I have no problems sitting at home, getting carpal tunnel from channel surfing whilst my woman is out earning the big bucks. Doesn't detract away from my obvious masculinity.
Tucker Carlson claims higher-earning women are hurting marriages.
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I have no problems sitting at home, getting carpal tunnel from channel surfing whilst my woman is out earning the big bucks. Doesn't detract away from my obvious masculinity.
that explains everything.
and here i was afraid Michelle Pfeiffer must have just not been that into me.
but no, had to be the income thing after all.
that said, women as a group have always approached marriage from more of a business pov than men as a group.
what TC says probably does have some truth to it, but it would be absurd to think or imply women should be held down economically to force them into marrying us when they otherwise wouldn't have. (except in Michelle's case anyway).
and here i was afraid Michelle Pfeiffer must have just not been that into me.
but no, had to be the income thing after all.
that said, women as a group have always approached marriage from more of a business pov than men as a group.
what TC says probably does have some truth to it, but it would be absurd to think or imply women should be held down economically to force them into marrying us when they otherwise wouldn't have. (except in Michelle's case anyway).
Michelle Pheiffer? She is a member of the AARP for a decade now. I can't imagine why would be into you unless miraculously you are able to be her toyboy.
I have no problems sitting at home, getting carpal tunnel from channel surfing whilst my woman is out earning the big bucks. Doesn't detract away from my obvious masculinity.
What exactly is "wrong" about saying what's true?
Just 2 generations back women basically had to get married for any level of economic security....whether they really wanted to or not. Plenty of women stayed in terrible abusive marriages (or just dead marriages with zero interest in each other) out of necessity. A necessity that no longer exists for them today. My grandmother (of the silent generation) pushed my mother very hard to obtain independence and to never be in a situation where she was reliant upon a man to provide for her. She has ended up married to my father for 40 years and counting....but she equaled (if not exceeded) his career success.
I surely don't blame the women, but rather the fact that there are a lot of loser men out there.....you can just see that from the educational data.
Finally, I totally believe what he said about men who make less money not being attractive to a woman. I just had this discussion at our company holiday party with two separate women co-workers who (sheepishly) said that they really weren't interested in dating guys that made significantly less money than they made. Considering women continue to outperform men in educational attainment, this cultural phenomenon will likely continue to accelerate.
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Practically none of what he says is true, starting with the root cause being that women make more money than men.
By the way, when a woman says she's not interested in dating men who make a lot less than they make, it means for starters she hasn't met the man of her dreams (who makes a lot less than they make or otherwise). Finding a good man is a serious problem for women and the criteria for good include several things, not just money. Clearly women want a man who has self-worth and is gainfully employed, and preferably some pride in what he does and goals for his future.
Carlson's a dipshit.
I actually read The Two Income Trap by Warren a few years ago. Thought is a very well written, thought provoking book. May have to pull it back off the shelf for another read.
Not sure if this was in rebuttal to the criticism Carlson got or not:
Not sure if this was in rebuttal to the criticism Carlson got or not:
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Nothing wrong about saying what's true, but he isn't doing that. Your own mother is an example of why he is wrong. Strong women strengthen marriage, not hurt it. They'll be less loser men out there (like Carlson) when they start to realize that.
What did he say that wasn't true?....the Twitter clip was a snip...I don't know what he was actually saying....and I'm sure the outraged tweeter carefully edited it for maximum grievance, otherwise wouldn't have started mid-sentence. And my mother wouldn't be an example....as she married someone that made the same income/had same educational level.
Here's the actual in-context monologue.....the part above starts at about 7 min mark....and was specifically talking about women making more than men in certain rural/small town areas where male dominated industries like manufacturing collapsed...leaving only jobs in education and health-care (women dominated industries).
But again....that doesn't fit the grievance model of the tweeting moron who selectively clipped out 30 secs from a 15 min monologue
The whole big connection that he makes is false, so pretty much the whole clip. That clip (and I'll acknowledge that it is surely carefully selected by the tweeter) says that study after study shows that women making more than men leads to higher incarceration rates and higher drug and alcohol abuse. I've not seen study after study that says that and I'm pretty sure that's not what the social science actually says. You can see how he pretzels the data when he says that out-of-wedlock births spike while saying that families decrease. The cause isn't women making more...it's the definition he uses.
And I apologize if I offended you in referencing your reference to your mother. My only point there is your mother being a strong and independent woman strengthens marriage, not hurts it. Carlson doesn't reference education level in that clip and I don't know if the data he is referencing is corrected for marital status, but the idea that women find men who make less than them unattractive would certainly than be reflected in divorce rates.
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Thanks for tracking that down. I watched from the 5-minute mark on. As usual, I think Carlson is off the mark a lot. Adding more context adds a lot more that's not true. I think some of the broad strokes are interesting, but the way he gets to them is wrong-headed.
twenty's mother aside, strong women aren't really the problem. Plenty of women are strong, even if they elect to have 3-5 kids and bear responsibility for caring for them. To me, that is 10x more difficult than any woman that becomes an executive or law partner.
The issue I think Carlson didn't stay more focused on is the increasing strain and potential breakdown of family dynamics and its impact on society in large numbers. I only have two kids at the moment (under 3) and my wife and I both work because she did not want to be a stay at home mom. So we agreed to send our kids to daycare.
Both parents working puts plenty of stress on ourselves and our marriage. I'm in a better spot now where I can work at home most nights, but probably travel a week or more per month. She has a 9-5 job, but plenty of burden for kids falls on to her, particularly if I am traveling or working late. If we end up having a third, my wife already said she'll probably become a stay at home mom and do some freelance work.
If we compare our daily routine against those from families where one parent (usually the mother) stays home, there are stark differences in terms of flexibility and number of stressors. So, if you are an upper or middle class couple, maybe you opt not to have children so that you don't have those stressors and financial burdens. Or perhaps you have fewer children. Meanwhile, the poor continue to make bad choices and are reproducing at far higher rates without the means or family dynamics (broadly speaking) to raise healthy, productive and capable children.
As for the women earning more, I have no idea if that has an impact or to what extent. I've know a few women that were successful that were with guys that seemed to mooch off of their income and status. I'm not entirely sure how things worked out as I haven't stayed in touch with those couples.
Yeah, modern life is tough and full of stress. Agree with all of that. Don't see data that shows that women earning more is part of that though.
Well it was mainly a populist message against the "ruling elite" of both political parties.
I think there are a fair amount of interesting topics he touched upon.... namely comparing the economic similarities of poor inner city communities to those of today's rural areas. And is just another testament to the ongoing political realignment....as he calls for Republicans to abandon the "religion of free markets" to solve issues of their changing constituency.
Two basic falsehoods:
1. Women making more money not the root cause of the consequences he mentions.
2. There is no causal relationship between the supposed root cause and the consequences he listed. (as hoos points out) Carlson just says there's a causal relationship but there obviously isn't.
In other words, practically everything he concluded was unfounded.
As for his video on the Two-Income Trap, Carlson uses it to support his implication that women working ruins families, and even tries to make it seem like Warren agrees with him. No. The basic problem is stagnant wages. Other problems are people consuming beyond their means (which Warren argues against but she's bleeding-heart wrong) and the consequent rising prices of housing from higher demand, and also the rise in cost of education and other things.
Carlson's point of view is essentially oblivious to the poor 50% (or whatever) of America, the opposite of Warren, which is why he can argue for (well-to-do) women not working.
Democrats want to solve these problems with policy that leads to better income and wealth distribution among other things. Carlson wants to ignore such policies and make it about his ivory tower world.
You might enjoy Warren's book. It's a good read. What's funny to me as that you have people immediately attacking Carlson for an issue where there is likely a lot of agreement from the left..... at least historically there has been.
https://www.motherjones.com/politics/2004/11/two-income-trap/
That's total gibberish and basically 100% opposite of what his full monologue discussed.
It wasn't an argument that women are making too much money whatsoever. Only people looking to be offended by him would take that out of it.
It's that male dominated industries have
been decimated in certain areas of the country. @Marvin the Martian has brought up this point many times, with the outcome being high drug abuse, suicides, etc...
The whole thing was really a critique of free-market/free-trade economics....and the traditional economic position of the GOP.
There was a lot that could be discussed about that monologue....instead we have a discussion about an out of context snippet regarding women's wages.Sigh.
Sorry but you posted the first two videos and I'm not wasting any more time listening to a dumb tucker. My response was mostly to the second video and my response was not total gibberish. He himself says the point is about "falling male wages and the destruction of the American family." That directly correlates with Reaganism and the many GOP policies that have skewed income and wealth to the top 1%.
If you want to have a discussion, how about writing a thesis rather than expecting us to listen to an asshole?
Well actually his point was the total opposite of that....a repudiation of many long-standing GOP economic policies....but whatever....
People would just rather have a reason to be pissed off at the other team.
Oh really? Tell me about it: "...the central thesis of the book was that the mass entry of mothers into the workforce has been a disaster for families and especially for women..." Okay, so he starts with a total bullshit interpretation of the central thesis of the book, at least according to the several reviews I read. And then, "...she'd never talk about that now, it's not allowed..." Again, a crock of shit. She harps on and on about how stagnant wages are killing the middle class and lower...oh wait...Carlson ignored stagnant wages (in that video)...
I don't hear one iota of repudiation or even referencing long-standing GOP economic policies. Again, I didn't listen to his longer video. Quote it and we can talk. Or whatever.
I'm not going to pull quotes from a 15 min monologue.... but that IS the video that this thread was about. Only a small bit of it was about marriage...it wasn't really the premise....and it certainly wasn't the premise that women making higher wages was a bad thing. That's a total distortion.
I only dropped that video in regarding the Two Income Trap as I came across it trying to find the full video....I had read the book and enjoyed it....and she's running for POTUS.
You can make the macroeconomic argument (that Warren did 15 years ago) that two income families have created a lot of negative externalities....without being an anti-feminist bigot.
Yeah, I get that the OP was a cut-out. So anyway, you and I are talking about different topics. Par for the course on the WC, no?
Yeah, it was pretty funny seeing Tucker go all anti-establishment. Dude has been a pretty entrenched part of the "lamestream" media and the establishment for decades.
He occasionally stumbles upon some things I can agree with in his 10 minutes of monologue, but like I said, how he gets to it strikes me as profoundly wrong. IMHO, there are lots of ways to get to happy marriages, strong family units, and contented lives. The problem I've long had with folks like Carlson is that the keys they identify for those things.
As always, appreciate your perspective. Thanks for the convo.
02, you need to learn to translate what women say from "women speak", to english.
when the women said "that they really weren't interested in dating guys that made significantly less money than they made", translation, "they only date good looking guys who make less, and are only interested in less good looking guys who make a lot more than them".
i'll go full non PC here.
as i said above, women as a whole, (lots of exceptions), look at marriage a lot more from a business investment POV than men.
men are the far bigger romantics as a whole.
don't shoot the messenger gals.
i'm an old man, are you under some impression i've only known or met a few women in my time, or don't observe society?
and don't forget my qualifier of "as a whole".
again, lots of exceptions. but i'll stand by my statement that men are the bigger romantics as a whole, and i think most studies and basic behavioral observation over time bear that out..
again, don't shoot the messenger.
You may find some interesting things in this article, this would be a massive political shift but I think a realignment is occurring that will incorporate at least some of what the author has suggested:
https://theweek.com/articles/816134...shot-conservatives-civil-war-over-free-market
Okay, after reading the article linked by Crazy, I listened to Carlson's dialogue and I'm glad I did and thank you for digging it up. Carlson's opening a discussion and so I take it. I appreciate his pragmatic approach and the broader view that things are pretty messed up. A conversation like this could bring the middle 70% of the country together to make genuine progress.
Here's an example of a middle ground that I see. Stiffening usury laws makes sense but we also need to educate very young people, all of them, to be more wise with their finances because if they get tricked into debilitating loans, they'll also get tricked into other things despite the more stringent usury laws. So yes, practical laws on usury but also practical education in our elementary schools. And maybe someone should write some picture book fairy tales about families getting destroyed by usurious lending practices for nursery schools. (8->)
As for inner cities, imo the single most effective way to boost them up would be to institute a society-wide reading initiative which somehow or another got each parent reading picture books to their infants, toddlers and beyond, every single day for at least 15 minutes. Not saying that's a panacea but a big boost.
I liked this post mainly because you took the time to read the article I posted and watch the video linked by Twenty. I think that far too often we have people on here who do neither. That is why the arguments tend to always be the same. Many of us disagree about which way we think is the right way to go but there is a definite tectonic shift happening in both parties and that is going to make for challenges to each Party's traditional orthodoxy going forward. There are interesting discussions to be had about those topics but we spend more time doing the "Whatabout Trump, whatabout Obama, whatabout McConnell, whatabout Schumer, whatabout Republicans, whatabout Democrats" type of game. I guess it is fun to throw shots at the opposition sometimes but if that is all that is going on it gets really boring, really quick.
I'm a generally libertarian leaning fellow.... but payday lenders are the scum suckers of society....they put their mafia forefathers to shame. I would have no issue having that industry wiped from the earth.
Glad you took the time to watch it....I found it pretty amazing to watch a step in this political realignment play out so directly on prime time Fox News.
The worst thing about Trump era is that policy discussions have basically gone the way of the dodo bird. Critical thinking is at an all time low in politics.
I would encourage everyone to read the links in that article too. I see the Democrats on this board asking constantly about just writing off Trump supporters or "how do we reach those people?"
I would say to start addressing their pain points. J.D. Vance is making that argument on the right. There are interesting conversations that are starting now that should play out as a different political landscape in a decade.
https://www.nationalreview.com/2019/01/tucker-carlson-health-of-nations-markets/
I would say to start addressing their pain points. J.D. Vance is making that argument on the right. There are interesting conversations that are starting now that should play out as a different political landscape in a decade.
https://www.nationalreview.com/2019/01/tucker-carlson-health-of-nations-markets/
Frankly, I think it started earlier. I'm stigmatized here (not to pat myself on the back) for using the P word (pragmatism). Along those lines, all I've really tried to do is start pragmatic discussions but who's interested? It can be pragmatic politics or policy, both are interesting.
My basic view is that both parties have some things right and some things wrong and that it's possible to pragmatically combine the best of both sides into coherent public policy. I don't even think it's too hard. Carlson, I think, would agree. For example, the pragmatic middle on abortion/right to life is policy to minimize unwanted pregnancies.That's a pragmatic approach. Find me five liberal women who are champing at the bit to have an unwanted pregnancy they can go abort.
I think there is absolutely a lot of truth in what Tucker says. The fact is that there are only so many of those "bread winner" jobs to go around and women seem to have about half of them today. I'm going to guess that 30-40 years ago that was not nearly the case.
I also think it's very true that high earning women in general do not want to marry lower income earning men. Historically male doctors will marry their nurses, lawyers will marry their paralegals, and executives will marry their secretary, etc but I haven't found the reverse to be true. The women I went to law school with and now have good jobs at big firms would never marry down. Most are single and if married they usually don't have kids. No one is saying that women shouldn't earn as much as men or shouldn't become highly educated but you can certainly make a good point that this has been very bad for society.
I also think it's very true that high earning women in general do not want to marry lower income earning men. Historically male doctors will marry their nurses, lawyers will marry their paralegals, and executives will marry their secretary, etc but I haven't found the reverse to be true. The women I went to law school with and now have good jobs at big firms would never marry down. Most are single and if married they usually don't have kids. No one is saying that women shouldn't earn as much as men or shouldn't become highly educated but you can certainly make a good point that this has been very bad for society.
I should have picked my words better in my original response. My anecdotal discussions with professional women indicate they are quite willing to casually date physically attractive guys that are further down the economic totem pole. But would not look at them as a suitable spouse.
I actually agree with IGW for once....women tend to be much more pragmatic when it comes to who they marry (particularly once they are in full adulthood) - while men think with their little heads and fill in the rest to fit.
Well there is some blame that lies on males too. There are quite a few guys that I would not be interested in if I were a female too. If you not only earn less but also seem to be drawn to youthful pursuits at an unhealthy level, you probably are not a real desirable mate.
For instance, I like gaming, grew up with it. However, the amount of actual gaming I do in a month would amount to maybe an hour or two...and most of that is because I am playing with the kids. We have grown ass men who will play hours a day, ignoring their significant other, and being content to just "get by". Women in general and motivated women in particular are not drawn to that.
LOL....yeah.... my wife has a friend who's husband fits that exactly. He plays games for hours and hours each night, and they have very young kids/babies. He also bounces around entry level jobs and she's the main bread winner....as well as doing everything at home.
I do not expect they will still be married in 10 years.
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