Misandry Review » Opposites As Equals

Gender Reconciliation

drD — Sat, 20 Feb 2010 20:36:00 +0000

Posting is removed pending further consideration, but is included as an addendum to comments.
See the thoughtful critique by Paul Elam (following).

Traditional Marriage vs. Contemporary Marriage: A Case for Choice

drD — Sat, 23 Jan 2010 07:36:00 +0000

Traditional Marriage vs. Contemporary Marriage:
A Case for Choice

Dr. D.

Marriage is falling out of favor, and can hardly be relied upon to raise the upcoming generation of youngsters. Fully 40% of American children are born to single mothers, and over half of teenagers live with only one of their natural parents (usually the mother).

Individuals are no longer so eager to marry, for a variety of reasons. But it is not merely individuals who are changing. The nature of marriage is changing as well, so that fewer of us want what marriage has come to mean.

A new law in France will soon outlaw contemptuous comments within marriages, and illustrates the forefront of where marriage may be heading. Supported by the French Premier, the force of law will soon support those who allege that a spouse berates him or her or otherwise shows contempt. At first glance, the law treats husbands and wives equally. Yet there is more here than meets the eye.

As a marriage and family psychologist, I have been taken in more times than I would care to admit by angry individuals who allege malfeasance from their spouses. The individual who so alleges may be an innocent stating the truth; an equal participant stating only half of what happens, or perhaps even a major perpetrator showing contempt and causing pain and suffering by his or her allegations. In relationships, as in life generally, we must hear both sides to even begin to understand a controversy. It would require considerable insight and wisdom, and more hours than anyone seems willing to spend, to separate the various possibilities and adjudicate these cases properly.

So who will benefit most from these new statutes? On the one hand, we might expect men to benefit. Research by John Gottman at the University of Washington, among others, shows clearly that women tend to be more argumentative while men are more highly stressed in arguments and tend to concede, placate, or withdraw. In those most lopsided clashes where only one argues and one is silent, by a ratio of six to one, it is the wife who continues to argue and the husband who bites his lip and searches for an escape.

On the other hand, women file complaints against their opposites considerably more often than do men. Men could accuse women and file charges , of course, but seldom do. Human nature is highly chivalrous, and we must look at who gains and loses in public accusations. We sympathize when women are mistreated and we naturally want to protect a woman and punish the offending man. But it does not work the other way around. We expect men to take care of themselves, and we have little inclination to support a man against a harsh women or to punish a woman who mistreats a man. And what sort of fool of a man would bring charges against his wife and turn her over to other men in authority, and chance losing her or sleeping on the couch until she gets over it.

The French law was sponsored by feminists, and we can see why. In spite of its balanced wording, such laws are generally used to support women against men and not the other way around. How can women be blessed and cursed by so many legal grievances against men, and continue to respect their opposites? In a recent survey 33% of women reported being "often or very often" resentful of men" while 14% of men were highly resentful of women. And men themselves see how it works, and are less inclined to work hard and try to gain the rare respect of women. Is it any wonder that the marriage arrangement is failing?

We now seem to have two forms of marriages. In traditional marriages, while husbands and wives might bicker, argue, scold, turn aloof or sullen, and show all manner of arrogance and contempt, men and women somehow managed to resolve conflict, shove it aside or bury it, and to get on with a life together (or bail out). A traditional marriage was an alliance in which two individuals stood together, supported one another, and made a mark on the world.

In our more contemporary marriages, which are becoming the norm, the alliance is giving way to an ideology of supposed oppression by men and government protectionism toward women. Either spouse (usually meaning the wife) is now more than welcome to make accusations against her mate, charging violence, assault, stalking, harassment, or causing her to be afraid, with or without any objective evidence.

I suggest a solution which should be acceptable to everyone (joke). Since we have two forms of marriages, we should provide a choice, and issue two forms of marriage certificates.

Those who choose a traditional marriage would be expected to work it out together or to get out of it, and assault provisions would apply only to intended injury (which is assault by any reasonable standard). In contrast, a contemporary marriage would allow either spouse to bring charges based on any actual or alleged mistreatment, and have the alleged perpetrator removed from the residence and handed over to the courts.

Traditionalists should approve, as the arrangement maintains the fundamentals of marriage and treats men and women as approximate equals, able to work out a relationship among themselves (or bail out). Ideological feminists should be pleased (but might not be) to see their programs set into law and fully implemented among those who choose to partake.

Maintaining more than a "single size fits all" marriage standard is not such an outlandish proposal. Indeed, many states now offer civil unions for gays, which have many of the legal provisions of ordinary marriage but without the official title. Great Britain and Canada have provisions for Sharia marriages among their Muslim populations, in which disputes are judged by Islamic arbitration courts with the full authority of the ruling government. The commonplace pre-nuptial agreement specifies conditions and so creates a variation of marriage tailored to particular participants.

Should the government choose for us, or should we be free to make our own choices? I suggest freedom of choice, of course, but we must be allowed meaningful alternatives to choose from. Traditional marriage and contemporary marriage should be allowed to compete freely, one against the other. Couples considering marriage would weigh the options, argue and persuade, and settle on something at least modestly acceptable to each.

Dr. D. (Richard Driscoll)

author of Opposites as Equals, with Nancy Ann Davis

Feminist Marriage vs. Traditional Marriage: A case for Choice

Richard Driscoll, Ph.D. — Sat, 09 Jan 2010 06:33:00 +0000

Feminist Marriage vs. Traditional Marriage

In traditional marriages, while husbands and wives might bicker, argue, scold, turn aloof or sullen, and show all manner of arrogance and contempt, men and women somehow managed to resolve conflict, shove it aside or bury it, and to get on with a life together (or bail out). It might seem miraculous today that even a few solid relationships could have existed with no government intervention.

In what we might call feminist marriages, which are becoming the norm, either spouse (meaning the woman) is now more than welcome to make accusations against her mate, charging violence, sexual assault, and now bad manners, and all without requiring a shred of objective evidence.

Men could accuse women, of course, but seldom do. Human nature is chivalrous, and we sympathize when men mistreat women but we expect men to take care of themselves. Is it any wonder that the marriage arrangement is falling apart?

I suggest a solution which should be acceptable to everyone (joke). Since we have two forms of marriages, we should provide a choice, and issue two forms of marriage certificates. Those who choose a traditional marriage are expected to work it out together or to get out of it, and assault provisions would apply only to intentional injury (which is assault by any reasonable standard). In contrast, a feminist marriage would allow either spouse (meaning the woman) to bring charges based on anything and everything, and have the alleged perpetrator and former husband removed from the house and handed over to the courts.

Traditionalists should approve, as the arrangement maintains the fundamentals of marriage. Feminists should be pleased (but might not be) to see their programs set into law and fully implemented among those who choose to partake.

A little choice can go a long way. Anyone want to bet how many red-blooded American men and women would choose a feminist marriage?

drD (Richard Driscoll)
author of Opposites as Equals, with Nancy Ann Davis, PhD

Comments on Opposites as Equals

drD — Sun, 20 Dec 2009 04:39:00 +0000

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Friends:

Are we as different as Driscoll and Davis suggest? Can opposites reconcile?

Please post your opinions and comments about:

<> theOppositeSex.info website
<> Opposites as Equals book by Driscoll and Davis
<> anything else pertaining to men, women, and improving relationships.

Many thanks. Enjoy!

Richard Driscoll & Nancy Ann Davis

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OppositesAsEquals: Sensitive Cave Man

Richard Driscoll, Ph.D. — Sun, 20 Dec 2009 02:11:00 +0000

OppositesAsEquals: Sensitive Cave Man

Sensitive Cave Man

drD — Fri, 18 Dec 2009 10:52:00 +0000

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Video release:
Sensitive Cave Man
Why Men Feel Compelled to Fix It.
http://vids.myspace.com/index.cfm?fuseaction=vids.individual&videoid=101886146

Sensitive Cave Man

Why do women want to talk about a problem, on and on, whilemen want fix it as quickly as possible and be done with it?

"Sensitive Cave Men" offers a comic sketch and an answer to this commonplace question.

Click on link below picture

Sensitive Cave Man is adapted from "Opposites as Equals"

by Richard Driscoll, PhD, with Nancy Ann Davis, PhD.
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Is the Feminist Culture Harmful to Women?

drD — Sun, 06 Dec 2009 22:14:00 +0000

News brief:
Women's happiness declines over last 35 years.
Is the feminist culture harmful to women?

Is the Feminist Culture Harmful to Women?

A recent analysis finds that happiness and the sense of well-being and satisfaction has declined among women, both in constant terms and also in comparison to men. The decline is found across various investigations, across various measures of subjective well-being and satisfaction with life, across various demographic groups, and within numerous industrialized countries.

The findings are from the General Social Survey [i], which is the largest sociology project funded by the U.S. National Science Foundation and is considered highly authoritative. Aside from the U.S. Census, the GSS is the most frequently analyzed source of information in the social sciences.

How strong is the decline for women relative to men? In 1972, in the initial surveys, the average woman had a 3+ percentile happiness advantage relative to the average man, while in 2006, in the last samplings, she was 1+ percentile behind. The figures add up to a 4½ percentile decrease in happiness for women in comparison to men over the 35 year span of the study. The investigators note that a change of such magnitude should be considered quite substantial.

While various explanations are proposed, we look here at the feminist position that women are oppressed and always have but are a special class of humans who can accomplish wondrous things once the forces of oppression have been overthrown. In spite of widening workplace opportunities, women find that it is not easy to accomplish great things and still raise a family and have a free moment to oneself. It is a tough world out there, indifferent to our fantasies and barely responsive to our best efforts. Inflated expectations are a standard recipe for failure and despair.

What about the ideology that women are oppressed? "Women are oppressed" usually means "oppressed by men," so in the active voice the message is that "Men oppress women." Naturally, the more one believes that, the more resentful she will be toward men, and the less understanding she will be toward her alleged oppressors.

A recent survey found that 33% of women "often or very often" resent men, while only 14% of men are highly resentful of women. Public condemnation towards men has obviously increased over the last 40 years, and surely contributes to the pandemic of personal resentments toward men.

Angry women tend to feel empowered when they express their anger, but then returned to the blahs and emptiness once the anger is spent. "I have become increasingly angry," comments Gloria Steinem, "as the alternative is depression." Overall, anger is a quick fix followed by a lingering headache.

Psychotherapists who challenge anger and seek to reduce it are not as popular with their clients but have better outcomes, while therapists who support anger and encourage its expression are more popular but have worse outcomes. Anger reduction, reconciliation, and a heartfelt understanding and appreciation of family and friends is fundamental to healthy living. It is a mainstay in Christianity and in most other religious teachings.

The hardships and general meaninglessness of life are problems that we all confront and probably always will. Yet increasing animosities toward our opposites is hardly a viable solution and appears to broaden a general malaise among women and nudge possible solutions farther out of reach.

by Richard Driscoll, PhD.
Author of Opposites as Equals, with Nancy Ann Davis, PhD.

See commentary at Tikkun

[i] Betsey Stevenson & Justin Wolfers, "The paradox of declining female happiness." American Economic Journal: Economic Policy 2009, 1:2, 190–225.
http://bpp.wharton.upenn.edu/jwolfers/Papers/WomensHappiness.pdf
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Unequal in Arguments

drD — Fri, 27 Nov 2009 21:50:00 +0000

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News Brief:
Unequal in Arguments

Why men concede, placate, or withdraw.

Unequal in Arguments
by

Richard Driscoll, Ph.D.

Insistence: While we might expect men to be more forceful than women in marital arguments, the research shows just the opposite, surprising our expectations.

Women tend to be more insistent, according to various researchers including John Gottman [i] at the University of Washington. Women argue more forcefully in almost half again as many marriages as men.

In the most lopsided arguments where only one argues and the other remains silent, by a ratio of 6 to 1, it is the woman who continues to argue and the man who remains silent. So in these most severe arguments, we see an almost complete separation between men and women.

Overwhelmed and confused. Men are typically more stressed and confused in arguments with women and feel trashed and bitter for longer afterward, while women are more comfortable amid verbal jousts, recover from them more quickly, and are ready for another round. Generally, it is fair to say that men are more intimidated in confrontations with women than the other way around.

Men are not blindfolded and gagged in arguments with women

— it just seems that way.

Origins: Insistence has been a viable tactic for women, to test the strength of a commitment, while a reluctance to offend has been a more viable for men, who must rely on women to transport their genes into the next generation.

Suggestions: Marriages are better when men and women participate about equally. Amid our typical arguments, we offer a few obvious suggestions for men and for women:

To better resolve conflict, you must learn to be more comfortable with it. Recognize that it is normal for women to be more easily upset and irritated than men, but that women also get over it faster.

Do not interpret it as a great catastrophe when your mate is bothered about something. Stay involved, and try to talk it out.

You might realize that men are more vulnerable in conflict than they appear and slower to recover from it.

Be careful to accurately gauge how much stress your accusations inflict, and make allowances.

Implications: If men were ordinarily more forceful in marital squabbles, then an increase in female power would promote equality. But since women are ordinarily more forceful, as observations indicate, the same solution pushes us farther apart. Men withdraw in the face of female accusation, leaving marriages emotionally barren and inhospitable. The challenge is to strike a proper balance, so that men and women can participate together and gain the best from each other.

Adapted from Opposites as Equals by Richard Driscoll, Ph.D., with Nancy Ann Davis, Ph.D.
<>See comments by Mr. Thoughtful and friends at Unfiltered Minds
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[i] J. Gottman and R. Levenson, "The Social Psychophysiology of Marriage." In P. Noller and M. Fitzpatric (eds.), Perspectives on Marital Interaction (Clevedon, Avon, England: Multilingual Matters, 1988), 182–202.

Misandry = Twice Misogyny

drD — Fri, 27 Nov 2009 14:59:00 +0000

News brief:
Misandry = Twice Misogyny
Recent survey reveals that women resent men about twice as often as the other way around.

Article:
Misandry = Twice Misogyny

Ideological feminists have long accused men of being misogynists, filled with loathing and contempt towards women and unwilling to allow women a fair chance. More recently, "masculinists" or men's rights activists accuse women of being "misandrous," which is an odd and seldom used word for loathing and contempt towards men.

So, which is it? Are we more often misogynists or more often contemptuous toward men? Admittedly, one or the other or both shows its ass often enough to pollute a fair share of modern conversation. But which is more commonplace? And how can we provide a reasonable comparison?

A recent 2008 Gallup poll in Great Britain finds that 33% of women "often or very often" feel resentful of men, compared to 14% of men who often feel resentful of women. [i] So fully a third of women carry with them an ongoing resentment toward their opposites, as compared to about a sixth of men.

In an effort to specify our terms, "often or very often resentful" of the other sex is probably about as close as we can get to the basic meaning of misogyny and misandry. While we commonly argue that women have more reason to be resentful, the comparison here is not about our reasons but about our ongoing attitudes. Twice as many women as men acknowledge often resenting their opposites, suggesting that ill will blows from "W" to "M" more strongly than from "M" to "W".

So why is "misogyny" such a familiar word while "misandry" is so odd and unfamiliar except on out-of-the-way websites such as this one? Some of the explanation is in the paradox of accusation. Women are more inclined to accuse men of malfeasance, while most men are uncomfortable arguing against women and keep their counsel. As in politics anywhere, the harshest and most repetitious accusations usually paint the strongest portrait, leaving the misandrous impression that men frequently resent women while women are innocent commentators to that sad state of affairs.

Another explanation lay in the unusualness of the condition, as we comment on what we find noteworthy and take the rest granted. In an earlier era, the psychiatric term "nymphomania" was applied to the woman who had an inordinate interest in sex, as she was the odd woman out. The complementary term "satyriasis" was seldom used for men, as it was so widely assumed that most men had an inordinate interest in sex that no such psychiatric nomenclature was required.

Back to "misandry." In that fully a third of women are highly resentful of men, and perhaps another third are somewhat resentful, do we really need a special word for it? Or is it so familiar that we take it for granted?

In an earlier era, men referred to women who bash men with the familiar slang words such as "scold," "shrew," "bitch," and so on. Today, now that such strong words are so severely censored, we are left with "misandry," which seems an unfamiliar, highly sanitized, and somewhat technical sounding excuse for a hearty epithet. Is the "misandrous" woman not merely a cleaned-up version of the rock-solid, salt-of-the-Earth shrew of old, that inspired Shakespeare to bring a fiery woman to the stage and pleased a younger Elizabeth Taylor to portray her?

Of course, men can be misandrous too. But we save that for a later time.

Richard Driscoll

author of Opposites as Equals with Nancy Ann Davis

[i] The battle of the sexes continues according to new Gallup poll." 2008. See http://www.prnewswire.co.uk/cgi/news/release?id=57662

Also posted at: http://mensenews.org/index.php?option=com_jb2&PostID=1560&view=post&Itemid=2