AIBU to wonder why women still accept unequal relationships?

I have only had 3 relationships. 1st one, I was a teenager, he was useless, I did go on to have a DD with him, but got rid of him when baby was born as he became even more useless. Together for 13 years. No DV but cheating. Good riddance!

2nd relationship, I upped my game, a nice professional man. He was divorced, good father to his 2 DC. Co parented and good relationship with ex wife. We were together for 10 years. We split amicably. I just wasn’t ready to marry.

3rd and current marriage. Happy, settled, partner for life.

I am aware of my decision to not settle for low standards in my relationships.

I spent 9 years on my own bringing up my DD after the second relationship ended. I made the decision to not have another relationship until my DD was older and until I met the right person.

I personally won’t and have never accepted low standards in my relationships. I give so much and I will only accept the same.

Thankfully I have avoided men’s bad behaviour and so not a victim.

I know what’s out there, I have sisters and friends, nieces and nephews.

I am not lucky, I made decisions.

My mum accepted low standards. I said not me!

I absolutely agree that “quality control” is perfectly acceptable if something is being done ineffectively (or inefficiently tbh!) BUT people parent differently, people have different standards and people have different skills sets.

I’m not going to give my husband a bollocking because he doesn’t put enough fruit and veg in my child’s packed lunch or cleans the bathroom with kitchen cleaner. Because neither of those things actually matter and he has the autonomy to make those decisions.

And me. I was beginning to think I was a complete outsider.

Most women I know are perfectly happy with nice men. Not because they’re weak - they are just in an equal ‘partnership’.

As I’ve always been - not all men are bad. Not all women are weak. Not all women are helpless little flowers. 🙄

I always think of the harm principle.

Obviously if the way a man does something has a negative impact that should be addressed.

But sometimes a woman just wants something a certain way because that’s the way she wants it and that’s what makes her more comfortable. In that instance of course she will do more.

I recall years ago a friend of mine would always whine about how bad things were with her housemate and how she was constantly cleaning up after her. I was there one day and witnessed an argument because my friend insisted that her housemate should wash the pan she had used to make lunch before eating her lunch. Her housemate planned to do it immediately after her lunch but wanted to eat her food first before it got cold. My friend ended up aggressively washing the pan and then complained to me later that this was an example of her constantly having to clean up after her housemate when actually it was simply her inflexibility. And I see this A LOT.

I think this is the other side of the lazy man coin: women not wanting to compromise on how things are done. (And maybe because I am the messier person / one with a higher threshold for mess I see it more clearly.)

Well on here it's often demonstrated that many women don't believe good men exist so it's normal to put up with a pig of a man if everyone in your real life circle also has a pig at home.
Then there's sunk cost fallacy , status, not wanting to share custody, wanting to keep children safe. Financial reasons. Society.
So many and many I can absolutely understand. Change is painfully slow unfortunately.

But as someone who has a good man And knows the difference I find it heartbreaking for these women and their children.

If I’m the team manager in our marriage then I’m also quality control, if he wants to step up and proactively plan and organise then that’s different. If he settles for ‘tell me what to do’ then I’ll tell him what to do and tell him to do it again if it’s not done well enough.

Definitely. He told me outright that his mother did everything for him and as I was his wife, I had to take over from her. It wasn't until I lived with him that I realised he was like this. I just couldn't alter his mindset. It was exhausting to live with and I tried many times to reason with him and explain how unhappy I was.

To everyone saying that women become controlling and micromanage their DH when they deign to finally do housework, I’d say that after years of actively opting out of performing any tasks they let their partner become the “expert” and it’s not unreasonable to expect them to do a good job of something.

E.g. If the man hangs out washing and leaves everything crumpled in on itself or overlaying other items on the airer then it’s not unreasonable to point out that this is not conducive to the clothes being able to dry…

I've just had a conversation with my 6 yo daughter which got me thinking again about this thread.
My husband had alresdy left for work, and I was getting ready to take her to my mum's so that I could leave for mine (I start a little later than my husband).
Me, teasingly: "Hey - do you think anyone would notice if I skipped work and came with you and nanna to hunt for fairies?"
Her: "You can't do that, Mummy - you want to buy a new car over the summer, remember?"
Cue Destiny's Child on repeat and one proud parent! ❤️

It’s a systemic issue which has deep deep roots. Unfortunately, all our want for equality has gotten us is full time jobs on top of the traditional female child and home tasks. It’s shit.

Many of my friend downgraded their own hard fought for careers once they had kids and now they can’t get anything like the money they had before. Which means the man’s job is always going to be more important because it does all come down to having enough money to live.

So men won’t ask for flexibility because their job is more important than their wife and also, why would they want to be flexible if it meant they’d have to pick up some child/home tasks?

As an aside, many of my friends are so controlling over their husband’s housework and time spent looking after the children. I have friends that micromanage any time that their husband is with the children, and that’s fairly common IME.

Agreed, I think this is me.

My children have two parents, both of which have been present. We’ve both worked but have always both put our children as a priority when they growing up. Pick up, sick days etc I don’t pack for my husband for holidays he forgets his pants that on him.

I do think your wrong in putting the responsibility onto mothers or women as to blame for (some) men not stepping up.

I have a 24 year old we had a very frank conversation as she is about to move in with her long term partner. His parents have what I would say is a very traditional set up, and his Mum is in quite a vulnerable position. She has now had a conversation with her partner and discussed her expectations and fairness - it was a really positive conversation, put her at ease.

Anyway - I do think feminists need to move on from the obsession with a perfect 50/50 domestic labour and childcare split as often it’s not the woman “putting up with it” because she’s “weak”. It’s often a choice due to:

a) Unwillingness to compromise (“things must be done my way just because this is what I prefer”)
b) The person with the higher threshold for disorder will typically end up doing somewhat less.

I am not sure those are bad in and of themselves. What should be encouraged is couples having frank discussions before setting up house (with the benefit of a counsellor) so they are on the same page about this kind of thing.

Once you're in a relationship with a lazy partner and have children with them, it's very difficult to just walk away. Also, you can't make that person split household chores 50/50. No-one can make another human being do things they don't want to do. Trust me, I spent almost a decade with a man who refused point blank to help me with the housework and children. I tried everything from having a conversation about it to arguing and crying. I also said that one day, if his behaviour continued, I would leave him. He just didn't care. So I left him. It was the single most difficult thing I ever had to do. I now lead a very peaceful life but everything is on me financially and emotionally. He still does nothing. I wouldn't change my decision but it hasn't been easy. I can see why women choose to stay. I can also see why women choose to leave. Ultimately, the man I was with was never going to change. He was very spoiled as a child and definitely saw our marriage as a continuation of that. He labelled all household chores as 'women's work.' I'm not saying that mothers are to blame for how their sons have turned out. All I can speak of is my own experience of living with a man whose mother did everything for him. He couldn't adapt to being a responsible and motivated adult, father and husband.

they just don’t all do this though. In order to not accept this trap I need to actively ignore the phone calls from school or childcare and check in with dh after waiting enough time for them to have tried him- ‘hi dh, missed a call from school, is everything all right?’ It’s work in itself to not accept it! It’s work im largely prepared to do, but it’s work.

People's perception of what qualified as "work" and "leisure" varies: I don't think holiday planning is work.

I 100% agree with you op. You are getting a lot of defensive anger from posters because you’ve touched a nerve. Lots of the unhappiness and dysfunction I read on MN is because of shit men, yes, but also because women willingly stay and put up with it (not talking about abuse here, just poor low effort behaviour).

Instead of walking away or expecting better, they mummy and enable crap men. They allow male uselessness because their goal is to be perfect stepford wives instead of partners. Probably because they’ve grown up seeing their mothers do the same.

It’s not victim blaming because these are not forced marriages or arranged marriages. Women have full autonomy and free will. They have a choice to walk away from inadequate men in the early days of dating - I know I did in my 20s. And I was neither very attractive or particularly emotionally intelligent back then so it’s not like I had my pick, but I was damn well sure I wasn’t going to settle for a dud. Even if it meant I was single forever.

Thankfully there is evidence that younger women are being more discerning. But men don’t seem to change. The world becomes more misogynistic and I fear that more women with low self esteem will feel the need to meet male expectations instead of being a fully self actualised person in their own right.

Yes, and many men accept bad behaviour from women. That's life. I'm in a profession that allows me to see both sides, and yes, there is definitely manipulative behaviour on both sides.

Things are only going to get worse if all we do as a society is continue to point the finger at the 'other side' and allocate everything wrong on them whilst assuming we are in the right about everything. This is the best way to build defensiveness and resentment.

What we need to do is listen to each other and better under. The regular threads like this one is totally counter productive as it encourages the former and shows no interest in the latter.

Yes, both men and women are under societal pressure to perform traditional gender roles and in many industries men will absolutely feel this. Pushing back on traditional gender roles is active, constant, hard work. It's setting boundaries with society - your family, your job. It's finding a social circle where traditional gender roles are not the default. (It's incredible to me how most MNers only socialise with their only sex.) And you have to be all in, because all aspects of traditional gender roles are connected to the other ones. Cherrypicking the ones in your favour doesn't work.

If you filter your dates for men who are invested in earning a lot and providing for you then you shouldn't be surprised if that remains their priority once kids come along.

This is yet turning into another men bashing thread. Women do no wrong, all the suffering in the world is caused by men. Women are never at fault, men are solely responsible for women's demise. No option for different perspectives, women see everything very clearly whilst men are in denial. The only acceptable men in society are those who fully agree that their sex is shit and rally to the thought that women are right and be heard whilst men should only speak to agree with them.

I'm so thankful that my world is one where men and women live in harmony most of the time, hear eachother out and consider each others perspectives. Hence the harmony!

Haven’t read the whole thread

For women with children - they don’t split because it would upset the children. And because if you’re exhausted from doing 90% of everything, losing that 10% feels impossible even if you know it’s unfair.

For women without children- I don’t know why they don’t split from useless partners but I would imagine a lot of it is low self esteem (often created or increased by the partner) and “sunk costs” especially if they want kids and feel time is not available to find another partner. Of course low self esteem and sunk costs also applies to women with children.