feel like I’m turning into an anti-marriage feminist

[NewFem]

So, I’m new to feminism but I’ve been having some thoughts about marriage and how it relates to women as a whole.

Marriage, I think, turns women against each other. Everything from weddings (making other women feel bad by not choosing them to be your bridesmaid for some nonsensical reason), to marital life itself is about women competing with each other and using their marital status (i.e. their relationship with a man) to one up another woman. Married women are seen and treated better than single women societally. They are showered with gifts for their wedding, for example and everyone must stop and celebrate their special day. When a woman gets married, all other women are expected to uplift her for finding a man in her life.

Whereas you rarely see any of the above I mentioned between married men and single men. Married men’s title remains Mr just like single men, nearly all married men keep their last name. Married women are distinguished above single women.

Overall I feel like marriage is a tool that brings divide amongst women and the reason why you see so many women aspiring for marriage or refusing to let go of this patriarchal institution is because of the elevated status that marriage gives them over other women. There’s no other patriarchal creation that I can think of that women - including some who call themselves feminists - generally defend so strongly. I believe the status it gives them over other women is the reason why.

Thoughts?

@reasysteady

"Competition for men is what’s behind most female to female bullying"

Ha ha ha.

Grow up op come join us in the real world. Why do you hate women so much?
Leave us alone, we've got enough problems without you trying to stir some imaginary pot

Reported.

Reported

OK, that's your choice but why?

You post does come across as disliking women and wedding days.

I have plenty of females friends and have never felt in competition for 'a man' in mu life. If I have to compete with someone for a man, why would I want him?

Honestly, I agree with OP.
I for one am glad that someone said it.

MN feminist boards are little strange often, women are always victims and the only problematic people are males.

@Floisme

How do we square economic independence with a desire to raise your own child, or even to cut down your working hours to spend time with them?

I don't see how we can.

Before I had a child, I had no idea how strongly I would want to be with them. It blew me away. It felt primal. We found a compromise and muddled through, as most of us do, but I have never found a satisfactory answer to this conundrum from feminism, certainly not from the first feminists I hung out with who were second wavers and treated mothers with little short of contempt.

This is the first feminist space I have found where anyone gets this.

This is the whole point of feminism though isn't it? The current structure doesn't work for women but we are so enveloped by the patriachy that we can't see the binds that tie us.

When I began to centre women, I swear to God I felt my world shift on its axis & things became clear (dramatic I know). So many people still just cannot cannot visualise a world which doesn't revolve around males, with consideration for women's biological demands & family centred working lives.

I tried to explain this to DH once and he shrugged it off saying 'well that wouldn't work would it? Nobody would make any money' which shows exactly the kids of thinking were all battling against & why sadly feminism has to work so hard for the tiny gains.

One problem with your analysis, OP is the assumption that women shouldn’t want status. Marriage may be one way of obtaining status. There are others. Status is important. A feminist analysis would acknowledge that.

@SawdustandHay but the issue is that marriage is still such a significant way for women in all walks of life from all backgrounds to achieve status and economic security. That’s not the case for men.

Women shouldn’t need to get married in order to have economic security for themselves or their children. A decent system to ensure both parents contribute adequately to the costs of their children would help the latter.

@Luredbyapomegranate

You are still making me laugh OP, the PP saying you have created an odd thread is correct.

Here’s a reading list for you, just so you can get a grip on what feminism actually is, and what the key societal issues are. Some of these books are very current, some of them are classics, but overall they will be useful

Invisable women - Caroline Perez

Men Explain Things to Me - Rebecca Solnit

We Should All Be Feminists - Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie.

Feminism is for everybody Bell hooks

Caitlin Moran - More than a woman

The women’s room Marilyn French

A room of one’s own Virginia wolf

The second sex Simone de Beauvoir

The female eunuch Germaine Greer

The Bell jar Sylvia Plath

Vindication of the rights of women Mary Wollstonecraft

Amanda Foreman’s the ascent of woman is a great BBC series

Thanks for sharing this list.

I think this is quite an odd thread, but your post is proof that there are positives in everything.

Just catching up.

Interested to see that op had a research paper to hand about women/ girls being bullies / horrible/ whatever.

Well yes of course they can. Obviously.

What's interesting is OP reading s post and thinking oh yes! No one has asked for evidence or anything or even started getting into that much. Certainly not enough to start anyone googling. Luckily it's something I know about well enough to have a link handy!

Is this an area you are interested in OP? Women/ girls being awful.

How long have you been interested in Feminism? You say it's a relatively new thing for you.

@MoonlightApple

I mean the aim of feminism should be to show children are not a woman’s burden if she doesn’t want it to be and not a ‘feminine’ thing for men to want to look after their children either.

A burden?

That's quite strong!

Is there an age limit on that? Maybe an age of parent/ child where children generally stop being a burden and as the years pass, very often become a support?

Some very depressing ideas/ experiences on here. About friends, family etc.

I look around and I don't see that at all. It's not usual to have friends of your own sex who are all essentially insecure, nasty, shallow arseholes who enjoy being nasty to their friends.

It's really not common for mums and dads to feel children are a burden FULL STOP!

I think of my children, OH, our respective parents, siblings.

The way the grandparents, including my parents who were v distant when I was at home, love the grandchildren, love seeing them being with them.
The way in OH family with host of siblings, who all have kids 0-10. They all are close. Helping their dad who lives alone, making sure he has everything he needs and sees them all etc.
The happiness of the whole lot esp grandpa when with grandchildren, esp whole lot together 7 children!

Children are a burden?

That's just, sorry. I'm sorry you feel that's, you said it like it's a fact.

I really feel for some posters on this thread tbh.

[quote CayrolBaaaskin]@SawdustandHay but the issue is that marriage is still such a significant way for women in all walks of life from all backgrounds to achieve status and economic security. That’s not the case for men.

Women shouldn’t need to get married in order to have economic security for themselves or their children. A decent system to ensure both parents contribute adequately to the costs of their children would help the latter.[/quote]
That’s really not what the original post is about. The OP entirely dismisses economic arguments, and really any argument that marriage might be in a woman’s rational self-interest. She views it purely as aggressive self-aggrandisement.

I’ve also never heard of a woman giving “financial protection” as the reason for wanting to get married (apart from the women here on mumsnet). It’s all about showing off to others that you’ve been picked by a man and that a man finds you more desirable (sexually attractive) than other women that drives most of the marital desire.

It's so interesting that the group that came up with the concept of marriage, what it meant for the man/woman, what it still means all over the world. The group that built the structure of societies, gave themselves all the power. The group that passed girls/women from one owner to another.

The group that in USA uses marriage in some areas to avoid being charged for rape of girls. And all over the world female children are married to when too young.

The group that made the laws, controls the majority of wealth across the world.

The group that developed norms for paid work in a way that suits them. That has for centuries? More? Categorised certain essential work as a privilege, and a natural need for another group. So obviously it is easy, fulfilling, devoid of real value.

...

The group that has a particular paranoia that is the root of the interest in controlling members of the other group in so many ways and for so long.

The group that have for millennia decided on what makes members of the other group high or low value.

The group so preoccupied by these things that when they decide to pick someone from the other group to be closely linked to them. That valued characteristics are youth, obedience, total lack of any previous sexual experience of any sort going as far as never having been alone at all with any man not related to her ever....

Any and all issues with the institution of marriage when it comes to negative impact on women/ girls is due to...

Women.
And how awful they all are to other women.

Are you ABSOLUTELY sure? As a woman with an interest in feminism?

OP your perspective is... Well I've heard it before for sure. The amount of support for OP view is also, erm, noted.

@Darkpheonix

Its not a prenatal agreement since lots of people do not have kids.

People always come up with "we should have this instead of marraige'

And it's usually extremely similar to marriage. Just without the wedding. If you want the legal side of marriage and it would offer you protection, get married. The wedding can be done and dusted in 30 mins. No party no fancy outlets etc. There's no need for 'marriage but a different word so we can pretend it's something else'

You are thinking too narrowly about what constitutes marriage.

It's just whatever mechanism a society has to recognize a set of commitments between a couple (or in some societies more than that, usually one man and several wives.) This generally involves some customary form of agreement, responsibilities to the people involved, and social recognition and support.

Our society has typically put this in the form of a legal contract, but that's because we live in a record=keeping, law-governed bureaucracy where we have pensions and medical insurance.

The fact is though, as much as some countries allow other permutations including same-sex couples, and as much as many couples may not have children, the institution is there because of the consequences of reproduction. If we did not reproduce sexually, there would be no need for marriage, even if for some reason we still had some sort of pair bonding. People could make alliances and change them or whatever, and they would be equally able to work, participate in politics, whatever.

So yes, if you change the name but accomplish the same thing, it's still marriage. Changing the name isn't really changing anything either, it's just a process change, or change of custom.

Though arguably you could have a similar institution that shared some features - say access to pensions - but were not organized around the needs of dependent partners and children or related to sex, and that would be rather different. So for example in some places you could have two sisters who formed such a union but clearly not a marriage, in any sense we'd recognize.

So this business about free childcare vs some kind of income so mums could stay home is interesting. I disagree that both are about socialism, that's not what I've observed. TYpically in my experience you will see universal childcare pushed by progressive parties that see themselves as socialist, while you will see payments directly to mothers is more likly to be pushed by conservative parties. Not the neoliberal wing, but the traditional kinds of conservatives.

That difference speaks to a lot of splits I see about right vs left issues. It's not about one nice side wants to help people and the other is just against that. It's a different view of what is really help and what isn't.

FWIW, I agree with Florisme - young mothers are often shocked by their feelings about leaving their infants. I had a boss suggest to me that this might be so when I was pregnant and planning to come back to work, I was incensed. He was entirely correct though.

Feminism has really neglected this issue, to the point where if you want to explore it, you have to look to conservative women's organisations, the kind feminist organisations look down their noses at. There are probably a few reasons for it - being blinded by a tendency to compare women to men and look for equality of outcome (thanks identity politics.) Perhaps a certain amount of capture by the state and industry who prefer women to work. The fact that two incomes is more advantageous for professional families. But I also think, at times, that there are a certain number of influential second-wave types who actually hate the female reproductive role, and the fact that it involves fathers. It limits the degree to which feminist messages will ever resonate with women though.

I think it is important to consider marriage as something separate from the traditional patriarchal oppression women face as well. I can be what we make it.

There are several legal protections in marriage, next of kin (in case on an accident), inheritance, sharing of assets accumulated during the marriage, tax breaks of gifts and inheritance etc.

When I studied law, our family law professor said that he had come across a lot of people who were trying to come up with complicated legal documents to protect their partner in case something happened. He was always saying “why don’t you just get married, this is what marriage achieve.

'
The fact is though, as much as some countries allow other permutations including same-sex couples, and as much as many couples may not have children, the institution is there because of the consequences of reproduction.'

Specifically it's about male paranoia about paternity. That's why it exists.

The fact that we were and still are in some places property of husband when marry, is a basic fact. And it says it all surely.

The examples I gave upthread.
Child marriage.
Women and girls conferred 'value' according to sexual experience.

Most value is girl puberty ish, definitely not had any kind of contact with men, possibly face not even seen by any male outside family.

Value reduces with things like sex before husband, already got children, previously married, often having been raped counts as lowering value, seen as / is promiscuous, has ever earned money through prostitution.

This male hierarchy of female value, maybe with small tweaks, is still embedded in the UK. If you look and listen it's obvious.

Marriage exists because of.. male paranoia. I suppose that could be called the consequences of reproduction but that airbrushes all the fundamental stuff out.

Are you sure it's only other posters who are looking too narrowly at what constitutes marriage?

We also have civil partnerships.

Did opposite sex couples get the right to that though I can't remember.

You’re conflating ‘wedding’ and ‘marriage’. The former is a commercialised hyped up event where (for some people) appearance is everything. The latter is a useful legal arrangement, especially for women who are planning to have children and therefore likely to take the associated career hit. It might be different if we had better legal protections for cohabiting couples, especially those with children, but in the absence of that, marriage forms a useful framework for what to do in the event of a relationship breakdown.

the institution is there because of the consequences of reproduction. If we did not reproduce sexually, there would be no need for marriage, even if for some reason we still had some sort of pair bonding

Yes that's one of the reasons marriage was created. Doesn't mean calling it prenatal agreement is right.

I do agree that there should be some way of having similar agreements, between say friends. That would be something new. My best friend is also my dps sisters and we have talked about it. As much as we love out respective partners, we do feel that life would be happier and easier if it was us that lived together. Especially for her as her husband is a bit shit.

But that's not what I was talking about. This is the first time I have discussed that sort change, outside me and my friend and seeing a video on tiktok where 2 women, had got married. Not because they were in love or in a relationship. But as 2 single parents to raise their kids. I support that. But that wouldn't be changing marriage. That would be the creation of something new.

The vast majority of the time this conversation is around creating something identical to marriage but still revolves around love and romance. It's always marriage between 2 romantic partners. It usually involves marriage by default, to benefit people who didn't get married and now regret it.

I don't know how I feel about marriage tbh

I think for me the trade off is this alleged financial security and stable environment Vs being trapped with someone who then changes or couod still ne entitled to half of what you have despite being a lousy husband and father.

I jate the idea if the embarrassment of having to day its iver after everyone chipped in thousands for your wedding. Having to leave before the credit card bill or even paid off.

I hate how even thinking about if someone is marriage material turns it into sonw limd of credit check like the bank does as opposed to being because you love eachother.

But then I ended a LTR a year ago amd I can't imagine going back to a situation where I lose my financial independence (sadly its benefit top ups and part time work but it's mine ) and be come part of a situation where Im financially stuck with someone again.

Having attenuated every combination amd compromise in.a relationship ie - stability vs chemistry vs love etc and not found what I can live with or without. I dont wanna be stuck again.

If that makes sense.

Plus the whole idea of a man giving me away to another man just makes ne too angry

@Darkpheonix
Well said. I’ve also thought they should allow siblings to form civil partnerships. My mother and (single asexual) uncle have always said they’d live together and support each other in old age if my father passes before them. Many times a partnership has nothing to do with romance or sex. It’s about love and not living alone but having someone to share your life (or old age) with.

@Doubletoilandtrouble

I am actually going to go a bit against the grain here. I think it depends on how marriage is defined and executed.

For me it is about having a partnership where both parties take joint decisions to benefit the family unit. It may mean that one person works shorter hours to facilitate child care. It may mean that both partners reduce their hours. I think ultimately women need to be responsible for ensuring that they maintain their independence but I don’t see anything wrong with marriage as an institution at all (although I have no time for weddings, wedding dresses, etc).

Actually, one of my friends is a high income earner. Her husband is a nurse who has reduced his hours in order to be able to pick up their children from school. My friend considers herself very lucky with this support and she contributes to his pension savings.

👏👏👏 for your friend I have said so many times that if woman gives up work for kids her husband needs to pay her a “wage” and her pension contributions. Pensions are so often overlooked at the time it is most effective to be saving for this

the institution is there because of the consequences of reproduction. If we did not reproduce sexually, there would be no need for marriage, even if for some reason we still had some sort of pair bonding

Are you saying you think people wouldn’t couple-up if there weren’t sex or kids?

Don’t you believe in love?

I also think it’s unfair that you can leave your stuff to a spouse free if iht but not to a sibling or friend. To me we should be able to choose how we live and who is dear to us. One size doesn’t fit all.