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Comment by anon291 | Hacker News Reader

> The whole 'trad wife' meme fed into this dream of coming home to a hot meal, a adoring wife, and obedient children. That's just not something that is going to happen anymore and only men are having a problem with it.

As opposed to young women, who expect men to earn more than them, adore them, and to do all that while caring for kids? Part of the problem here is that young men's desires are constantly castigated as bad. In particular, coming home to an adoring spouse is something both sexes ought to want, and it should never be castigated as bad for a young man to want a wife who adores him.

Well, either way it doesn't really matter. Yes young men today will be sad, but ultimately, this is a self-correcting problem. The women that do this are not going to be represented in the next generation. Their choice of course. It's a free country.

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Great points. And an interesting idea that it might be a self correcting problem on a society wide level, although I’m not sure how heritable relationship preferences might be, versus being culturally transmitted.

> As opposed to young women, who expect men to earn more than them, adore them, and to do all that while caring for kids

Not anymore, that's my point. Women's dreams are changing now that they can make real money. Men's dreams are not catching up.

> Yes young men today will be sad, but ultimately, this is a self-correcting problem

Self correcting in many ways but it is often 'corrected' by oppression and violence. Women did not forbid themselves from going outside or showing their faces.

> Not anymore, that's my point. Women's dreams are changing now that they can make real money. Men's dreams are not catching up.

What should men dream?

I honestly think the truth of the matter is that women's dreams change the moment they have a baby. Literally every women I know suddenly has a change of heart on how their future ought to unfold the moment the baby is born. Part of the problem here is that couples are not even crossing that Rubicon, so to speak .

I count myself as a man who probably dreamed what you think men ought to have. My wife and I married young, yes, but we both envisioned working full time. Then we had the baby... and suddenly your wife is obsessed with this little person in a way you never thought possible. My wife in particular never counted herself as a 'kid' person, but it's different when its your own, especially for women. Suddenly, it seemed like the only sane option was the traditional one. But I scorned those who told me that before that happened to us.

I think we should just be honest about the effect of hormones on women's desires. It would be kinder to men and women to do that.

> What should men dream?

Anyone can dream anything but they shouldn't respond with outrage and fury if their dreams don't come true.

> I honestly think the truth of the matter is that women's dreams change the moment they have a baby.

Not in my experience but that is immaterial in the context of the current discussion.

Women are not having babies. Not in the US, not in east Asia. In their opinions they've got better things to do.

> they shouldn't respond with outrage and fury if their dreams don't come true.

Who is responding with fury? I see no widespread male fury? On the internet, you'll always find someone furious enough.

> Not in the US, not in east Asia. In their opinions they've got better things to do.

Fine with me. Their ideals and cultural preferences won't be present in the next generation. A self-fixing problem.

> Fine with me. Their ideals and cultural preferences won't be present in the next generation. A self-fixing problem.

The governments of Japan and South Korea disagree.

> Self correcting in many ways but it is often 'corrected' by oppression and violence. Women did not forbid themselves from going outside or showing their faces.

Where in the western world is this happening?

Nowhere in the west of course, but in the mid-east they found their own way to 'correct' liberated women.

Saying something is 'self-correcting' is not the same as saying that the correction is something that you are going to like.

This is ridiculous, not all populations that have a healthy birth rates are forcing women to coverup.

Western culture as it stands today, promotes individualism driven by capitalism and ignores the collective, others promote family values and builds support networks to sustain it.

No one in Israel is beating women.

No one in Israel is beating women.

But of course they are. Women are beaten everywhere.

There's certainly nothing special about Israel in this regard.

At vastly different rates. You’re talking about an extremely rare and legally and socially heavily discouraged behavior.

One could just as easily say “women kill their young children in every country”, because some mentally ill women sometimes do so. That’s not the same as societal acceptance of the practice.

Or we could generalize any negative behavior to any group that has members that do that behavior, which would obviously be an incorrect generalization.

Of course there's extra detail, and one can parse out all sort of things based on what the commenter might otherwise have said.

I just find the choice of phrasing -- "No one in Israel is beating women" -- to be weirdly idealizing.

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