“Feminism exposed traditional marriage as a prison for women, so it can no longer be pushed as a career-move. Instead, it is all about love. Today’s wife does the lioness’s share of the housework out of love. She places herself at the disposal of her husband and his job — out of love, just as wives have always done since Adam delved and Eve span. She maintains the home and the children, providing a kind of power-base from which her husband can conquer the world.
“I would love to have a wife — but that doesn’t seem to be the deal. Men, quite understandably, regard that supportive role as cr–….”
Whoo!
There’s one bitter woman! It’s man-basher Kate Saunders reviewing man-basher Anne Kingston’s new book The Meaning of Wife, whose main theme is that marriage is the worst thing that can happen to a gal. Case in point: Prince Charles of Wales and Diana Spencer. That marriage went south after a big wedding, and so most likely will yours, according to Saunders and Kingston. Here’s what Saunders writes (in a review in the U.K. Times):
“If you know an otherwise sensible woman who has started drivelling on about white frocks and wedding place-settings, please give her this book. Encourage her to wonder what the act of becoming a wife will do to her relationship. What will the world expect of her once the gold band is on her finger? More crucially, what will she expect of herself?…
“A traditional marriage will be most advantageous for the blushing groom, but it’s not the oppressive males who are forcing us up that aisle, or shoehorning us into white meringues. Oh dear me, no. A traditional wedding is something that brings many a man out in hives. It’s us girls who are keeping what Kingston calls ‘the wedding industrial complex’ booming. We’re hurling ourselves up the aisle like lemmings. A woman can head a corporation and split the atom, but her appearance as a bride is still seen as her moment of triumph and the pinnacle of her career.”
Oh, dear, I myself am one of those gals who “started drivelling on about white frocks” some eight months before my wedding day. Being a bit more mature than Princess Di, however, I didn’t expect union with another frail human being like me to be a fairy tale (although it’s sure been nice), and I found a guy who doesn’t regard the wifey things I do for him–make coffee in the morning, iron his shirts–as excrement. Some women marry wisely, and some don’t (ditto for men). I don’t fault the institution, however.
The blowtorch-wielding Saunders, however, wants to melt your wedding cake down to a puddle of white goo:
“Although unmarried herself, [Kingston] is not against the institution of marriage. She thinks that marriage is still the best framework for the bringing up of children. She acknowledges that ‘for some, self-fulfilment can be realised by supporting and inspiring those we love’. Well, isn’t that the point? Some of our chains are made of daisies, and we love them. Which is why the Woman in White will continue to hobble the progress of feminism for the foreseeable future.”
The source of Saunders’s sourness seems to be that she’s divorced and in her mid-’40s and her gal-pals aren’t having her over for dinner anymore:
“My career is irrelevant. Not having a husband makes me a total loser in the eyes of the world — particularly, I’m sorry to say, in the eyes of other women.”
Earth to Kate: Maybe if you quit whining all the time about how rotten men are, you’d have a better social life.