometimes takes time. But what about those of us who are somehow, essentially, single? And yet aren't all that fulfilled being "essentially single"? I guess that is why these articles make me feel like more of a mess every time I read them.
@WaityKatie I agree, I love to read these articles and love that people are out there thinking about the same things I like to think about and try to figure out, but then I get, not discouraged really, but at a loss. It's difficult to maintain being "essentially single" in the face of my parents and others constantly being confused about what I'm looking for and why I don't have the relationship thing figured out. I can't honestly be the proudly single person confident in her choices either because it sometimes isn't that fulfilling, as you say. It would be nice if there were a clearer roadmap for how one's life can proceed when the marriage and/or babies thing is not the road that's taken. Fucking singleness, how does it work?
@WaityKatie This is exactly how I feel. How do those "relationship girls" do it?!
@likethestore I feel like there was some kind of class given on How to Have a Relationship, and I was sick that day. (the same way I suspect there was a secret class on how to put on makeup, that I also missed). Because I went to a women's college, for a while I thought this class might have been part of the core curriculum at coed institutions?
@MaScherzi The thing is, if you're single there's all this pressure to defiantly say your life is perfect, you are soooo fulfilled by being alone all the time, etc., or you risk being viewed with pity and scorn for "not having a man." But whose life is like that? Yes, there are things I like about being single, otherwise I would be one of the thousands who have frantically settled for whatever "good man" wandered around at age 30. But life isn't some magical barrel of self-fulfillment, either. There's no way to express ambivalence about the path you're on and whether another path would be better without falling into the Sad Spinster stereotype. You either have to be perfect perfect perfect and not need anyone, or you have to be incomplete without a man. There's no recognition of the complexity of human lives in this narrative.
@WaityKatie I just registered to comment on this and echo you. I feel like there are "relationship girls" and non-relationship girls and there is no way to change that! Like, who are these people that go from long term relationship to long term relationship? I just don't get anything about that life.
@theguvnah YES. Who are those people?? I know some of them, but I definitely don't get it. Is it magic vagina?
@franceschances I think part of it (OVER-GENERALIZATION) is that certain people do not like to be alone. I have a friend who went from boyfriend to boyfriend to boyfriend, even though she didn't like some of them at first, because she'd rather be with anyone than be alone. She talked herself into liking them. It's not wrong or right, it's just what you're happy and comfortable with!
@lalaland It's true, one of my many "relationship girl" friends left her husband a little while back (while having the next boyfriend lined up, naturally), and went through a "single" phase where she sort of compulsively hooked up with guys (no judgment, but it was a bit compulsive). She was asking me why I, as a perpetual-single, didn't do that all the time, and I said that I just am not attracted to very many guys and so generally don't feel the impulse to hook up with everyone I meet (I think I said that more nicely than it sounds). She was baffled by this and said "well I'm not necessarily ATTRACTED to all these guys, but you know, I do it anyway." What?? But in her world, a guy is a necessary thing, and issues of attraction to that particular guy are just secondary. Totally different worldview that pretty much blew my mind.
@WaityKatie Yep. I've had a similar conversation with that friend, replete with compulsive hook-ups during a phase of "single-hood". Anything is better than being alone. Some people really just do not like to be alone. It takes all kinds, I guess.
@WaityKatie Completely agree, it's a no-win situation. I've gotten better at "convincing" people of my (actual) satisfaction with my life as it is about 75% of the time- too good I think, because now it's starting to feel like making any allusion to wanting the relationship thing to work out sometime in my life just reads as desperation. Frustrating because it makes the 75% seem like a lie I'm telling myself. One person can both truly enjoy the singleness thing most times and yet consider and be hopeful for something else to work too!
Your reply reminded me of that post from a few weeks ago about that Modern Love column where the 35 year old spinster grew out her hair and found a husband. There was an awesome comment about shaming women for being single and shaming them for not wanting to be single. Damn we just can't win.
@WaityKatie I hear you. I want to be able to own my single-dom, but I feel like the married mothers I know are like…"isn't that precious that she's such a *modern woman* with her career and single-life". Like I'm some Mary Tyler Moore type who should be admired for her independence but pitied for her loneliness. Not that I'm projecting or anything…
@momentisaflower Ohhhmygod, yes with the Mary Tyler Moore thing. When I moved into my latest apartment, TWO separate friends exclaimed that I was "just like Mary Tyler Moore!" What does that even mean? I'm 35 and have been supporting myself and living alone almost exclusively since I graduated from college, so it's not like I suddenly moved out on my own. And, so condescending. I also notice a lot of assumptions from marrieds that my life must be some perpetual extension of college life, like, they are amazed that I don't eat out every night or spend my nights in bars trying to pick up guys, or that I have real non-Ikea furniture. I'm just as much of an adult as they are (perhaps more, because I have to do everything myself rather than delegating half the stuff to someone else), yet I'm the eternal child with "no responsibilities" somehow. Argh.
@lalaland and @WaityKatie and @everyone else — OK so the compulsive hook-up thing when single is not necessarily about never wanting to be alone. It can just be about restlessness, or a desire to experiment, or a desire for more plotlines. And it's not AT ALL the same thing as being a relationship person — it's a very alone way to be, actually, and very compatible with being an essentially single person. (This isn't me, but it is a slice of my past.)
@WaityKatie I have been both a "relationship girl" and a "hookup girl" in my storied past, but I'm also just great with being alone. I honestly don't know why it is that some women can be serially monogamous and other women are in the "I have never had a boyfriend" camp, because I know fabulous women from both sides of the coin, and I can't really generalize very well.
I do think though, that the long term relationshippers seem to have a little more give to them. It's very subtle, but I think the unattached friends I have are more rigid in what they want. They come at dating like, "ugh not this again, unlikely to work, I hate it". And the relationshipper is more like, "oh dating! You crazy thing! Let's do it!" One of my friends is very commanding, and aside from the fact that she is ruthless at cutting the strings on a first date for minor infractions, all her emails to guys read like orders. She has very little give, no willingness to tolerate the foibles of another human being, with all the complex and unloveable things they bring with them. She doesn't like to accept her own flaws either- hates being vunerable at all, which is necessary to attach to people.
It's not so much a skill as it is an attitude. When you say, "I'm not attracted to that many guys", some women are different. I like a lot of different types of guys. There are only a select few that do it for me on all levels, but I'd be perfectly willing to make out with or go on a date with lots of different guys.
Also it's a self perpetuating myth. A person who thinks of themselves as the kind of person other people are attracted to, holds themselves differently than a person who is walking around thinking, "always alone". So once you come to think of yourself as some kind of mysterious relationship repeller, I think it manifests in a millionty subtle ways- how you smile, how you respond to people you are attracted to, whether or not you ask people out, etc.
That's my smattering of thoughts. Also, being slutty, if it's ethical, is not a bad thing in and of itself. I haven't been in love with everyone I went to bed with, and I don't really have any regrets. Fun was had, and the only thing that hurt at all was when my normally cool female friends said mean things about me.
@E I think there is definitely a lot of truth to what you're saying, but I think the "give" can only be a partial explanation. I am, for lack of a better term, a "hookup girl," and I have give to spare. Too much give! As in, my therapist clapped for me when I finally, haltingly said that sometimes my needs have to come first (which was even uncomfortable typing just now!)
So it's a balance – too much give means you settle for less than what you want – which can lead you (me) to being a hookup girl with a guy you want to be a relationship girl. Not that I've deep down wanted to date all the guys I hooked up with – quite a few of them were just sex thank you and I was quite happy with that! There's been some of them, though, that I wish I hadn't been quite so "giving" with.
(and I'm going to put a million qualifiers around that statement, because I know that tensions run high around hook up culture conversations – I'm talking about my personal experience, and I'm by no means trying to say that all women, everywhere, are "settling" on hooking up. But from time to time, this particular women here has been setting)
@hedgehog No, no, no! That's not what I meant at all, and I apologize if that's what it came across as judgey or disparaging More like, my friend, specifically, told me she hates being alone. She would prefer a boyfriend, but should there not be one available, she will hook up with guys in the meantime until one of them sticks. I don't mean that in a judgmental way at all, like I said, different kinds, and I've certainly done random hooking up. And you're right – the hooking up can be more lonely than actually being alone. (CAN BE! unless you're happy with it! In which case, great!)
@E Well, ok, your mileage may vary, but this comment is veering dangerously close for me to the mainstream idea that people are single because there's something wrong with them or they are doing something wrong. I know plenty of women in relationships who are VERY "commanding," "rigid," and have very little "give." (Haha, I just described my mother, also, but that's another comment for another day!) I would love to be slutty, don't get me wrong, but I'm pretty shy so for me it's just awkward to go and make out with some total stranger unless I am completely drunk. But I honestly don't judge people for doing that. It's the making out with people you aren't attracted to because you just can't live without male attention for even 30 seconds that I find disturbing. I'm going to go ahead and stick with that.
@lalaland Oh wow. Yes, I see. (No need to apologize at all btw.) I feel like there is a really great side to the hooking up — major power rush, resilience, good times — but also, for me, it was debilitating eventually because of the loneliness magnification effects. And I'm the opposite of your friend in that I'm basically someone who's really happy alone. (I got married eventually, but to my total surprise. I still occasionally six years of honest to God bliss later go WTF why am I even married at all.) I don't know, I have genuine faith that it can totally work well for women as well as men, I'm just viscerally wary of some kind of overdose syndrome? Your friend has her own cost:benefit and that is totally valid.
@WaityKatie Dude, I want to apologize if it came off as like, "there is something wrong with you." I can only theorize based on the people I know, and of the people I know in the two camps, that's the only real difference I can see- a sort of subtle attitudinal (is that a word?) thing.
And because dating is luck, and being open to chance, I think the chances are a little more narrow for people who think of themselves as permanantly alone? I guess that's what I meant more. Doesn't mean the bullseye can't happen, but the target is a bit smaller.
Also living in the wrong effin city. Rural towns and NY. Those places seem to have the wrong/limited pool of men.
@E I don't think of myself as permanently anything, but I do think that there are "people-people" and there are, well, misanthropes, for lack of a better word, and I would put myself in the latter category. I do think it is harder to find a partner when you just don't cotton to the majority of people, but I have accepted that about myself. I do live in NYC, but I've had the same crapolarama dating experiences in DC, Philly, and NYC. I think the mistake is more in looking for differences between singles and couples, instead of acknowledging the scary truth that there ARE no significant differences, and that it really IS all up to chance. Most people will spend long periods of their lives being single, whether it's due to divorce, death, or just being "toooo picky," as all single spinsters presumably are (not that I'm accusing you of saying this, but it gets said, A LOT). And, that's ok. It doesn't mean that you are failing at life because you "haven't found someone yet" or because that "someone" didn't last forever after all. I wish all the judgment and criticism could just be leached out of this whole debate.
@WaityKatie I just registered too because I wanted to second what you're saying in this thread. I'm much happier being single than I am in a relationship – I love being single. Does that mean I'm 100% happy all the time? Sadly, no. But I find myself exagerating how awesome my life is when I'm talking to friends/family because if I express ANY unhappiness whatsoever they immediately attribute it to my singleness. I mean, my career's nowhere near where I want it to be, my finances are in the crapper, I hate where I live, but if I have a bad day it MUST be because I don't have a man in my life. There's no other explanation.
@WaityKatie I missed that relationship and make up class too…..it does make you wish that hte article was written by someone who isn't a serial monogamist. I only really wanted to say that I appreciate your comments, and am glad to have a kindred spirit out there somewhere! I love my friends, but I swear I do not know one girl in the city I live in who doesn't care solely about having a boyfriend and/or children…..
Nice piece!
Re: Cigs being cool, a friend of mine always said that they symbolize our mastery of fire. Whenever you hold that little "fire wand" you are becoming a modern Prometheus advertising our mastery of the elements. AND, we like to be reminded of that fact!
I can't speak for any other dudes, but I mostly just think the article is really cool and interesting. Growing up, it was always my culturally-informed assumption that 100% of women were eager to get married, and therefore, showing a similar inclination towards marriage was a good way to distinguish myself as a super-sensitive dude (which has pretty much always been my #1 goal, as potentially messed up as that might be). Then I grew up/started reading The Hairpin, and those conceptions were mostly exploded.
It's interesting to ask how dudes will react to this conversation, but I think it's equally interesting to ask how married folks will respond. I recently got out of the military, where early marriage is very much the norm. It was completely incomprehensible to my peers and superiors that I would be in a serious relationship for 6 years without definite plans for marriage. They insisted on calling my girlfriend my fiance, no matter how often I corrected them. In a way, I think people saw my life choices as a repudiation of their own life choices.
Anyway, awesome article awesome interview!
@Jon Thank you for this. I'm currently with a very nice, successful, older than me gentleman who is basically ready to rent some horses so we can ride off into the sunset together. He doesn't get why I don't find this incredibly sexy, or that "I want to get married and be monogamous" isn't always the only thing a woman is looking for in a man. Sometimes it's like, just shut up and pull my hair already. I wish he would discover the Hairpin and have his conceptions exploded.
@Jon As someone in a long term relationship with eventual-but-not-at-all-soon plans for marriage, I can totally relate. I've be besties with my guy for 10 years, we've been together for three, but we've had tons of friends meet their significant others and get engaged in the time we've been dating. Our friends totally get why we don't feel the need to tie the knot, but many people we just meet seem baffled as to why we're not racing to get married.
Part of that for me comes from my parents divorce, and my mom's subsequent insistence that there was no need to get married until I'm at least 30, if at all. But I think she struck a good balance in teaching me the value of a relationship while reminding me that it is not the only thing that defines you. I have a man I honestly want to spend the rest of my life with, but I also have a great job and amazing friends and family and live in a city that I love and all of that makes up who I am. There's nothing wrong with needing YOUR partner, just so long as you don't do it because you think you need ANY partner.
@clarkie "If your man is only renting horses and isn't looking to buy, that is a DEALBREAKER, ladies."
@melis If you liked it then you should have bought a horse for it.
@melis But why even rent a horse when you can brush the mane for free?
@Jon Glad to have you in the discussion! It's honestly very helpful to hear a guys POV on this type of thing.
Many, many, interesting things glibly touched upon, but way too many enormous (and occasionally fatuous) generalizations. I hope this comes out as a book but in a more critical form. Veer away from Thomas L. Friedman territory, please, before it's too late!
@atipofthehat a little bit of this, a little bit of that. I agree, get inside and make more sense of it all
@atipofthehat I think Rebecca Traister is working on a book on this topic, which I imagine will go into more detail.
@atipofthehat
I wish you would expand on this comment!
you know what else, for real: The Shakers. they were right on! (too bad about the celibacy, but what they did with those energies!) I wonder – if the economy continues to falter, utopian communities might make sense to some again
dear kate and edith,
i want to marry you both.
got that out of the way. just wanted to say that i never thought i would get married — i think it's because i grew up without a mom, and didn't really have family-type stuff modeled for me. also i knew from a young age that i was weird, and understood from many books that weird chicks tend not to get married.
still, even with all this cognitive stuff going on, there was a part of me — a deep, almost subconscious part — that felt incomplete without a guy. and i see this deep incomplete feeling in a lot of other women, as well.
the awesome thing is that, through a true and gnarly confrontation with reality — the reality that i may never hook up with someone i wanted to spend my life with — i came to the place where i realized no one was coming to make things better for me, that what my life meant was entirely up to me, and i would NOT allow myself to consider my life a failure based on whether i happened to find a partner to share it with or not.
i mourned the loss of my fantasy and came out the other side feeling, for the first time as a 35 year old, a grown-ass woman. full of appreciation for the opportunity to live my life as i want to live it, full stop.
and the thing that warms my spinster's heart is that, as the years go by, i see more and more women confronting our leftover, completely-inappropriate-to-the-21st-century, betty draperish feelings of needing someone to make everything better.
and every time one of us breaks down this wall inside us, a world of opportunity opens up, not only for us as individuals but for everyone everywhere.
it's breathtaking to behold and be part of it.
@madge
"We are at the very beginning of time for the human race. It is not unreasonable that we grapple with problems. But there are tens of thousands of years in the future. Our responsibility is to do what we can, learn what we can, improve the solutions, and pass them on."
–Richard Feynman
"What do you care what other people think?"
–Arline Greenbaum Feynman
@atipofthehat if i have a religion at all, it's encapsulated in that first quote. thanks yo
@madge
Ha! The second is my mantra now and then. Those two crazy kids got married, against everyone's advice, knowing that she was terminally ill.
@madge I vote you write the manifesto of our Hairpin Lady Commune.
I have question about her bangs.
(I have starred this whole thing to read later because it's way too much to sneak read at work, and I want to be able to concentrate on it because it sounds interesting, but this bangs question must be asked now because it is time-sensitive.)
I'm going to get my hair cut tonight and I'm 90% sure I'm going to get bangs. I'm bringing in this picture to illustrate the bangs I want: http://www.newhairstyles.tk/resimler/shannon-elizabeth-shoulder-length-haircut-with-bangs-7.jpg
BUT I'm terrified my bangs will actually be more like Kate Bolick's in the picture above. Not because they look terrible, but because I hate having shit in my eyes and if my bangs turn out like that, I will no doubt clip them back every day and make the whole exercise of getting bangs in the first place entirely useless.
SO: Are there styling tricks I should know that will keep my bangs out of my eyes, like how that Olsen still has use of both of her eyes? Or is there something I can tell my hairdresser that will keep my bangs from getting in my eyes like the lady in the picture?
@KeLynn. I have no bangs advice, sadly, but would just like to say that I love how Big Questions and Bang Questions mingle on the Hairpin.
I applaud Kate Bolick for broaching the idea of non-traditional relations and support systems. These are crucial stories that we don't see covered in the US that often. I thought this was a fantastic interview.
But Edith, you asked about how men might read the piece. As a man, I was put off by Bolick's reductive division of men into perpetual adolescents or arrogant playboys. This strikes me as the kind of categorical thinking that writers in men's magazines so often apply to women. It was jarring to find such simplistic reduction in a piece that was otherwise so timely.
If we want to understand why people are moving toward these kinds of new living arrangements, we can't just see one gender as reacting to some deficit in the other. Gendered identities develop in tandem and in response to outside pressures. It's true that twenty-somethings in Western societies are encouraged to prolong adolescence. It is also true that the job market demands increasing mobility. This puts strain on traditional relationships, and it's time to start recognizing, both socially and legally, the new forms of interdependency people are inventing. But we have to look at the whole picture–and not just blame it on the bros and the douchebags.
@DarthChewie it's a complicated world we're trying to make sense of here — we're all simultaneously trying to work out what kind of choices we want to make while also being blown around by our acculturation and rapidly changing life conditions.
for what it's worth, i didn't read a reductive division of men into perpetual adolescents or arrogant playboys at all. i saw a deep understanding of the relationship between economics and gender roles, including how they change over time and the particulars of the moment we find ourselves in. all kinds of men exist, from short graphic designers, to 28 year olds who fold shirts beautifully to, yes, bros and douchebags and absent fathers as well.
i felt like kate did a great job touching on both the (very real) societal forces at work and the (sometimes difficult) choices women are making in the face of those forces.
@DarthChewie The whole prolonged adolescence thing I find to be so, so true. I see a lot of my peers out there 'finding themselves,' and I wonder what the hell they were doing during our four years of reprieve from adult responsibility. I honestly think people are more interesting when they're not so self-involved. Maybe it's because they have something to lose?
In the article there was this bit: "I have always been very close with my family, but welcoming my nieces into the world has reminded me anew of what a gift it is to care deeply, even helplessly, about another. There are many ways to know love in this world." I was/am very involved in the raising of my little sister, and it seemed like this was what Bolick was longing for… I'm not saying kids, I'm just saying that kind of helpless, heart existing outside of the body love (willing the world to be just a little kinder to this unspecial yet most special being). It's terrifying, and it only happens when you grow-up and develop the ability to love someone almost better than you love yourself.
My favourite part is this: 'When I asked her if starting a relationship was a difficult decision after so many years of pleasurable solitude, she looked at me meaningfully and said, “It wasn’t a choice—it was a certainty.”'
I finally stopped with the serial monogamy in my VERY late 20s, and spent a couple of years in my early 30s not just single but also not looking. It was a great time, and I sorted out a LOT of my bullshit. And when I met Mr. Crackers it really was a certainty (I got married for the first time at 34, which is IDEAL. For me, of course). And easy. I don't know, maybe it's just that if you spend that time in splendid isolation when you couple up you never entirely let go of that own-self-ness, and it actually becomes easier to have a really balanced, equal relationship. That's been my experience, anyway. I don't feel cheated of a single life, I had that. I didn't have to choose between the Mr and myself. That's some of what I get from this article, the fear of having to do so.
Ok enough essay.
@cheeseandcrackers
I did something like this, too.
@cheeseandcrackers Me three, including getting married at 34. My college boyfriend proposed right before we graduated and I said no – not only was I not ready, but even then I knew it would only have ended in disaster.
I don't know, maybe it's just that if you spend that time in splendid isolation when you couple up you never entirely let go of that own-self-ness, and it actually becomes easier to have a really balanced, equal relationship. That's been my experience, anyway. I don't feel cheated of a single life, I had that. I didn't have to choose between the Mr and myself. That's some of what I get from this article, the fear of having to do so.
@cheeseandcrackers: I would never have been able to describe this as perfectly as you just did. And yes, yes, yes – I completely and utterly understand and agree.
@cheeseandcrackers beautifully said! and i have to add that, for ladies who have been in serial relationships since adolescence-ish (and i guess for dudes, too), i strongly advise a long period of avoiding relationships/perhaps even celibacy — like, a year at least.
it's not true in all cases, for sure, but i think it can be hard to get to know who you are when there's someone else around all the time.
Song title: Damn, it's good to be a spinster…
Lyrics?
@minijen Yes please. I'll write a verse, you write a verse. Let's get on this.
This piece is fascinating, but it just reminds and oddly reinforces the CRUSHING pressure I inexplicably feel to Settle Down. It doesn't make sense — I'm a young, independent, livin' alone, 22yo with a career and lots of really happy things — and yet I'm somehow terrified of ending up alone. When that 22 year old girl looks at Kate — awesome, kickass Kate — and says that she's afraid to end up like her, THAT IS BASICALLY ME and I hate that about myself but am incapable of denying it.
Does anyone else feel painfully stretched between your own ideas of feminism and independence and a truly ardent desire to do that love and marriage thing with a picket fence (albeit in Brooklyn, not the suburbs)?
@Janestreet I'm 26. I really want to find "the one." I want to have kids very badly. Every day I struggle between trying to enjoy my twenties as a single woman and feeling like I'm not complete without a man (and feeling like a feminist failure). The past year I've come to the realization that I'm most likely not getting married, or if I do it won't happen until well into my thirties. I'm just not the kind of woman guys want to be with, for whatever reason. Being honest with myself and facing reality, no more daydreams of my perfect wedding dress, has helped me get over this fear.
@Janestreet The best thing you can do is be comfortable with the apparent contradiction. It's not unfeminist to want to marry a man and have children – if that is what you want. Feminism is about women's autonomy. It's ok to interrogate why you feel the way you do (culturally, not as some kind of psychoanalysis) but in the end, your choices are valid, period.
@Janestreet I pretty much addressed this in earlier posts, but I am so with you. I get mad at myself for wanting the family/kids/house, because I was raised with independence and personal satisfaction being more important than anything else. But I do want those things and it's a very hard thing to reconcile.
@Janestreet @likethestore @momentisaflower One of the most liberating things I've ever realized about myself in my life is that my desire for "the one" had very little to do with a desire for a MAN. Maybe it's because I'm the daughter of a single mother and see how she struggles, even today, but at some point in the last year I realized that I just wanted a partner. The world is fucking hard, and it's incredibly reasonable to want someone to have your back through thick and thin. While it's possible to have that in platonic relationships, it's totally true that those tight "platonic life partner" sort of relationships frequently end when someone couples up. Having a romantic partner and marriage implies permanence, whether that's true or not.
This didn't make my loneliness go away, or make my anxieties about the future any better, or help myself esteem, but it DID make me realize that I wasn't a bad feminist, or incapable of being a fabulous single lady, etc. Please don't beat yourselves up about that fact, ladies. We all certainly beat ourselves up about enough as it is : )
also @likethestore I want to be friends with you so I can buy you a beer and like hug you and eat ice cream with you because I feel the exact same way and it hurts me so much to see someone else saying that. IT'S NOT TRUE. The only thing that has made me tell myself that it is not true, even when I don't believe it, is hearing fucking fabulous women say it and knowing in the core of my soul that it is not true. Dudes like you, dudes will like you, it is a guarantee. It wasn't until I went to grad school and had a total change of scenery and community that I ever had the experience of non douches being into me. And I was 27. Sometimes you are just in a crappy social swirl, sometimes you are just so depressed you can't see what is happening around you, and sometimes, it is just SHIT LUCK. But it is not, NOT NOT NOT *YOU*. I swear to god, it's not. it doesnt make the moment you are in any easier, I know, but its true.
@kasa Thank you. This made me tear up a little bit. I am looking forward to the day when non-douches are into me. Ice cream's on me.
As a fella, I also really liked reading this. My wife and I dated for 10 years before getting married and just had a kid. She came from a very strong feminist background and admitted that she viewed marriage for quite some time as an antiquated tradition. The only real frustration for me was that for about 8 of those 10 years I was harassed by female friends about why I had the audacity not to have proposed. Every time I said that it was because my wife wasn't interested, I was scoffed at.
My point being, if I actually have one, that there seems to be a really malleable definition of feminism when it comes to marriage. The women scoffing at me were highly-educated, successful women who I'd classify as very strong personalities. And yet, they were aghast at the idea that you could date that long and have a great relationship and not propose. In their opinion, there clearly was something wrong with me!
Now that we've been married for 3 years and have a baby, I would hope that my wife would say that nothing has fundamentally changed in her personality or ability. She's still strong and in control of her life, there's just a legal definition around our relationship. And most importantly, hopefully she's happy with how things have gone.
First of all, thank you Kate for so perfectly articulating the conversation my girlfriends and I have all the time. We even started a private facebook group so we could all reassure each other that we are in fact not loveless losers. As more and more peers from middle/high school get married and have children, the more I feel like there must be something wrong with me. I feel so stuck between my feminist mindset of putting myself first (career and personal satisfaction) and wanting reassurance that I'm not going to die alone. I can't even make sense out of it…my general belief is that most marriages wind up with the couple being miserable, so I don't even know why I want to assure myself that I will get married and have kids some day.
I loved reading about the women's collective in Amsterdam. The bonds that women form with each other really can't compare to a male/female relationship. This facebook group I referred to earlier also has this conversation fairly regularly. If we all lived in the same place we would seriously consider some sort of communal living situation where we could support each other and eventually help each other raise our children.
@momentisaflower Ha, I basically said exactly this upthread but you articulated it better than me. With every new engagement/marriage/baby announcement on Facebook, I die a little inside. And yes, the constant question in my mind is what's wrong with me? Why do good things happen to other people but not me?
@momentisaflower OMG. I literally clicked 'reply' to this post, and then my co-worker turned to me and said "I have some exciting personal news!". That's right. She just got engaged.
@momentisaflower When I went on Facebook to share this article with friends, my feed was full of a friend's new engagement announcement. She was proposed to during a hot-air balloon ride. At dawn.
@SuperGogo I don't care who is proposing to me, I'm not getting up at dawn to take a ride in a floating death trap.
@likethestore and momentisaflower, I'm sure I talked to you about this upthread, but definitely count me in as a person who wants/needs that reassurance and finds Facebook a constant agony too! 'Why do good things happen to other people but not me', every single day. The option to hide posts on Facebook is a godsend.
I'm coming at this from the perspective of a 23-year-old in a 4-year relationship and absolutely no desire to get married or have children. I'm happy to stick around with my boyfriend, but for me, I'm happy with the way things are now and being married just…doesn't seem like a big deal? I don't want children at all, so maybe that's part of it, but for me, being committed to someone sans government sanction and a big party is just as good. It seems like a lot of folks in the comments are coming at "no marriage" from the perspective of being single, which I dig, but I feel like I'm somewhere in between. I just thank everything I can that neither my parents nor his parents seem to have any expectations about us doing traditional gettin'-married-havin'-babies stuff, although even if they did, I would be pretty comfortable explaining my perspective.
I think that articles like this are wonderful and express a lot about how women in general are learning to deal with this issue.
However, if I see one more woman post something like "Why don't guys want a fiercely independent female for a girlfriend? *marriage woe*" I'm going to throw up.
Marriage shouldn't be about these power struggles. What ever happened to two people loving each other and caring for each other? Career, feminism, kids, money… all are untrue to the reality that Love should be the only reason.
The main reason why most of my friends don't want to get married? The people they're with don't love them – they love the idea of getting married and just want some guy to play the part – which is ridiculous.
@Jasons_Johnson@twitter "Marriage shouldn't be about these power struggles." This!!! I think that's what this article is going for, saying that women have traditionally found it more difficult to find men who support them in career, friendships, children, no children, etc. But at this point nobody, woman or man, should have to "sacrifice" a career or any other important, fulfilling aspect of their life to be in a relationship.
Edith, you should read "Savage Beauty: The Life of Edna St. Vincent Millay" by Nancy Milford. It is amazing and fascinating and a really well-done look at an awesomely unconventional life. (Nancy Milford's bio of Zelda Fitzgerald is also not to be missed, if you have a thing for ladies in the 20's like I apparently do)
@FMoss3 wait, I thought the Zelda one wasn't out yet?? I'm jealous of your ARC!
@theguvnah The Milford Zelda book I have is an old old paperback from the 70's…I think maybe it's just been out of print and is being re-released this year? Possibly?
@FMoss3 oh yes – that makes sense. I just quickly looked at amazon and it said it would be released next month but once I scrolled down I now see that it has been out for ages! thanks.
@FMoss3 OMG yes, these books are both so good. Even if neither Edna nor Zelda are really models of healthy relationships.
I'm also looking forward to the upcoming biography of Margaret Fuller (not by Nancy Milford). I think it's like a year away, but talk about unconventional lives …!
Lunchtime, I read the whole article.
Great piece, though I agree with some above looking for specifics rather than generalizations. And: what about the rise of the Wedding Industrial Complex? Is the corporate clinging to (and inflation of) the symbolic significance of the wedding day and all of the accompanying Things that Must Be Perfect On That Day (so buy it! or at least watch someone on TV buying it) a response to declining marriage rates/changing marriage demographics? It's in the interest of late capitalism to keep this traditional marriage thing going, maybe especially as more and more marriage is a privilege for well-off whites. Write a book already, Kate Bolick!
Also this is my favorite part: "…welcoming my nieces into the world has reminded me anew of what a gift it is to care deeply, even helplessly, about another. There are many ways to know love in this world."
@julia My line about marriage and babies in today's world has always been that I'm suspicious of anything that has to be sold so hard. And anytime other people are so concerned about my personal choices, that raises some major red flags as well. There's definitely a societal panic going on about the declining relevance of marriage and the traditional nuclear family unit.
"Too, the studies around how men behave when they have the demographic upper hand is sobering — less committal, more promiscuous, etc."
I am a dude. Now that that's out of the way, I like Kate's argument a lot, and I have never believed that anyone has to get married for any reason. I mean, if they want to, great. Have a blast. Don't expect anyone else to buttress your institution. But this quote rankles me because isn't she suggesting that ladies should feel A-OK with being less committal and perhaps more promiscuous? Less committal at the very least? If we're arguing for real agency and autonomy in relationships, why do we find less commitment and more promiscuity "sobering" in men, but appropriate in women? See: what's good for the goose …
@erikonymous That kind of threw me off too, b/c it still seems pretty outdated — the subtext there is still that (regardless of age) What Women Really Want is a committed relationship, vs. men who just want to get laid all the time.
This isn't exactly scientific, but the one time in my life (I'm a guy too) in which the women in my social group were "outnumbered" by men — early/mid-20s in NYC, factoring in the fact that a lot of the women were attracting a wider age-range of men than vice versa — the dudes were all trying to find a nice relationship, and the women were sleeping around like crazy.
Holy shit, has anybody checked out the Comments section at the bottom of the Atlantic article? It must have gotten cross-posted on "Stereotypical Bitter Men Who Blame the Fact They Can't Get Laid on American Women Being Too Mouthy" dot com…
@b3k Seriously, those people sound so threatened.
@b3k I know it means my media consumption stays in a bubble, but I don't read comments on news websites for that very reason.
@julia Me too! I just kinda assumed The Atlantic would attract fewer dumbasses… I'm just surprised I haven't seen anything about "Alphas" and "Betas" yet.
@hands_down Yeah, chauvinism masking sheer terror.
@b3k Exactly! OMG, I was appalled by some of those comments. As you probably noticed, if you read them after I got through with them. Appalled!!!!
I guess I'm in the minority here, BUT… I have to argue for the get-married-young side a bit. The idea of spending your 20s "finding yourself" and spending your 20s with a legal partner are not mutually exclusive. Life is hard for most of us. When do you decide that you're a fully self-realized adult? I dunno. I do know that you get there by struggling and failing and learning to be compassionate and responsible and to think about somebody other than yourself for a change. Life is about who you spend it with, be it your family, friends, spouse, partner, ladycommune, WHATEVER. The point is, you grow a lot when you learn to stop always putting yourself in the middle of the universe, and being in a committed partnership with another person is all about doing just that. NOT sacrifice, but broadening your definition of self-interest.
I'm not saying that people SHOULD or SHOULDN'T get married and have babies or whatever. We all have the right to decide what works for us. Me, though? I got hitched at 24 and I'm grateful to have a partner to GROW UP with.
@paulapancakes This: "The idea of spending your 20s "finding yourself" and spending your 20s with a legal partner are not mutually exclusive" is a really good point. There's this idea that your youth is for being single and having fun, fun, fun and then you must shackle yourself into a marriage for all time and watch paint dry and never change again. That's bullshit, as anyone who has ever experienced life should know.
@paulapancakes
I'm not married or anything, I'm just in a long term relationship, but I was having this sort of freakout a few months ago, where I wondered if I was stifling my personal growth by being in a committed relationship when I'm young. Then I realized that the last year and a half has been perhaps the most dramatic period of self-improvement and personal satisfaction I've ever had. I moved to a new city, articulated my long-term career goals, lost weight, became more fiscally responsible, even started doing Pilates for god's sake. These and more are all goals and wishes and to-do list items that have been lingering for years. My boyfriend has helped me tackle goals that seemed too daunting on my own, and I've tried to be supportive in return. And many of these things, I would have accomplished just as well on my own – but my point is that while he didn't necessarily help me accomplish these goals, he sure didn't stand in my way. I'm not trying to get all "rah-rah! relationships!" at a spectacularly inappropriate moment, I just mean that my ideas about self-actualization and independence were wrong. Personal fulfillment and relationships are not by their very essence mutually exclusive.
But then again, I think the point of the article is that it might be growing harder to find partners who are willing to be in this type of relationship. I definitely think there are women like old-me who are maybe creating a false dichotomy between self-fulfilling singledom/stable and committed. But I think there are a lot of women who can't find somebody who wants to grow up with them.
@paulapancakes Yeah, I agree. I say this as a 24-year-old in a committed relationship who doesn't feel quite ready to get married yet… but it seems like many people see marriage on the level of, say, buying a house — something you invest in after everything else in your life is under control. If that's what you want/need to make that kind of decision, that's absolutely valid, but hopefully in a relationship you'll be able to be self-fulfilled and partnered, right? I mean, I don't ever want to stop changing — at 25 or 45 or 75 — and so maybe the best anyone can do is find someone who will support you through those changes (and vice versa) as best they can?
I realize finding that person is like finding a unicorn or a needle in a haystack or whatever. But I do think the single=fulfilled and partnered=static and boring is a weird dichotomy that I seem to be seeing everywhere lately.
@paulapancakes I could've got married straight out of my parents' house at age 23 to a guy who is now extremely rich and successful and handsome, the classic "good catch." But I'd be damned if I was going to do that. Yes, he was a great guy. And yes, he's actually still available 23 years later (so maybe I was right? there WAS something missing?). Haha. But no, for all the misery I endured for two decades — got that, people? two decades of being dicked around by jerks — it was all worth it. I did meet the perfect guy for me finally, and even then it took seven years for us to figure that out. For a while, I thought he was going to join the rest of the peanut gallery.
Am I picky? Yes! Do I regret being picky? Heck, no. It was worth every minute of it, every tear, every jerk, every embarrassing moment of being 39 with no savings and no house and no husband when I came back from my travels in Europe, all of it was worth it. I would not be the woman I am now if i had married good ole Mr. Perfect when I was 24.
And what's more, I passed on three other opportunities to marry the "Perfect guy" — you know, good looking, wealthy, connected, intelligent, wants babies. Why? Because they weren't the one for me and I knew it.
It all depends what you want from life. Did I want children? Nope. Did I want to derive my wealth and social standing from another? Nope. Did I want to see the world? Yes. Did I want to learn about other cultures, other lives, other ways of having a relationship, maybe invent my own? Yes.
And that's what I did, and I paid the price, and it was worth it. I may end up some homeless old lady in Santa Monica someday, but it'll still be worth it. Because you know what? I could end up the same way by marrying the wrong guy and settling into complacency, and then getting the rug pulled out from under me. All you people who think marriage is going to make your life easier are just dreaming! Only you can make your life easier, marriage or no marriage. Marriage is not a solution. It's an option.
@carolita My point is not that marriage is a solution to anybody's precious life problems. My point is that Kate Bolick's essay is another drop in the sea of ME FIRST ideology. Ever since the 60s, there's been a growing obsession with the individual, and everybody's rushing to go to therapy and self-realize and grow into themselves. Women are choosing to postpone committing to ANYTHING because they want to have all their emotional ducks in a row first, and then find somebody/something that fits into the internal world they've made. In my humble opinion, it's actually pretty nice to love somebody other than yourself.
@paulapancakes But I mean…this idea that women are "postponing" commitment doesn't really ring true for me. Are a lot of women out there turning down marriage proposals in their early-mid-20's? Because almost everyone I knew at that age, men and women, had zero interest in being married at that time (this leaves aside the one friend I had who got married 1 week after college graduation, but she was definitely the exception). I think it's more likely that relationships don't usually get that serious for people at those early ages. Nor should they, in my opinion.
@paulapancakes i think what you're saying is super important. it IS pretty important to be concerned about something bigger than yourself, and if jean twenge's research is to be believed, yes, we are getting more and more narcissistic as the decades go by.
however, i don't think expanding our bubbles to include 2 people instead of just 1 is the answer. in fact, that's been THE PROBLEM for most women throughout history (who knows about pre-history) … we've actually located our identity entirely in our relationships with other people, especially men, without whom we were incredibly vulnerable and even largely powerless to participate in the wider world. which led to a very unhealthy lack of ego and agency in many (privileged) women in our society. see: betty draper and all the other unfulfilled midcentury ladies who started waking up from their feminine mystique in the later 60s.
that waking up process continues to this day. though we've gained a lot of external agency and freedom in the world over the last few decades, i believe that many of us are still internally imprisoned by old psychological habits of locating our value in our relationships with others rather than in our own objective selves. see: this article's example of young women participating in a hookup culture they don't even particularly like. why would they do that, if women were as free as a virginia slims commercial? i think we have a good bit more work to do — as individuals and together — to attain that true freedom.
so, yes, i agree with you that it's more about ME ME ME than ever before, but i actually think that's a healthy step to becoming full agents in the world, liberated inside and out and able to act in the world as full and powerful adults.
from THAT position of healthy THIS IS ME-ness, we can expand our bubble of care. but, in my opinion anyway, expanding it to just include 1 other person, or just our families, doesn't get us anywhere new. we've been there for centuries.
what women are learning how to do — for the very first time! in big numbers! in recorded history! — is to expand our bubble of care to include everything. not just the immediate people around us. and that to me is the most thrilling thing ever.
tl;dr: being all about ME is a necessary step to being healthy enough to be all about US. we just need to make sure we don't stop there.
@madge I agree, and I think the recent obsession (yeah, I said it) with child-rearing is part and parcel of that. (A certain class of) people are now viewing their children as extensions of themselves, and devoting all their time, energy, and resources to giving those few children every possible "advantage" to compete against everyone else's children, rather than focusing on the health of the society at large, and what is best for the community. It's all "MY kid will get into Harvard and stick it to YOUR kid later on." Unhealthy.
dying over her disclaimer "some of my best friends are married!" I use that exact line whenever I talk smack about weddings.
This is all super-interesting, but I have some problems with Bolick's essay, which Elisa Gabbert articulated so well that I'll just leave the link here: http://thefrenchexit.blogspot.com/2011/10/more-meh-marriage-journalism.html
@Lili L. Great response from Gabbert. The more I reflect on this piece the more I think of it as a well-researched personal essay that didn't quite make the connections it could have. But I really enjoyed reading it! And I think I like the conversation with Bolick posted here more.
@julia Yes–I think that's right. The personal observations are scintillating, but the broader conclusions rankle. There's too much zero-sum thinking underpinning the approach. If women are achieving more, men are achieving less–*relative to women*. That's definitionally true, but it's framed as a problem: now women have fewer men they can marry. That does not constitute an injustice, or a social problem. It can't, unless we're adhering to the very standards the essay sets out to question. To invoke the outdated logic of eligible bachelorhood and classify a group of men as "unmarriageable" because of their achievements or ambitions is problematic, just as classifying a group of non-working women as unmarriageable would be. Particularly in an article trying to unthink the usefulness of "marriageability" as a relevant consideration.
I am a bit of a slower reader than I'd like to be, but this article was so worth the 40 minutes it took me to read it.
I do agree that it would be so interesting to hear this article summed up in a single sentence, because I must admit that at first I did think I was reading a rebuttal of "There are no good men so just cling to one before your ovaries dry and the world ends," by Lori Gottlieb.
The part that stood out the most to me was the bit about the cultural triumph of the couple having devalued other relationships. I found it hilarious when she discussed some study that found that married couples spend less time with friends than singletons. Erm, OF COURSE THEY DO. Who even gave these people a research grant? It is as if culture peddles a version of romantic partnerships that demands a monopoly on intimacy, and I think that Kate Bolick is saying that they shouldn't.
"Gay men have traditionally had a more permissive attitude toward infidelity." I'm probably being touchy, but I think "infidelity" is not the right word here.
The phrase "still single" is unfortunate. It's like asking someone if they are "still married" which assumes that they're headed for divorce, because, you know, they probably are (if the statistics are to be believed).
@thundertheft truth!
@thundertheft I have fantasized so many times about replying with "still married?" when I get asked this question, but of course I never think of it until afterwards.
There's also a huge, huge difference between not wanting to be married (or equivalent … not being a relationship person, being an inherently single person) and just not wanting to be a mom. That whole thing about running a houseful of kids and logistics and being this child-centric supermom person corralling the toddlers and breastfeeding the baby and organizing everybody else? You can not want that, but still be up for maybe having a hopefully-forever adult partner. I think that tends to get lost in a lot of these conversations. And it can make it impossibly hard to sort out SO MANY THINGS. I feel like the whole cultural conversation just wants to put a gun to the head of the 30-year-old woman and say, OK, so choose: do you want to be a supermom or a cat lady? There are other choices. (And yes, of course they include that you can be a mom who's not a supermom, or permanently single without being a cat lady. I do not personally endorse or condone this gun-pointing asshole's views.)
I loved this article and spent today discussing it with friends, so kudos for putting it up.
My comment, however, is a copy-related one: "turtlenecked" in the section about beatniks in NYC is misspelled.
omg. wow. I LOVE this. I have an "Allen" of my own… he is the perfect man in so many ways. But I am SO ambivalent about marriage and children and he so… isn't. Breaks my heart to think of what could happen eventually. But anyway…
I would love to see an article like this, but about women who live their lives basically solitary from female (and/or male) friendships in general. People who just have themselves and a cat and maybe a few close friends they keep in touch with and see once a year. I feel like this is an existence I can partially relate to even though I have a boyfriend.
Also the part about marriageable men: it should be "taller than their wives." (It's written as "there" now). I know these corrections make me sound insufferable, but thought you'd want to know!
@BoozinSusan Thanks.
I usually agree with most of Edith's assessments, but I was not a fan of this article. First of all, what we're experiencing is not (and never has been) a "war on boys"…it is simply degradation of institutionalized male privilege. Privilege which is, by the way, still largely intact. Just because boys have had ludicrous advantages taken away from them does not mean they are being systematically victimized.
Also, I don't like Bolick's insinuation that playboys can only exist because women are such giant hobags. How else would you expect them to act in a society that treasures male dominance almost pretty much anything else? Oh, and then she trots out the tired cliche that women don't care about appearances, but men do. So ladies, shut your legs until some ugly guy comes along, and all your problems will be solved. YAY.
There is nothing fresh about her perspective. However, this is exactly the sort of writing I've come to expect from "The Atlantic"…psuedo-provocative nonsense designed to subtly reinforce the patriarchy. See Caitlin Flannagan's corpus for more examples.
It makes sense that single ladies would have the time/motivation to be good friends with other single ladies. Serious relationships can have an isolating effect. I know that to Bolick, she and her group of friends seem like THE WHOLE WORLD, but the fact is, most of us are more likely (statistically speaking) to get married than not.
Finally, what is the big news here? SOME LADIES PREFER TO STAY UNMARRIED. Um, correct me if I'm wrong, but hasn't that been the case since pretty much forever? What exactly is so new and alarming? I think a better title for this would have been "Bolick's Bullocks."
@dragoness And the not-so-subtle condemnation of second-wave feminism. ARGH. I could go on…
@dragoness Thank goodness, I am not alone. There were so many things that I disliked about the article. First and foremost, the use of poor black women as a stand-in for all black women everywhere, which completely negates the existence of middle class black women and their issues. And argh… I was unhappy and very surprised to find this article lionized here. The Hairpin is one of my happy places on these wild wild interwebs.
@hairouna: Yeah, I'm going to come out and say that her entire section on the "African American community" rankled something fierce because it was just so… unexamined?
Also this? "But the reality is that what’s happened to the black family is already beginning to happen to the white family." No. Not even close.
@mouthalmighty There was so much privilege all up and through that piece. I find it very hard to reach over the gaping chasm of the differences in our lived experiences to feel sorry for her. When 1 in 9 young white men (age 20 -34) are in prison then we can start talking about the "decline" of the white family. Unexamined is a very good word for it.
@hairouna oh my god yes. i was reading this thread and feeling the same way. i support this whole idea of giving women space to do what they want to do and i appreciate the new world order of marriage, but i just had SO MANY problems with the way she set up her "facts," especially how she set up the "demise" of black society as being a harbinger of things to come for middle class whites. what? also, so problematic.
i really want someone to write a carefully reasoned article about these subjects — new motherhood, new marriage, hook up culture, in this modern age — that actually addresses the fragmented and diverse demographics that contribute to these changing statistics, because those demographics are not necessarily easily represented solely by the personal anectdotes of educated upper-middle-class white women. i'm not saying that experience is invalid, but when educated white women start using general population statistics to justify their experience, i just have so many problemmmmms.
The thing that really kills me about all the hand-wringing and pearl-clutching surrounding the "demise" of "traditional marriage" is that the idea of a breadwinner-man, housewife-woman and 2 or 3 kids as a self-contained, self-sufficient family unit is so relatively new! Just because there are new ways of being a family than ever before doesn't change the fact that the nuclear family didn't always enjoy the hegemony it does now. I know that's a big aspect of the article but it never fails to astound me. That and the idea that if you don't have a spouse you are "alone" in life, as if your family, friends, coworkers, etc just cease to exist and/or have no meaning in your life. I mean, what?????????
Anyway, as a 22-year-old who has never really dated (hookup culture like whooooa. the only dude who asked me out on a legit date in four years was a townie. and my friends were SO EXCITED for me.), I always assumed that I would worry about finding a man when I was "settled" in my career, and looking for a job and realizing the state of the economy, I realize how long that could take, if it ever happens. I don't know if "settled" is even a thing that exists in the job market anymore. So I realize that maybe I won't get married for a long time, and maybe I won't get married at all, or maybe if I do I'll opt for a town hall ceremony rather than a big party…actually, the biggest thing I'm thinking about is whether I'll have children. I go back and forth on this, but one thing I've always thought is that I won't have kids until I've had a few unfettered childfree years to travel, etc without that added responsibility. And now I'm realizing that I will probably be much older than I imagined by the time I am at a point career-wise when I can take a breather and spend time and money on myself, and so maybe I won't have children after all.
tl;dr It's just so weird to think about the way something as impersonal and out of my control as the economy is shaping my life in very real and concrete ways and as a young college graduate this is just hitting me and I have lots of feelings about it!
everything is depressing
So is the "my boyfriend is actually my best friend" thing quite rare? While this discussion interests me, and I'm glad it makes people feel better, I also feel confused because I would never give up the relationship I have with him so I could be single/free/available for other single ladies. I have never really had a lot of friends (even before boys) so I kind of want to stick to the one I have, even if that means we might end up married someday (probably for the benefits reason). Is this just a case of the minority finally becoming accepted in the mainstream? Does it mean everyone can do their own thing, even if it is traditional and even if it is not? I just read this stuff and get panicked that my relationship will ultimately fail because it's too much like How Things Were.
Is there a club for introverted girls who just want to hang out with their doofusy, not very tall, guys all day every day?
@mackymoo There are more of us, we're downthread! "I just read this stuff and get panicked that my relationship will ultimately fail because it's too much like How Things Were." < – This. I have to remind myself that giving up my best friend sounds nightmarish, even if it would make me Grow As A Person. I'll find other ways to grow! And I feel like I'm my own person despite having a boyfriend. Also, it sounds like you have a fantastic relationship. So congrats.
@mackymoo Please start that club! Mr. Plumap will bake us cookies.
@mackymoo YES, this club exists, though we may not be formally incorporated yet. I'm 29, started dating my husband at 23, married him at 26 (largely for legal/benefits-related reasons), and yeah, I'm a majorly shy introvert who has always had a tough time making very many friends, and me and my own doofusy husband are like our own little best-friend-comedy-duo every day. Sometimes I wonder if I missed on the the whole Cool Single Girl thing, but when I hear my single friends talk about what it's like out there, they often don't sound like they're having a whole lot of fun. I like to hope that we're transitioning into an era where everyone can do their own thing whether traditional or nontraditional, but yeah, sometimes things DO feel a little outsider-y and loner-y when almost everyone you know is single and people seem to think it's so old-fashioned to just meet a nice guy who you enjoy being with and settling down with him. But anyhoo, you are not alone! And you can totally marry your boyfriend and join that club!
@mackymoo Ha! Reading these things I find myself thinking "Is my life a lie? It doesn't feel like a lie!"
Anyway, I can definitely relate to what you're describing, and @werewolfbarmitzvah too, so much. "I like to hope that we're transitioning into an era where everyone can do their own thing whether traditional or nontraditional"=OMG yes. I like coming home (and staying in) to my best friend, brownies, and 30Rock.
I remember being a little kid and reading, like on a magnet or something, that a best friend is the person you want to be with when you want to be alone. It's super corny, but kind of true! I don't feel like I have to choose between being with my fellow and being with myself…because I am so myself when I'm with him…if that makes sense. We've both grown and changed over the years, and I like to think that not only have we not inhibited each other there, we've influenced each other so that we've grown into better, wiser people.
I think it got touched on above (though I'm about to run out and don't have time for the whole thread), but I guess I hate these sorts of articles. I want kids and to have all the legal and emotional support of a healthy two-person marriage. I know this is a load of heterosexist privilege BS because cultural expectations blah blah, but it's how I feel, and more and more it seems like the new cultural dialogue about this desire is one of the following:
1. You're young and you're wrong. Haven't you ever wanted to do yoga on a mountaintop in Bali? You don't need a man! You should find yourself.
2. Congratulations, how wonderful. We, The New Women, are really progressive and you have A CHOICE. (But ours is implicitly or occasionally explicitly better.)
Again, I want to stress my positionality on this issue as a white cis straight lady, which I recognize. But I'm always a little put out by this non-discussion. I don't understand why it has to be mutually exclusive that I want to be in a two-person legally recognized thing, a real live Marriage, while being perfectly aware of the really loaded cultural context this desire has. It seems that the New Best Only Thing To Do is to hate the institution. Something something grad school. Am I right? Help. Kick me if I'm wrong or snotty.
@hairdresser on fire No. I feel the same way. I'm glad that marriage and children is no longer the default for everyone, you must, ever. I'm in a wonderful relationship in my 20s; my sister doesn't want kids and is dating a bunch of interesting guys, and we're both happy! But I think a certain subset of well-educated, smart, and otherwise great ladies seem to subscribe to "Partnering up, at least before you're 35, is a terrible mistake!" Obviously NOT everyone meets someone before that, and obviously you shouldn't settle for the sake of settling. But I resent the idea that marrying younger is always settling/closing yourself off. Signed, a lady whose man would totally support her if she wanted to go do yoga on a mountaintop in Bali.
@julieta Yessss! Exactly this, thanks! I'm in a long-term, long-distance kinda thing, also early 20s, and like I don't really want to sow wild oats or Eat Pray Love my ass to death, but that doesn't mean I don't party hard/have fun/learn something new about myself all the time that has NOTHING TO DO with my guy? (Also I just had to Google if there were actually mountains in Bali, which yes, thank goodness.)
@hairdresser on fire HI are you me?? Also long-term long-distance; I'm 24. I feel like I've gotten militant about this and I feel guilty because I know the amount of shame people get for being coupled is nothing compared to the amount that single (especially older single) ladies get and I don't want to add to the "no you're wrong we're right!" Others expressed it better than me downthread: being with someone is fine, not being with someone is fine, but you're going to grow and change all your life. A stable relationship isn't like a mortgage that you take out when you hit life benchmarks a, b, c and d.
@julieta Twins! I feel the same, like I should probably just shut my mouth and move along, but also I don't really believe in maligning people for their belief systems (at least the beliefs that do no harm to others), so I get a little rankled being told I'm buying into some great delusion.
@hairdresser on fire I also think it depends who you spend time with. All of my friends are coupley and a lot of my boyfriend's friends are a bit older and married (so he's all into the marriage thing!). It's more the Internet where people make me doubt my life choices…
i feel like i come from the opposite end of the spectrum here, and i'm wondering if anyone else does. (i need some encouragement!) i am 22 and dating a guy i love and could totally marry. the thing is, i'm not ready to not date other guys ever again. all this reading makes me afraid that i'll settle though out of fear of ending up single and regretting it. bueller? (to clarify, i have no intention of marrying him any time soon, but i just worry about this happening years down the line…i'm too young to already be afraid of never finding someone again, right?)
@LSB We seem to be coming to this thread late. Go with it! No one's saying you have to get married now, but don't break up for the sake of being single because you feel like society is telling you you must. (I'm in a relationship with someone I honestly believe is someone I can be happy with forever but I'm not ready to put a ring on it. It's OK! No one's making you get engaged now. If you're happy, relax and be happy.)
@LSB Ah yes we all have found each other at the bottom of the thread! Bueller to your bueller, see my above post. I spent an hour reading all this shit and freaking out only to have my boyfriend come home and tell me all he's wanted to do all day is kiss my cheeks repeatedly. I think I'll keep Grade A Awesome Boyfriend and we can go on adventures together in our TARDIS.
Also I wonder how much "genuinely liking other people" comes into play. Because I definitely do not. When people say, "oh but I've met so many great people!" I think, "ugh how is that possible?"
@LSB I started dating my boyfriend in college, and I know the feeling of "but I never got to be a cool single girl!" even though you love your boyfriend. You're happy and your 20's may not be the same as all your friends, but they are still awesome.
I'm 26 & newly married to someone I met in college, and there was so much in the article & these comments that resonated with me! But my main takeaway was just that everybody is different (I know I know I'm not saying something brilliantly cutting edge). Many of us can empathize with part of a story or a particular experience, but generalizations (even with statistics to back them up) can make things uncomfortable (and here I am generalizing- sorry! I recognize the irony).
For me, marriage made sense. But I also have a desire for a career (I'm currently a graduate student), additional travel, and personal growth. My husband is a great source of support to me, as are my female (and male) friends. I feel comfortable that I will be able to grow personally within the "confines" of marriage, but I can definitely understand that other women haven't yet found and/or may not ever find a traditional "marriage" to be something that works for them.
I really enjoyed reading about all the different ways that others perceive marriage/relationships/single-ness- it's super cool to hear about people doing what makes sense to them, cultural norms/expectations notwithstanding.
I have been entertained by the comments to what most of you agree is a weak argument. My favorite part is, as a man, I get to be one of two things: a playboy/team captain/captain of industry/misogynist/insufferable a-hole OR a short/ugly/underachieving loser.
@thatguy Nah, there are plenty of short/ugly/underachieving/misogynists out there, so you have options!
@WaityKatie touche
I may be late on this, and I haven't even read the article, but reading all this… I dunno, I can't shake the feeling of "why is this even being talked about?" As in, when a huge amount of people in this country aren't even allowed to get married. Like, oh cool! Straight professional women are CHOOSING to not get married? Let's give 'em a fucking parade.
I guess just seeing people bitch about the shit they get from ~society~ about being a single woman just kindof seems like Not The Issue right now.
@micalala You're right, we should never talk about a problem until all worse problems have been fixed.
@WaityKatie Blegh, I knew I would get some snotty comment like this. I don't know why I bother sometimes, haha.
It just doesn't seem like a "problem" to me (even as a [mostly] straight female with no plans to get married)… but that might be because I live in a great city with plenty of strong married and non-married female figures, and I come from an awesome, accepting family that doesn't care about that stuff. So I guess that's just me personally. I apologize.
@micalala I generally choose not to comment when people are talking about things that are completely irrelevant to my life, rather than signing in to tell them that they shouldn't care about or talk about those things, but I guess that's just me.
@WaityKatie Uh, i was apologizing. I was trying to say, hey I thought about it and fuck, I'm really lucky. So I'm sorry.
The Internet sucks sometimes.
@micalala Oh, ok.
Jesus. The divorce rate is bunk. It is a meaningless statistic. This is conventional wisdom in sociology. It has also been discussed in perfectly mainstream media. Why does the author of this article not know this? Why doesn't Edith talk about it to her? Why are professional journalists not doing their job here? It's frustrating.
@Freddie DeBoer@facebook If you're curious as to why, the conventional divorce rate merely compares given year number of NEW marriages to given year number of divorces. This is widely misleading about the number of individual marriages that end in divorce. For example, if the economy goes bad, less people marry due to the cost of a wedding. This causes the divorce rate to spike even though the number of people divorcing remains constant. The pool of marriages is limited to new marriages whereas the pool for divorce includes all marriages.
A meaningful divorce rate can't just concern itself with new marriages. It has to track the number of individual marriages that end in divorce. That metric is far more valid, but much harder to track. Limited data suggests that the divorce rate is much lower than conventionally believed, that it never exceeded 40%, and that it peaked in the early 90's and has had a small, steady decline since.
Which, again, is not hard to find out, if you bother to look.
@Freddie DeBoer@facebook Are you saying I'm not doing my job?
The premise of this article is silly. Men who don't get college degrees are entrepreneurs, attend technical institutes, become apprentices, get a four-year head start on work/life experience. College is only as useful as the degree you received. Engineering, for example, is useful. English and history is not. Get it?
Men are doing just fine.
The self-aggrandizing paraded as a 'serious' topic is a nauseating new habit in American culture. Writers with too much time on their hands, and people who need to bore us to death with their personal stories in the comments section.
To think that other people around the world are losing their lives while fighting for their freedoms and people's biggest concerns in the US are based on a fairy princess novel.
@Mohammed Noori@facebook Seriously? Are you implying that women who don't get college degrees aren't also becoming entrepreneurs, attending tech. schools, etc.? The rates may be differential, but I don't have the data on that, nor do you, I suspect.
Oh yeah, and I just spent a major chunk of my life overseas "fighting for our freedoms," or whatever. Just so you know, this sort of dialogue is precisely what I thought I was fighting for.
@Jon Fighting in pointless wars in the Middle East against an indigenous population that pose no existential threat to the US is not even remotely compared to people going out in protest to fight for an independent state i.e. Egypt, Libya.
These conversations are just about soothing those particular women who need an ego-boosting article to explain their horrid dating life.
And there is no "implication" in my post. Men are the vast majority of entrepreneurs. They are also the vast majority of those who take degrees in engineering and other technical fields that actually provide a real job (not some useless liberal arts degree). This isn't an opinion. This is statistics.
They can put as much lip stick on this article as they like, but the facts are weak and the anecdotes provided are abundant.
@Mohammed Noori@facebook English and history aren't useful? Really? My English degree's doing a pretty good job of getting me through law school and before you jump down my throat and tell me that the law degree is the useful degree (and those couple of years I spent immersed in literary theory were wasted), I'd love to let you know what judges and clerks think of lawyers who can't string together a halfway coherent sentence. Hint: they think very little of this significant portion of the profession.
Some people view college as merely job training. Some people view college as a means of learning to think critically, an environment in which to explore complex ideas, gain cultural capital, become well rounded people, learn a language that will allow them to understand the world around them and express their thoughts in a coherent and well-understood manner, etc. Both approaches are okay. What isn't okay is stating that someone's degree is useless because it does not immediately translate into economic gain.
This article is weak, and it also has little to do with the gendered divisions in the workforce that you cite, which can be attributed to many different cultural and social issues that were barely touched upon in Bolick's article.
@Mohammed Noori@facebook You're having an argument with yourself. The premise of my initial post was that many young men choose not to waste 4 years of their life wasting their parent's hard-earned money and want to make something of themselves using other means. Many of them become much, much more successful because they have a jump-start in the working world, starting their own business, etc.. I couldn't care less about your English degree (where I'm sure you wrote a lot of "useful" essays about Chaucer's sexuality) or your non-existing career in law.
And since you couldn't properly read my post, I would guess that 4 years of yours was a waste.
@Mohammed Noori@facebook You're kind of a juicebox, huh?
@S. Elizabeth MARRY ME. NOW.
@Xanthophyllippa YES, YES, A THOUSAND TIMES YES!
@S. Elizabeth Can we both wear frilly dresses? Tuxes make my ass look big.
Am I the only one who didn't like this article because it had multiple inaccuracies (women making less than men because they take time off to have children, divorce statistic, etc.) and was all about what well-to-do women think? It was like an episode of Sex and the City.
Oh God! "Morbid over-honesty!" I have that too, KB!
Kate bolick's piece in "the Atlantic" was fascinating, illuminating and mind-expanding. It was wonderful. But something i
took from it that doesn't sit right: several times she classified today's men as either "successful" or "deadbeats." it marred the piece for me, and in continuing to read, I could see that she doesn't view men who are not conventionally successful as dead beats.