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

Well yes it does, so the old fashioned notion of not hiring women incase they took maternity leave. Even if you never had children or wanted them you could still be discriminated against because of your sex when you aren’t offered a job “just in case”.

By dominate I meant men have the power because they're stronger and more aggressive. Do you really think men would still kill as many women if women were bigger, stronger and more aggressive than men?

Are you a man? Women don't want to "dominate" men, that's a very masculine notion. Women, in general, want to live a quiet life, and tend to respect life far more than men.

Men are responsible for over 80% of violent crime in the World. About 98% of sexual abuse. Why on earth are you even trying to excuse that? Are you really wanting to imply that women are more violent than men? Have you ever looked out the window at the real world?

It's men who start wars. Remove men from the picture, and there wouldn't be wars to fight, let alone soldiers to fight them.

Women would just start wars with each other. The only reason we can't dominate men is because they're naturally a lot stronger and more aggressive.

Despite men killing their partner more often (unsurprising due to the strength disparity) women are actually more likely to assault their partner and....well, have you not seen all the MIL threads on here lol. We fall out with each other much more often than men do and often over silly things.

Because the ones that say that are a little hard of thinking or have never actually seen a bear in the wild?

I frequently say good morning to male dog walkers and it would never occur to me that I'd be safer saying good morning to a grizzly bear. 🤣

It's men who start wars. Remove men from the picture, and there wouldn't be wars to fight, let alone soldiers to fight them. Men are the ones who don't care to destroy lives as long as they can prove a point, get a quick fuck or accumulate money. Remove men from the picture, and there would be nothing women would need "protection" from. I refuse to have to respond for fuckups in this world which were caused overwhelmingly by men's violence and impulsivity. They can fight and kill each other if that makes them feel "manly". I just want a happy, peaceful life.

Men who choose to take dating, family and childrearing advice from single, never-married, childless, undateable men who only get sex when they force a vulnerable women to have it (like Andrew Tate and their ilk) deserve to be lonely. Let them rage online as much as they want, and may they all die alone and frustrated. I couldn't give less of a shit about them.

People, both men and women, are all different, and want different things. I have no doubt plenty of women want a "protector& provider" type of man. But some others, like myself, don't care about that. I am happy to be by myself, I work because I love the purpose working brings to my life, and I take pride in being independent and having paid for my home, my hobbies, my clothes and the lifestyle I want. If any man wants to share this life, they will have to go through my standards, which are sky-high simply because I can, because I don't need them, and because "being alone" for me is a source of happiness. A man in my life has to offer way more than the happiness and satisfaction I get from all the things I can do by myself. I actually didn't think there would be one, and then I found one without looking. If the relationship did not work, I doubt I would bother looking for another. And I'd enjoy my life equally.

Yes, all of this was made easier by the fact I never wanted children. Children make women vulnerable in a way nothing else does, because most men are too happy to abandon their responsibility towards them, and sometimes literally abandonig them altogether, while few women can give up their responsibility as mothers the same way. Children give men a power they would otherwise never have, because let's be honest, without children men have to prove themselves much more. If they are not fathers and providers, men have to be equals, and that's way harder and more difficult than being a provider and protector. because, let's be honest, women have the intelligence, equanimity, skills, resistance, longevity, health and stamina to do absolutely anything a man can do. Yes, men are physically stronger in general, but in our modern world there is nothing where brute force is absolutely needed, we have machines to do that in a much safer, much better way than any person can.

Let them play their war games. And if a man uses their physicality to try to enslave me... I know where all the kitchen knives are. There is a limit to how much force men can use to enslave an unwilling partner they live with. The majority of women stay in abusive relationships not because they are physically weaker, but because they love the man and are trauma-bonded to them. Try to do that to an independent modern woman. Just try.

Lots of issues with this - you've counted male babies in your reasoning. You also omitted all violent crime and only looked at partner murders. If you narrow that down to 20yo+ and add in all of the violent crimes and sexual assaults, stalking and peodophilia cases you'd have a far higher %.

If we didn't have the men around do you think there would still be terrorists or idiot BMW drivers doing 90 on the motorways? Truck drivers falling asleep at the wheel or watching porn while driving?

@gannett Absolutely - I chose an emotional "provider" over a financial one (the absolute polar opposite to my ex-husband) and it was by far the best decision I ever made.

And that's what I call the kind of protection that matters - both to society and to his family from the sounds of it.

@gannett I agree. My DH is a social worker - adult MH. He is one of only 1/2 males most of the time in a large office of women. He earns nowhere near enough to be a 'provider' (not that I want or need him to be) but he has an incredible amount of emotional intelligence which makes him not only good at his job, but also a great husband and Dad/Stepdad.

Can we stop thinking of protection as purely physical.

How many times in their lifetime do people get held hostage by terrorists in a theatre, or need to be rescued from a burning building?

There are everyday acts of heroism that genuinely save people's lives on a daily basis but aren't recognised as such in comparison to those big dramatic male-coded jobs. I'm thinking about therapists, counsellors, social workers and plenty more. People need emotional protection, and protection from systems that keep them down, as well.

Not going to be patronising and say those professions are female-coded as plenty of men do them as well. But then plenty of women are surgeons, firefighters, police officers and so on so even your reductive premise doesn't hold up.

Yes yes that’s lovely. Women would still rather meet a bear in the woods. Why do you think that might be?

Why do you think I think that?

Taking into account that most female murders are comitted by a male partner or ex parter I find it quite laughable the idea of men being "protectors".

I need protection against these "protectors".

Yeah, but men committing the vast majority of homicides isn't the same as the majority of men being violent.

There were 83 women murdered by their partner in the UK in 2024. With 33,105,000 men in the country that's 0.0002% of men. It's probably more logical to worry about driving to work.

How many men do you think are firefighters, police officers, soldiers, surgeons, etc? A lot more than 83! So you're actually much more likely to have your life saved by a man than taken by one.

If a nutter starts trying to break down your door at 3am it'll probably be men that turn up to arrest him. If you need cut out of your car after a nasty crash it'll probably be men again. Rescued from a burning building? Men.

What if you get held hostage when terrorists take over the theatre you're in? Will the special forces/armed police be primarily female? Doubt it somehow lol.

In fact why is it always men that come to the rescue?

@Badmintonteaparty That's on the woman. If a relationship fails then she should have the ability to stand on her own two feet financially.

If you are right OP, why when relationships hit trouble does the man fails to step up but neither does the women (which you are advocating?) She becomes the stereotypical helpless women and wants the tax payer to bail her out. Or am I imagining countless threads?

Sad to say in many cases, we now have neither sex willing to step up. I fail to see how that is an improvement from the male provider stereotype?

I agree. My friends who date men aren’t with men who want to lead. In fact in many cases, including mine, the woman earns more and the man does all the cooking. They’re mutually supportive relationships where we both retain autonomy.

I showed this comment to DP and we had a discussion about it, as I didn't want to just speak for him, but he finds this idea horrifying (which is borne out by everything about our relationship). He doesn't want to lead a woman, and I will absolutely not be led. We both prefer a partnership, where we both end up happy with decisions, and no one has the final say on making them. That's been my general experience of relationships, and my friends' - rare partnerships with men who want to "lead" are looked at as concerning aberrations.

What makes you think you're qualified to speak on behalf of all men?

Some men don't want equality.

Some do, and they're perfectly happy to work in partnership with women, without feeling the need to "lead".

It sounds like you have only encountered the dinosaurs, but they certainly aren't all like that.

It's threads like this that makes me glad I'm gay! 😅

I don't think you know a lot about men.

Men don't want equality, they want to lead. If every decision is a negotiation, they're not interested.

Being "equal" makes sense for us, not for them.

That's why marriage rates have fallen off a cliff. We don't need men. They don't want us. We are no longer compatible in that sense.

Well, when I say we "don't need them", obviously I'm not referring to the jobs they do. Just in terms of a domestic setting. Of course, wanting children does change that dynamic.

The idea of needing a protector makes me want to puke. Never even been on my radar - who even thinks like that?

But surely this depends on your circle, where you grew up, your upbringing, your role models, your cultural background and the people around you now.

I am the opposite - I don't know any SAHDs in real life but plenty of SAHMs. My own sister is a SAHM and content to be so. She never wanted a career, if she had it her way, she would have had a baby at 16 but our parents pushed her to get some sort of education. She and her husband have an extremely traditional marriage set up and they both seem happy with that. She never really had a career, mostly low-paying jobs so I wonder whether that is a part of it.

Many men in prison have been raised in dysfunctional homes, with cultural expectations of manliness. Neural pathways are formed at a young age and damaged by that dysfunctional nurturing, it isn't nature, it's culture so yes, you can absolutely raise your children correctly or at least give it a good try as having a boy is not an aleatory event where the outcome is unknown!