To think that proposing to a man kills attraction, even in “modern” couples?

[ByHonestRoseBiscuit]

We all talk about equality in relationships but I still think there’s something about a woman proposing that disrupts natural polarity, especially attraction. Even “progressive” men seem to respond awkwardly to it.

AIBU to think that deep down, most men still want to be the ones to lead when it comes to commitment?

Interesting. I like the idea of mothers, grandmothers and other close but wiser female relations having a guiding hand in decisions about who to marry and when.

Exactly. "Neither of us proposed, we had a conversation and it was a mutual agreement" is usually code for "she asked him".

Same and just had our 40th wedding anniversary!

I don’t want a husband whose male fragility I need to panda to. I proposed to DH. He said yes. Been married almost 4 years. I earn more than him and he does the majority of domestic organising and admin because he’s much better at it than me. He is secure in the way he contributes to our family and ultimately we are team Basil and Tom, it doesn’t matter if we’re fulfilling gendered roles or not.

Why was he the only one that was allowed a moment? What if you'd wanted to have a moment?

So if a woman says she wants to spend the rest of her life with him, he feels LIKE HIS BALLS HAVE FALLEN OFF?

Jeez, she needs to find a man with more securely attached gonads!

We all talk about equality in relationships but

There is no but.

It is bizarre. How there is so much inequality in relationships.

In the work kitchen yesterday, a colleague was talking about her.Wedding dress fitting. Another colleague didn't know she was getting married. He is male and said to her good, that your partner is going to make an honest woman of you.

So she's a dishonest woman and doing something immoral, until her male partner decides to marry her.

Christ alive.

This was in a professional job with highly educated individuals.Supposedly.

Sigh .....

This is 2025?

I don't think it's that. There's a difference between internalised misogyny and recognising a genuine pattern of behaviour that appears to be biologically encoded in most men. How we deal with it may show internalised misogyny but knowing it exists doesn't.

My parents have been married 51 years. There was no proposal as such but it was my mum who suggested they got married. No signs that is emasculated my rugby and cricket playing policeman dad.

A proposal seems oddly old fashioned these days. Just discuss the idea of marriage then do it surely.

Some cases where the woman proposes will be those where the man was dragging his feet. Didn't want to get married or at very least didn't care. I'm not sure how far it's possible for such men to separate feelings about the woman proposing from their disinclination to get married in the first place. but you'd have to control for that.

Why would it be ‘code’ for anything?

Well, you're not wrong because it's clear from the thread that old fashioned misogyny is still alive and kicking. And yes, we should be honest about this.

But no decent man would have a problem with being proposed to by a woman. The problem is that there are still lots of shitty men out there, and lots of women who are prepared to put up with them.

Each to their own, I suppose.

I’ve recently read a novel set decades ago, probably early post WW2, where it suddenly dawns on a woman who’s been in love with a (married) man for over 20 years, that his wife (a much more assertive type) almost certainly proposed to him. That same wife later more or less says outright that her own niece has proposed to her fiancé, since he’d probably never have the nerve to ask her. He’s a curate, she’s a ‘female don’ and he’s already said ‘she’s far too clever to look at anyone like me’.

(Some Tame Gazelle, by Barbara Pym, a lovely read, but almost as much a period piece now as Jane Austen)
The opening sentence is a comedy classic!

I mean, he wasn’t but I wasn’t arsed about it at all. So I was happy to let him have his “moment” if it meant more to him than it did to me. Nothing wrong with that.

I’m not sure how proposing marriage - an entirely human invention - can be biologically encoded into men. Socialised, maybe, but then anyone can (and should) apply some critical thinking to social expectations and traditions to interrogate whether they actually make sense. Any man who can’t do this and would feel “emasculated” by being proposed to is not, in my book, a decent man.

What's the evidence that it is biologically encoded?

Men are the evidence!

I would never have proposed to my husband. It’s old fashioned but I see it as romantic and the man’s job. I’m sure he would not have wanted the proposal to come from me.

You should propose to a woman instead if proposing to a man isn’t on.

I think the idea of man as the pursuer, woman as the passive party hoping to be selected is deeply embedded in our culture. When a woman proposes this disrupts the patterns we expect and can result in a view that the woman wasn't sufficiently desirable for the man to play the 'usual' role in moving things along, so had to take matters into her own hands. Or that the man is weak, suggestible and not committed, as if he were not he'd have taken charge of his destiny in the time honoured fashion. A man who makes a woman feel she is not desirable enough to be proposed to, or who appears too passive/disinterested to play his role, will not be attractive to women who think in these terms.

@ByHonestRoseBiscuit

only a man secure in his manhood prefers a woman with her own agency, brain and who takes control of her destiny.

what a dated view you have on relationships and order of things.

i am married to my equal, i want my daughters to marry their equal should they choose to marry, i raise them to be independant and to have control of their lives.

i am sure they will discuss the direction of their relationship.
i hate the false sense of romance with a man down his knee.

i love the sense of security that discussing marriage between 2 people brings, discussing finances, future, children, as 2 equal adults.
those are the relationships that last.