Why Does America Have So Many 'Peter Pan' Men?

I have never had a woman insist she pay half of a dinner date bill. My experience: She may offer, and then only sheepishly, and is all smiles when I pay. And the author of this article not only has the cluelessness to suggest otherwise as being typical but also that men 'ought' to be doing so. She makes me want to vomit.

As someone else once said here on MANN, a conservative woman and a feminist arguing roles for the sexes is like two slave-masters arguing about which way the whip should be held when beating the slave.

Feminism has taught women only one-way 'equality': If it's good for me (ie, the woman), it's equality. If it isn't, it doesn't really apply.

"...She may offer, and then only sheepishly, and is all smiles when I pay."

I'm kinda curious as to why you pay after a woman offers? I would think this would go against all your logic and goals to stomp out chivary.

My experience in life isn't limited to my recent experience. I did used to date, and I also used to not be an MRA. But something women who are sincere in seeing true equality come to the sexes' relationship with each other can do is to resolve to firmly insist on paying their half of things like dates until it is made clear that the social expectation around men paying for these things is not in play. Just as with the burden being on slave-owners to release their slaves from subjugation, so too is the burden on women to do likewise in this analogy. Otherwise the pathology of learned dependency (from the woman's part-- women have gotten used to this dynamic and now view themselves as valuable or not based on whether a man will pay for them-- ie, "soft prostitution") and learned servitude (from the man's part-- to serve women in this fashion) will go on and on. But there is a further influencing factor: economics. With younger women outearning younger men more and more, there will be little or no chance of a traditional date scene if the men can't afford it. So ladies, if you do want to go out with a guy, it may be best to 1) do the asking and 2) state up front that there is no expectation that the man will pay, but will split the bill(s) that are part of the date and to be sure to keep the expectations about where and how costly the date will be within reason. The young men these days, by and large, just can't afford to go taking Betty Sue out for a nice dinner. Seen the unemployment stats for these guys lately?

Men have been paying for dates for too long. We face countless forms of discrimination, including in hiring and promotion practices. Why should men still pay for HALF? Women should pay for it ALL.

The law punishes men who marry and earn a living by taking their kids and turning them into child-support slaves for their ex-wife.

If we're going to punish men who marry and take on adult responsibility, we should hardly be surprised when men don't marry and wish to take on adult responsibility.

I keep wanting to ask: Why is anyone surprised at these results? Did anyone really believe that 40 years of male-bashing rhetoric, of ousting fathers from their homes, of glorifying women and denigrating men would have no effects? And that these effects can all be reversed simply by telling men to "man up"?

Give me a frickin' break.

Thanks for your explanation above, Matt, I had not realized you were speaking about before you were an MRA, so your comment about paying for dates had me a little puzzled. Now it is cleared up.

That is the same line of thinking behind so-called 'affirmative action', as it has morphed into-- a quota system. It is a way of disadvantaging and in effect punishing an individual today for the actions of other individuals who look like him done in the past. If you keep that kind of cycle going, there is no end to it. At a point you have to say 'We're done'. If it fair, here and now, that people all be treated the same way without consideration of their ethnicity, sex, etc., then that is what ought to be happening. Vaunting one type of person ahead of another because of indelible characteristics is just more of the same, only with different people getting the shaft. Likewise with things like dating costs. Should a 25-YO female have to pay for all her date's side of the expenses because her father paid for all her mother's? Not fair to the 25-year-old, is it? But what is fair is if SHE pays for her half, in the here and now. That is where the focus ought to be.

Your explanation is consistent with everything you have posted in the past. I can see that when it comes to men paying for dates you honesty believe women are morally wrong for accepting, women have to change, men are victims, and dating practices are all learned behaviors that can be changed.

However, I believe that dating practice are a mix between nature and nurture (therefor part learned behavior, but also part biological). The biological factor, IMO, would be impossible to overcome, and men play just as big of part in it as women. Look at the men with influence and power to change the dating practices. Do they? or do they perpetuate it? Your posts above seem to only focus on the fault you see with women and that only men are victims. I'm not sure it it was intentional or an oversight.

I don't believe men and women are equal, therefor I am not fighting for equality or have any expectations of treating each other equally. I want harmony, the balance that nature intended when forming two separate genders (if we are equal, there would be no need for two genders, and we would all become homosexual). I am an MRA because I recognize the imbalance that has been artificially created by feminism and unfair legal practices, and lack of respect for men. But I don't believe men and women could ever treat each other equally no matter how hard one tried to implement equal treatment expectations.

I think everyone should implement dating practices that suit their needs and beliefs. No one if forcing men or women into any dating practices, therefor I don't believe in your analogy to slavery, "quota system" or that men are victimized by paying for dates if they choose to do so. It all sort of falls into the law of "supply and demand". The more a man or woman wants to date, the more effort he or she will put forth to do so. You can't break the law of S & D. He or she is free to offer, withold or accept whatever the market deems and I don't see any shame or blame in whatever a person freely decides. So I don't see anything morally wrong with a man offering to pay on a date and a woman accepting.

I do agree that the economy influences the "supply and demand" for dating. And women have themselves to blame for the lack of men asking for dates and possibly offering commitment as women are becoming devalued by their own behavior.

This is just another woman (the author of this article, not Kris) shaming men into "manning up." In other words, it's another attempt to get men to live up to the broken social contract involving gender roles. Of course feminists don't want to do that, but men are supposed to (oh, that's "equality"). This manipulative shaming approach is just laughable these days. I'm insulted when a woman uses it on me, and I tell her so. Like I'm so stupid that I don't see what happens when men marry women? Like I don't know plenty of guys that are wage slaves just to support their ex-wives and ex-children? These women give modern men no credit. We are smarter than women think we are. I say that video games are a protest. Men in ever increasing numbers are saying, fuck that dating, marrying, and child support bullshit. It's all quite obvious. But women don't seem to want to see the writing on the wall.