Federalist: As a 22-year-old, I didn’t know who I would end up dating or marrying, but I felt sure there would be no fellow writer, especially not a fiction writer. There was something intrinsically off-putting about the thought of getting close to someone who might use my life and quirks to tell my story their way. And what if things soured? I assumed I really wouldn’t like what I read.
So I can only imagine what it’s like to read about yourself in a non-fictional account, particularly when your spouse is putting you on blast in a major national newspaper. If this were a one-time thing, I might shake my head. But after reading the latest installment in the “my husband disappoints me” genre in The New York Times last weekend — this one penned by a clinical psychologist — I’d say we have a trend. And America, we need to talk.
Darcy Lockman, whose editors sneeringly titled her opinion article, “What ‘Good’ Dads Get Away With,” opens by telling us, “When my husband and I became parents a decade ago, we were not prepared for the ways in which sexism was about to express itself in our relationship.” She proceeds to describe her husband’s cluelessness and lack of engagement, as well as their disagreement about whether she frequently noted his (perceived) failings.
As I read this, I suspected I was supposed to identify with the writer and cackle about what a jerk her husband is. Yet my sympathies were with him. How did he feel reading about himself in The Times and having countless people read this unflattering account? Did his wife bother to run a draft of this article by him before publication? And would there be more unfortunate details in his wife’s forthcoming book, entitled “All the Rage: Mothers, Fathers, and the Myth of Equal Partnership?” read more
I was married to a harpy once.
I am a free man now.
Very happy ending.
My now deceased bride was wonderful and thought that I could do or fix anything……. She was frequently disgusted when other wives would belittle their spouses. As far as I know, even when she hated me she never discussed it with others.
Not good at all.
Works both ways !
Identity politics are the tools of the useless, that is why the left bathes in it, we should do better. Criticizing your wife in public makes you look equally horrible.
As a married woman, I find this article and others like it very disturbing. Who is married to the perfect partner? After 42 years of marriage, my husband and I have to constantly update our “roles.” Life has a way of doing that and airing your dirty laundry is not the way to do it–ever. Hey, lady–get a divorce if you are so unhappy with him.
I have never been married, but do have a daughter whom I love. Watching my brothers and father with her and with their children, I observed that men are not good with babies or small children but once the children are toilet trained and can talk, men become very much “hand-on” fathers. It just is.
Lazlo and Mrs. Lazlo are Partners in this grand play called life.
People who trash their Partner in front of others don’t deserve a Partner.
“…why are a growing number of women publicly criticizing their husbands?”
Because of….umm…The Oppressive Patriarchy is silencing them? That’s all I got.
Except I’m glad my Chinese wife believes that face is lost by both parties in public, emotional displays of marital discord. I learned early on that we close ranks and back each other in public. Very important, kids.
@Big Mama ,”It just is”…………ah, no, it’s not.
Not to pic on you per se but blanket statements of ,”Men are not good with babies” is just as sexist as ,”Women are not good in math”, or women can’t be good mechanics or can’t lead men into combat.
I bonded with my children at birth, many men do. Not all men are the same just as not all women are the same.
My son is currently going through a long drawn out divorce – by her. Every opportunity she can she prolongs the next step, they are at a year of divorce proceedings this month and she still won’t return calls to a judge mandated mediator.
While they were together all (and I do mean ALL!!!) she ever did was bad-mouth him. I even told her straight to her face that she needed to stop verbally ripping him apart, especially to his parents. She didn’t listen.
Best advice I have ever heard was just last year and passed it onto my son for when he starts thinking about wife 2.0:
Don’t stick your dick in crazy.
Women are more inclined to carping about their husbands to their close female confidants. Men on the other hand tend to be more protective about their wives and not only they won’t bad mouth their wives nobody else better either.
That’s the general trend, there are exceptions.
I wonder whether the Times will give the guy equal time. Breakups that bad are very rarely one sided.
She writes like a girl……with a penis
MENOTU…..yup, they call that “a permanent reminder of a temporary feeling”
A few decades back I had a friend who was an engineer at Boeing and his wife use to spend her time doing lunch and shopping with some of the other Boeing wives. She was constantly belittling her husband if front of the others and then before she knew it she was divorced, shunned by the women and one of the ex-friends that had been widowed, was married to her ex-husband!
I actually went to the source article and found this nugget of hope at the end:
“Division of labor in the home is one of the most important gender-equity issues of our time. Yet at the current rate of change, MenCare, a group that promotes equal involvement in caregiving, estimates that it will be about 75 more years before men worldwide assume half of the unpaid work that domesticity requires.”
I’ll be long dead in 75 and most likely my four sons will be too – so problem solved. Not doing anything at all is solution in and of itself that most women cannot understand.
@Cryojohn, I don’t believe any of those stats mainly because they limit what ,”unpaid work that domesticity requires” means. They don’t factor in things like yard work, working on the cars, fixing things around the house, etc, to me all these things should be accounted for. Naturally a division of labor is required and there is no perfect arrangement or percentage for all couples. As long as both are satisfied that the other is contributing properly, equanimity will prevail.
There once was a handsome and wealthy young prince who fell in love with the princess in the next kingdom.
He proposed to her and she said ‘No”.
He lived happily ever after hunting and fishing.
The end.
This is a sore spot for me. I was almost married at 30 but never let myself get near that possibility since. I have many single women friends who would love to be married and would be wonderful, supportive spouses. I also have several male family and friends who are wonderful spouses. The problem I see, from my ivory tower, is that the wonderful men and the wonderful women never seem to find themselves (generalization).
I don’t know how to fix that, or I would have fixed it for myself long ago. But, back to the point of this post – women harpies are an abomination to the female plight. Good men, after being hen-pecked, will most likely not take any more chances. I understand, as that’s what I did after my failed relationship. But I realize, being an old fart now, that I was wrong. There are people out there who will come alongside you and make a commitment to work together to solve whatever issues come up.
Don’t ask me how to find them, for I am clueless. But there are women out there who would never think to criticize and belittle you, especially in public. And I know there are men who feel the same.
I am heartened to hear the success stories here. Thanks.
These women are married to beta males. Masculinity is a dying art.
In regards to the division of labor within the household:
If you’re keeping score, you’re already losing.
my wife & I have a system that works for us. I handle all the outside household work – mowing the lawn, fixing stuff, painting, working on the cars, etc. Inside the house, she does the laundry and cleaning and I fix stuff. We share the cooking because we both enjoy cooking for each other.
Even though I stunk in wood shop & metal shop classes, I’ve built her a She Shed, a makeup vanity, pantry shelves and refurbed the kitchen with subway tile, a new sink and butcherblock countertops. I enjoy the sense of accomplishment I get out of building things with my own hands. I also have earned scowls from my buddies when their wives see all this and say “why dont YOU build something for me honey?”
“Men are not good with babies”?
I’m reminded of a time in the kitchen of my Dear sister’s (RIP Sally) at what was probably a baby shower for my daughter who was carrying our 2nd grandchild.
The room was full of women of all ages and somehow I wound up in the middle of this giddy, cackling crowd. Being an over the road trucker of approximately 25 years at the time the room
was shocked and stunned at the fact that I was the only person at the gathering who knew how to properly fold a cloth diaper for a girl!
Among the most shocked was my daughter. I had to point out to her that I learned that particular skill while diapering her when she was an infant.
Do cloth diapers even exist anymore? I remember we had a service that stopped by weekly and picked up the soiled diapers and left a supply of clean fresh ones.
Badco
@Rich Taylor, I’m sure you’re right. Who could count all the chores required to run a house? I’ll still be happily dead when they come up with a number though.
Reason #823,760,823,775,686,439,621,749,836,532 I don’t do FAZEbook. My wife already lets me know all the things I do wrong; no need to go to FAZEbook and see ’em a second time. 🙄
Well, nobody and I mean NOBODY can MF you behind your back like your sister….they can make shit up and smile while they’re doing it….No rhyme or reason nor historical context…..mystifying…
FIFTY years of marital bliss the 24th of this month, if neither one of us kills the other by then (she is Sicilian).
That’s a joke son, a joke! The killing part and sometimes the bliss part also.
My only comment on the comments:
“men are not good with babies”
Not 100% true, but I understand if it’s 100% true in your family.
Babies are actually easier than teens, IMO. I enjoyed every minute of it and did almost 100% of the 2am attention needed. Diaper changing, baths, feeding, loving, toilet training, etc.
It was when I was able to spend the most time with them and they are why I wanted to get married in the first place.
No way my child was going to cry from hunger, no love, laying in a wet or dirty diaper, or be misled/abused by anyone taking care of them. No way. That’s my child and gift from God Himself. I felt blessed and honored to cover their needs, soothe their fears, and show them love.
Each day, hour, minute of their lives was the only time they were going to be that old and have that new need to be met, What are you doing avoiding it?
Sorry your men don’t see it similarly. Truly a loss for both the children and the, men.
P.S.
@Claudia, if Chad Prather isn’t in line for you, I can only hope a guy that doesn’t seem to measure up to him will still be a winner for you. You’re a keeper.
This article proves the point:
Women don’t know what they want, but they do know it’s a man’s fault they don’t have it.
I agree with the principle that as a general rule criticism of one’s spouse ought to be avoided. Especially in public.
However, there are exceptions.
I would enjoy me schadenfreude if Kellyanne Conway leveled some needed critical guidance in public to that jerk of a so-called husband she is chained to.
Dadof4, haha, you’re funny! Yes, I do adore Chad Prather, but he is just good looking. What’s more important is a man’s character; mind, spirit, soul. The outside is just what holds the really good stuff about a person.
But, thanks. You just made me blush!
So you’re saying I have a chance. Cool.
😉
🙂
Claudia and DadOf4, can I go to y’all’s wedding?