Anyone else married a subconscious mysoginist?

[Popcornio]

I married a nice guy.
But he's not really I've learned over time.

He's a bit of a sheep, follows crappy ingrained societal values and I can see he's part of the problem. He's a sexist but is offended when I suggest so... he can't see his own subconscious sexism, he's not outwardly sexist like some.

Has anyone else married one of these "nice" guys, who aren't really? Has anyone else come across this with their husbands and if so what do they do/say?

Forgot to add, if I discuss feminism, he calls me a man hater.

All the nice husband's my friend's have are like this, including mine. There is no incentive to change their mind set, there is no benefit to them dropping the patriarchal shite.

My husband is the same. I used to be a support worker for sex workers and during this time he went to a sex show on his stag do (not saying so to start a debate on these places, or judgment on the women who work there). He thinks straight, white, middle class men have it tough as “no one” likes them. But everyone says how “nice” he is.

Me and a lot of my friends.

“fucking hell another woman commentating on football- The world has gone mad”

“Who wants to watch this shite” - any women’s sport on TV.

“She hasn’t aged well” - never said about a man

It is ingrained.

Yes absolutely. He would be offended if I called him a misogynist but he is one.

My exh definitely was. Couldn't see it of course.

Yup, I did this. It sucks.

Yeah, it's depressing. DP isn't too bad but my dad is. I rang him after sports personality of the year to see if he watched and for a chat ( he usually does) and he said I quote " I didn't watch it this year, it was a farce with all those women being nominated, just ridiculous " . I was gobsmacked, it was like a punch in the stomach. He's otherwise a lovely man.

I'm afraid we are pretty much all like this. It took several years of FWR here at MN to recognise my own internal misogyny, my subconscious still surprises me regularly.

It doesn't mean we can't learn about it or change ourselves though.

Oh yes, mine absolutely loves football, any football, all football, he will watch any game, any team, as long as it’s football, point blank refused to watch the women’s! Apparently they’re just “not that good”. He was awfully quiet when they won the Euro!!

''We must learn and then teach our children that niceness does not equal goodness. Niceness is a decision, a strategy of social interaction; it is not a character trait. People seeking to control others almost always present the image of a nice person in the beginning. Like rapport-building, charm and the deceptive smile, unsolicited niceness often has a discoverable motive.''

• Gavin De Becker the Gift of Fear

Similar but my ex was a "nice guy" but he was actually very intolerant of others - disables, LGBQT+, racist...he'd think he wasn't but he really was. His views were so old and backward.

Yes, no longer with a deeply misogynistic abuser, who speaks publicly about how wrong sexism is! I think it is really common and I'm amazed when you start talking to other women whose husbands seem 'nice' in public they are not great behind closed doors; don't listen to their female partners, never apologize, enjoy the benefits of financial/emotional/work-load inequality. I'm only just starting to realize how ingrained my own unconscious misogyny is, to the extent that it has held me back.

That's so right!

OP, I did. Once I saw it, I couldn't unsee (and that he was abusive). Left 3 years ago, still find it hard to trust men.

My DH is pretty good now, but it's taken years of discussions.

There's some god awful sexist shite on children's tv and in adverts - it's still everywhere
I worry about my grandkids but they are gradually beginning to understand that women aren't there to pick up after them.

I agree with a pp that Mumsnet is eye opening and informative.
It's helped me establish healthier boundaries and it's helped me to articulate why those boundaries are important

Yes, me too, sadly.

He really thinks he's all for equality but shows he's not when it comes to household tasks etc. Definitely thinks there are 'boy jobs' (involves a power tool) and 'girl jobs' (involves any sort of hot water/ cleaning by hand).

I'm gradually chipping away at it, but it's ingrained from his family/ his father, who:

• sent their only son (DH) to private school/uni, but daughters to state/college
• kept telling me how much he liked women 'smartly dressed' i.e. to wear hats and skirts! (this was in the 1990s)
• disapproved of me breastfeeding, even though he had zero knowledge or experience of it (MIL apparently 'couldn't' but I suspect was forbidden to)

I feel I have to point it out EVERY time he (DH) does/says something sexist. We have sons and I don't want them growing up with him as a role model.

No mine isn’t like that at all. He sees women as fully people some of his good friends are great women. . Sadly it’s rare. Oh and he gets penalised for it by other men. It is societal think England particularly bad for it.

Yes, to a degree, but he's learning and he WANTS to learn, which is important.

He has teenage nieces and I often use them to illustrate examples of what I'm trying to say. The impact is greater than using my 40 year old self that takes no shit.

Mine gets really offended if I point out gender injustices- takes it personally and just sees that I must dislike men.

He recently made a comment about mums doing school runs being able to watch the first half of shitty channel 5 films in the afternoons whilst men "slave away at work". I pointed out that these channel 5 watching women were collecting their kids from school for zero financial gain, saving the costs of wrap around care whilst their husbands are actually getting paid to work.

He speaks of women who work mainly school hours to be able to do the school runs as if they're shirkers. I'm one of these women two days a week and although I'm grateful to be able to collect my own kids from school, you'd think I was taking a daily fortnight in the bahamas. It's become a novelty and a treat to look after our own children which is absurd and men make is feel guilty for it. Although I see plenty of men on the school runs these days, particularly since covid as many work from home. He doesn't see them as shirkers.

He also won't play sports with me as "the level of challenge isn't good enough". He only plays sports with men.

I think that your quote about niceness and goodness is excellent @Thelnebriati

He's gradually getting deprogrammed (as have I) over the last 15 years.

He's always seen women as whole people. He's had to distance himself from friends whose girlfriends get younger and younger and who pick off women at the end of the night.

He would have loved to disappear from the boringness of child rearing. He never cooks for himself or the child. However his involvement has increased so parenting is more equal. I think sometimes he wishes he had married someone who did everything for him and the kids.

He's seen me get ill trying to manage a career and child rearing. He uses this insight to support women he manages at work and to build relationships with suppliers.

This Tory government and the pandemic has radicalised him on healthcare, social care, education, tax etc.

He probably would like to have remained ignorant about his position in society but the scales have fallen from his eyes.

He's improving year on year. As am I as I had plenty of ingrained stuff myself

Yep same here. He was really really upset when a couple of years ago two sports pundits lost their jobs on Tv after getting called out for racist mickey taking of a another cricketer, but doesn’t care at all about transwomen in sports or prisons etc.

a bit. Think any man has this potential, and it can be once you’ve had children it really comes out.

my DP found parenting a shock at the start and definitely externalised that and blamed me for it (like another thread - DP said it’s the worst Christmas ever - running on here today).

i stood my ground on somethings important to me (breast feeding, responsive parenting) but had to unlearn my own sense that the baby was ‘all my responsibility/ problem’

we’d agreed before we had the first that DH would do one day a week of childcare for the first six months when I went back to work. He was uncomfortable when that rolled around (afraid of what he boss / colleagues would think) but I held him to it and it was the making of him as a father and us as more equal coparents.

a few years in he’d told me he was wrong about his approach at the outset, standing back and watching me struggle (though it’s also true I was shutting him out. It took us a while to work together rather than fight and blame each other).

he’s also had an excellent female
boss, the best boss he’s ever had and that made him reflect on why she only reached that position at the end of her career compared to all the younger men who’d been promoted ahead of her and were worse at it.

some of their concerns are valid. As a shy quiet nice guy at work, no one is nurturing HIM with a special programme to find his work voice / identity the way they are women or other monitories.

yet the men that make it to the top are agressive and trample on the nice guys as much as they do the women and non whites.

as a society we need to face up to why a bully’s personality is often rewarded.

he enjoys women’s sports and is un fussed by who is commentating or whatever.

he’s a work in progress. I’ve learned that so far feminism has been too much a discussion amongst women.

men need to ask questions. Have conversations eg at work. I’m encouraging him to be more open at work with how he prioritises his children, changes a work commitment for them, as leadership for others in the work force.

but we realised recently he’s the only senior one in his male dominated company with young children and a wife with a senior job of her own.

he’s a conformer so openly doing things differently isn’t easy for him.

but he thinks about stuff and has changed and owns it when he’s wrong. And that makes him a keeper.

I’ve encountered so many sexist men in the past (including ‘nice’ ones and woke ones) … When I met lovely DH, I jumped on him. He doesn’t big himself up for being antisexist, he just is. He has many friends of both sexes, respects women’s rights, revels in my successes and and never goes along with sexist banter. I finally got lucky.

And yet you are still married to these misogynists. Gross.

As @3487642l said .

don't listen to their female partners,
never apologize,
enjoy the benefits of financial/emotional/work-load inequality.

He thinks he's great, as do others, but last year I glimpsed the inner him. It was regarding a certain incident in the usa but the upshot was that young girls/women should not be upset or frightened or offended when confronted by a naked erect penis and they should have turned their heads away from the male flasher. It was the young girls fault. Hers.

Yes I want to leave, and no I cant.