To think many women expect emotional perfection from men but don’t offer the same?

[ReciprocityMatters]

I support high standards.
I support emotional maturity.

But AIBU to think some women now expect men to be therapists, mind-readers, emotionally fluent, endlessly available - while offering very little emotional stability themselves?

We say “I deserve more” but rarely ask “what do I give?”

Because it's manosphere red pill crap.

Speak for yourself.

I don't demand perfection from my DH and I know I'm not perfect myself. I don't think I expect anything from him that I wouldn't equally expect of myself, and vice versa.

Some women may have impossible high standards. The same applies to some men. Both men and women in this category are probably destined to be either alone or dissatisfied with their relationships.

Some women set the bar way too low. So do some men, but personally, I have seen far more women in this category than men.

This is not my experience at all. The majority of the women I know are constantly analysing their own behaviour and worrying about whether they have been unreasonable, expected too much, not done enough, been unkind, said something that might have been misinterpreted etc. That level of self reflection is vanishingly rare among the men I know - and I love many of them very much but they just don't think about the impact of their actions anywhere near as much as women, don't do as much as their female partners. Also, in the case of dads of teens, I see a lot of men who are very quick to take personal offence at standard teen detachment/selfishness and expect their teen child to be mature and put others first without doing the same themselves. So, I think YABU. But maybe we know very different people!

Men are treated like dirt? Men are responsible for sooo much of the evil that exists in this world and they still get advantages that women could only dream of (pay, career progression, positions of power). Women have to set standards high in order to protect themselves from the absolute horrors some men will put women through. Yes, women can also be abusers but statistics show that women are much, much less likely to be the perpertrators in any sort of crime. Men are simply not helping themselves. If they want women to trust them they have to treat women the same way they treat other men.

I think Men of a certain age impose lots of those hang ups on themselves, "showing emotion" for example they might think is weak not women thinking it is.

I agree OP, and that's after having been through an abusive marriage. I was not mature enough and certainly brought a lot of problems to the table. Of course it doesn't justify abuse that I received but even without that I, too, made that relationship very rocky.

It's not even about having too high standards, how can you? You know what you are prepared to live with and not. I love dogs but wouldn't adopt a dog who is reactive, barks all day and shits inside, I'd rather have no dog. Why should women put up with men who don't make them happy when they could live happily without a man. No man is always better than the wrong man.

Well, a list not consisting of strawmen would be a start

Agree - just look at the news today to see the horrors being committed by men the world over. And yet there is so much hand wringing about whether feminism has gone a bit too far and "it's not all men" etc I never used to think about this stuff as a younger woman but I look around me now and see what many women are having to contend with and how much higher the social standards for young women are than young men and find it desperately unfair.

You've clearly thought about this deeply and are either a man or are riddled with internal misogyny.

I read the subject and immediately knew this would be a specifically designed user name who would plop something vaguely anti women and never come back with any responses.

What is this shit on here and why does it keep happening?

I have a husband I treat him well he treats me well. I work with a disproportionate number of men as I work in the construction sector, most I deal with behave impeccably well and have a high degree of emotional and practical maturity are are heavily involved parents and behave nothing like the relationship section of MN. Their wives where I know them well enough to say, are the same.

However I grew up in a very problematic home environment where girls were bullied, mistreated and given second class citizen status.

There are men and boys out there who have been raised this way. They are the problematic ones, the ones who treat their partners poorly and disrespectfully or abusively, the ones who take any opportunity to throw out subtle sexist comments and digs to try to maintain status.

There is a dominance hierarchy and power dynamics across almost every population in the world that gifts men dominance over women. That has not remotely been lifted yet in the Western world, just look at the backslide in the USA or how quickly people were to throw away women’s rights in favour of transgender people.

So threads where women come on to say that men are the victims of modern society are very much straw men arguments or else they are coming from a very very privileged position.

I totally agree with you. There are so many threads on here where men's needs are just mocked, dismissed or ignored.

I think the social media algorithms are teaching men and women to hate each other. I’m a very happily married mother of sons and all I seem to read online is red / black pill nonsense with men in the comments who clearly detest women or “100 reasons women are happiest being child free and single” type reports and I’m honestly not seeking this stuff out. We’re in some kind of online war of the sexes nonsense.

No idea. You'd need to survey all women to find out what they were insisting on from men, then find a reliable way to assess what they were all offering, then cross reference the requirements against the offer, and see if at least 70% fit your theory. Has anyone done this?

Whats wrong?

Nothing.

THIS!!

I don’t get the “too high standards” complaint. If I know what I cannot deal / live with then so what?

That’s my standard. How can it possibly be too high?

Is nothing wrong or is it massively glaringly obvious?

Men are just as guilty of this one as women are.

I don’t think this is for generalizing, but I do know two women, now 38 and 39, desperate for marriage and children who couldn’t make relationships stick and now can’t even find dates and both have followed the same pattern. They have always said they “deserve” not to compromise (“why should I settle?” was the phrase they both used). Their partner has to be dad (as in, look out for their best financial and health etc interests and plan for their futures), lover, best friend, high earner, good looking, loyal, and an stalwart “manly man” who can handle their emotional whirlwinds. Both women offer, in return, looking pretty, carryying their babies and being a SAHM, and that’s about it. The one who is my SIL is actually a very sweet and loyal and supportive person who would make a loving wife and an amazing mum. But she has the emotional resilience of a feather in a hurricane. Truthfully, it would be like marrying a child and looking after her forever. When DH has suggested emotional resilience training or counselling in the past, she started crying and accused him of sabotaging her progress.

So yes, I personally know of two women who want the moon on a stick but have seemingly never stopped to look at what they might bring to the table. And here we are. Both seem fine with their choices, however. Seemingly they’re more ready to give up on marriage and children than expand their search criteria.

This 100%

Are you OK?

You seem to be struggling to understand basic English?

Because the use of we implies most people reading this would be part of the we - and that’s a load of bollocks

YABU - I'm perfect

We understand you perfectly well. We just think you are talking nonsense.