NAMALT. Really? Dig deep and be honest with yourself. AMALT

[NoEggs]

I love my DH. He’s a great guy and we’ve been happy for many years.

But
He’s not perfect. Doesn’t do the laundry. Defaults to letting me make stuff happen etc. etc.

Now even if your partner is a paragon I would argue that the species ‘men’ will generally default to slightly bloody useless.

AIBU?

"I’m a massive proponent of the theory that this inclination is biological in origin. Doesn’t make it right though."

Men are one long breeding experiment conducted by women. Both men and women as groups reflect the characteristics that individuals of the other group value.

Women could become the more physically dominant of the sexes by mutually agreeing only to mate with small and physically weak men. However, as individuals, most women want tall, physically strong, socially dominant men. Therefore as a group, men are taller, stronger and more dominant - "AMALT".

If you want a man who priorities community/family, then select for these characteristics. However, the reality is NAMALT because women don't value these characteristics ahead of the more stereotypically male characteristics.

Can we agree that there are studies and statistics that could present women in a more favourable light and ones that would show men in a more favourable light?

It really depends on the angle, the exact topic, and many-many other factors. And as such, it is a complex mix of things, and the logical conclusion is that neither is superior as a whole. Even comparing two individuals is difficult, but two whole groups of people? That is the peak of being misguided to claim general truths.

All of these considered, it is wild that anyone can still say - nah, we are better, though. The funny thing is the two sides are not "women are superior vs men are superior" It is "women are superior vs women and men are both flawed in different ways". One being superior to the other. How realistic does that sound to you?

I think we could agree that @exhaustDAD if, based on the empirical evidence available, it weren’t patently untrue.

Women and men are different - yes.
Not all men are the same. Not all women are the same. - yes
All humans are flawed - yes
Some humans are more flawed than others - yes
On balance more women are less selfish ergo less flawed than men. Absolutely.

I realise that this makes me seem utterly unreasonable to you, a man but to me, a woman, it is a hill upon which it is worth dying on.

What does that accomplish, dying on that hill, though? Dying on a hill that you are superior to others. That's... hm.
Where's the conversation, attempt to improve ourselves? Or that is the peak of our existence - to sit down with our besties, open up a bottle of rosé (or whatever, I don't drink), and we just complain how much worse our spouses are compared to our superior asses?
Can I ask - is the irony completely lost in there for you? "Men are generally more self-centered than us, the generally less selfish women. And thus, as we don't put ourselves on a pedestal, we think we are better." Snake biting its own tail? Maybe? Just maybe?

@exhaustDAD if you were a proponent of determinism you could argue that much of this discussion is predicated on facts that are outside our control. But this is not philosophynet and I am not here for erudite discussion. Or if I were I’d be sorely disappointed.

I do believe that, in general, women are less selfish than men. To me that makes them (women) better. If men want to work hard to improve the situation I would applaud loudly but I don’t see the majority working particularly hard to change things right now.

Hope springs eternal.

Well, this was certainly interesting.

It's more nuture than nature.

I posted this in another thread and feel it's fitting here too:

The solution is to drastically change the way boys are raised and stop with the "boys will be boys", boys should fight, play football and tackle each other in rugby, and girls should learn to play with fairies and dolls. Then stop calling those boys "soft" or "sissies" when they're more gentle, kind and show empathy.

The idea that women are less self centred/selfish/more concerned with how others view them is, in my opinion, based on biology (quicker and more easy let down of oxytocin, the tend and befriend hormone), pulled for by evolutionary necessity (someone had to be inclined to look after those slow maturing babies instead of wandering off and leaving them to fend for themselves) and socialization. Whether it is "better" or not is really a really interesting question though. I think it is really possible that having a balance of different approaches is probably helpful for social coherence, or at least was in human history.

Its reminding me of the research on authoritarian predisposition, and the researchers hypothesis on why this can be helpful - some people act as brakes on change in society because too much change too quickly can be destabilizing and this threatens everyone.

Perhaps the difference balance each other but dont necessarily lend themselves well to modern life?

Have to say though, that although I meet many men who are very committed to the idea of their work serving the public, there are also a sizable number who are motivated by wages, benefits, stability of employment, structure offered, or ego stroking.

Men are one long breeding experiment conducted by women.

No they're not!🙄
Women are not responsible for shit men.🤨

My husband genuinely could not be further from the stereotype. He's strong and sporty so looks like the stereotype I suppose but he isn't thank God!

People have strengths and weaknesses. DH is the tidy careful one and I’m not. OTOH, I’m good with a budget, maths, and spatial stuff.

Well, most people doing jobs like working in the fire service have saved multiple lives.

Google tells me that there are 31,000 male firefighters in the UK and that the role is 90% male dominated. With about 100 men a year murdering their partners annually even firefighters alone are saving a lot more female lives than are being taken by men murdering their spouses.

When you consider the various other public safety roles and that most will have saved multiple lives it seems fairly certain that men are saving a lot more female lives than they're taking. Without men a lot more women would die!

.

90% of women have at one point been sexually harassed. This could mean a single instance of a man wolf whistling at them or saying something crude.

How many men do you think they walk past in the average day? It could literally be one harasser per 100,000 men and the statistic could still be true.

If it happened even once a week/month it could be one man in every million. The statistic doesn't really tell us anything about the prevalence of it.

Also, the biggest metastudy of DV to date found that women perpetrate more DV than men despite not killing their partner as often. It was called the 'Partner Abuse State of Knowledge' and was conducted by over 100 academics from 20 universities in UK/US/Canada alongside DV organisations and charities. They reviewed over 10,000 studies and extrapolated the data from over 1200 peer reviewed studies. They have a website you can look at.

Have you factored into this calculation the number of fires started by men (or machines created by men) in the first place? Of course not. It's a ridiculous rhetorical question in response to a ridiculous assertion. i.e. in some walks of life some men save some women's lives. In some walks of life some women end some men's lives. It's irrelevant.

It is not about 'good' or 'bad'. It's about propensity to be selfish or unselfish.

Have you factored into this calculation the number of fires started by men (or machines created by men) in the first place?

The leading cause of fires is cooking accidents. So presumably they're mainly caused by women, unless you believe men are stepping up and doing the majority of meal prep.

@GaIadriel I’m quite impressed by how spectacularly you have missed the point of my statement.

Google tells me that there are 31,000 male firefighters in the UK and that the role is 90% male dominated. With about 100 men a year murdering their partners annually even firefighters alone are saving a lot more female lives than are being taken by men murdering their spouses.

How many women's lives are saved by UK firefighters each year?

In the year ending March 2025, 155 women were murdered on England and Wales alone. Do you have any facts @GaIadriel?

Exactly, there's no reason a woman can't learn, or that a man would instinctively know how to.

The culture of misogyny in the fire service is well documented.

'If only women had thought of creating a patriarchy to support them in every area of life.'

• re this : men in more recent eras didn't create the patriarchy so much as perpetuate it, though. Women could have tried to do a similar system but unfortunately stuff like the move to agriculture, emphasis on paternal lineage made this harder, as well as women's lesser physical strength making it more difficult to impose their will, especially in times when there was a lot more physical fighting & less law enforcement.

Is there patriarchy in England now though to support men in all areas of life? There is certainly misogyny : but how would you say patriarchy manifests? And clearly patriarchy doesn't always suppprt men, certainly not if it perceives them to have failed (homeless men, suicidal men etc)

Research shows women tend to have higher in-group solidarity. Imo patriarchy in history was more about groups of men supporting each other, siding along class/religion/tribe etc lines rather than generalised solidarity among men.

A lot more women are doing DIY now though, and it increases down the generations.

https://www.insightdiy.co.uk/news/rise-in-the-female-diyer/994.htm

https://www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/home-news/diy-jobs-women-men-study-b2884267.html

https://www.insightdiy.co.uk/news/yale-survey-modern-women-more-confident-about-diy-than-previous-generations/7053.htm#:~:text=The%20study%20found%20almost%20half%20of%20today's,and%20seven%20per%20cent%20of%20their%20grandmothers