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Comment by darth_avocado | Hacker News Reader

Is it surprising though? Regardless of how far we’ve come in terms of viewing gender roles, the society still expects men to provide. Most women don’t prefer marrying down, while men are okay with it and that is a fact. And when married men do not have stable jobs, most women get additional pressure from people around them, friends, family, etc.

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> Most women don’t prefer marrying down, while men are okay with it and that is a fact

I’ve seen this once: Trophy husband (college buddy) to a high earning wife.

They are still happily married though I don’t keep in touch.

More common: I’ve met Ivy League women (or similar, very smart) who’ve underachieved in their career, who wouldn’t marry down.

They asked me if I knew anyone but thin pickings in the 40s: I know guy, but he’s in the milita…nope.”

The more successful a women is in her career, the fewer dating options she has. The opposite is true for men.

Another issue is that college educated women do not prefer to marry non college educated men. This is a problem because there are way more women in college than men.

The best place to be for successful women to find a mate is Silicon Valley where the gender ratio is so messed up. There is a joke that women in the Bay Area have a “49er attitude”. A 4 who thinks she is a 9 because of the abundance of successful and intelligent men.

> The more successful a women is in her career, the fewer dating options she has.

This is a result of their own sky-high standards and unwillingness to date/marry down. The same is not true for a man.

> There is a joke that women in the Bay Area have a “49er attitude”. A 4 who thinks she is a 9 because of the abundance of successful and intelligent men.

Isn't this also true nationwide due to dating apps, skewing the perception of successful and attractive men on the apps as the new "average" ?

> This is a result of their own sky-high standards and unwillingness to date/marry down. The same is not true for a man.

That's a very reductive take.

While I'm sure this is sometimes the case, is it inconceivable that it's also hard for women to fulfill their socially prescribed womanly duties while also being a high performer in their careers, and they have to choose between picking from a limited dating pool of partners who don't have traditional expectations, or a relationship which becomes punctuated by conflict over their unwillingness to take on duties expected of them?

Whereas a traditional relationship is centered around men as the primary (or sole) breadwinner, and the family structures revolve around catering to their domestic needs while they make the domestic/familial/social sacrifices in order to climb the career ladder, so (while I'm not denying it's also a frequent source of conflict) it's easier for high-achieving men to find partners who will accept the status quo and take on supporting roles

You seem to misunderstand what is meant by "dating down" and the refusal of women to do so. It's not a problem of philosophical compatibility and non traditional roles.

If I like fast cars and I'll I've ever been exposed to is your average beater, then it wouldn't take that much to excite me. A sporty commuter might even do it.

But if I've been consistently exposed to supercars, or if I even own one myself, then it will take a much more impressive vehicle to excite me.

Fundamentally, I'm still attracted to the same thing regardless of my situation: fast cars..but one scenario leaves me wanting a lot more than the other.

No, I think it's just necessary. Most couples want kids. That means the man needs to be able to support her lifestyle in the 9 months where she shouldn't work.

>Isn't this also true nationwide due to dating apps, skewing the perception of successful and attractive men on the apps as the new "average" ?

It's true on dating apps but those women come back to Earth as soon as they turn off Tinder. In Bay Area, women don't come back to Earth. Tinder or not.

PS. I'm not bashing Bay Area women. It's how it is. I think more Silicon Valley men should move to New York and more New York women should move to Silicon Valley. Both sides will be happier.

It's surprising because several myths about financial status within relationships are still unfounded despite being commonly spoken about.

Also, we haven't come that far in regards to gender roles. Women wearing pants and going to work, and men wearing nail polish is the extent of what was normalized in society. Anything else and we still view it with very traditional lenses.

> Also, we haven't come that far in regards to gender roles. Women wearing pants and going to work, and men wearing nail polish is the extent of what was normalized in society. Anything else and we still view it with very traditional lenses.

Even this is an optimistic lens: a man wearing nail polish at work is likely to play very differently between a coastal city and a small "heartland" town.

The truth remains that women can and do get pregnant.

Very true. My son is six months old and as we've chosen to breastfeed half the time I'm completely useless to my son. I can change nappies and comfort him but most of the time he needs his mum. I can see why society developed the way it has. If you remove birth control and baby formula people would be forced into traditional rolls during their child bearing years.

Business must accomodate humanity, and not the other way around. Silicon Valley utopians would like everyone to be a fungible unit of productivity. If your culture does not produce healthy children, your culture is going away.

That's not the Bay Area, mate, that's just Capitalism.

SV just like to put their own veneer on it to make it seem kinder and gentler than the NYC screw-you-pay-me approach, but make no mistake it's the same stuff.

The SV utopians are firmly in control of technology with the most leverage to define the future.

Men wearing nail polish is definitely not normalized in our western or eastern society.

It's normalized to the point where it's not likely to attract attention but still not common. I'd say it would be vastly more normalized than a man wearing a skirt for example.

I have literally never seen a man wearing nail polish.

I see them every day. We must live in different places.

I would argue that for a thing to be normal both of you would have to see it at least sometimes, unless OP lives on the moon and you live on mars.

Kenji Lopez-Alt wears nail polish in most of his videos.

Kenji does it when he's playing with his daughter, he polishes her nails and she polishes his -- I think this explanation would fly even in the most uptight and puritanical of the conservative crowd. I do wonder whether he'd bow to the pressure of being more "professional" if he was still making videos under the seriouseats or ATK banner.

Maybe he would, but he is quite an oddball in more ways than one. Both of his parents were Harvard/MIT professors, he is not silent about his political views (he at one point literally forbade anyone with a Trump hat to come in to his restaurant) so we shouldn't extrapolate from this one singular case one way or the other.

You've never been to any concert by an artist born after 1960?

(excluding classical music)

No male artist born after 1960, no. Last concert I went to was Carrie Underwood. Who was wearing nail polish. (I’m not judging just literally was not aware it was a thing.)

Just attended a high school event. I guess 50% of high school boys wear nail polish.

This seems very bay area bubble to me.

Not 'round these parts they don't

They wear it on their toenails, where you can't see

I thought that one specifically was a non-hetero signaling device?

Or goth

Yeah mostly where I've seen it on guys is in the metal / goth / punk / i'm-in-a-band-but-not-really scene. No connotations to homosexuality AFAIK.

Close, I think it’s more about signalling you’re not into traditional gender roles. There are women who are into that, just like there are gay men who don’t like effeminate men. If you live in a place with enough potential friends and lovers it saves everybody time, and you look fabulous to boot.

The issue I think is more that women have been fighting for rights while men aren't really allowed to do that in western society. There are countless examples. Women can wear mens clothing and no one bats an eye, but men can't wear womens clothing. It's now normal for women to work, but stay at home men are almost non-existent. Teenage boys kill themselves many times more often but the main thing you hear about in the news is how social media effects teenage girls.

> men can't wear women's clothing

Regarding men's fashion, I find it interesting that:

Long robes are still worn as formal/professional attire in certain contexts: judicial robes, academic regalia, clerical robes, etc..

Wigs seem largely out of style, with the professional exception of British judges and barristers.

Kilts are still around, but tunics are out of fashion and tights/leggings seem to be relegated to sports/athletics and dance.

None of those are women's clothing. They're formal clothing used for status signalling.

One of the messages is "We are not here to do manual labour, fight physically, or display overt sexuality."

(Kilts are something of an exception, but they're dual-use.)

Re Kilts, I'm reminded of that scene in _Braveheart_ where the Scots start flashing and mooning the English before a battle starts.

there is nothing in Braveheart that should be thought of as historically accurate

Academic robes and hoods were originally practical for keeping you warm in a freezing university. I can't imagine churches or abbeys were particularly well heated either. Another advantage of robes (or kimonos) is they can trap heat from external sources.

Athletic/gym gear, tank tops, bike shorts/leggings, speedos, etc. aren't really formal clothing, and they are practical both for physical activity and for fitness signaling (e.g. attracting mates and discouraging rivals.) (And sports from football to martial arts are a sort of ritualized fight.)

But I think you are on to something - men's attraction strategies are often via resources rather than health/fitness (or overt physical conflict with rivals.)

I'm somewhat upset that tunics are not really a thing any more. Wearing an overly-long tee-shirt is almost the same thing, but only almost.

Reminiscent of Roman togas, the clothing for aristocrats and magistrates. Much of today’s western culture is derived from Rome.

Who is “we”?

Citations:

https://www.pewresearch.org/fact-tank/2017/09/20/americans-s...

https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-6004239/High-flying...

Don't jump to conclusions. What you describe is one possibility, or may account for part of it, but men who don't have work and don't feel useful or like they have a purpose might also become intolerable, and this could easily lead to divorce too.

For instance, other studies have found that men's work is strongly tied to their sense of identity, much more so than women, so men who lose their identity could become depressed, irritable, lash out, etc.

the wife of a friend of mine works for the united nations and every few years the whole family is moving to a different post in a different country. because of the way the visa works in most countries, the husband can't automatically find a job in the new place, and so after they moved last time, after having a job in the previous country he felt exactly that kind of uselessness because he could not contribute. he eventually found a purpose in running his own startup online.

myself i used to earn a lot less than my wife, but i never felt useless as i see my purpose in contributing to society and i could always do that by working with FOSS. it is my work and my purpose, even if it doesn't pay.

While we should be cautious, this also agrees with the lived experience of almost every married couple I know.

I don't think this is true of all women. But I and several of my friends have noticed that as our income level changed the level of support and tolerance from our wives changed noticeably.

When I'm making more money or receive a promotion my wife is noticeably more supportive and tolerant of me. Despite me being much happier and more agreeable at the low income jobs, my low income jobs still pay more than her job, and only caused a very small change to QoL (due to my large savings). I can only imagine what it's like if I made less than her or we had to actually start sacrificing due to lower pay.

And of my friends where the wife is noticeably more successful than the husband there is always quite a bit of stress from the wife who is constantly pushing him to be more successful. Not to mention the amount of crap these wives get for their less successful husbands, which is quite substantial.

I think men and women just prioritize different things. Men might be willing to "marry down" in terms of finances but are probably less willing to do so in terms of attractiveness. And as a woman with a high-paying job, I would argue the problem is not entirely with women. I couldn't care less how much a guy I date makes (that's the beauty of being able to fully provide for myself and my kids, I don't have to rely on any guy's money). Without exception, though, every guy I've gotten serious has had some level of insecurity around it. They might say they are OK with it, but eventually they will have some problems with it. To be fair, this might be because of societal expectations, but it isn't because I care what they make.

It can be indirect socialization to boot. Perhaps we have agreed that men don’t have to be the breadwinner. But… what else are they supposed to bring to the relationship?

We can of course say, oh they are supposed to be funny, loving, and do their fair share of chores. But what can only they bring?

I think this could be a driver of insecurity. If not a provider role, we haven’t figured out what alternative respectable roles they could fill, which means as far as culture is concerned they feel useless.

A man who dates a woman with higher income is taking a big risk that eventually she's going to get frustrated with his lower income and end the relationship. This isn't an misguided concern, hang on on reddit dating/relationship forums and about once a month you'll see a post from a woman in this situation and frustrated by it. Inevitably the advice she gets is "break up with him".

Majority of women are not ok with men making less, no matter what they say - its often an unrevealed preference.

Purely anecdotal claim but I think the more time you spend with your spouse higher are the chances of divorce.

The part time job might be more about spending too much time with your spouse rather than failure to provide.

"down" means what?

Socioeconomically (as opposed to looks, or strictly money). I thought it was pretty obvious.

Socioeconomically marrying down then is a big disadvantage for either gender, in the cases i am aware of. I don't however know how to find wider stats. thanks for explaining.

It precludes being a power couple, but high status wealthy men have happily wed their secretary or a school teacher for decades. Especially in the single breadwinner era, this worked fine. The woman was bringing skills like caring for children and cooking, not wealth.

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