Dr Helen And A Holy Grail

Dr Helen Smith, PJM’s advice guru tackles a cultural Holy Grail:

“It has become a kind of religion that you can’t criticise because then you become a traitor to the great cause, which I am not.

“It is time we began to ask who are these women who continually rubbish men. The most stupid, ill-educated and nasty woman can rubbish the nicest, kindest and most intelligent man and no one protests. “Men seem to be so cowed that they can’t fight back, and it is time they
did.”

—Guardian “Nobel Prize Winning Novelist Doris Lessing

A reader writes in:

Dear Dr. Helen:

After reading your last column on men’s rights, I have to ask, what are your thoughts on whether or not men should get married?

Wow, that is a tough question. Let me start by saying that many of you emailed me about my last column on men’s rights to say that I was wrong to blame men for “not showing up” to fight against the courts and laws that treat them worse than common criminals—without due process, constitutional rights or any say in government intervention into their private lives. But it seems that women are getting ahead in the workplace (in NYC and other large cities, they earn more than men) but men are falling behind in the domestic realm which includes marriage. I understand that many of you feel that I am “blaming the victim”—in this case men—but I will use in my defense the refrain preached by Martin Luther King: “Freedom is never voluntarily given by the oppressor, it must be demanded by the oppressed…”

…How could someone tell young men or older men not to have families? A good family is a wonderful thing; however, I admit to having been naive enough to do a post on marriage at my blog thinking that I would hear about the positive things men liked about being married. Boy, was I wrong. Here is what I heard instead:

Dr Helen’s column will get your attention and is provocative in that it will make you think. Her advice is practical and useful- and that’s a lot less common a commodity than it used to be.

Read the entire post- and be sure to read the comment thread.

As it happens, exactly two years ago today, we wrote about marriage and Maureen Dowd (how’s that for irony?) Here’s an extract (post is on mirror site):

…it isn’t success that makes women less desirable. It is the deceit that often accompanies that success that makes women less desirable. A successful woman isn’t less likely to find a mate or have a successful marriage- unless she equates success in business with success in marriage or relationships. The biggest deceit is the self deceit…

…There are legions of men, over 40, that are looking to partner not with a twentysomething, but rather another like minded 40 something.

Men seriously looking at marriage are not looking for a trophy- they are looking for a wife, someone who understands the meaning of the word ‘home,’ in every sense of the word. There are a lot of men that have tired of the perfectly coiffed, weekly manicured and exercise compulsive woman. Men want women that put their marriage, not their ‘self esteem’ and ‘identity’ as a priority…

Men want to worship their wives- not because they are successful or powerful, but because they are their wives. ‘In all the world, you have chosen me!’ Is it really any different for women? Marriage is about the sharing, not the sharp retort, to be applauded. Marriage is about a partnership, not the parties. Marriage is about a lot of things, none of which are about external success and power…