So angry at all these threads on useless and selfish men

[Winterday1991]

Off the back of the thread where the H refuses to care for his sick child so the OP can get some much needed rest as he is on annual leave from work 😡. I am seriously fed up of reading threads like this, why are so many men so selfish?

Why is it always women who have to do the lions share of caring, pulling themselves in all direction whilst their male counterparts glide through life uninterrupted? Why is it always women who carry the mental load for family life and the men just show up. Why is always women responsible for maintaining the household?

Even in the 21st century, why do so many men get such a bloody easy ride, whilst often their poor wives/partners are running around like headless chickens keeping on top of everything.

I don't want to get into a boring spat about evidence. I've seen your form on this and can't be arsed.

But I also don't want to hear any boring chat about glass ceilings either, seeing as you've now stated, as a categorical fact, that single women earn more than men, on average.

I don't think that housework is 'women's work', but I do think it is low-value, menial, and poorly paid. And I think that 'mental load', whilst an interesting concept, plays no part in any value generation and is therefore also low-value. Just because the people claiming they deserve extra credit for their performance in dispatching low-value chores whilst also carrying this mental load are a loud and vociferous bunch, doesn't actually prove that this mental load generates any particular value to anyone either, save for their own egos.

What I am curious about is how this forum believes any man can survive as a single man or a same-sex couple, seeing as they are so incapable of dealing with complex mental loads and the physical graft of shopping and loading the dishwasher. But then, any confounding variables can just be ignored when attacking the patriarchy, right?

Of course, housework is hard if one is working from 6 am-8 pm every day and then coming home, cooking, and cleaning for a family.
The key is to let it go or organize a relationship so that this isn't the case and not feel guilty about it. However, a sizable majority are women on mat leave at home with partners who work long hrs.

My own relationship was more equitable but I took a role that meant my availability in the home would be compromised. Dp has just done it, it helps when one enjoys cooking or makes the tasks enjoyable and takes pride in them.

@Mark19735

Its a conundrum alright

How these hopeless men mange absolutely fine pre partner and kids.

And how someone incapable of knowing how to work a washing machine can hold down a job.

It's almost like it's not actually a capability issue

What a load of waffle.

My ex-husband earned less than me before we met, while we are married, and still does by an even higher margin now we're divorced. While he has no contact with our children and I also do all of their care and donestic chores as well as providing for them financially.

Please explain how he provides more "value" than me in any sense. Or cease directing your ignorant and ridiculous comments to me, I'm not remotely interested in your misogyny.

Indeed.

I think the way to improve things is around better management of expectations, not criticising capabilities. But go back and review the posts on this thread, and you'll find far more of the latter.

If someone is made to feel inadequate, they'll very quickly stop even trying. Every single poster here would agree with that if it was said about a kid with an EHCP struggling at school. Point out to them that adults are no different, and suddenly it becomes all "why do I now also have to massage my DP's fragile ego - I'm already carrying too much mental load". But being an embittered survivor of failed relationships who vents their spleen online by posting misandry and abusing other women who take a different view is somehow preferable? Odd. No wonder they are unhappy. Ain't no man, or woman, gonna fix that. There's simply not enough good ones to go around.

All the best world leaders are women. A society created by women and enforced by women would be egalitarian and enlightened, much unlike this mess that we’ve all inherited under the stewardship of men.

If it were up to me, men the world over would be all dumped in massive security fenced enclosures, where they would be free to beat each other over the head with clubs to their own hearts content, leaving the real world to the rest of us.

All the best world leaders are women. FACT. I'm sure Liz Truss is mega popular on all of these threads.
A society created by women and enforced by women would be egalitarian and enlightened. TRUE DAT. I'm sure the Windrush folks chortle with happy memories when they remember Theresa May's premiership

@Mark19735

What would you suggest to help coax these poor fragile men into doing their fair share?

A gold star?

A lollypop?

I am glad it isn't up to you then. I wouldn't like to see my father, my lovely partner and my little nephews locked away in some shitty enclosure. I happen to really like the men in my life.

Come on ... you can do it! You're soooo close to getting there!

What's the matter - daren't write it lest all the ones who only skim-read misconstrue it and bite your head off?

Ah yes, we have had so many wonderful women lead our country! Margaret Thatcher. Theresa May. Liz Truss. Nicola Sturgeon. Truly amazing.

And good luck reinhabiting your world with no men. At what age should we remove baby boys from their family?

Both my siblings DB and DS are successfully married and in both marriages the men do a lot of the cooking and shopping and childcare and they have a cleaner. Both relationships have a kind of running updates system of organisational negotiations. I would say their division of mental load is different. One is more even than the other.

I think the unifying factor is that they all want to be happily married and they adore their kids. So they recognise they all have to be in it. I'd say it's the same dynamic for my friends who are happily married. My less happily married friends do have husbands who are less committed to doing their share as part of making the family happy.

"why do I now also have to massage my DP's fragile ego - I'm already carrying too much mental load"

This is exactly the point. Why on earth should anyone have to massage an adult’s ego?

I’m sure I’ve misunderstood the context of your post, but this part stood out as a huge truth in many marriages - not enough sex, not enough attention, men jealous of their babies, many unable to adjust fully to parenthood and walk away, and most unable to share the load in the home, whether both adults work or not.

I had disabled dc to care for pretty much single handedly, exH still thinks we were a great team (it must have been great for him as he didn’t do a thing).
So many men seem to need congratulations for doing the bare minimum, and if they don’t get enough of it they feel neglected. At the same time where is the woman’s praise? I could go more into how mothers of disabled children are treated vs fathers, and how the imbalance tends to become greater.

Members of online groups for various disabilities are predominantly female. When men appear on the scene they very often expect special praise for taking part in their child’s life, and often flounce if their need for attention is ignored or called out.

Cygnet groups to learn about your autistic child - predominantly women, even though most there take time off work to attend. Very few men, and those that are there are treated with kid gloves as though they are something special for actually giving a shit about their child’s life.

You see this over and over again. Men disengaging from the practical and often difficult realities. Yet mothers are blamed for having children with these men, or even looked down in for daring to have a child with additional needs. But the poor father? Oh isn’t he doing well, isn’t he a hero!

@Thepeopleversuswork

I love many individual men and want to keep them around but as a rule I think families are usually healthier without them and a social group and in the way they operate as a pack I think their benefit to society is negligible.

You do realise that not all men "operate as a pack" don't you? My father and my OH have minimal social contact with other men, certainly aren't the type to go pubbing with others nor football/golf with other men at the weekend either. I think you're meaning a certain sub-type of men rather than all men.

Men as a whole are a completely self interested group. It took women and their bravery for us to even get a shred of dignity and freedom and that fight is far from over. Some men might appear non offensive in many ways but none of them will relinquish their privilege gladly that’s for damn sure. Not even the so called ‘feminist ally’ men, who are the worst of them all if you ask me.

@Mark19735

Yeah I can't take you even a tiny bit seriously

Crushed.

There's simply not enough good ones to go around.

That's an amusing take on it. Many women have decided that they're mot remotely interested in a man hence all the incels who are surplus to requirements: quite the opposite of what you think is happening.

@Kazzyhoward

Fair cop, it was badly worded.

I know men don't operate "as a pack". And I suppose what I'm saying really is that I think a patriarchal society is toxic.

I stand by the idea, though, that in many if not most cases (and with notable and noble exceptions) families which don't include men are healthier. Taking money out of the equation (and I know this is a big one) I think single parent families headed by women are by far the best way to raise children.

Aside from bringing in money (which we can usually do on our own), the majority of men don't bring much to the table in families. They largely drain time from women and children through their constant "needs", often fail to pull their weight at home, channel what family resources there are in ways that don't particularly benefit the children, their lack of emotional intelligence is quite often a negative impact on the women and children and the much touted "role model" figure they are supposed to provide for boys is usually nothing more than a set of two-dimensional macho stereotypes.

I know there are many exceptions to these rules and increasingly many men and boys who buck these trends. But the socially normative role that a man plays in a family is not usually a net benefit to that family.

It may have been useful in the days when women didn't work and what was needed was a lot of money to support the family. But we have evolved beyond that and in general they haven't.

There's simply not enough good ones to go around.

That's an amusing take on it. Many women have decided that they're mot remotely interested in a man hence all the incels who are surplus to requirements: quite the opposite of what you think is happening.

That doesn't contradict that poster at all. There aren't enough good ones to go around, and that's partly why many women have decided they're not remotely interested. The surplus incels are the 'not good enough' ones.

I'm sorry - I've completely lost this thread. What is the problem again? That men don't do enough? Or that there's actually no need for them to do anything at all? If the later, why get so upset about them watching the footy of an evening?

So far I've learnt that women earn more than men, on average. They do a better job raising children without men present, although when men are present them not doing 50% of the work is a catastrophe. That men doing 100% of their day job counts for nothing and the counter gets set to zero when they walk through the door. That the women in their lives get to decide what is important, when it needs to be done, what standard it should be done to, and that when they do it, it counts extra because them doing involved mental load, whereas men doing it barely counts at all because it wasn't good enough. That everything men do, or want, or say they need is useless, disgusting and pointless. That men's working lives are anointed and they enjoy a stress-free existence that is an oasis of joy, despite sharing those lives with posters on here who are demonstrably not fountains of joy themselves - at least not in their descriptions of men. That the number of male suicides isn't to be taken seriously because erm ... what was it again? Oh yes, women are more likely to indulge in ideation, which is exactly the same, or maybe even worse, because it is the men in their lives making them think those thoughts in the first place. Have I got it right?

I always maintain MN is full of covert incels.

I think it is slowly improving due to society expectations , my observation from my colleagues is that generally the people in their twenties and thirties have a more equal responsibility to childcare and housework then people in their forties and older ( I'm 50) more women return to work and dad's do nursery and school pick ups - rarer than hens teeth to see a dad at school pick up 15-20 years ago. So it is slowly changing but I do think women do carry the mental load, I.e remembering everything.
I also that think that actually women and men care about different things. DH wouldn't be upset/ guilty if he didn't make it to a nativity play for example, I'd be gutted.
He would see a school l
He's not bothered if the carpet is covered in dog hair whereas I am etc etc. Different priorities.
Lastly men seem incapable of putting someone else's needs above their own consistently and for a prolonged period of time, they won't make sacrifices.
As in when the shit really hits the fan and you really need to dig deep, men are rarely to be seen -Observation from eating disorder clinic for teens

Mark carries on thinking anyone is listening to him...😄

@Mark19735And I think that 'mental load', whilst an interesting concept, plays no part in any value generation and is therefore also low-value. [...]What I am curious about is how this forum believes any man can survive as a single man or a same-sex couple, seeing as they are so incapable of dealing with complex mental loads and the physical graft of shopping and loading the dishwasher. But then, any confounding variables can just be ignored when attacking the patriarchy, right?
You are mistaken that the mental load is of low value. Most of it is to do with arranging things for the benefit of the child(ren), which is why single men or same-sex male couples have no issues with the mental load.
It is easy to fend for yourself, pay your bills, wash your own clothes, buy your own shopping, or even to do bits of this for an adult partner.

It is much harder to do all the thinking required to run a child's life. Then double or triple that for two or three children.

Monitor their health, make dentist appointments, book haircuts, check what shoes and clothes need replacing, know what their current shoe size is, know if they fit the standard clothes sizes for their age range or if you have to buy larger or smaller ages, decide what to do with too-small clothes, know what their interests are so you can choose their toys and gifts or advise relatives and grandparents, know which toys they no longer need, decide how to dispose of these, ensure clean uniform is always ready, and PE kit on the right day, know what day they have to go to school in a 'book day' costume, or non-uniform day, or the day the class is going to the zoo so they have to be at school an hour early, know what day they have to take in cookery supplies, ensure food they like is available for packed lunches, and know what the school's policy is on packed lunch items, or alternatively remember to pay for the school lunches, know on what days their after-school clubs are, on what days their out-of-school clubs are, and when the fees for these need paying, what their weekend bookings are, know when to drop off, and when to collect, and if they need to take anything like a birthday present, and remember to RSVP the birthday invitation, and on and on and on it goes.

This is without considering any mental load relating to the general running of the household.

This mental work is neither low-value nor unnecessary.