Would you be put off by a man who doesn't drive?

[ItDoesMyHeadIn]

I was. Cancelled the date. I'm being too fussy apparently. To be fair my friend is married to a man who doesn't drive and he's amazing. Neither of my parents drive. The guy I was going to date could afford it, he just can't be arsed. He is happy to walk everywhere or use public transport. Up to him. But I would want to be with someone who can literally take the wheel sometimes. Like fuck do I want to be the one driving 8 hours up to Scotland for a holiday, or being the one to always collect the takeaway etc. I'm pretty traditional and sometimes I admit I would want my man to pick me up and take me out for dinner etc (fuck off crazy feminists, yes I can take myself out for dinner). I didn't actually realise how much of a deal breaker this was until it was put in front of me! Interested in opinions...

I agree with you. A friend of mine (male) doesn´t drive although he has a driving license because he doesn´t want to and it gets boring very quickly and I also think it tends to go with other quirky accents. We live in a village and if i had to do all the pick ups and ferrying about in the car I would be pissed off about it pretty soon.

Oh, it's Mumsnet ableism again.

What if your partner had arthritis or a serious illness with fatigue?

Not everyone is able bodied. Not everyone can do their share of the household. Not everyone can drive. Some people are disabled.

Relationships aren't about 50/50 no matter what. One of the main attractions of them is that people can use their different strengths and contribute in different ways.

If I met a partner tomorrow with a car and we went on loads of road trips in Europe, I wouldn't be sharing the driving load, but I can contribute in lots of different ways. I can use the languages I spent ages learning to get us around and buy what we need. I can do most or all of the cooking. I can do most of all of the logistical planning and routes. Relationships are supposed to be about making both people's lives easier, not splitting every single chore 50/50.

This is so disgusting ableist, it's unbelievable.

Lots of non-drivers have disabilities.

Lots of non-drivers live in big cities and have no use for a car, so why would they spend a fortune on driving lessons and tests?

Being able to drive isn't some essential life skill. I've got to the age of 36 and have lived all over the world without needing to drive.

My ex didn't drive when I first got with him. I told him he needed to, especially as we were planning a family. Fair enough, he did. We divorced 5 years ago. Kids remained at home with me. He instantly surrendered his licence and refused to drive them anywhere meaning he played little oart in ferrying to and fro from clubs/after school activities/ university open days/ to and from uni 6 times a year

Competence is sexy. Incompetence is not. Not being able to do something the majority of adults can do is not a good look. No one wants some one who can’t pull their own weight.

Choosing not to drive is not incompetence. Just because the majority of adults can do something doesn’t mean it is a benchmark of competence (leaving aside the fact so many do it really, really fucking badly). Most adults can procreate. Are infertile men and women also incompetent? I needed fertility treatment to conceive. The majority of women don’t. Am I incompetent as a woman?

I’d be pissed off if I had to do all that in a car too, which is why I don’t live in a village. In fact I’d be pissed off if I lived in a village full stop.

Competence is sexy. Incompetence is not. Not being able to do something the majority of adults can do is not a good look. No one wants some one who can’t pull their own weight.

My husband literally can’t pull his own weight, hes sexy as hell because hes intelligent, caring, hardworking, honest and has the right balance of selfishness to both care for himself and give enough to us.

So basically you forced him to do something he didn't want to do, and when you split he stopped doing it to please you? If this situation was the other way around on MN, there would be an outcry.

Why do the kids HAVE to go everywhere in a car? Could your ex not take them on public transport. If the kids are old enough to go to uni, can't they use a bus or train?

Really puts me off... along with not being able to cook and living at home still 😬so I dont think you are that fussy OP!

Frazzledmummy123

'So basically you forced him to do something he didn't want to do, and when you split he stopped doing it to please you?'

I didn't force him to do anything. He saw the fairness of shouldering the ferrying of the kids when we were married. Didn't when we were not.

In case you missed this ... public transport is hugely expensive, often doesn't run effectively when you live outside major cities and doesn't necessarily match activities and clubs' times.

@Frazzledmummy123 thats a really awful thing to say, that man has decided out of spite to make his ex wife ferry his children around. Thats a terrible example to set children. A non drive through choice is is basically limiting their childrens opportunities because they don’t feel like driving. That’s selfish.

There are only so many hours in a day, if you spend 1/3 of them standing in a queue for a bus, connections, little legs tired from walking, it’s a complete waste of a childhood. After school activities that are a mile away from each other have to be missed because the bus takes an hour, for example.

I feel sorry for children who are forced to trek across the county purely because their parents couldn’t be bothered.

Better for the planet surely?one less car on the road.
I'd say it's a positive thing and the opposite of lazy.
Everyone has different views on driving,he has his own,you don't know him well enough to comment really.
But it is your life,your choice too.

Surely it’s possible to accept that that particular man is being a selfish arse - by choosing to have and raise children somewhere that a car is required, and then suddenly refusing to drive them - without also deciding that every non-driver with kids is inflicting the same cruelty on their children, no matter where they live?

I wouldn’t want my kids to grow up only being able to get to places by being driven, myself. I’d be concerned they would turn into the kind of adults who can’t get their arse from A to B unless it’s sat in a car seat.

If it was done out of spite by him, then yeah she has a point. However, how do we know it was done out of spite? She basically demanded he drove, and then they split, so we don't know that he didn't choose to stop driving because he wasn't instructed to by his then wife. As I said earlier, if it was a man demanding his wife drove, opinions would be very different.

Likewise, I feel sorry for people who bring up their kids to be ferried about anywhere, never having been on a bus or train, and have never walked anywhere in their lives. Having to walk anywhere is seen by snobs like yourself as 'a waste of childhood' or 'trekking across the country' (dramatic much!).

Children I know whose parents don't drive tend to be very independent, resourceful and have plenty of options for going places. They also tend to be down to earth not look down at other people.... (I am referring to the judgey drivers here, not drivers in general).

I agree @GoldenOmber . It was the anger that struck me with that particular poster as to how terrible a person that mother must be to expect equal input from the father in getting the children around.

Likewise, I feel sorry for people who bring up their kids to be ferried about anywhere, never having been on a bus or train, and have never walked anywhere in their lives. Having to walk anywhere is seen by snobs like yourself as 'a waste of childhood' or 'trekking across the country' (dramatic much!).

@Frazzledmummy123 its not either or. Its possible to travel on public transport and still be a car owner. I live in Hertfordshire, I can be in London in 20 minutes on the fast train and in fact have already been in to London this morning for work and am back home already. We visit London almost every week as we have fabulous links and my eldest is only 13 and can find his own way on the tube. However my childrens school is an unwalkable distance, a bus is every hour and the next connection is often missed making it an almost impossible trek to do what takes 10 mins in a car. Would I be unreasonable to make my children spend hours every night waiting for those connections or walking down a dual carriageway, when I could drive in 1/10th or the time. Yes. That would be selfish and a waste of their childhoods, making them tired and grumpy purely because the adult didn’t feel like it.

There are only so many hours in a day, if you spend 1/3 of them standing in a queue for a bus, connections, little legs tired from walking, it’s a complete waste of a childhood. After school activities that are a mile away from each other have to be missed because the bus takes an hour, for example.

Who is spending 8 hours a day waiting for the bus? Little legs get tired from walking when they’re little legs that never walk anywhere except for to and from mummy and daddy’s cars. After school activities that are a mile away from each other can also be walked or scooted or cycled.

@Windbeneathmybingowings where did I say the previous poster was a terrible person? Unless you are correct that her ex stopped driving out of spite, she said she told him he needed to start driving. The fact that he stopped driving when they split up suggests that he was only doing it to please her. If someone doesn't want to drive, they shouldn't be told by anyone else they have to, driving isn't for everyone. It doesn't make the pp a terrible person, but she can't tell someone what to do. However, if he stopped out of spite, then of course that is totally different and I take what I said back.

You seem to have backtracked a lot from your earlier post both in your response to someone else and myself. Your earlier reply, in first paragraph in particular, basically generalised all non drivers to be selfish. Now you are drip feeding that your circumstances (school location, etc) means you have to drive as is unwalkable and requires a lot of travel for which a car is needed. I didn't say people should put their kids through that amount of walking and travel by public transport if it is impossibly so. Obviously people adapt their arrangements to suit their situation.

Non-drivers make sure they are beside transport links and choose after school activities, clubs, etc that are accessible without needing a car, and it doesn't necessarily cause any problems or stress. People who live in certain places do need a car, but don't have a right to dictate if others drive or not, or judge non-drivers as being selfish.

@BobbinHood waking hours. Obviously. And a 2 hour trip to school and a 2 hour trip back would be 4 hours. Or walk down the A10.

@Frazzledmummy123 you insinuated the poster was coercive and that if the roles were reversed we would be up in arms. When in fact asking someone to do their share is not at all coercive.

A lot of non drivers do live with great transport links. Great. But if they do not; then learning to drive is the very least they can do if they do not want to burden their spouse with the majority of the care.

and choose after school activities, clubs, etc that are accessible without needing a car, and there is it. Sorry Billy, you can’t go to football/swimming or any other activity you enjoy and have picked yourself, daddy doesn’t want to drive you there. Your only options are whatever is closest. That’s selfish and limiting your child’s opportunities though choice.

it doesn't necessarily cause any problems or stress - to the adult.

The child may be thinking ah I really wanted to go to play with my friend but he lives too far. Get over it, Daddy didn’t want to drive today so no problem.

@Windbeneathmybingowings again, no one is walking 2 hours and 2 hours back. Clearly your specific circumstances are such that you’ve created a life for you and your children that requires a car. I’ve created a life for me and mine that doesn’t. My DC misses out on nothing by virtue of me not driving. My DH does drive, as it happens, but doesn’t drive her to any activities because she doesn’t need to be ferried about. How is any of this selfish? If you don’t choose to live a 2 hour walk from their school and activities then your child isn’t limited, because there’s a way to get to all of them by using their legs or two wheels. And they won’t grow up relying on us for lifts earlier which I know from teenage experience gives a great deal more freedom.

Maybe they’re thinking they wish they didn’t live so far away from everything that they have to be driven?

I generally don’t let my 6 year old get the bus unaccompanied so what other option do I have other than ferry them about? Tell them no, you can’t go because it’s my choice not to drive. Sad times.

We don’t even live far from anything at all except their school. I could be in Stratford faster than I could be at their school. I am not the only person in these circumstances as this thread has revealed.

You accompany them on the bus. “Being ferried” suggests you’re driving them about, so they never have to walk more than 10 paces in case those little legs get tired. You might tell them that, I wouldn’t have to because getting the bus (metro, walking, cycling, scooting) isn’t a big deal. No sad times needed.

Yes, and I’m not the only person not in those circumstances, as this thread has revealed, so it’s almost like different circumstances means it’s inaccurate bollocks to class people as “selfish” and “incompetent” for choosing not to drive.

@Windbeneathmybingowings as opposed to living in such a way that if suddenly the car went off the road or God forbid, something happened that you couldn't drive, you would be isolated and wee Billy would have to miss his clubs, etc. How independent eh! 🙄 . A set of wheels doesn't dictate if my kids attend their clubs and events..

Most people don't actually choose their school and "choose" where to live in relation to their budget and what's available.

I'd prefer to live somewhere that the is next to my children's clubs but it's not even close to in budget ... There's other areas that would be close and affordable but you have to be really lucky with timing to buy one of the houses there. That's with a decent budget and buying. If you're renting there's even less choice and moving becomes more frequent. It's a bit rubbish for kids to lose their hobbies just because the landlord wants to sell or get more money...