To believe theres an increase in cocklodgers and men have lost their pride in providing?

[Thickums]

Just musing this to myself today.

There seems to be a steady increase in cocklodgers in modern day life. Not just on MN but real life too.

Since women have gained better equality in the workplace, a lot of men seem to be taking a back seat or opting out completely in providing. More than happy to let their wives and girlfriends pay the bills or watch them go broke paying for everything whilst they spend their earnings or 'fun stuff' even if they earn more.
They don't cringe or feel ashamed watching their wife struggle. Its baffling.

Its not just that.. But also the pride in providing seems to be gone? Before there was better working opportunities in the work place for women, men were the sole providers for a lot of families. This used to come with some level of pride for men. Most of them WANTED to provide and for their children to be able to do activities like sports, brownies, scouts etc. They were happy to put food on the table. They would be proud their wife was able to get her hair done if she wished and keep the house nice, cupboards full etc.
Now however a lot of men seem to treat their women with almost contempt if they need help financially or don't earn as much?

The thing i find interesting is that women that work and earn more than their spouse dont seem to harbour this same attitude. They're more than happy to provide for their families. They'll buy a new rug for the living room, new charcter bedding for the kids and pay for their swimming lessons out of their own money. They'll also buy their partners nice birthdays and christmas presents.

So its not a two way thing it seems.


I think whats most intriguing for me is that 'wife work' and the 'mental load' still seems to fall majorly to women. So a lot of men havent caught up with that yet. But at the same time most of those very same men still want modern day 50/50 finances. So they dont believe the home is their 'domain' but yet they don't want to be the 'provider' either. How does that make sense?

When i look at previous generations in my family, although my grandfather didn't lift a finger at home in terms of cooking, cleaning and childcare (which is wrong), he was a very proud man and was proud of the fact he was provided a good lifestyle for his family. He was happy for my gran to manage the finances and the kids to go on days out. He was proud he could give his family a lovely house and buy a car.
He would work lots of overtime to provide.
It seems it was the same for most men of that generation.

I could be talking complete bollocks. But be interested to hear your thoughts as to why mens attitudes have changed in this regard? Why is their an incresse I'm cocklodgers and resentment in providing?

YABU = there is no rise in cocklodgers/financially stingy men.

YANBU = there is a rise in cocklodgers and an increase in men not wanting to provide.

[downlow]

It may be that too. If she goes out/away her mum & or his mum step in to help because apparently this educated man with a responsible job can't look after his kids.

[thepeopleversuswork]

downlow increasingly women don’t put up with it. But as we see on these threads it usually has to get to quite a dire point before they reach their limit.

For a host of reasons. Because people don’t discuss these things properly before marriage. Because they disregard red flags or hope they will magically disappear when children appear. Because financial circumstances impact people’s lives in a way they cannot predict or expect.

The solution is for parents to imprint upon children when young that parenting is a partnership which requires equality and self sacrifice and flexibility and that includes flexibility as to how you perceive your role in the family. And to make clear that defaulting to outdated gender roles without discussion is not acceptable.

I think there has been remarkable progress in my lifetime. Old attitudes take generations to die out and we need to keep the pressure up.

[Helpinghim]

Women have raised these man children, and made them lazy. They over compensated for the lack of a father and should have sent them to cadets, but instead opened the front door at let them out like dogs when they couldn't deal with them.

A lot of them had no father's, they cleared off so these men don't know how to provide, they have no one to look up to.

They also have these out of date stereotypes and don't know what is expected of them because of it.

Less jobs out there, a high rate in mental health issues in men, an ever changing world outside that no one can keep up in! A world that blames (white) men for everything. Cis men are portrayed as dangerous, on TV, on billboards. Many want to provide but don't know how and they don't know if women want it because us women all want different things. We want equality but we still want him to play daddy. A lot aren't trying either because of the militant
Feminism. I'm not talking about equal rights, I'm talking about the vagina hat wearers with blue hair, men haters who have a questionably close relationship with their cat who would sooner die than admit pregnancy and children have affected and caused a wage gap.

I'm not surprised they've given up on themselves.

[UYScuti]

Cis men are portrayed as dangerous
Cis?? wtf are you talking about?

[Bluebutterfly90]

@Helpinghim
Yikes. Yeah it's a shock us women want different things, it's almost like we are individuals! Also EWWWW at wanting someone to 'play daddy'. Please speak for yourself only!!

Back to the OP. Men are also individuals, some are wastes of space, some aren't.
I don't think it's a generation thing though. I remember my boss's husband marching into where we were working at 6pm demanding to know what was for dinner after he had been home all day and she had been working. They were both in their 50s. I was totally shocked that he couldn't make his own dinner!
That same boss expressed surprise that my DP does laundry! I was totally blindsided- of course he does laundry, he is a grown man!
I think that if you let someone get away with sitting on their arse and not contributing, they will do that. It's all a matter of what you put up with. Don't put up with it.

[Helpinghim]

www.google.com/amp/s/www.urbandictionary.com/define.php%3fterm=cis%2bmale&amp=true

[Helpinghim]

Things like this really do not help matters.

[UYScuti]

I don't think anyone is suggesting that men are uniquely susceptible to the corrupting influences of power?

[Graphista]

YANBU at all!

Myself and a notable few others frequently comment that couples of older generations MAY have divided labour along sex based lines the men DID do work at home AND worked full time, often in manual jobs.

@Blueeyedgreeness I don’t think op and I know I’m not, means men who are sahd and therefore contribute to family life in terms of childcare and doing the bulk of household chores and admin. Not a cocklodger.

Although I’ve seen several threads where a man is supposedly a sahd but the dc are in childcare and they do sod all else! That’s a cocklodger.

Certainly there actually seems now to be a weird bloody minded pride in NOT paying cm!

My parents and my ex’s parents don’t understand this at all, for their generation it would have been a source of shame not to support your dc.

But yes, there’s also elements of us being more aware now and that it was not perfect in the past - my dad & his dad were both hard workers and pulled their weight at home in terms of doing the “men’s” jobs, but both were/are abusive in other ways.

If my mum hadn’t kept up appearances there’d be hell for her to pay at home, so dad providing for her was not necessarily proof of a good husband.

“Also who wants to be constantly having the battle of trying to make the other person be equal in all matters when it’s easier to just get on with it yourself.” Perhaps by choosing a man who isn’t a sexist arse?

My ex had his faults while we were together, financial illiteracy and TRYING to shirk pulling his weight at home early on in our marriage (we didn’t live together first) included but it only needed one discussion on each because he knew he was taking the piss and I made it clear early on I wouldn’t tolerate that shit!

“For some men cocklodging is revenge... and its time we were honest about it*.” Totally agree

We as a society do seem to be slipping backwards in terms of women’s rights which is very disturbing.

My dd I don’t think has ridiculously high standards but she won’t put up with boyfriends who need constantly subbed, who’s rooms or cars are a shit tip or who think sexting/sending dick pics to other girls “isn’t really cheating”

@stouffer while a seemingly positive post - what about your friends and Male relatives? Do they genuinely pull their weight and contribute to their families equally?

“We were told that financially 50/50 is the right way to go” in my opinion that’s only fair if both parties are Earning equally! Until then that’s not true equality.

“A lot of them had no father's, they cleared off so these men don't know how to provide, they have no one to look up to.” I wondered when single mums would get blamed - utter bollocks! Most of the ones I know HAD fathers who were just as lazy!

The sons of single mothers I know are generally motivated, responsible people who pay more than lip service to equality. But then using “cis men” says it all really!

And men as a class ARE dangerous that's a fact!

[downlow]

@thepeopleversuswork yes I definitely think there pressure to put up with it because people may be unhappy but life is expensive. And as another poster said you can often be quite equal but when dc comes it changes. I worked in a very female dominated industry from my late teens to late 20s, never experienced sexism at work. I truly never realised how sexist the world was until I had dc.

[Verily1]

Cocklodgers are definitely rife now.

I’ve had an unfortunate run in with one myself. Obviously a ‘nice’ bloke but F*ing useless at being an equal dp.

Young men seem to have such huge expectations rations of their dps now:

Slut in the bedroom
Saviour the kitchen
Saint in work
Shepherdess with the dcs

She’s to bring in the £££, never to ask for £ from him, to bear dcs without a ring but always with his name, to cook and clean but never nag or be mean.

Any complaint gives him free reign to cheat or leave or call her a Nazi feminist bitch who is trying to ‘feminise’ him.

They are so entitled!

They think call centres and care homes are above them but don’t realise that no one owes them a well paid job so are unemployed but claim they are ‘sahps’ when they spend their days putting the toddler in front of nickkids for hours whilst they work on their ‘music’.

And she can’t leave because even though he’s unmarried he now has full PRR as no one told her not to co-register the birth with him, so he can keep the dcs and she will be stick still paying his bills but only seeing her own dcs EOW.

It’s worse now than when divorce was almost impossible!

[2020bluegirl]

@Verily1 Good post, and largely true.

@Helpinghim Quite harsh posts from you, with a sprinkling of women-blaming , but I do agree with some of it.

[EnthusiasmIsDisturbed]

Plenty of men in the past spent muchbod their money at the pub or gambling while their children and wife went hungry at home

Society has always allowed men to be selfish and excused their behaviour should they not be and put their family first or see their wife as equal they are so often held up as some sort of amazing saint of a man 🙄 with comments like oh he is such a good husband, wife is so lucky you know he does his fair share around the house and babysits his own kids

[EnthusiasmIsDisturbed]

Much of the money they earned is what I should have written not their money (but would have been seen as their money not family money)

[SummerPavillion]

Agree. I think the 'happy ever after' romantic myth is more dangerous than ever for girls and young women now.

[Bluntness100]

There has always been feckless men. Men who spent it down the pub, who didn't provide and the wife cleaned or whatever,, men who didn't work, who kept getting sacked, who did fuck all at home.

It's nothing new. Really it's not.

[CatalogueUniverse]

If you look at historical pictures of unemployment lines they are all men up to about late 70s possibly 80s and women are a minority at that point.

Lost status as being seen as the man providing the lifestyle - possibly.
Societal shaming for being an unemployed man decreasing - maybe?

Aligned with removal of men’s ability to abuse/sack/financially punish and otherwise control women due to legislation and welfare state.

Add in the unasked for requirement to do a share of the domestic chores and child rearing due to women working.

Yes I think all of these has resulted in an increase in crap men kicking back in various ways from refusing to do housework to full on cocklodging. I think a lot of men do not have the status (at home or in the world) they expected to have and they gained extra “women’s work” and they hate it.

[CatalogueUniverse]

EnthusiasmIsDisturbed

Yes the saint thing. And which of those men lapping up the praise is actually doing his fair share? I suspect none because the men I know who are doing their fair share and are doing it for the right reasons refuse to be praised for it.

No woman has ever been lauded for taking kids to school clean with hair done and with the right kit. The differing praise/shaming for that sort of task proves the sex based gap in societal expectation of standard duties and extra tasks.

[2020bluegirl]

@Thickums YANBU.

I know half a dozen women right now aged between 20 and 28 who are in relationships with men (and they live with them.) All not married, and all have no children.

All of these young women have been to uni, are well-travelled, are intelligent and articulate, and have good (fairly well-paid) jobs. They are all self-proclaimed feminists, and get snarky if a man dares to open a door for them, or offers to get the car out of a parking space for them, with this 'I can do it my fucking self' look fired out!

However in all six of these relationships, I already see a pattern of her doing more in the house, (chores and house-admin etc,) and also all of the men doing hobbies that take them away from the house (golf, fishing, cycling, boxing club, karate club, fencing club.)

In these relationships, the man in the couple does 2 or more of these hobbies. Either, the man is away 4 or 5 evenings a week, OR he is away at LEAST one day of the weekend.. Literally from 8am to 5pm... at least one day of EVERY weekend. (And one or two evenings too.)

Whenever anyone asks her if they want to meet up/come round to visit, she says 'I will have to check with him first to see what he's doing.../what WE are doing'

Everything revolves around HIM and HIS hobbies and what HE is doing. Already! They are not even fucking married yet, and have no kids yet, and yet everything revolves around HIM.

The woman in the partnership has hobbies too (one or two,) but they don't affect HIM in any way, or anything HE wants to do. And you just KNOW that when/if they get married and have kids, that her hobbies and interests will take a back seat, but HIS will not.

He will carry on with his 3 or 4 hobbies, while SHE does all the wifework and childcare. I have seen it happen in so many couples, and I don't know why the women put up with it, but they do.

Annoyingly, once the kids have left home (and the wife/partner has done 99% of the wifework and child-rearing for the last quarter-century,) these same men tend to give up on the hobbies somewhat, lose contact with most of their mates, and rarely leave the fucking house.

[UYScuti]

I will cram as many self-indulgent hobbies into my life as I can to set a good example for my daughter

[EnthusiasmIsDisturbed]

Yes when do you hear she is such a great mum because she cooks them a nutritious meal and manages to get her children to school on time

I was shocked how many of my friends thought ds dad was absolutely fantastic to take ds (7) to a routine none serious hospital appointment. He wasn’t working at the time and I was in the middle of university exams. I am surprised he still hasn’t received his MBE

Expectations on men are so low and sadly in regard to being responsible towards their children have lowered

I have been told so many times ds is lucky that his dad sees him regularly I always correct them ds isn’t lucky he should nit expect anything less. Apparently I am lucky to I don’t have to fight for maintenance no not lucky this is the very least I should expect

[2020bluegirl]

@Bluntness100

There has always been feckless men. Men who spent it down the pub, who didn't provide and the wife cleaned or whatever,, men who didn't work, who kept getting sacked, who did fuck all at home.

It's nothing new. Really it's not.

You are correct of course. But unlike the OLD days, THESE days, women have to put up with men who are lazy, feckless, selfish arseholes, but also work (often full time) themselves. And this is in ADDITION to doing everything around the house/all the wifework/all the childcare.

And OMG YES!!! Agree with a few posters that it is so fucking annoying when a man looks after the kids for the afternoon, or picks up the fucking vacuum cleaner or washes up, and he is praised and hailed as a saint, and the woman is told she is SO lucky to have such a good husband.

When MY DH had Sunday afternoons with the kids twice a month (watching TV!) even my own mother said 'you've got a good 'un there. look after him!'

Also what pisses me off, is this idea from some (and this featured on a thread a few days ago,) that if you don't shave your box, do anal, be a whore in the bedroom and give it to him at LEAST twice a week, then don't start bleating and bitching when he strays... Men NEED sex ya know, and it's the WOMAN'S duty to provide it!

[Reginabambina]

In general I think you’re off the mark but women’s equality in the workplace has given feckless and abusivr men an excuse. You see it all the time on mn where a woman has no money to spend on herself while her husband is having hundred pound lunches because her high earning DH insists that she pays half of everything.

[CatalogueUniverse]

I should point out that i think it’s a logical conclusion for men to have become disaffected and angry.

I don’t think women should be responsible for fixing it.

[Pumpkinspicewhatever]

I do agree with this. There’s no way dh does the same amount as me round the house... I have occasionally made lists to show him the disparity as he seems to think cooking and washing up (he does do these reliably basically every day as well as a bit of DIY) is equal to laundry/tidying/hoovering/life admin/making the home nice with new things etc/doing the lions share of dd stuff. I sometimes do get resentful and we talk about it. However he’s not mean with money, he earns more and generally pays for more stuff and doesn’t expect me to match his contribution.
Op I don’t think YAB completely U