One of the more common misconceptions in the manosphere is that women don’t place any cachet in being married. A surprising number of men have inadvertently swallowed the feminist misdirection on this issue. This is somewhat understandable, since there is a paradox involved here. Yes women are divorcing frivolously at alarming rates as well as delaying marriage. Yes most women seem to enjoy (or are at least very open to) messages glorifying divorce as empowerment. But anyone who has studied game even a little knows that what women want doesn’t always make sense from a man’s perspective. An obvious case in point is that women want commitment from an attractive man, despite the fact that a man offering commitment tends to make the man less attractive to women (but it does build comfort).
Even prior to my coming to the manosphere my wife has pointed out the cachet the term husband has with women. Very often when women invoke the term there is a subtle status message, a sort of bragging right. The wife of one newlywed couple we met on a cruise several years ago used the term fairly conspicuously in this way, although many would likely have missed the subtext.
One way my wife uses the cachet of the term is when other women are trying to pressure her into something she doesn’t want to do. She has found that if she tells a saleswoman she doesn’t like a particular scent, for example, that the woman will just continue trying to talk her into it. The same goes for girlfriends trying to talk her into a different style or a new product. One day a woman was trying to sell her something that she knew I wouldn’t like, so she said My husband wouldn’t like that. The phrase was like a magic incantation; the saleswoman immediately dropped the issue. She has found it works just as well with girlfriends. It is the one thing which will stop the constant pressure from other women to get her to conform on something.
Just the other week my wife was looking at Halloween candy at Oriental Trading Company. She noticed that many of the reviews showed a kind of wifely pride which many in the manosphere wouldn’t believe is possible. One woman shared her thoughts on Oozing Eyeballs:
I was alittle disappointed in these because I purchased them to put on top of cupcakes. I thought the eyeball design was on the product, but it’s on the package. My husband says they taste good though…
And another review on the same product:
Actually my husband requested these. We bought them several years ago and he ate them ALL before Halloween!!! So, bought them just for him this year.
Somewhere a feminist’s head just exploded. But what can they do? They’ve already tried moxie.
That women can take pride in their men and the inherent status for women associated with relationships is denied by feminists and many MRAs alike. Denied or not, it remains the truth. Heartiste touched on this in a recent addition to the collection of Maxims:
Maxim #1(a)(2): Men want to be turned on by their women. Women want to be proud of their men.
What do I mean by proud? It doesn’t necessarily mean she’s proud of your career success. It could mean something as simple and endearing as installing a mantle over her fireplace, so that when her girl friends come over for a party and ask about the fantastic looking mantle, she can tell them, with no uncertain amount of swelling pride, that her boyfriend did it. For her.
This is undoubtedly true, but husband would carry much more cachet than boyfriend when she is talking to another woman. What woman can’t even get a boyfriend, after all? Even the term fiancé has lost its value over time because so often there really is no commitment involved. Ironically as women on average spend a smaller and smaller percentage of their adult lives as wives, having a husband if anything is growing in status. Not only does it signify the ultimate in investment/commitment from a man, but it is now somewhat rare as well.
Related: Intrasexual Competition and the Strong Independent Woman.
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