I coined the term post-marital spinsterhood when I created the spoof warning label for Eat Pray Love. Women finding it difficult to remarry after divorce is something I’ve noted personally amongst my own generation. Many women my wife and I know our own age have been very surprised at the lack of long term interest they received from men following divorce. This same phenomena was documented by the AARP study on late life divorce which spawned the Grey Divorce hype. However, keeping with the standard spin for divorce in academia and the media, the study featured a picture of a sad old man on the cover and the news stories about Grey Divorce all painted a rosy picture of late life divorcées feeling empowered by this “exciting new trend”.
The actual findings of the study were that men fared better than women in a number of ways following late life divorce. It painted a grim picture where a surprisingly large number of women ended up struggling financially and receiving no sexual contact from the opposite sex, not even hugs. Here are some quotes from the report that you won’t learn from the cheerleading Grey divorce articles (emphasis in quotes is mine):
Almost 9 in 10 men (87%) dated after their divorce, compared to 8 in 10 women (79%)… Among those who dated after the divorce, more than half of men (54%) but fewer women remarried (39%). (Page 39)
Many women, especially those who have not remarried (69%), do not touch or hug at all sexually. An even larger majority of women who have not remarried do not engage in sexual intercourse (77% saying not at all), in comparison with about half of men (49%) who have not remarried. (Page 6)
I think it is no accident that the reality of the study wasn’t made widely known. Feminists in academia and the media have an agenda to sell divorce to women. They know that women won’t find the idea so enticing if they realize it quite often is a one way door to a much lower quality of life. This is because while women often fantasize about indulging in endless choice of mates, they also want a high level of investment from men both for the practical advantages and the status this confers on them. This is a large part of the reason spinsterhood has such a negative connotation. No woman wants to end up without a worthy man invested in her. In the early stages of the sexual revolution women quite often were able to have their cake and eat it too. But the data I have found which I have shared here suggests that this is no longer the case. Meanwhile the media is selling a dangerous fantasy which is leading many women into awful situations they can’t get back out of.
When Stella got her grove back, women across the world swooned at the idea of a 40 something divorcée bagging a newer, younger man. Even more exciting, just like with Eat Pray Love, the author based the story on her own life experiences. Terry McMillan wrote the book which became the movie after meeting and eventually marrying a Jamaican man 23 years younger than her. Here is a picture of Terry and her new young hottie (full article):
Click to see
Oh wait! I did it again. That’s them in the movie. Here is the real life author and her younger husband.
Click to see
Also like Eat Pray Love, it later came out that the dreamy younger man only married her for a visa. He also was looking to cash in on the royalties from the deal. Oh, and he also forgot to mention he was gay when he married her. Evidently that was a deal breaker for the author, and the two have since divorced. From SFGATE.com:
It was devastating to discover that a relationship I had publicized to the world as life-affirming and built on mutual love was actually based on deceit,” she wrote in her declaration. “I was humiliated”.
Adding injury to insult, Terry was then forced to pay him spousal support even though he had signed a prenuptial agreement.
The divorce and new/better man theme is extremely common. All you have to do to find other examples is check out the women’s fiction section of amazon or turn on Lifetime to see more stories like EPL and Stella. The last example that came to mind when writing this is a real estate commercial they ran in the US a few years back focusing on how the Realtor had helped a 40 or 50 something divorcée buy a new home to start her exciting new life. Within a year she had married the next door neighbor who was a university professor. The end of the commercial showed the woman leading a line of dancing revelers around the backyard of her new home, with her dressed in a wedding gown and carrying a bouquet. The message of the ad was clear; dump your loser husband and we’ll find you a new better man along with a new house! Of course, they made their money whether the pipe dream panned out or not…
Edit Oct 29: Added quotes from the AARP study and the fact that Terry was forced to pay spousal support.
Haha… I never knew that story about the author behind Stella. That’s hilarious, and it’s so indicative of the damage our culture’s media and mythology have done, poisoning our minds with false expectations.
The Stella Got Her Groove Back twist is just hysterically dark humor.
But none of this matters, because as was made clear in the Eat, Pray, Shop thread, women are totally resistant to any images in popular culture. Like, totally, y’know? So I guess that’s why “Sluts and the City” was only on for one season, and hasn’t shown up in repeats on stations like WTBS, and why fashion/makeup/undergarment advertising is so totally, totally ineffective.
Because all teh wimmenz are so strong minded, they can’t be swayed by propaganda.
PS: Can anyone explain to me why Orpah hasn’t had “Stella” on to tell how things are going for her? I just can’t seem to understand why not…
If it’s too good to be true…it probably is.
Yes, the “Stella” story ended on an interesting note. I remember when news of their divorce and his sexual orientation broke. I felt bad for her being humiliated like that before the whole world.
Then again, she wrote the book and let them make the movie…
OTOH, a humilation + a lucrative book/movie deal is still better than just a humiliation.
Seriously, though, this particular “divorce and get a newer, better man” fantasy that is being sold is destructive. It’s like dentists handing out free jawbreakers and caramels at the end of an appointment. A 40-something woman suddenly on the market is very unlikely to find another man, and claiming otherwise is just cruel.
David Alexander will hug you.
I don’t hug bitter old women. 🙂
The divorce and new/better man theme is extremely common.
I think it’s a dream for many women that have become sick and bored of their husbands who think they can find somebody better. Of course, unless you’re in your twenties and childless, it’s going to be hard if not impossible to find a better man willing to make such an investment in a woman when he has his choice of women. It can work for a few women in a limited context, but only with older men. Otherwise, for the average woman, divorce is going to mean living alone or with your grown children, and not with some hot young guy or real-world accessible version of an over-50 celebrity. She may find somebody, but it’s certainly not going to be somebody better unless she was in a really bad marriage where she stayed only for the kids.
The actual findings of the study were that men fared better than women in a number of ways following late life divorce.
The fifty year old man can play around with some of the women in their late twenties and thirties. The fifty year old woman has to deal with dwindling supply of men in their sixties who may have health issues.
Seriously, though, this particular “divorce and get a newer, better man” fantasy that is being sold is destructive.
The problem is that a lot of women marry men out of a certain degree of desperateness, and the feel that they’re considerably better than their husbands. So, they flee thinking they can finally get that alpha that they’ve always wanted without realizing the supply and demand dynamics have placed them at the wrong end of the market. Ultimately, there isn’t much we can do to prevent divorce except by preventing the marriage in the first place.
“The fifty year old man can play around with some of the women in their late twenties and thirties.”
Seriously, anyone here know of guys (other than Hollyweird celebrities) dating women THAT much younger – or vice versa? Most twenty-something women do not lust for the Rogaine/Viagra contingent. That’s as much internet “truth” as the cougars landing hawt young dudes. Very few of these cases in real life. And really, if the old boys can make fools of themselves, so can the old girls. It’s the last dance for some of them; let ’em have a little happy time before they move into Sunny Haven Senior Living Community.
But this is a good thing. Every cloud has a silver lining.
These women who frivously get divorced based on “Eat,Pray,Love”-like fantasies are not often the best wives. They are often the harpies that think they are princesses and are entitled to the world. They are the women who make their husbands miserable.
Let them get divorced. Another divorcée means another free man. This man can find a younger, nicer woman or he can enjoy the peace of a bachelor.
Seriously, anyone here know of guys (other than Hollyweird celebrities) dating women THAT much younger – or vice versa?
FWIW, my dad has had a few of his younger co-workers lust after him. A few were in their early thirties, and one was 29…
That’s as much internet “truth” as the cougars landing hawt young dudes.
A cougar can theoretically land a hot young guy, but she’ll be in the upper range of cougar looks when compared the average.
Don’t younger women usually go for older men for money? But, Steve can get his goove back too right?
[D: Who’s Steve?]
“The fifty year old man can play around with some of the women in their late twenties and thirties.”
Seriously, anyone here know of guys (other than Hollyweird celebrities) dating women THAT much younger – or vice versa?
Generally when I see men with significantly younger women, one of three things is at work:
1) The older guy has lots of money.
2) The woman needs a visa.
3) The woman has daddy issues and often a history of promiscuity that “daddy” will save her from.
[D: Who’s Steve?]
The male equivalent of Stella?
Re J:
Your comments about younger women are in part accurate. As a 50 year old man, 20 year old people are boring… of both genders. One of the troubles I am noting in my mid 30s colleagues is that if they are NOT married they are either going “down” (PhD lecturer marries cook. doc marries nurse) or going old.
But the girls in their 20s are girls…. ick.
Thank God, neither do I. Here’s looking at you.
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I am 55 and fairly happily married to a 49 year old. I don’t use or need viagra. If I suddenly found myself back on the marriage market, I might look at 45 or maybe 40 year olds. I don’t mind a more mature woman. Anything younger would be unseemly, in my opinion.
This myth is being sold to women all over the place.
I just had a conversation via email with my ex-wife. We’re very civil.
She asked me jokingly to set her up with a male friend of mine who she knows is single. I suggested that she go and call him up herself – not like she’s shy about this sort of thing.
She’s only 37 and not unattractive at all for 37. And yet, her experience on the dating market of late has been abysmal. Her expectations are pretty damned high.
Great post. Anyone who has lived and observed the world around them knows that older divorced women don’t have the power in the sexual arena they once did. It’s the media that tells us otherwise, trying to sell us on the myth of the empowered older woman who men flock to.
As for the thread about older men and younger women (above) in every society, that’s been the norm. It’s only in feminist America we started to hear about “daddy issues” and “power imbalances,” etc. This was a ploy to try and give aging women an advantage in the sexual marketplace (they try and a similar thing with fat women). Biology trumps media and there are always a large number of younger women who are just naturally attracted to older men. Women often seek authoritative figures. Blame Mother Nature.
I am fairly attractive for my age, and in a good job. But I don’t get a lot of female attention. I suppose 55 is a bit old. But I would have thought that a few women in their forties might show interest. It is possible that the word gets around that I am safely married, and maybe I give off happily-married-man vibes. I don’t know.
My wife has “Daddy issues”. I thought my getting older would turn her on a bit, but I don’t think it has made much difference. We do still have a sex life though, so maybe it helps. As for me, I honestly find older women a bit attractive. I always have. I liked MILFs before they had invented the term.
My stepmom is what? 23 years younger than my dad, if memeory serves.
“Seriously, anyone here know of guys (other than Hollyweird celebrities) dating women THAT much younger – or vice versa?”
I can’t think of many in terms of ‘regular people’ but I have seen it more in the far east (westerner/local girl, the local couples tend to be close in age).
Most people when there’s an age gap worth talking about, it seems more like 10-15, not 20-30 years. And it’s perhaps a bit foolish for regular people to go into 20+ years, whether they are Stella or Steve?
I kissed an old man when I was 21. Thinking back on it, he was only 45. But his skin felt old. My skin feels crawls just remembering it. Luckily, I don’t feel that way about 45 year olds now though 🙂 Oh yes, and later on I found out that he and my father knew each other. *shudder*
This is true.
Whilst I’d much rather be a cat lady with no hugs than be in a miserable marriage, really if someone leaves a perfectly ok marriage because of a book like EPL or Lance Armstrong’s, they are unlikely to be a very good spouse.
Yes, J. You have a point, there, I guess.
This is an excellent topic and points directly to the women’s emotional pornography industrial complex. I have come to the conclusion that emotional pornography is actually believed by most women. They see a movie like Eat, Pray, Love or read a book about some 40-something woman getting her “groove” back and they think that such fairy tales will become reality if they just dump the loser/NiceGuy husband and wait around until they are swept off their feet by a knight in shining armor to a life of sex and the city and long walks on the beach.
@J
The male equivalent of Stella?
I’m just not a fan of imaginary arguments. If the media constantly bombarded men with the same message of “divorce and be empowered, find a better spouse, and live a life of excitement”. And if men listened to the message and began initiating the bulk of divorces. And if they then quite often found themselves alone and struggling financially, it would be just as bad.
Three ifs in succession, none of which are true. And all of them would need to be true to be analogous. What scares me is I think many people don’t know how ridiculous such a line of thinking is. Of course it would be just as bad. If a comet slammed into our planet tomorrow that could be roughly as bad as nuclear war too. Can we return to the topic now? The one based in reality and not a long string of hypotheticals?
BTW J I know you weren’t the one making the argument, but speculating on what the original commenter had in mind. I fear you are right.
@J
Generally when I see men with significantly younger women, one of three things is at work:
1) The older guy has lots of money.
2) The woman needs a visa.
3) The woman has daddy issues and often a history of promiscuity that “daddy” will save her from.
Haven’t we ripped on the EPL chick enough already J?
Besides, not all of the above list applies to Elizabeth and Felipe; he was the one who needed a visa, not her. And she was the one with money, not him.
🙂
lol@Dalrock. Yes, definitely works both ways. I hadn’t heard about Stella but I’m surprised she was surprised, I mean he’s *23*.
[D: Plus, he’s so obviously gay in the pic you could tell from space. What was she thinking? Still, the guy was a creep. The male equivalent of the women Marcos cons. She now has to pay him spousal support. But in the end she was like a pusher who was dosed with her own poison.]
But Felipe is from Brazil apparently, not from say Bali or Jamaica. Doubt he’s that bothered about a US visa at his age. I wonder where his kids live.
[D: She wrote a book about their decision to get married and explained it was so Felipe could get a visa.]
Seems the UK was the last country for EPL to take off which may explain why I didn’t understand why you were so upset.
http://www.guardian.co.uk/lifeandstyle/2009/jan/10/elizabeth-gilbert-books-interview-family
I did later see a big billboard in NY so I got an inkling. I think I’ve only seen one trailer here.
[D: It is the whole industry that really upsets me. Not just one book or movie. We have several channels here in the states on cable TV dedicated to this kind of thing. That and the fact that we know that women often divorce because they see others divorcing, and women are initiating the bulk of divorces. How many kids don’t know their dads because Oprah made EPL a sensation?]
I couldn’t find any info about Felipe’s background easily, I just had a look on Wikipedia. I did learn what a ‘dude’ ranch is…*So* not what I’d imagined…
[D: If a rancher calls you dude, he isn’t being friendly.]
Most women look for men who they can get money and/or babies from. An older man can get a lot of “action” from younger women if he can play on those desires convincingly. If he is upfront on not wanting to give women either (or if he is unconvincingly deceitful) he will not get much “action”. Few women really want to be in a 50/50 partnership, even with men close to their own age, when they are at an age (starting around 32) when they “should” not want babies anymore and “should” be able to support themselves.
Men age like wine, women age like milk. A stable child bearing relation is most likely to be initially formed when the woman has many years left of her most attractive years and the man has not yet come to his most attractive years.
@D ‘She wrote a book about their decision to get married, and explained it was so Felipe could get a visa.’
Sure, but they were together in a committed relationship, it’s not like he got with her to get a US visa. Seems she just writes a book about anything that happens in her life. Except being a cook on a ‘dude’ ranch. I can imagine a lot of frustrated housewives in the UK buying that one over EPL lol.
I guess a woman needs about 10-15 more attractive years for this to work and the man should be about 5 years from his most attractive years to begin. If the woman is closer to the end of her attractive years, she will find no buyers, and if the man is already is in his most attractive years, he will want to avoid getting hitched, and he will become one of the famous “toxic bachelors” in SATC parlance.
Lily I just read the article in the Guardian that you linked to (thanks!). You Brits have a better sense of propriety than we do. EPL wasn’t just tacky for being a divorce fantasy, but the author crossed some boundaries with family, etc. that I wasn’t aware of. I’ve never heard that part discussed in the US.
One quote from the Guardian article stood out to me:
She is nearly 40 now, married and living in New Jersey where she and her husband are thinking of getting chickens and, yes, bees.
When I was searching for info when doing the where are they now post it seemed like every article/interview had something about them collecting pets. I know the manosphere is pretty cruel about the whole cats thing, but I think there is sometimes a kernel of truth to it. I’m guessing as an expectant mother (congratulations!) you have some insight into this. I know before we had kids my wife and I probably treated our dog a bit too much like a kid without really knowing what we were doing.
As tacky and damaging as I think she is to our culture I don’t actually wish the EPL woman ill. Hopefully she is finally happy and can cease thrashing around leaving a trail of wreckage in her wake.
Hey Lily!
I too, kissed an old geezer. Or rather he grabbed and kissed me; I was 19, he was in his late 50’s, one of my teachers in school. One of the grossest things I’ve experienced in this life; wrinkled, grey flesh, gnarled hands — bleechh!
Thanks for stirring up that memory!
@dalrock
That’s an interesting observation, the ‘Guardian-reader’ is pretty close to SWPL, I suspect she would fare worse in the right wing press.
Thanks for the congrats! Don’t know about the animal thing, so many English people are completely potty about them, especially dogs. In recent years, chickens have become quite popular and a lot of people would love bees.
See this link, though this would be the SWPLers, most people would build their own.
http://www.omlet.co.uk
A lot of kids are really into chickens. Elderly people too but they don’t refer to themselves as ‘mummy’ etc like they do with their dogs.
@JD
Sorry! lol. Though you’ve now stirred up a memory from teenage years of my uncle’s friend who kept grabbing me so we’re even.
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not even hugs
This keeps coming up, and I find it so hard to believe. No one hugs divorced women? Not ever? No male friends? Female friends? Children? Nieces and nephews? Other divorced women?
It just seems like such an exaggerated claim.
@J
This keeps coming up, and I find it so hard to believe. No one hugs divorced women? Not ever? No male friends? Female friends? Children? Nieces and nephews? Other divorced women?
It just seems like such an exaggerated claim.
It keeps coming up because it really is so amazing and yet it is true. As I’ve explained multiple times, the AARP did a statistically valid sampling of late life divorcers in 2004. The majority of the women never remarried (over 60%). Of that 60% of divorced women who didn’t remarry, here is what they found (see page 6 from the report):
Keep in mind that 87% of those surveyed were in their 60s or younger. 56% of responses were from those in their 40s and 50s. So these weren’t a bunch of rest home aged women. And roughly 70% of them didn’t even get hugged.
The men were more likely to remarry and to be gettin some even if they didn’t remarry. The media looked at the report and spun it like another Stella Got Her Groove Back.
Chris–I think a lot 50 year old men feel 20-somethings, who are not their own kids, are icky. In the work world, 20-somethings are the bane of my husband’s exixtence. They get on his nerves. Plus, a 20 yo girl would feel like a daughter to him.
David, Lily, JD–I agree that 55 yo man is old to young women. David, don’t take it personally; if you still attract 40-somethings you’re still hot. 😉
Lily and JD, yeah, who hasn’t had that horrifying experience of an old guy coming on to you when you were young. Weirdly enough, those 55 yo guys are hot stuff to me now. 😉
Dalrock, if you think you and your wife treated your dog much like a baby before you had kids, wait till your kids decide they don’t want to be treated like kids. It’s back to the dog! Oddly, I recently told my husband that I want fruit trees and bees.
Many women, especially those who have not remarried (69%), do not touch or hug at all sexually.
What about platonic hugs?
[D: I’m sure they still get hugs from grandkids, the ladies in the knitting club, social workers, etc. Check out my original quote. I’ve always been very specific that they didn’t get any affection of a sexual nature, not even hugs.]
An even larger majority of women who have not remarried do not engage in sexual intercourse (77% saying not at all), in comparison with about half of men (49%) who have not remarried.
Wonder why? Maybe some of those women are unattractive, but maybe some of them got divorced because they were just through with men, not because they wanted to persue an EPL fantasy. Or maybe older divorced women underreport their sexual experiences.
[D: Rationalization hamsters, start your engines!]
The Queen only has a single berth on the royal yacht. I suspect this is choice not cost cutting.
[D: I’m not interested in trying to assess the libido of the Queen, so I’ll take your word for it. Either way she is 84, and we are talking about women mostly in their 40s and 50s and (less) in their 60s. This idea that women are “done with men” starting in their 40s is beyond absurd.]
Lily-I believe it. My parents slept in separate rooms for the last 20 years of their lives together. The sex was over, and my father’s snoring and getting up to pee six times a night drove my mom crazy.
Dalroick–Had my mom and dnd divorced at that point and had my mom had sex with some other old goat, I doubt she’d have told some researcher about it.
[D: Before I proved the point with overwhelming data your argument has always been that older women can have their pick of men. You also said that the reason women like widow remarriage fantasy stories is they fear ending up alone. Now that I proved it with data all of a sudden the argument is well, they probably didn’t want men anyway. Not only is the story changing, but this isn’t what the media is selling women. If women fantasized about divorcing their husbands and being done with men for good EPL, Stella, every Danielle Steele novel and every Lifetime movie would have a very different plot.]
J, I wager you do not know very many divorced women over 40. The few that I know of are uniformly unmarried. Some were divorced for reasons I don’t know, one got divorced over cheating by her husband, some others possibly got divorced just because they could. But all of them are still unmarried, living alone or with one soon-to-be-college-bound child. My anecdotes match the data Dalrock presented, in other words.
Therefore, I stand by my observation that this “divorce and remarry” fantasy is destructive. It’s destructive for both women and men. Women embrace it at their peril, given the fact that women are indeed more socially oriented and thus vulnerable to “everyone else is doing it” fallacies.
I know a few divorced women in their 40s or 50s through work, ex’s social network and foster son’s friends parents.
Some are remarried but most are in long term cohabiting relationships.
I can see a big difference to 60+ where anyone I meet who is with someone but not their original spouse is in a (re)marriage. There are a few single older ladies, some divorced, some widows. Both my granny and my mother says there were a lot more single older ladies round before (due to the wars).
But this is obviously anecdotal and no doubt different between the UK and the US. I’d imagine the cohabiting post first marriage is bigger in Scandinavian countries.
And yet you still allow J to comment here.
[D: Good one.
The only commenters I’ve banned were trolls. But I reserve the right to call BS when I see it. At the same time, don’t assume that everything someone says I agree with just because I don’t state otherwise.]
Terry–
Serves her right. Much older woman/younger man marriages are simply unnatural and she was obviously kidding herself big, big time. And then spread lies about it. Of course not many people who saw the movie know the truth behind the story.
Postscript: a man who is getting up multiple times per night to urinate is likely suffering from benign prostate hyperplasia, and should consult a physician. There are several ways to deal with that issue now. Interrupted sleep is bad for the health for people of any age, as it interferes with secretion of growth hormone, crucial for healing.
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Hey Dalrock,
I was sent over by The Private Man where he passed on the post-divorce spinsterhood term. I’m not a feminist and I don’t believe in divorce (for no good reason.) Certainly not because life is “better” divorced (though it probably would be better than being trapped in an unhappy marriage.) Many of us “post-divorce spinsters” were left by our mid-life-crisis husband’s who felt life would be better without their family responsibilities.
Life sometimes finds us divorced. We certainly don’t have to wither up and die or succomb to spinsterhood. There are those who want to “have fun,” some who want to remarry, some who are happy being single. Whatever we decide, we shouldn’t be labeled as “spinsters,” but as women who are just trying to find our way…
Hopefully, we will all find plenty of ways to give and receive love, married or single…
@yvettefrancino
Many of us “post-divorce spinsters” were left by our mid-life-crisis husband’s who felt life would be better without their family responsibilities.
This is undoubtedly true. However, it doesn’t change the fact that:
1) The media is on a full court press selling divorce as empowerment to women.
2) The facts are quite different than what the media would like you to believe.
Knowing the truth can only help women, no matter what their situation is. Those who are married to good men but are tempted to wallow in self pity and pine for a fantasy life are better served to know the truth. Divorcées who are looking to start over are better served to understand the reality of the changing “sexual marketplace”. Young women who are considering entering a “starter marriage” (as the 7th and 8th grade girls my wife taught commonly commonly discussed) are better served understanding the wreck they are likely going to make of their lives thinking that way.
As for the term itself, and the sting of it, I do wish as a society we did a better job of distinguishing between frivolous and justified divorce.
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Well, there are many reasons why a long term divorced woman may not be sexually active. One very important and valid reason is that some are celibate by choice for religious/spiritual reasons. They may prefer to wait until marriage before being sexually intimate, even though they know the likelihood of remarriage is slim to none…and for some of them masturbation is NOT an option. So they sublimate and rely on the Lord to stay away from temptation. Yes, it does work…if one works it….
Sure, there’s the occasional longing and frustration and loneliness when you don’t have a regular sexual partner, but so what? Such a thing has never killed anyone in the whole of human history. Mature adults realize that there’s not sense in being bitter and angry about what they don’t or won’t have in their lives. We won’t win the lottery and become milionaires either but does anyone expect others to get bitter over that and spend their lives fretting over it?
Another reason: some have been there, done that with the whole ‘casual sex’ thing and realize that the risking diseases and the post-coital loneliness just simply isn’t worth it. In short, they don’t want to be used or to use others. Despite the good game some people like to take, very few people, male or female truly enjoy no strings attached casual sex for long. It feels empty and eventually heart and soul destroying. People want something real…and the casual thing with strangers or acquaintences just isn’t real.
Yes, in some cases, some of us may find as we age that our days of being seeing as, if you’ll pardon the expression, f***able, are gone: in short, no man wants us (that’s the one thing no woman ever wants to admit, but I will …I haven’t had a boyfriend in three years since my last relationship broke up.). It’s an awkward situation: yeah, maybe you want sex…but what are you supposed to do? Advertise for it and wind up looking like a floozy? If one cares about their reputation and doesn’t want to become part of the neighborhood gossip, then they;ll elect not to act in ways that can get a person talked about.
Besides, there are plenty of married women out there who haven’t “felt the earth move” in a long time either. Why not? Well, maybe their husbands may be impotent and can’t/won’t take viagra or the man simply no longer finds her attractive and won’t even try to keep up any semblance of a romantic life with the woman. or the woman finds him absolutely repulsive and avoids him but doesn’t feel right cheating?
At any rate, no one should be judge for not being sexually active any more than if they are sexually active. That sort of scorekeeping doesn’t belong in middle age.
Dalrock: “As for the term itself, and the sting of it, I do wish as a society we did a better job of distinguishing between frivolous and justified divorce.”
I do often wonder how it is that contemporary culture is so eager to embrace there is no wrong there is no right mythology… not realizing the cruelties that come with it, such as the complete loss of any distinction between a divorce that’s actually justified from all of the frivolous ones that take place. No wrong/No right in practice makes everything wrong, rather than providing the illusionary reality of making everything right that the adherents of the mythology are expecting.
@They Call Me Tom:
The “Wrong/Right” dynamic tends to be very Christian in origin, when it isn’t along some Class lines. (Old World Class structures, not the new ones) So much of the drive is the anti-Christian impulse, as it confines your options when something you “want” is not “right”. It’s always much easier to “make right what is wrong” than to address your actual problems.
In one specific context, there’s a reason why “would rather come out of the closet than clean it” is extremely apt.
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