DH says I've turned him into a chauvinist.

[HowDoIMakeHimUnderstand]

Have namechanged...

DH and I have been together 2 years, married for 1 and we have an 8 month old DD.

When we met, he was a laid-back, tolerant liberal man. Very much a live and let live sort of person...especially when it came to gender roles and women.

However, since we married and had DD, he has really started to alter his perception on relationships, marriage, men/women and just about everything.

We have a traditional set-up. I am a SAHM, he goes out to work. He works full time and has his own business, so he works really really long hours. As a result, I do all the housework, cooking and the majority of child-care.

Recently, he has begun to make comments in regards to a 'woman's place being in the home', he doesn't like the 'feminisation of the work-place' and says that when he was younger he was led to believe that there was no such thing as a happy housewife so he gave up thinking he would ever meet one. Until I came along apparently...

I am a v. laid back sort of person. I don't mind picking up dirty socks and towels off the floor, I couldn't give a fig what he wears, how he does his hair and I don't give a crap about clothes/jewelry/shopping etc. I hate confrontation, so if something trivial is bothering me, I just let it slide. Because of our personalities, DH is very much the dominant one in our relationship.

This is just who I am naturally, it is not planned nor is it a conscious choice.

However, it seems that my laid-back, do all the housework and generally let him get on with his business/go out to pub/fix up his cars, attitude is bringing about a really unpleasant side in him.

He now spouts forth that all women should stay home full time to raise their children and that no man really wants to do housework and change nappies...and any man that does so is just pandering to 'his woman' because he has been mis-led by the feminist movement and the media into thinking that he has to act 'like a pussy' in order to keep a woman...

I've tried pointing out how wrong this attitude is...I've argued with him. All to no avail. He just smiles at me and says 'Well, I'm just glad you're not a career-woman type. I go out to work, you stay home...this is how it should be'. He even said our marital set-up has made him a chauvinist.

What should I do? We are fundamentally very happy with our marriage, he treats me really well, is always there for me if I need him and is a completely devoted father. But I'm v. worried about the impact this new 'thinking' could have on our DD as she gets older...

Have I made a rod for my own back here? Should I stop behaving like this? What can I do?

Advice really needed here...thanks if you got this far!

This is a quote from my favourite christian marriage website:

"The concept of submission in Christian marriage is in a specific context - one of complete love and protection of the wife by the husband. It is when the husband is living as he is called to, putting his wife's interests above even his own, that she is called to submit."

The submission in this case refers to wider concepts - god; the church; the concept of marriage - NOT to the man as dominant. In all the major faiths, man and woman are supposed to be equally humble. A humble person does not judge others, even if he perceives them to be living the 'wrong' way. He never calls another person to submit to HIM, since that privilege is reserved for god.

I respect your faith, HDIMHU. I admire couples who live according to the principles above. I feel your good will, and good faith, have been used against you as a woman - be it ever so imperceptibly. I feel sad that your daughter is growing up to believe she is less than a man.

Maybe I am not being clear.

I support the right of all people, everywhere, regardless of gender, colour, race, religion and social status to live life as they choose, free from coercion, pressure or force.

I believe women should have all the same choices as men. I believe women should receive equal monetary compensation as men for doing the same work.

I believe there is nothing (bar biological examples) that a woman can't do that a man can.

I believe women are of equal value and worth and should be seen as such in the eyes of the world and all it's governments and societies.

I also really regret beginning this thread.

I knew there would be many people that would strongly disagree with how I live and I tried very hard to not lie about my situation to make it sound acceptable, nor yet to allow people to assume I was in an abusive situation which I thought many might.

It doesn't seem to have worked and I am sad that my claims to being a feminist are being refuted.

I really don't know what else to say...

Yes. I live in a 'biblical' style marriage. My husband is the head of the family. He has final say in the decision making process. I am happy and content in my role as his supporter and mother to his daughter.

I was NOT happy about his comments and name calling. It made me worry for my daughter that he may, in the future, attempt to persuade her that she should live as we do, simply because she is a girl. Those comments ran contrary to some of my most fundamental principles and beliefs.

I pondered what to do (including abdicating my chosen responsibilities as a housewife) before deciding to confront him head on, using this thread as proof of how serious I was.

It worked. He heard me, took me seriously, apologised and promised never to say those things again.

That's the flip-side of all this, it's the side you're not hearing. I allow (yes, allow) him to be head of our family. In return, he treats me as he should, with respect, love and as his number one priority.

I don't believe that adherence to any religion is compatible with being a feminist, unless you ignore and gloss over the inherent misogyny and underlying principles about gender roles and the inequality of women.

A significant part of most religions (some more than others) is about keeping women in subjugation to men.

OP....if you don't want your dd to be persuaded to live her life this way....then why are you doing it ?

Serious question

AF,

No, I'm not going to persuade her that she shouldn't live like this. But nor am I going to persuade her that she should.

I am going to teach her that the are whole range of choices out there and she should choose the one that she feels is right for her and makes her happy.

I feel that how I live is just such a choice and if she were to decide of her own free will to live as I do, then I would be just supportive of her as if she chose anything else.

I hear your frustration. It's not really fair to ask you to defend a thousands-of-years-old doctrine, when you came to ask a relatively simple question.

I think some of us feel your question wasn't that simple after all ...
... Your title says your DH reckoned you'd turned him into a chauvinist. I don't believe that's possible: a chauvinist chooses his own position. This part hasn't really been addressed in your thread: did he claim (or you suspect) that your 'surrender' made him feel superior & entitled?

If so, I consider that a great failing. If all he has to do is shut up about his sexist views - and continue enjoying a life of cushy entitlement - then yours isn't a model marriage and it isn't fair. The 'surrendered' marriage is supposed to elevate both partners, not just the one with a penis.

I have the same concerns about the lessons your daughter learns by observation. If the words she hears from you belie the life you live - she'll learn that words don't count, especially the words of a woman.

The way you live is your choice, of course, and I appreciate that you've made it consciously. I'd ask you to try & avoid using religion as an excuse to shut your ears to criticism, though: you know better than that.

HDIMHU...do you agree that by far the biggest impact on how our children form relationships as they grow older is by modelling the primary one that influences them from the day they are born

their parents

grace

The reason I said 'DH says I've turned him into a chauvinist' was because that is literally what he said.

We have not been married (hence living together) long and the comments had only started recently and when I did challenge him (albeit gently at first) about them, he would often laugh or smile and say something to the effect of 'well, living with you has made me see that this way of life is the right way...a lot of divorces wouldn't happen if more people did what we do'.

So, yes, I did worry that my 'surrender' if you want to put it like that, was bringing about this those horrid comments.

I considered that if he really meant what he said and he didn't stop, I was quite within my rights to go back on my part of the deal and refuse to be his supporter and look after the house, do all the child-care etc.

I consider myself a decent human being so when I heard the things he said, I was really shocked...and appalled. But perhaps I was too quick to assume that he really meant what he said and that they weren't just mis-guided and ultimately stupid and offensive jokes. Certainly nothing more has been said since I confronted him head on.

I consider that my marriage does elevate me. I'm really happy with what I do and how I live. How many people (especially women) can say that?

The criticism of his comments I absolutely agree with. But the uncomfortable turn the thread took with abuse allegations and the names he was called (which he has read) I couldn't just ignore.

Just as he should not ever refer to women as btches or harpies, I don't expect others to refer to him as a cnt or any other degrading name.

With regards to my daughter. I will tell her that I have freely chosen my life as it is and that she too should feel free to choose a life that suits her. I don't see that my words are in opposition to my actions.

I don't think I have used religion as an excuse to shut my ears to criticism. Some of the criticism is fair. Some of it is not.

AF,

Yes I completely agree that children are likely to model the example of marriage that they grow up with.

So given that I have a happy marriage, I would be entirely comfortable with her attempting to emulate/modelling mine.

When I think of some of the utter fuckwits I dallied with in my youth, my blood runs cold that I would ever consider "surrendering" or "submitting" to them

If she chooses your way of life, HDIMHU, I really, really hope the attitude of her father (that women are somehow inferior) doesn't rub off too much so that she makes bad choices in whom she might submit to

However...she has you to guide her, thankfully

"This is just like all those other sexist things that women claim to be in a position to "choose" to do, like pole dancing, or prostitution, or taking their husband's name, or wearing the burkha etc. These aren't choices, they are imposed upon us - some women have just been brainwashed into thinking it's a choice".

Well, that is convenient.

Lucky for us we have women like you intent on removing these so called 'non-choices'.

And this is where it all comes crashing down for me. Years of reading all the right literature and proselytizing about 'The Beauty Myth' and the evils of patriarchy etc etc etc led me to one conclusion:

Feminism has lost it's way here. There is no such thing as the sisterhood, at least not anymore. We quibble over who can be in the feminist club because no one really knows what it means to be a feminist in western culture.

But where feminism in it's true form is badly needed is in those places in the world where it is truly dangerous to be a woman, where women are forced under threat of violence or even death to conform to a series of customs that leave them virtually imprisoned with no education and inadequate health-care.

I am not a sex-trafficked prostitute, forced into selling her body for someone else's profit. I am not a woman living under Taliban rule, unable to leave her house unaccompanied. I am not a Congolese woman living alone with the very real prospect of rape by military forces hanging over my head. I am not an 'honour-killing' bride, forced to marry a man I do not love and do not want to live with.

I am an educated, lucky Western woman who has chosen to live a life according to the principles I feel are best and right for me. I respect and demand for the right of all women to have such freedom.

I don't need to be saved.

'I am an educated, lucky Western woman who has chosen to live a life according to the principles I feel are best and right for me. I respect and demand for the right of all women to have such freedom.
' well you may choose to decide that- presumably you have formed that opinion since the OP where you ask for advice.

May I however just point out that others do need saving; in this country. My good friend may not have been the trafficked prostiturte but her H turned out to be the one doing said trafficking, there is some beleif (we are not sure, taking it in steps) that friend was being run and she is having to rebuild her life post-saving by the police and judicial system. Very successfully: she started her first ever job 2 weeks ago, a huge achievement.

There may well be greater diversity of role in Western culture (I am a lucky person married to someone who regards me as equal and bears an equal and varying share of responsibility) but becuase some of us are not trying to battle that level of hardship does not mean that others are not. Or that our DD's (well actually I have only ds's but they may well have daughters)will not be the unlucky ones who fall victim to a seemingly respectable man who then manipulates them into a lifestyle we can barely imagine: my friend is 5 stones, has lived in fear of her H's heavies snatching her children for years. Some of us are lucky, some are not. You seem to be able to make your own decisions and fundamentally that's the lucky side.

I did indeed study fem lit as an undergrad.

And I loved The Beauty Myth. I still do in fact despite it's declining popularity.

I did for a few years become very active and interested in feminist and gender politics.

But I eventually came to realise that I wanted to be a feminist on my own terms.

After all, Julie Bindel has written about the neccesity of political lesbianism in the feminist community but you don't find that every woman who considers herself to be a feminist forgoes relationships with men.

If Bindel can disagree with Burchill and Greer can disagree with Wolf, why can't I disagree with you and still be a feminist?

"Feminism has basic tenets".

As far as I know, there is only one:

That women be afforded all the same social and political rights as enjoyed by men.

Dittany, I have to agree with HowDo on this. She's exercising a personal choice. She's not advocated the same choice for other women. The fact that she was able to choose her surrendered/submitted lifestyle is a triumph for feminism.

HowDo, you emphatically don't seem to be doing anything to advance the cause of feminism; not even with your daughter, as she will learn from how you live rather than what you preach. So I kind of think you may have been a feminist - and you might think feminist thoughts - but you're not an active feminist. Whereas Dittany is.

So, HDIMHU...your last sentence tells me that your husband should be equally as happy to live in a submissive relationship as you are, and agree to be dominated by a woman

ain't never gonna happen

I haven't and don't claim that how I relate to my husband is feminist, but since I do strongly and wholly believe in the intrinsic equality of men and women, I do have the right to label myself a feminist.

AF - What my husband might choose to do in a relationship is up to him, just as what I choose to do is up to me. However, what you wrote did cause me to think that I would probably wish to conduct my marriage in the same way, even if I were gay and married to a woman. It suits me as a person, even taking away the gender dimension.

It's probably because my choice to let my husband be dominant is so unacceptable in the feminist community that I'm so keen to emphasise that I am a feminist. Women are not equal, in so many ways, I completely agree. But I'm not arguing that men have a right to dominate women...not at all.

I'm arguing for my right to choose to let my husband dominate me. It is personal, not political.

I am not in the "feminist community"

I don't consider my opinions on this to be purely from a feminist viewpoint

I just have too much self-respect to place the responsibility for my lifestyle, opinions and how I bring up my children in a man's hands (or in fact, anyone else's)

I don't consider kow-towing to some bloke (who gets a bit uppitty in his outlook, if left unchecked...) a sensible life-choice, nor a good example to my daughter

You give away too much of yourself or perhaps my personality type is not suited to being under the thumb

I have another question for you, OP

Why did you feel the need to namechange for this thread ?

"This is just like all those other sexist things that women claim to be in a position to "choose" to do, like pole dancing, or prostitution, or taking their husband's name, or wearing the burkha etc. These aren't choices, they are imposed upon us - some women have just been brainwashed into thinking it's a choice".

This is the absolute truth and it is not at all convenient.

I don't see why either partner has to submit in a relationships. Why is it necessary? Do you have a dominant and a submissive person in your friendship with other females?? or other peers?

"who gets a bit uppitty in his outlook"

classic.