More on Marriage in the News

Continuing from last time, the current (October) issue of First Things has an interesting article titled 'What does Woman Want? The War between the Sexless" which discusses a number of recent articles by women in The Atlantic, Time, various blogs and books that have a common theme of middle aged women divorcing their husbands, claiming that their marriage is barren of sexual intimacy, and assigning blame mostly to things like extended life expectancy making marriage unsustainable, having been intended for a society where most people die much younger than now. The author of this article, Mary Eberstadt, effectively points out how bizarre this all is and makes some pointed observations, such as:

• Wharton economists have assembled surveys over the past 35 years showing steadily decreasing female happiness in general. This is despite large advances in education (more in college now than men), in job equality, sexual freedom, longer life expectancy,closing the wage gap, etc. Instead of improving their happiness, women's happiness is steadily declining, now less than men though historically it had been higher than men.


• Womens' and mens' narcissism is increasing. A study of 16,000 collegians personality tests showed a sharp increase in responses to such statements as 'I am an important person' (in 1950 12% agreed with this one; it was 80% by the 1980's)


• Women are becoming more the instigator of divorce. A recent Parade poll showed 70% of men said they would never leave their spouse, versus 50% of women say they have considered leaving.


• Men used to complain about sex-withholding wives and used it to justify affairs; now women do exactly that same thing. That is the whole gist of The Atlantic article 'Let's Call the Whole Thing Off'' by one Sandra Tsing Loh about her decision to seek a divorce.

Eberstadt could have done better in coming up with more clear conclusions from her survey of the angst this summer about marriage from female 'elites' in the media, but she does point out that much of this is the price of feminism, and part of the price of feminism has been its acceptance of pornography. As the article points out, pornography becomes an easy substitute for sexual intimacy in situations where that intimacy is strained by the pressures of life and marriage, and porn's easy availability now only makes it worse. Women have accepted porn in their quest for their own sexual license. Now it is helping destroy the intimacy they say they want, in addition to their own destructive work via promiscuity, abortion, narcissism, and career obsession.

I would add another point: competition. Loh paints a generality of the modern man as a sexless, sex-withholding 'competitor wife'. That is amazing since men historically have been blamed for being sex-obsessed and indeed that is why men are so vulnerable to porn. So what is going on? My opinion is that feminist women have been obsessed with competition with men to the point that they have made the home a place of competition instead of a place of acceptance. The word 'competitor' in 'competitor wife' is key. Men do not like to compete against women, especially their wives. Not in sports, not in school, not in a debate (see Hillary versus Barack for example), not anywhere. But now, men are competing with their wives to maintain their self respect as a provider, as a leader, and as a lover. In the home competition does not work. It shuts down intimacy and porn becomes an easy escape for many. I am not justifying porn: as I have said before, porn is a lie. But is an easy out for those tired of competing against their own wives. It is rather ironic that these feminists who have so strenuously insisted in competing against their husbands now find themselves in a no-win competition against the air-brushed, silicone-implanted, liposuctioned lie that is pornography.