This article in the March Atlantic Monthly is stirring quite a controversy. In it, Lori Gottlieb declares that single women with children should marry whoever… The premise is “Mr. Good Enough” is a more realistic goal than “Mr. Right.”
I think this is akin to that Newsweek piece 20 years ago which claimed women of a certain age were more likely to get killed by a terrorist than marry. In short, a scare tactic to encourage women to wholeheartedly lower their expectations.
On the other hand, she does have a point. When does our desire for someone to help us raise the children outstrip our desire for someone to help us raise our roof?
We have a 20-something writer at Strollerderby and her perspective on it is quite radically different than mine.
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For a laugh today, check out Cracked’s Top 40 most inappropriate children’s book covers…. (this is one of them)
this more rational approach works in somewhere like India where they are used to less romantic marriages…but choosing someone who is just good enough to marry in our Western culture is just a recipe for disaster. There has to be that indefinable connection I reckon if it is to last the seven-year itch!!
As a divorce attorney and one who can’t marry the push to do so has always puzzled me. I’m not one of the lesbians pushing for gay marriage. I like that I define my relationships without the paternity of the state defining them for me…even with the unfair tax laws.
I still think if he/she isn’t great for you, how good can he/she be for your kid(s)?
For an intelligent publication, The Atlantic sure loves to publish sexist shit written by women, for women.
True, that expectations for romance may be replaced a bit with practical desires, but I think most of us would be better off single than marrying the first guy who asks. Same shit, different angle.
The Sunday NYT had another perspective in Modern Love this weekend. Of course, there’s no mention of the cost of single parenting, but it’s still a moving tribute to single parenthood.
http://www.nytimes.com/2008/03/02/fashion/02love.html
So many of my friends have settled for someone, just to not be alone.
I’ve personally found that settling of that sort is far more lonely than not having a man in my bed.
I cannot, and won’t ever be that woman; although, there are moments when I think, “God, I wish I could just settle…” However, those seconds are fleeting, unlike the sense of peace that comes with having found solace in being alone or being with another, as long as I’m with myself.
Gosh, Redsy, I do hate to admit this: but I am one fo those chicks who waited for The One into my thirties and refused to give up on romance and perfection and chance encounters and well, it worked. I spent a lot of thrilling and miserable time with the wrong ones. I adored crazy men, alcoholic Jack Mormon carpenters, schizophrenic actors, insane Chilean marine engineers, freaky handsome mobbish Russians, brooding dark-horse Germans…all of them fabulous, all of them fabulously wrong. Who knew that one night, in NYC, after an evening spent drinkign wine with girlfriends bemoaning the lack of available men in the city I would get on the subway at midnight and sit next to this godlike man who would become my future husband. Which is what happened. And he is an amazing clever, brilliant, gorgeous, fabu-daddy man. And even then: marriage sucks. Because it’ s hard and dull and boring to raise little children with a partner even though it’s also a beautiful dream and a precious gift. So I guess what i’m saying is “hold out” because choosing a halfway-mark love for life doesn’t bode well for raising a family in my experience. It’s hard enough doing it with The One. Let alone The One you sort of love. Ish.
I was going to say what Crabmommy said but she beat me to it.
Well, minus the whole meeting my man on a subway in NYC. Substitute that for hurling a hammer at his head in a fit of womanly rage….
My sister is a single mom and I often encourage her to wait for the right one.
What depresses me about this kind of article is that it presents such a stark choice. Even though the writer tries to make it less black and white, it still seems to come down one of two outcomes. You either get The One or That Asshole I Tolerate. Is that how it feels?
I absolutely hated that article. I am over 30 and I intend to never marry and I resent that *she* thinks she knows better than I do how I feel (her claim that women like me are just in denial).
As Dennis says, this author gives you two options: Marry That Asshole I Tolerate or live a life alone with 40 cats and a test-tube baby.
There are other options. There are MANY other options, even if marriage *is* something you ultimately want. Yes, if your goal is to raise a family, you do need to re-prioritize what qualifications you look for in a partner - that wild and crazy alcoholic brooding artist biker dude might not make the best father-figure. So you will have to look for someone who is more responsibile, whose goals in life are similar to yours. But that does NOT mean you should go out and catch a guy, any guy, who will have you while you’re still young enough to get him.
Y’know, sexism and oppression is not done by men nearly as often as it used to - nowadays, we women are prefectly capable of oppressing ourselves.
I wrote a much longer rant about this on my own journal: http://joreth.livejournal.com/66128.html