The other day a woman mentioned her frustration with smartphones to my wife. The woman’s complaint was that her husband would play or read on his smartphone while she browses through stores. My wife asked why that was bad, and the woman explained:
Because now he isn’t miserable.
This is an example of what I’ve termed punishing with her presence, and a Game lesson that should be easy for men to grasp if they can make it past their own denial. If it seems like your wife wants to spend time with you for no other reason than to make you miserable, that is almost certainly what is going on. Yet the concept is so illogical and foreign to men’s thinking that few men will recognize it.
If you can get past your own denial, the appropriate response is to calmly and lovingly call out what she is doing. You aren’t doing your wife any favors by signing up for the role of henpecked husband, and in fact putting up with this will only frustrate your wife.
For another example of this kind of thinking, see the recent post by Jezebel Managing Editor Joanna Rothkopf: Chinese Mall Installs ‘Husband Pods’ for Husbands Too Lazy to Accompany Their Wives for 1 Freaking Afternoon!!!
The Telegraph, translating from state-run site the Paper, reports that the Global Harbour mall in Shanghai, China is testing this new pilot program of baby bouncers for stupid adults, in the form of four glass pods where men (or theoretically women) can go to play video games while their wives shop. God forbid they spend one minute participating in an activity that doesn’t specifically revolve around feeding them sexually, emotionally, or spiritually!!!
I bet Rothkopf is fun at parties!
Yeesh…that’s what a miserable heart wants…more misery.
“Yet the concept is so illogical and foreign to men’s thinking that few men will recognize it.” I don’t recognize it, either. I know you don’t make things up, but I’m having a hard time with this. What kind of detestable creature is this?
I kinda thought the mall pods were a nice idea. Far preferable to shopping. But then, we only visit malls when we absolutely have to, and as few stores as necessary. If hubby doesn’t want to go, he doesn’t. Shopping is torture for me, though, so he usually lends his moral support. Again, what kind of woman is that? I know none like this!
Even in my Bluepill days I became aware that most shopping with women is painful and thus I categorically refused to accompany her unless I was interested in the shopping experience myself. Most men should do exactly the same. Men and women are different and we enjoy different things.
Women will actually appreciate the backbone and accept. “Making the husband deliberately miserable” is however a psychopathic trait and should be looked at. However I think that the Red Pill and Game would help that husband greatly. The fitness-/shit-tests of women are sometimes structured in a way to coax out the Alpha/stronger man out of the shell. So the suffering of shopping may be intended to create a man who establishes more Frame, does his thing against the wishes of wifey and paradoxically becomes a more attractive man to the wife.
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What kind of detestable creature is this?
A typical 21st Century American woman.
Shopping is torture for me,
LOL. Obviously you’re not a typical 21st Century American woman!
Punishing with presence:
It is a pure Glasses moment to realize that women not only have the capaiblity to make a man miserable, but will do that via passive and active means for their own reasons. One has to put away the neo Victorian image of Woman as Pure Angel to get there. The fact is, some women always, and all women sometimes, like to spread their own misery / anger around all over everyone else. Elspeth had a pretty good take on this on one of her blogs a couple of years back, something like “We all know how to make a man miserable, it’s not hard, but why do that?”.
Being cheerful and self amused is one way to Game a woman out of that “misery loves miserable company”, because it creates a framework or Frame that is completely indepedent of the woman’s. This takes practice. But in time it’s more fun than reading on the phone or playing a game.
Shopping:
A friend of mine reached an arrangement with his wife. He would no longer accompany her to the malls except for clearly targeted purchases such as appliances, and she would no longer have to trail behind him at gun shows, unless they were shopping for her.
Meta:
Online sales are cutting in to mall sales. Shopping malls across the US are seeing more empty space as a result.
@Dalrock
Not sure if you’ve seen this bit from Bill Burr, but it dovetails well with your observation.
I truly wonder if a woman’s natural proclivity to make her man miserable stems from envy or jealousy of how easily and simply men are placated with entertainment such as watching football.
For myself, I will go with my wife into a store for non-targeted purchases only if they have a “hubby chair” for me to sit and read. No chair, no second visit with her by me.
Now if only I could convince her that my opinion of what she wants to buy isn’t necessary. She ignores me most of the time anyway.
Malls are down not only because of online sales, but also due to massively decreased disposable income for an ever larger part of the population.
@earlthomas786
>Yeesh…that’s what a miserable heart wants…more misery.
Yes. Specifically, the heart wants to project its misery onto the rest of the world in order to attribute the *cause* of that misery to other people rather than to the idea/sin its clinging to. Which helps it to cling more tightly.
@The Question
Hilarious!
@Hmm
I very rarely go shopping with my wife, but if you are going to go, I suggest you make it fun for both of you. Next time, have her try on the outfits and model them for you. When she asks you what you think, give an indecipherable look and say “Twirl around for me”. Then tell her which outfits she should get, and which ones she should avoid.
Because we all know us men like being dragged around a generic mall where we don’t even get to go to Sears (assuming the one in your mall hasn’t shut down yet) to look at tools and instead we have to sit down inside a Macy’s for the umpteenth time while the gals spend an hour looking at dresses and shoes they might wear once or twice before it’s you who has to figure out if they get sold at yet another garage sale or donated. Isn’t that right fellas?
getalonghome
What kind of detestable creature is this?
You don’t go to the mall much, do you? Or maybe you don’t people-watch when you are there?
@HMM
“Now if only I could convince her that my opinion of what she wants to buy isn’t necessary. She ignores me most of the time anyway.”
You could use these moments as tiny exercises in building frame and leading her. No matter how little you care about what she is asking you, HAVE AN OPINION. You can literally flip a coin in your head, but no matter what side it lands on and how random that was, give your opinion like fact and then stand by it even when she disagrees.
Women ask for opinions because 1) they don’t like making decisions for themselves, 2) they love useless conversation. This is a great opportunity for you.
I’m not saying men have to go shopping with their wives, make your own decisions there, but there is a way to use it to your advantage.
Guide her through the store with you leading, have opinions on everything, don’t take back your opinion when she disagrees, but do learn her tastes so you can guide better and have better opinions later.
Women are very different. Lead them and love them.
[D: Well put.]
This behavior is innate and transcends time. A woman sees, or hears, or is told about a man, or a group of men having fun and enjoying themselves. Without conscious thought at all, she somehow knows to resist this and attempt to thwart it. For what precise purpose she herself does not know.
Really, they’re all born as the anti-fun police and have to be trained out of that if possible.
Why should I participate in any activity that doesnt feed me sexually, emotionally, or spiritually? Oh and she forgot physically………
sounds like the husband already found his solution.
let her stew in her own agony while he enjoys his free time doing as he pleases.
“If it seems like your wife wants to spend time with you for no other reason than to make you miserable, that is almost certainly what is going on. Yet the concept is so illogical and foreign to men’s thinking that few men will recognize it.”
So painfully true.
…
Thundergot @ 12:23 pm:
“Malls are down not only because of online sales, but also due to massively decreased disposable income for an ever larger part of the population.”
Malls also all chase the same market. You collect a dozen or more stores in a single location, all of which target the young hot chick with disposable income, the result will be not enough customers to go around.
I remember when there were also guy stores at malls… not just Sears, either. Bookstores, game stores, computer stores, outdoor stores. Now they’re all handbag boutiques and the Apple store, which does not count as a computer store. Malls were fun when I was a teen. I hung out at malls. Not anymore. There’s no male space left.
It’s the giant pink elephant in the marketing department. Men have money, too! But you’ll have to respect us long enough to sell to us.
Many years ago there was an upscale boutique in La Jolla that had a half-dozen different shops with women’s clothing that all opened into a central atrium that was tastefully decorated with comfortable chairs, coffee tables with (male) reading material like the Wall Street Journal, the Economist, a variety of magazines focused on golf, outdoor activities and a selection of national newspapers. And they had a coffee shop next door that provided service to those waiting.
One of the things I found amusing was conversations would start among the men as they waited on their women, occasionally interrupted by the women as they came out of one of the shops to model something they’d found. The women seemed to enjoy having an audience of more than one when they did so.
I asked the general manager about it (I couldn’t understand why more stores didn’t do that) and she said sales had increased over 100% year over year after they created a spot for the men to relax while their wives shopped. The more comfortable men were with the visit, the longer it lasted and the more money the women spent.
Because now he isn’t miserable.
I should add that this is another datapoint that proves that many ‘intact’ marriages are just tortuous for the man, with endless threatpoint and henpecking.
This is the UMC norm, so don’t get fooled by a low divorce rate. It takes the form of water torture instead.
Not sure if you’ve seen this bit from Bill Burr, but it dovetails well with your observation.
Bill Burr used to do lengthy red-pill comedy routines that were very good.
But now is married with a kid, so is under threatpoint, and has moved away from red-pill material.
@Artisanal Toad July 21, 2017 at 1:18 pm: Great post! Goes to show how well things can work when men’s needs and wants are not excluded or wrongly defined.
Because now he isn’t miserable.
Add that to the *lengthy* list of factors where modern women, particularly those over 35, will have difficulty competing with VR sex…
while the gals spend an hour looking at dresses and shoes they might wear once or twice before it’s you who has to figure out if they get sold at yet another garage sale or donated. Isn’t that right fellas?
This is what is known as resource misallocation, and malinvestment.
It’s a perversion of the noble intuition that suffering produces good. In this case: His suffering elevates her perception of herself. If he doesn’t suffer, then (according to her twisted internal metric) she’s not really improved. Medieval romantic notions worked their way through various cultural shifts (bourgeois values, consumerism, post-modernism, etc.) and now the contemporary Lancelot is a Knight of the Shopping Cart.
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What is so absurd about this complaint is that women are the biggest offenders when it comes to having their noses stuck in their SmartPhones
Why would any man go to a store with a girlfriend or wife? When I’m with women, the only shopping I’ll take them on involves groceries or lingerie. If they want to shop for other things they can do so on their own time.
This really strikes me as an epidemic of guys who are unable to say “no” and mean it.
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Because now he isn’t miserable.
My best friend from childhood and I were talking yesterday for the first time in years, and he’s been going through the whole divorce / child support / alimony ringer in the last several years. He and I agreed that women are basically just mean, not that they really all are, but that the ones who are mean are just mean in a way that goes beyond how a man typically is. In his experience, a man will usually just be mean to your face. In contrast, a woman will be mean behind your back. He said his ex would secretly do the cruelest things, which he knew she had done just to spite him.
Anyway, since we’re on the subject of “Ruins Everything,” have you ever seen this bozo?
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It might amuse you Dalrock, but “Rothkopf” is German for red head (I suspect, with the name, feminist and working in the media, she’s Jewish)
Redheads are supposedly famous for fiery tempers, but historically Judas Iscariot supposedly had red hair.
Not just a party pooper, but also a bite in the arse to be around.
Dan H.:
Thanks for that advice. I’ll do that next time, and see how she responds.
As for why I go with her, there are places at our local mall (books, music, Sears) that I like to look around in. And we combine several destinations in one journey, since we live in a small town a half-hour away. To my mind, one of the sweetest things our mall did for the men was to put in a couple of brew pubs. Drop your wife at the door, go and enjoy a couple, and wait for her to fetch you out. Watching the women of ESPN on the screens…
You won’t have Sears much longer the way things are going….
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@Dalrock
Nice post Mister “D”…..””Because now he isn’t miserable.””……Your wife’s friend sounds like delight? A real prize to live with! ……..”Rothkopf”??…….Very obvious to me what tribe she belongs to…..and how many times have I warned men here on your blog about “She-Brews”?….L*
“”I very rarely go shopping with my wife, but if you are going to go, I suggest you make it fun for both of you. Next time, have her try on the outfits and model them for you.””
Great Advice! When my g/f first came up here for a visit I took her shopping.Put $5000 in my money clip and away we went.She did not want me spending any money on her.But,I did not mind as being from WVA and as poor as she is made me want to buy her some nice clothes.The great thing about it was how great of a shopper she was.She noticed every “Sale” sign in the mall and spent with the utmost care that I have ever witnessed.Now a “She-Brew” like Rothkopf or any other?…$5000 would not even get you in the front door of any of the stores that they would want to shop in.
@ Dan Horton
Women also ask your opinion so that they can have someone to blame if something goes wrong. If you agree with her and something goes wrong, its your fault alone somehow. If you disagree with her, first she’ll try to persuade you over to her side, if that fails she’ll go ahead with her choice anyway, but if a problem arises you should have stopped her, so your fault.
Women only have agency when there is credit to be portioned out.
A decade or so ago an academic study determined that the most shopping any one man can tolerate is seventy-two minutes thereof, but men are nothing if not adventurous and I can tell you that I long sailed past that mediocre marker of tolerance. I liked my girlfriend’s company and as we would have been out walking had she not been shopping I was happy to accompany her and of course I would have the reassurance of the sympathetic gaze of the female shop-assistants as said girlfriend removed herself to the dressing rooms to try on yet one more frock. She lived within walking distance of Oxford Street [London’s Fifth Avenue] so I could hardly object to her indulging her desire to shop – even on Sunday. My theory is that as Americans never walk anywhere that they are perforce anti-pathetic to shopping.
Sounds to me like you are all Misogynists; Misogynists, I tell you.
We don’t like shopping because in our country the shops are mostly inside noisy malls that have a strange electronic buzzing going on invented to influence the behavior of mall rats. If you’re out on a sunny high street strolling beneath trees, getting fresh air and enjoying the day in a leisurely way, that is entirely different from the typical American shopping experience.
BillyS @ July 21, 2017 at 8:37 pm:
“You won’t have Sears much longer the way things are going….”
No loss. Sic Semper Chinamarts.
…
Opus @ 11:17 am:
A decade or so ago an academic study determined that the most shopping any one man can tolerate is seventy-two minutes thereof
A disturbingly specific number. Besides, I beat 72 minutes on every trip to Fry’s Electronics.
Because now he isn’t miserable.
I bet that no schlub on his wedding day to his high-N bridezilla ever thinks there will be a single time when bridezilla will specifically want him to become miserable for no apparent reason.
If it seems like your wife wants to spend time with you for no other reason than to make you miserable, that is almost certainly what is going on.
Yet, the vast majority of society’s resources are funneled to women. A great scale and degree of malinvestment, the world has never seen.
I bet that no schlub on his wedding day to his high-N bridezilla ever thinks there will be a single time when bridezilla will specifically want him to become miserable for no apparent reason.
If Bridezilla she is,
then miserable on wedding day he might be
Considering no man really wants to go to a mall and malls are being killed by amazon why not have a gin range in the mall. Of course there is the high likelihood of vibrancy ruining everything.
Gun range not gin range. Combination gun range and bar serving gin maybe a bad idea.
You aren’t doing your wife any favors by signing up for the role of henpecked husband
Hmmm… You know I never thought about the fact that having three women that know about each other saves me so much non-sense like the above. I’ve never had even one want to “go shopping” when we’re together. If she did, I would see if I could pick up another woman that was more interested in doing the things I enjoy.
Never put up with BS from a woman… It is that simple – it’s a sh*t test to see if they OWN you – if they do, they will start looking for a guy that isn’t such a push-over.
Never do what is expected – or play the henpecked hubby… Or you’ll be the cuckold next…
“We don’t like shopping because in our country the shops are mostly inside noisy malls”
My understanding is that the old school indoor mall is dying and is being replaced by outdoor malls, which are basically strip malls on steroids, with an anchor store like Kohl’s or if if it’s a “fancy” one, it might have a Macy’s.
‘But now is married with a kid, so is under threatpoint, and has moved away from red-pill material.’
If you ever listen to his wife on his podcasts….you know he didn’t choose wisely in the marriage department.
‘I bet that no schlub on his wedding day to his high-N bridezilla ever thinks there will be a single time when bridezilla will specifically want him to become miserable for no apparent reason.’
It starts with the high-N. She’s been wronged by men who fornicated with her and left leaving a deep emotional heartbreak (all women will suffer this if they embark on it…all feminism does is try to cover it up). Now that she’s finally married she has her own personal whipping boy to unleash all the hurt she brought on upon herself through premarital sex.
Point being…another reason why a virgin bride has a better advantage in a marriage.
I guess men should write articles complaining that their wives don’t want to walk along beside them as they mow the lawn.
Frank, yes. Those suck too. Nothing compared to an English or European high street. Nothing to see or do.
Alex Jones says not having his kids is a “win”? Dad of the Year.
“Yet, the vast majority of society’s resources are funneled to women.”
Women are responsible for the environmental destruction of our planet.
Malls: the soon-to-be abandoned monuments to the precipitous decline of brick-and-mortar retail.
Rothkopf, the much-credentialed “writer” of the mall piece, ended on of the last sentences in her “article” with ten (10) exclamation marks. That’s what an outrageously expensive education that can do for you: teach you to write like a 13 year old passing notes in Geography.
But even then, her vacuous “article” is nothing compared to the raging vitriol in the comments.
This is on the border of unbelievable for a few reasons – one that it would require a high level of honesty and self awareness to articulate why the cell phone was annoying. Sounds more like a joke. I would be really curious on any follow-up dialogue.
Forgot this:
Dan Horton
Women are very different. Lead them and love them.
Cosign that comment.
‘When she asks you what you think, give an indecipherable look and say “Twirl around for me”.’
Best example of Christian Husband Pimp Hand I’ve ever heard.