I'm not convinced that feminism has helped the women it should have?

[soapona]

I think on these discussion boards and on my Facebook I see women. They don't insist on marriage so they partner remains married to the ex for years and year, they live together and I wonder what will happen should the man die. I also see women with no security living with men with no intentions of marrying and having children. Women moving in with men too soon. In the days gone by women would and could have insisted on commitment. So now the position for women is worse hanging round waiting for a proposal.

I know they don't have to I'm fairly wealthy and a single parent so have choices and always have. I don't have a lot to gain from marriage.

I'm not sure things have got better for women we are expected to do a lot now two incomes are the usual for a mortgage instead of one in the olden days . So it's a given women work, do the most childcare do we honestly think these thing will change when the power imbalance is there from the beginning?

Also the women marrying "beneath themselves", that's not the correct term but a man earning less and not likely to come into a decent inheritance. What is the point in getting married there if you're a women? Perhaps if the woman is wealthy to avoid inheritance tax for her children but other than that I don't know?

So would woman not be happier marrying the same or above and insisting on marriage early on, like it was a given in days gone by?

Surely Women are now in very risky positions due to this living together in a man's property. I see much more domestic abuse these days. I believe the stats are much higher with non married couples. Surely living together unmarried has been caused by equality and feminism and the very people feminists has been trying to help they've hindered.

Individual women making bad choices is not feminists fault. Men acting like assholes and treating women shit, is not feminists fault. The fact that the patriarchy is still out there swinging it’s balls around, is not feminists fault.

No it's not, it's men's. You're right that we need to keep some perspective.

It is very frustrating because women fight so much to get so little in return. The vote is a good example. Now the three major parties don't believe women exist as a class, because there is no definition of woman, and women's reproductive rights/health don't matter because men can represent women.

It's like no matter what we do they'll just blindside us.

Men using equality laws to fuck women over, happens a lot. I read last week on here about a male midwife saying he faced a lot of sexism. Because to him, women saying they want a female midwife = sexism.

I'm referring to post 1960s feminism. As for the informed choices, very difficult to implement when you become the only one insisting on marriage. It becomes norm.

I saw a post a while back saying after 2 years cohabiting couples should have the same legal protection as marriage. Personally I don't think it's a bad idea. It would be interesting to see the outcome of that.

I saw a post a while back saying after 2 years cohabiting couples should have the same legal protection as marriage. Personally I don't think it's a bad idea. It would be interesting to see the outcome of that.

Absolutely not!. It's a terrible idea and two years is nothing. Some people have good reason to choose not to marry. I'd choose not to in order to protect my assets. (No kids yet) and I want to be able to make a clean break should I find myself in a relationship again that doesn't work out. People should have to make an active decision to become so closely tied to another person.

OP, why do you blame feminism for giving women more choice and rights, rather than men/patriarchy for taking advantage of women in anyway they can for as far back as anyone can remember? Maybe if men hadn’t oppressed us in the first place, we wouldn’t have these problems huh?

@PineappleSeahorse Two years cohabiting is long enough to decide if you're committed or not. If it's not you're not committed!

AngelsSins

You're totally right. Maybe it's better to say, how did we manage to get it so wrong, and could we have done things another way to get a better outcome? But I think the answer will probably be that all roads lead to the same place because our oppression is so complete, and where me make small gains in one area we lose them in another area.

@AngelsSins I'm blaming feminism as in many ways women are worse off. In my opinion it's lead to the destruction in family and made life worse for women. They are now even more subservient than they were when my mum got married in the 1960s. Women are expected to do everything with no commitment!

Two years cohabiting is long enough to decide if you're committed or not. If it's not you're not committed

I can't agree with that.

I know dozens of people who cohabited with a partner for four or five years in their late teens/early twenties and ended up going their own ways.

Are you seriously be suggesting such people should have to go through the hassle and expense of divorce?

My other "feminist" issue is much as the pill helped many women it is not a feminist friend. It put men in a position to push for sex without commitment, leading to the situation we are now in.

Sorry but I disagree. Two years is very little time in a relationship. And no one should be forced into sharing assets like this. It should be a choice. You don't need to have an elaborate wedding in order to get married so if people want to get married they can go to the registry office for a simple ceremony, I have assets which might not be much by others' standards but which will keep a roof over my head and I want to be able to walk away with them should the relationship end.

I saw a post a while back saying after 2 years cohabiting couples should have the same legal protection as marriage. Personally I don't think it's a bad idea. It would be interesting to see the outcome of that.
Absolutely not!

If 2 people wish to enter into a legal contract with each other then they both freely enter into it.
If either party doesn't wish to enter a legal contract then that is their right and the other party can decide if that is a deal breaker and/or make appropriate arrangements that suit them.

2 people should be able to cohabit without a legal contract without having things imposed on them to appease others who chose to make bad choices.

Why should a woman with assets have to live alone rather than cohabit and remain legally separate from her new DP?

I'm afraid I'm of the view that education on choices and finances and responsibilities is crucial, but we can't legislate in a way that binds the majority for the minority's poor decision making.

I think there has been something of a mixed message given to women, in particular, around having kids, and the idea of marriage vs freedom.

I don't know that I think trying to force couples to put men and women in the same roles is really the way to go. Making it possible is one thing, but in other ways it doesn't really accept the fact that there are sexual differences around the care of infants and small children.

For a time there was a sense that laws around married couples could to some extent account for this, wrt things like division of property, spousal support, and so on. And a lot of that has been degraded by the expectation that all women work, childcare should be outsourced, and men should be interchangeable as caregivers - even with infants who are still nursing. This is one thing I don't think we can blame men for, there has been a brand of feminism which has pushed this and many women have chosen this by preference. But of course if those things are all true, the basis for needing certain protections in marriage are harder to argue.

I think its true that better social housing and benefits might see some couples separate who are together for mainly financial reasons. I have mixed feelings about this though, because I am not convinced it is good overall for society if it seems like having a child with someone and living with them is easy to reverse. It's not great for kids and it's not really good for adults either. It seems like it can be very difficult to find a balance between that kind of seriousness and negative social judgement when things go wrong. (And for anyone who says no women are making these kinds of decisions casually, that's not my experience. They do, for a variety of reasons.)

@PineappleSeahorse Can I ask what is the purpose of these relationships? It's sound more like a glorified lodger, you're bidding your time. Fair enough if both agree you can sign to waive your rights to marriage like security after two years. You will be in no doubt where each of you stand then.

@ArnoldWhatshisknickers I am not expecting people to go through the hassle and expense of divorce as it would "clarify" what these people really wanted. We have government legalisation on cigarettes and sugar in fizzy drinks. How about legalisation for this?

The purpose of the relationship is that of any other relationship, you hope that it works out but all too often relationships don't and I'm aware of the mess that can result and people be left with nothing so I want to protect myself . I'm not willing to lose my assets to a man.

I'm not in a relationship at the moment and I have no desire to be. I like my independence and space too much but should I change my mind, I'll make it very clear that I have no intention of marrying or giving up my assets, and I don't expect my partner to sacrifice theirs either.

Women are expected to do everything with no commitment!

You seem to be pretending women don’t have a voice? If a woman wants marriage and her partner doesn’t then she has the choice to leave and find someone else. If a woman wants a man who accepts that housework is just as much his work as his partners, then she has the choice not to settle with a sexist pig. Women aren’t passive objects for men to own anymore, we have our own choices to make. You suggest the pill made it easier for men to push for sex?! Ok, let’s say you’re right, women don’t have to obey men’s demands.

@AngelsSins very true but it's not the norm and men now hold the cards. Whereas in time gone by men had to get married to have sex on demand. The alternative is being single, which is fine but I think most women would prefer a respectful family unit as would most men but often without the commitment.

I saw a post a while back saying after 2 years cohabiting couples should have the same legal protection as marriage. Personally I don't think it's a bad idea. It would be interesting to see the outcome of that.

There are laws like this in some places. Where I live, it's modified, the couple still own what assets they cam in with, but there is scope to argue to a judge that there is another division that is fairer, for example if one person also contributed significantly to maintenance of the dwelling. But things like pensions do become shared.

While it's very neat to think people can live together and keep everything separate, the reality is that doesn't really happen in most cases, and it creates a situation where one person, and it is usually the woman, is exploited. It's the same reason these sorts of rules and laws around marriage came to exist in the first place, to protect from exploitation.

Like the OP said, when the customs around marriage are deemed passe, or it becomes expensive and is seen as a luxury to have a wedding, it becomes very difficult for many women to insist on marriage with their partners. They still make the same choices women in other families do about childcare, or work, or moving, or buying a car that requires two incomes, and everything else.

Yes, this does curtail people who want to cohabit with no ties, in the end that never quite works out the way people think, emotionally or financially or otherwise. In any case if it's been two years and you aren't willing to make a commitment it might be time to move on. The women who can afford to not worry about the protections of the law tend to be better off anyway.

Yes, this does curtail people who want to cohabit with no ties, in the end that never quite works out the way people think, emotionally or financially or otherwise.

It worked out very nicely for me and my former partner.

I agree that these things are not the result of feminism, but rather evidence of how much the patriarchy still disadvantages women. Things that would help IMHO are:

1. Absent parents (let's face it, usually men) should be pursued for child maintenance in the same way that they would be pursued if they owed HMRC. I think there should be a minimum level of support that all children are entitled to, regardless of how much their absent parent earns. This should be paid to the resident parent up-front by the government, who chase the non-resident parent until it has been paid back.

1. Good quality, subsidised wrap-around childcare until secondary school age. So many women lose their independence because it's "not worth" going back to work after maternity leave.

1. Fathers to be should be lawfully entitled to a substantial period of paternity leave. Lots of reasons why this would be good for families but it also make men a potential liability to employers in the same way as women.

1. Financial protection for cohabiting parents (again, usually women) who give up work to care for children. You often hear people say that having a child with someone is a bigger commitment than marriage. In practice that's untrue.

Patriarchy's gonna patriarch

I was born in the 1950s so I know the time you are talking about. My mother first couldn't go out to work, because it would have made it look like my father couldn't keep her. Then he left and she was able to get a job where she was paid half of what the man beside her with less responsability was earning.

She couldn't sign a contract herself, only the husband could sign it. And there were lots of women already in work and going home to do all the cooking and housework for their husbands.

We have a lot to thank the feminists of the 60s/70s for.

In retrospect, I do have a few criticisms of our worldview in those days. I was never an activist but a woman of my times. We viewed housewives in the same way as way men do. I thought that childcare and housework were demeaning work of no value, for example.

But in the end, we live in a capitalist system that will always turn things to its advantage and everyone became complacent. The younger generations took these gains for granted while deriding feminism.

What really annoys me is when women won't discuss marriage. You see it all the time on here. A poster complains that their DP of some years hadn't proposed but they aren't willing to propose themselves or broach the subject. "I'm old fashioned. The man has to propose" Well, more fool you then, you bloody idiot. If it's so important to you then raise the subject. Marriage is not about a "romantic" proposal and an expensive day spent dressed in white. It's about the commitment, not the dress.

@PineappleSeahorse I wholeheartedly agree with this statement.

The benefits of social housing apply to couples too. Better social housing isn’t just about there being more single parents.

A large part of why people need big incomes and two people working full time is because of the huge cost of housing.

It worked out very nicely for me and my former partner.

That's nice for you, but it's unusual for people to separate after years of cohabiting with no financial or emotional fall-out.

It's interesting that you keep saying you don't want to sacrifice your assets in order to have a live-in relationship. That is what men who are in a better financial position than their partners are inclined to say, why they would choose in some cases not to marry if they could, and why laws like these were developed to protect their partners.