How Practical is it for Women to be Submissive to Their Husbands in Modern Society

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Well, I don’t have to pretend to be cute. 🙂

Seriously, wiles are not insincere.

Gosh, it seems this thread really has bad impressions of women.
 
Wile

devious or cunning stratagems employed in manipulating or persuading someone to do what one wants.

By it’s very definition a wile is a bad thing.
 
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Why use a two-by-four when a nudge will do?

Wiles is flirting, being sweet and loving. Wiles encourages affection between spouses. It is a way of non-verbally boosting your man’s confidence. It is fun and playful. It adds depth to your marriage. It is boring to only communicate purely in “board room” fashion.

Do some women misuse their wiles? Yes. But that’s a problem with the woman not the method.
 
You are assuming manipulation is always bad. It is not.

Parents manipulate children. Teachers manipulate students. Friends manipulate each other as do spouses.

Some manipulate is so open, people are fully aware it exists. Such as the mom guilt-trip.

Manipulating a person to do what you want at cost of their or someone else’s good is evil.
 
I’m a teacher. I don’t “manipulate” students.

I don’t actually manipulate anyone.

What is your definition of manipulate?
 
The dictionary says to handle or control in a skillful manner.

I know everyone hates the word manipulate which is why we typically don’t use it.

My point is feminine charm is a perfectly valid communication tool.
 
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KathleenT said:
Um, how?

Husband wants to buy x car, wife wants to buy y.

You would take the money and go buy y, just to get your way?

Good luck ever seeing a dime of his money again
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In that situation, I don’t think the couple should buy the car until they have an agreement. And I think that the person who is mostly going to be driving it should get a bigger say on functionality.
 
Tis_Bearself said:
Husband and wife both have jobs, husband and wife both make the money to buy their own car, each person buys one car and picks it themself based on what they can afford. Simples.
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You don’t have children, do you?

The model you are suggesting is much less workable for larger families where mom has spent a lot of time out of the workforce.
 
Agreed. My point was married couples don’t always have the freedom to make independent decisions.
 
In the case where husband is supporting a large family, I would rely more upon his judgment in selecting a car. I would hope he would be cognizant of the needs of him and his wife in driving his large family around and of his budget when he picks it. I would also guess that in that case the family is used to making decisions about how to spend the money since they will be making decisions about it constantly given the number of financial demands on one income.

I personally would not want a situation where one person’s income was relied upon to support a large number of people because again, he could become disabled or die tomorrow. I went through this in my youth as my own father became seriously ill and disabled and could have died and finally did die. That experience strongly instilled in me a sense of financial responsibility for myself and any children I might have, even if my husband was the most wonderful and faithful provider in the world. While I do not think women who don’t work outside the home are “worthless” or any of that, I do think they all need to keep this in mind when making their life choices.
 
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KathleenT said:
A husband who ignores his wife’s wishes and overrides her is an abuser…a wife that does the same is “strong and independent”
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Is that really true of mainstream middle class opinion? Do middle class SAHMs actually you-go-girl a peer who leases a car with a large payment and then announces it to her husband?

I think that in middle class US culture, going out and getting a car without a spousal green light is one of the biggest marital sins there is. It’s not as bad as adultery, of course, but it’s right up there. In the personal finance world, they even use the term “financial infidelity” to describe spouses making large financial moves without prior OK.


I’m one of the loudest voices on this thread for wifely dignity, but I would never dream of making any purchases that didn’t fit into the budget that we have jointly agreed on every month and I expect the same of my husband.
 
AdamPeter said:
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Vonsalza:
When it is a major issue we disagree on, I’m the head. I make the call, her objection duly noted.

Now, this is a rather rare thing. It might only happen a few times a year (if at all) and the older we get, the fewer of these situations we encounter. And thank God. I don’t like the cool marriage bed we share in the immediate aftermath of such decisions
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That sounds a bit like you’re a military unit commander, rather than a family man. I don’t see why discussing the issue and coming to a compromise is such a problem.
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It’s not at all. I zealously agree that compromise is the primary method of solving problems.

I’m just defending the reality of the ultimate headship of the husband over his family; an unpopular stance in these modern times, but still the absolute truth.

Husbands and wives are absolutely partners and both are due equal dignity. Compromise should be sought whenever possible. But in those 0.01% of situations where it’s not, “Abraham’s gotta go to Canaan, sorry Sarah”.
 
AdamPeter said:
Could that partly have to do with the fact that society increasingly places the value of the SAHM at nil? If SAHMs were valued highly as being the contributiors to society that they are then that would probably change slightly?
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That’s part of it. It’s even worse when husbands (including conservative religious husbands) do the same to their wives. For example, the classic problem where mom has been alone with the children all day, but when the dad comes home from a long day at work, he expects to take the evening off.

Here’s a piece I like on some related issues:


US SAHMs are very likely to lack grandma and extended family support and to be socially isolated. Grandmas and aunties are far away and/or busy, the couple may have moved far from family and friends, they may have lost all their friends when they had a baby earlier than their peer group, the new mom has lost her old social contacts from work, etc.
 
Tis_Bearself said:
I suppose so, but when somebody is overspending, it’s usually not on necessities.

I have seen a husband who went the other extreme and forced his wife and kids to live like they were in Iron Curtain Eastern Europe because he was afraid to spend a dollar. The poor wife was my mother’s good friend. She was so sad, she prayed every day to find some way out of the situation. One day she was praying at church and her husband dropped dead. I hate to say this, but it was a big relief for her.
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As with the husband in your anecdote, “overspending” can be in the eye of the beholder.

There’s also the hybrid variety of husband, who spends lavishly on himself, but expects his wife to scrimp to make it work. This writer’s husband was like that:


"Here is the reality: I worked night shift (from home), breast-fed to save money, and went without basics like medical checkups and dental cleanings. I learned to sew, cook from scratch, scour yard sales and thrift stores for our furniture, plan grocery trips around sales and coupons, and barter for baby needs and toys. It was practically a full time job, just to live within our means. Did I mention we had three young children (now four)?

"Yet, I would come home from the thrift store, excited that I found a dresser for our kids for only a dollar—all it needed was a coat of paint and some hardware—and would find my husband opening a $70 ratchet set. “I needed the metric kind,” he’d say, “and they were 15 percent off.” He’s not a mechanic; he’s a math professor! He didn’t “need” this ratchet set. He wanted it.

"Stories like this happened once a week.

“I couldn’t understand why he’d buy expensive tools for his hobbies (or camping gear, or musical instruments) and yet had no problem with me getting public assistance when we “qualified” for it. I often wondered if I was the only wife in the food stamp or WIC line whose husband had a PhD, some great guitars, and no food in the house.”

That’s the same writer who wrote this piece about discovering that the conservative Protestant version of wifely submission was bad for their marriage:

 
Xantippe said:
As with the husband in your anecdote, “overspending” can be in the eye of the beholder.
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It’s not in the eye of the beholder when the husband is appealing to his extended family members for financial help. it’s in all of our eyes then.
 
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