We need to talk about men needing to be partners, not 'providers and protectors'

I think a lot of men underestimate the provider / protector role when they think about it. Its meant to cover not just finance, but emotional support, love care, and a decent environment . Its not just meant to be here's money and switch off and play x box and wife does everything else. They should be emptying bins, mowing lawns fixing stuff, washing up. I mean they are so big and strong there is a lot they can do yo make sure thier wives dont burn out in thier role of providing a safe calm environment.

We're heading down a very dark path if women keep being lied to about shunning marriage and children.
Men are protectors and providers, and we do need them, anyone who says otherwise has either had terrible luck with finding the right man to settle down with (my sympathies if so) or is coping hard. Sorry to say.
I don't think it's quite as bleak as all that - if you think post WW2 many women ended up single and childless through necessity. Women choosing not to have kids is possibly slightly more trendy than in 80's but usually that's down to some personal traumas or fear for climate change and men are doing the same - it's not all women. I know a couple of women who physically can't have kids, thanks to fibroids and uterine removal, I think women and men need to be slightly more thoughtful when they outright say these women are being naive without considering all aspects first. There's a lot more that can go wrong in the whole baby making process for women than men, let's not forget.

I totally agree with you! I saw a podcast on this where it said about society has evolved and women no longer need marriage for financial security etc so women have evolved and can provide for themselves and now the happiest group of people are single women.

Yet in comparison men haven’t evolved in ways that will compliment their relationship such as emotional maturity etc - and therefore use the provider and protector excuse but women are no longer interested and not willing to settle

Bullshit. That’s nothing like ‘equality’

Good luck with that.

"For most couples, both need to work"

That's because the other 50% of the population were encouraged into high-flying careers to make a point that they can be equal to men. Men and women have different qualities, the union of marriage brings those qualities to the fore so they can be applied equally within the marriage, which then forms the foundation for a family, ie children. That's genuine equality between the sexes and that's what it means to be equal to the other sex. Women and men aren't equal in the physical sense and never can be, but each intrinsic quality, characteristic and attribute can be applied evenly, ie men can do things women can't, and women can do things men can't, bring them together, they help each other out = equality.

The trouble is, when you get 100% of the population in work, prices go up because they can, more money passing through more hands (we're all economic units whether working or not) equates to high GDP, but with a dual income, it's all affordable. House prices go up, taxation goes up etc so then being a SAHM becomes unaffordable, couples who desperately want kids have to make the heartbreaking decision to abandon plans to start a family because they don't want to bring a child up in poverty.

It wasn't really that long ago a big house, decent car, 3 or more kids and a handful of foreign holidays were all affordable on a single income. Even mortgages were tiny without crippling interest, so they were paid off in a couple of years, now we have 30+ year mortgages.

We're heading down a very dark path if women keep being lied to about shunning marriage and children.

Men are protectors and providers, and we do need them, anyone who says otherwise has either had terrible luck with finding the right man to settle down with (my sympathies if so) or is coping hard. Sorry to say.

It's funny isn't it though, you'd think men would have notice men who have been through divorce tend not to work as well, look after themselves and die sooner. Giving them a few weeks off to bond with the baby and start being an actual parent does pay off for workplaces in the end.

I have had a partner, not a ‘provider & protector’ for the last 30 years. In many ways, he’s more of a feminist than I am (he’s certainly a much better cook) and he would regard ‘provider & protector’ as Neanderthal sexist crap.

@Bringemout yes! So easy for men to be swooned over just by looking after their own goddam kids!

Fundamentally women are vulnerable in a way men aren’t, if I am being completely honest if DH couldn’t assertively advocate for me I would lose attraction to him. Tbf it’s probably vice versa as well.

He is very much a decent father and husband (he makes dentist’s appointments, does bath and bedtime fine, didn’t cry when I was a way for a few weeks can use the washing machine, does bedtime story, Dd comes to get him on weekend mornings not me). There doesn’t have to be a trade off, you can be a protector and a partner. I serve the same functions as DH, possibly in different ways but he knows I will be in his corner.

The problem I think is not so much the protector provider discourse (I actually think being in decent shape and having a job will massively increase your chances of getting a girlfriend) but the fact that men want traditional relationships without fulfilling traditional functions, like do the bloody DIY, teach your kids skills, take your kids out and play with them, lug all the bags, no whinging about being tired, providing support for their children and wives. Men want it both ways, trad wife but no trad role for them. The manosphere has got too caught up in what women should be doing in their olde worlde fantasy but haven’t spent enough time thinking about what it took to actually be a man held in esteem in this world.

It probably the fact in the UK families are often nuclear and isolated from the wider family and community so the woman, the mother, is isolated and looking at her husband (their dad) to help but in more traditional societies other women helped each other more I think or have more access to domestic/hired help from cleaning the house to minding and teaching the children so it felt less unfair on the mother.

It'd be amazing if they even manage to do that (provide and protect) and that can be their role in the partnership, that is them being a partner.

The emphasis on providing and protecting also makes men worse partners. If they're conditioned from an early age that the best things they can do as men are to be strong and earn money, that kind of "hyper-masculinity" (all scare quotes necessary) is not going to lend itself to sharing the domestic load (which, in the provider-and-protector world, is what women are evolutionarily programmed to do anyway).

Agreed.

The problem with MN isn't that people love traditional gender roles, it's more that useless men are regarded as the norm and anyone who says their partner isn't like that is disbelieved because it's easier for them to assume.other women are lying than consider that maybe being 6ft, good looking and earning a 6 figure salary isn't the most important thing in a partner after all. And doesn't necessarily make someone a good partner or even a good provider in some cases.

Apparently getting more popular, too. No one my age I know would have bought into the tradwife idea, and the majority of my friends were more interested in getting a good career than looking a certain way. Not the case now, so the idea of a man being a provider is probably more prevalent in 2025 than in 2000. Not to everyone, obviously. And sure, social media skews things, it depends where you live etc, but the idea that we should always be able to pay for ourselves seems less universal than it was.
Suppose it's none of my business if a woman wants to be a tradwife and her husband is happy to pay all the bills, and while I don't really like the idea of gendered expectations (because I'm grateful to have amazing male and female friends in my life, and I don't expect them to behave in particular ways based on their gender), other people have the right to their opinion.

“Outdated”?

I am not British and have made this point on here before- The UK is a tiny island and most of the world still live a much more conservative and traditional way of life than you, and while no country and society is without its negatives, it works for them. Yet, British people who hold such views as yourself, speak like you are the majority.

There are entire continents out there, that hold 60 times your population, still living this “outdated” way of life you speak of.

There is almost a smugness in your progressiveness as a country, when your woke era is still relatively new. Need I remind you of your mainstream media’s attitude to women, just 15 or so years ago. Yet you (your mainstream media and propaganda) like to act like you’re a role model for how the world should live their lives.

Also your aggressive feminist movement has not ultimately benefitted women. You were going in the right direction at one time, but you passed that line many years ago. We talk about toxic masculinity, but fail to notice toxic feminism within our own community. Now, as a result, you have a country full of competitiveness between genders. Forget respect, men and women don’t appear to even like each other no more.

I agree it's as if the Hillbilly American Dream has been swallowed since the internet.

Yanbu but I think it may be hardwired into humans on a subconscious level that men are protectors and providers. Personally I agree with you, a marriage, child rearing should be a partnership.

I think when initially meeting a person things like being a protector etc do matter (why do we need men to generally be taller than us if it wasn’t so, yet it’s something thats hard to articulate even though the chances of your DH having to fight people off is low).

I think there are two seperate issues really that get mixed up, what makes for initial attraction and what maintains a relationship. I like big men who look like they’ve been sleeping in a forest and fighting off bears, keep your pretty men, I like the rough looking ones (but smart, happily for me I’m married to a massive clever man). I literally cannot explain that preference. However I expect as civilised people who are conscious of our own behaviour we can manage the second part which is being stable, reliable and useful to the family.

I’m a 50 year old Gen X and I really don’t recognise this ‘provider and protector’ narrative within my age group and social circle. This wasn’t what we aspired to growing up or what we looked to men for. We were brought up to want an equal partner and to go to uni and have careers. I think there’s a more recent circling back to old fashioned gender roles that you see across social media, like the trad wife/husband-provider narrative, for example.

Sorry, slightly digressing from your OP, but I increasingly notice things I’d taken as a given are being reframed as ‘things we need to talk about’, and I’m left scratching my head thinking, ‘but wasn’t that all sorted out back in 1993?’ 😂

Edited to add that my background is bog standard comp, first in the family to go to uni etc.

I don't know any in my social circles either! I only know two SAHMs - one comes from a lot of family money and the other definitely wasn't aiming to become a SAHM. And yes, I like the way DP and I keep each other safe. Emotionally, more important than physically. (It was really important to me that he's a gentle, non-violent soul.)

You see a lot of the protector-and-provider rhetoric on MN dating threads though, and if you push back you get told you have a low bar.

Mine is all three. He is firstly my partner and I out earned him. However when I was pregnant and sick and a new mother he protected and provided so I could breastfeed the baby and look after him until I was comfortable to leave him and re enter the workplace. For those three years we had traditional gender roles. Now he out earns me but we share household duties and childcare. I would not have been happy to have a baby and leave them with dad while I went back to work. Totally against my instincts abd physically impossible until the invention of formula.
I'm sure the dynamic will change again over the years but sure as he'll he couldn't get pregnant or breastfeed and he is much stronger than me . I needed a protector to advocate for me when I was pregnant and a provider so I could stay home with the baby.
I can't see a problem with this.

I think it is not black and white. I am always open mouthed reading threads of women in maternity leave using up all their savings and being expected to contribute 50% of expenses etc. We are the child bearers and at those times we do need to be protected and provided for and I for one am very thankful that I had a husband who felt the same way. I worked minimal hours whilst our kids were preschool and primary, then I worked full time when DH was unemployed, then he WFH and did drop offs and pick ups and we both were full time. Now I out earn him, and we have always shared all expenses. But, when my 3 were young he was definitely the provider and most of the friends I had were similar. Even as we all returned to work, must of then were clear that they would much prefer to be SAHMs and only worked because they could not afford not to.

You can see it starting when the dads buy their daughter's baby grows that say things like "Hurt My Daughter and I'll Shoot You" or "Daddy is my Hero" rubbish. It's a weird vaguely sexualised dependance on his ego that some men seem to absolutely need to "be needed". They tend to go for women who also had this messaging from a young age and the idea of being single, let alone a single parent, actually terrifies them. Often they didn't do well at school because being brainy wasn't attractive to men (care for their little egos again), so they rely on them for income. So the cycle continues.

I'm in my 20s and like most of my friends we're not interested in kids and if we are we want a more equitable partnership. It's the reason I've stopped dating because SO many men want to be a provider and protector and that makes me run a mile

@FracasFracas I wonder if that depends on the social circles in which you move? For example, if you are a working professional are you more likely to know other professional women/couples?