Friday, January 26, 2018

The One Who Pays, Decides

There are lots of resources on the internet devoted to criticising feminism and restoring "traditional society". Yet, the traditional society some of the authors envision, has never really existed, and sounds utopian at the very least. It's a society where women are expected to be traditional but at the same time, to support themselves and even to be financially responsible for their children.

 The whole truth is that while in the past women were expected to be chaste and submissive, men were expected to provide for their needs, not only fathers and husbands and brothers, but among the upper classes, also male cousins and uncles since it was considered shameful to let your female relatives work. Don't believe me? Read books like Miss Silver novels I have mentioned previously. In one of them, an older single, never married lady is selling her furniture since her last male cousin was killed in action and there are no men in the family to take care of her any more.

Too many men nowadays want to have their cake and eat it, too. They expect the wives to be co-providers, but also sweet submissive Suzy homemakers. The truth is, earning a paycheck gives power, economic power. While I'm not generally a big fan of the Pearls, I found a recent post by Michael where he explains it very well:

In our modern world, the one whose name is on the paycheck is the head of all finances, the one to be thanked and appreciated. That person is the fountain of the family, possessing the right of veto over all spending, and controlling the direction of the family where it involves finances.
The one who comes home tired from a day’s work is entitled to the recliner until dinner is served. It is the one who says, “Why aren’t my socks in the drawer?” and “This house is a mess; what have you been doing all day?” The breadwinner decides what kind of bread to eat and whether or not spending is foolish or necessary.

I'm not denying the evil of divorce and, in fact, have written several posts about it, yet one of the reasons modern nuclear family is so fragile is the changed family dynamics which comes with women earning their own living:


A bread-winning woman is not vulnerable and finds it difficult to come home and be a submissive, servant wife. To be forced to do so breeds resentment and a feeling of being used...when a couple reverses roles because the wife is able to make more money, or when the man is lazy and incompetent, or when she just likes to work and he just likes to hang out at home, you can be certain that neither is going to find fulfilment in their relationship, and their marriage is likely to end in the woman divorcing the man.

Of course, he's talking about complete role-reversal over here, but the same is true to a lesser degree for any family where the wife earns a considerable income.

Men who are more honest admit that they appreciate feminism because it lets them off the hook concerning support of their wives and especially daughters and other female relatives. While I necessarily disagree with them, I value their honesty. Yet, there are others who keep complaining about the state of modern Western womanhood (which is, I agree, deplorable) while fully expecting women to be self-reliable financially.

Why aren't women keeping their virginity? Why do they chase exciting bad boys? Some men will claim it's because of "natural hypergamy" that women chase total losers unable to earn the living. Hypergamy actually means selecting the best. A gold-digger is hypergamous, a woman dating an unemployed alcoholic musician isn't. The reason women are doing it is because they don't depend on the men for support any more. They earn their own living and can afford sleeping with losers.

Here naturally the question of welfare arises. I partly agree with the criticism of the current welfare model. Yet, individual men profit by it, too, since the ability of women to claim welfare frees them from financial responsibilities (and, by the way, men use it, too). The truth is, that some form of welfare for single mothers at least has always existed throughout the centuries, and the same is true for the infamous child support. Here are some extracts from a historical overview of child support laws in UK:

By an act of 1576 (18 Elizabeth C. 3), it was ordered that bastards should be supported by their putative fathers, though bastardy orders in the quarter sessions date from before this date. If the genitor could be found, then he was put under very great pressure to accept responsibility and to maintain the child"

"In 1732-3, a woman pregnant with a bastard was required to declare the fact and to name the father. In 1733, the putative father became responsible for maintaining his illegitimate child; failing to do so could result in gaol. The parish would then support the mother and child, until the father agreed to do so, whereupon he would reimburse the parish - although this rarely happened." Peter Higginbotham.
Also: "Any person after 24 June 1733 charged on oath with being the father of a bastard child shall be apprehended and committed to gaol until he gives security to indemnify the parish from expense".


In the 19th century fathers of illegitimate children were briefly let of the hook:

"The Commissioners thought that poor men were at the mercy of blackmail and perjury by unscrupulous women.... The bastardy clauses of the Act of 1834 were in line with the opinions of the Poor Law Commissioners. The laws which had enabled a mother to charge a putative father before the magistrates were repealed".

A Bastardy Clause Act made all illegitimate children the sole responsibility of their mothers until they were 16 years old. If mothers of bastard children were unable to support themselves and their offspring, they would have to enter the workhouse; the putative father became free of any legal responsibility for his illegitimate offspring. Not only did this remove the not infrequent problem of disputed fatherhood, but it was envisaged that the measure would discourage women from entering into profligate relationships.

Yet, the law was changed again after a mere 12 years:


1844 - 1845 Poor Law Amendment Act 1844 Bastardy Act of 1845
(7&8 Vic. c.101)
Took bastary procedings out of the poor law authorities and turned then into a civil matter between parents. Finer.
Enabled an unmarried mother to apply to the Petty Sessions for an affiliation order against the father for maintenance of the mother and child, regardless of whether she was in receipt of poor relief. This was probably in recognition that the 1834 Act had not reduced illegitimacy (by making it harder for mothers to claim maintenance), but in fact increased it (by enabling men to avoid some of the responsibility for their actions).




If you read the whole document you'll find out that the 19th century divorce laws ensured that even guilty wives got some sort of a maintenance since women weren't supposed to have to support themselves.


For the record, in my country until the man is legally married/has a partnership contract he has to agree to fatherhood, otherwise he'll have neither rights nor obligations. The mother can then apply for welfare. Guess what, I heard men complaining that they pay taxes to support other men's bastards.

I'm also rather suspicious of the fact that so many folks who claim to be against divorce don't want easy divorce actually to be abolished but spend all their time attacking child support laws which makes me think they wouldn't mind easy divorce half as much if they had no obligations afterwards. The idea that most women marry with a nefarious plan to later divorce their husbands "for cash and prizes" is ludicrous in the extreme. You only get "cash and prizes" when you manage to marry a man with a much higher status than yourself, which isn't true for the majority of marriages.

 I've witnessed many divorces and in some situations women were to blame, in others men, and sometimes both. The statistics about who files for divorce aren't helpful since filing for divorce doesn't equal being guilty of breaking the marriage contract. What if a man leaves but doesn't file? What is his wife supposed to do? The only way to actually fix the current situation is to return to fault based divorce + traditional sex roles. Any person who claims to be traditional but has no problem with no-fault divorce and female economic independence is either lying or delusional.

Because nobody can have it all.

12 comments:

  1. Hi Sanne. Yes, this is an excellent piece and you have nailed it well. I have trouble believing men who go on about how much they hate feminism, but are unwilling to be the sole providers for their households, their wives, and especially their daughters. Women are subjected to much vulnerability and peril when expected to "get out on their own," but that is the default position here in the States. There is such evil fruit that results in departing from God's ways.

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  2. Lady Virtue, I'm glad you liked it! I'm afraid some of these men are just the mirror image of feminists. They don't really want a return to traditional society, what they do want is male equivalent of emancipation from traditional responsibilities.

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  3. Wonderful post, Sanne.

    So many men seem to be so delusional nowadays that I am actually quiet scared. They hate women so much, or at leat they write things that sound a lot like that!

    I assume that those woman-haters are those men that no decent woman would ever marry or even date. That is why they have only experience about women of lesser value and they are so stupid they think that all women are the same. They can't see that good women do exist, but good women are out of their league. Or maybe they see that, and that is why they are so bitter? Hating women becouse they know gems exist but only thing they find is quicksand?

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  4. Thanks, Housewife!

    This hatred of women is especially typical for the USA, probably due to the prevalence of radical feminists? When I read discussions on our blogs, men mostly complain that women "don't profit from equality", "don't want to pull their weight", "aren't interested in careers" etc etc. Some of these men claim to be highly educated yet are too dense to figure out that women are different from men. It's downright pathetic...

    As for the English-speaking blogs, it's amazing how many half-truths and downright lies are spread concerning females. I've heard claims that women at 30 are not able to get pregnant since they are menopausal!!!

    And what concerns child-support, in general I agree with the way it's regulated in my country, but only because if you change the laws and make all fathers responsible for the maintenance of their children, it will only further erase the distinction between legitimacy and illegitimacy and destroy what's left of the institution of marriage. However, the idea that men who sire children out of wedlock are somehow poor innocent victims of scheming women is too idiotic to even be discussed seriously. Did these women rape them or something?

    It's like these guys think they are entitled to free sex.

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  5. Your last sentence sums it up. It seems to me that all these MGTOW- "men", gamers, and whiners who never get laid; they all have one thing in common: they think that they truly are entitled to free sex and they get angry and bitter when they realize that there is no free sex (outside marriage). It always has a price for both men and women. Price woman pays is her dignity. Men usually end up paying only money.

    Here in Finland on internet forums those men call married women/women with children "wallet parasites" because if woman is bringing up man's children and therefore unable to make us much money as he does, she is obviously a parasite. It seems to me that those men don't really see that they have some duty to support their family. It seems to me that they think that children are WOMANS children, not theirs, and only nuissance and waste of money. THEIR precious money. And mean fat parasite woman spends it.

    So yeah, obviously women rape men in order to get pregnant. Poor little men, raped and then forced to pay for their children's living!

    I am sorry about this ranting. But that whole mindset is so horrific.

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  6. Oh, and keeping your zipper up is obviously no option because they are snowflakes and universum OWES them that free sex.

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  7. Well, at least, in my country mothers are still more or less respected...This free sex goes for both men and women, btw. I've read discussions about artificial contraception where women were complaining that not enough is done to ensure she can have sex without any strings attached since obviously all artificial methods have side effects. "What am I supposed to do, abstain or something?" asked one of them. It's like sex is a human right or so. It's all the consequence of sexual revolution. Someone was behind it!

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  8. I'm just waiting when antibiotics will finally stop working and people will start getting incurable stds again. I can already imagine how they will complain that the government has to ensure that they can have 20 partners a week and not get sick.

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  9. I have read that nowadays really huge percentage of people have herpes in their genitalia. It cannot be cured, but it is so common that people seem to think it is "no big deal, just no shagging when it is active". It seems to me that people do not care about std:s anymore... Here in Finland young girls get HPV -vaccination to prevent cervical cancer. Having many sex partners is one big risk factor in that particular cancer, but are the girls educated about that? Of course not. Just vaccinated.

    I somehow understand that people do not have morals anymore, but why they had to get rid of common sense when they ditched morals? Is common sense too patriarchal or something?

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  10. Yes, the vaccine is promoted here, too. One thing few people know, it doesn't protect against all HPV strains.

    I have long pondered the disappearance of common sense. You know, the NT says somewhere that the law exists for the lawless. And that some people don't need laws because they have law written in their hearts. It's always interpreted in spiritual terms, however...

    In every population there is a certain percentage of people who are too stupid and impulsive and totally lack common sense. They are lawless and need the rules and laws to keep them in check. On the other hand, top 20% are intelligent enough to calculate all the consequences of their actions and will invariably choose the better way of doing things. They don't need outward rules to behave decently.

    Since our modern dogma is equality, the ruling liberal elite acts accordingly, with the result that the lower classes and young people, those who need more moral guidance, are not only left to fend for themselves, but are actually actively encouraged to choose destructive lifestyles. With predictable results.

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  11. Yes and yes. It's like someone somewhere WANTS Western societies to collapse. Like Rome did. In Rome it started with giving up morals, didn't it? They got led poisoning from their water system, we are poisoned with junk food and glucose-fructose-syrup.

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  12. It is my opinion that they are trying to recreate the Tower of Babel. The elites, I mean. But probably not really because they expect collapse but because they truly believe that this time, they succeed?

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