I wrote a column recently lamenting the decline in marriage rates, which is a record that half of American adults are currently single. As a long-married romantic myself, steeped in statistics suggesting marriage correlates with happiness, I found that sad.
Readers, not so much.
Many female readers in particular reject heterosexual marriage as an outdated institution that pleases men while turning women into unpaid slaves.
“Marriage is generally good for men,” said a female reader from North Carolina whose comment on the column was her favorite, with more than 2,000 people recommending it. Her husband is stuck with caregiving, she added, and “the type that receives care will be happier than the type that doesn’t receive care.”
The second most recommended reading comment was from a woman who said that when she and her female friends got together, “We all said, ‘Not again.’ A man needs a lot of care. He can be such a baby.”
I think these skeptics make some valid points – we the people need to up our game! – although I remain a staunch believer in marriage for both straight and gay couples. But put aside for the moment the question about marriage. The flood of outcry among some female readers caught my attention because although anecdotal, it aligns with the growing survey evidence of the political, cultural and social divide between men and women across the industrialized world.
A poll in 20 countries by research group Glocalities found a “widening divide between young men and young women” in political and social perspectives, while The Economist examined polls in rich countries and also found that young women are becoming more liberal as they age. junior. to be a bit more conservative.
A study by Pew found that compared to unmarried women, unmarried men in the United States are 50% more likely to align with Republicans.
One measure of the rightward drift of young people: In 2014 people aged 55 to 65 were the most conservative group, according to Glocalities data, while today young people are more conservative than older people.
The background is that boys and men are lagging behind in education and fewer than women are getting a college degree. Many of these less-educated people struggle in the job market, and increasingly they blame feminism for their problems. Young people are more likely than older people to tell pollsters that “the pursuit of women’s and girls’ rights has come a long way”; women of all ages disagree.
A remarkable 45% of young people aged 18 to 29 said that in America today, people face discrimination. Older men can’t feel that way.
In the end, the polls show, that men are grumblers and hate women’s success more, and are more attracted to conservative authoritarian populists, from former President Donald Trump to misogynistic internet personalities like Andrew Tate.
The Glocalities survey concluded that around the world, “the radical right is increasingly finding fertile ground among the youth, which has led to elections.” Rep. Matt Gaetz suggested that Republicans’ turn against women voters doesn’t matter because they can be replaced by male voters.
The gender gap is most easily measured in politics, but the Brookings Institution warned last week that “it is also visible in measures other than politics and points to some deeper and possibly deeper problems among young people.”
“The social bonds of previous generations seem to be eroding among young people, and this has serious consequences for coupling, future birthrates and social cohesion,” Brookings said.
One of the most discussed gaps between the sexes is in South Korea, where almost 80% of young people say men are discriminated against, and where (male) President Yoon Suk Yeol was elected in 2022 on an anti-feminist platform. Women have their own complaints, including how they don’t help their husbands around the house. Some Korean feminists have created the 4B movement, which promotes no marriage, no babies, no dating and no sex. South Korea’s total fertility rate has fallen to one of the lowest in the world, with the average woman now having just 0.7 children.
Brad Wilcox, a sociologist at the University of Virginia, suggests in a new book on marriage that the gender divide in South Korea and other Asian countries may foreshadow what’s to come in the United States. He estimates that perhaps one-third of young Americans today will never marry, with cohabiting couples not replacing marriages. More people, he says, just stop and be alone.
Some women in America have publicly announced that they are avoiding men, not having sex or “sober men”. Nearly 70% of breakups from heterosexual marriages in the United States are initiated by the husband.
One window into gender tension is a viral meme on TikTok, where women discuss whether they would rather meet a bear in the forest or a man. Many went with the bear.
Young people are not only marrying less and partnering less; he also lacks sex. Traditionally, parents worry that young people are too promiscuous; now maybe we geezers should fret about young celibacy.
Perhaps this gender divide will reverse itself and repair itself. Or perhaps, as some female commentators have suggested, it’s not a problem, or a problem only for men. But polls have found that young men and women across the Western world are not very happy when they look away and are increasingly reporting that they are “not having a partner”. I’ve written enough about the epidemic of loneliness that the divide will cause; social isolation is thought to be as deadly as smoking.
For me, the fundamental problem is the human struggle to adapt to a world that is less important than brains, education and emotional intelligence. It’s an important topic that hasn’t been adequately addressed, despite alarm bells like Richard Reeves’ 2022 book, “Of Boys and Men.”
Reeves and others have proposed many ideas, including recruiting more male teachers, adding more breaks and holding boys back so they start school later than girls. Vocational training programs like career academies and Per Scholas also help.
I worry that gender frictions can grow and add tension to modern life, leaving more people facing the world alone with no one to snuggle up and provide long-term comfort. I fear that I am a romantic in a world that is becoming less romantic.
