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Notes -
Pair this with your (very good) intro statement:
And then a big problem emerges:
It is not enough to find a "traditionally" minded (however one defines it) intelligent woman because her attitudes on various things will be defined in the majority by the other women she socializes with. The absolutely untenable problem that men have to contend with is that they can't just "marry a good one" - they then have to plug into a social circle and larger community that is predominantly "good ones."
But then you have the eternal problem of socialization; defection. It's classic Prisoner's Dilemma with more than two parties and over repeated games; if all of the women in a social setting decide to abide by certain social rules but one or two defect from them, those defectors can gain outsized advantage to whatever their goal condition is. The classic example here is age old sluttery and slut shaming; one promiscuous woman in a group can be handled by the rest via slut-shaming. But if everyone defects into sluttery - sorry, "sexual autonomy" - no one can slut-shame anyone else but then everyone has a worse off situation.
In a "trad" marriage, the wife probably isn't going to turn into the village bicycle, but, with social media, will she slowly begin to move towards that very online style of contemporary feminism that led to the Friends of Lindsay Clancy movement (yikes!). Will she begin to think that you, yes You, husband!, are actually problematic because of your patriarchy (...that she willingly signed up for).
So to "go find a good one" is to find a create a parallel society that has reverted to rigid social structure. Some of you are nodding "Yes" and thinking of Amish communities and/or RadTrad Catholic communities in Idaho. But where do those roads lead? This is the Benedict Option redux and the conclusion is still the same; cultural amputation, however noble, doesn't actually work.
Ultimately, I don't think this changes because of policy or wishy-washy "we need to change the culture" think pieces. You could make every college in America sex segregated again, but the genie is already out of the bottle. I see a potential change coming from the active choice of certain segments of women; pro-social moms who are willing to publicly state that motherhood beats the hell out of careerism and that finding a man interested in supplying that life for you should be the point of your early 20s. That's both a radical and accessible statement for women in 2026.
LARPing TradeWife-ery on TikTok isn't going to land. Esoteric Catholic theology on the role of women bandied about by tweed-clad Catholic Neckbeards (Pints With Aquinas, looking at you) gives the ladies the "ick" because those guys look like and often truly are weirdo dorks. Even if every giga-chad on earth started to vow pure monogamy, it wouldn't matter because of the monolithic nature of women in determining social value hierarchies. You need other women - preferably high social status as possible - to "hold the line" on family and motherhood being the ultimate supreme good for women.
Yes. It seems also necessary to "unplug" them from the screeching hivemind that will try to spike their anxiety 24/7 and feed her self-sabotaging advice to assuage that anxiety. This can also include her normal circle of friends. I keep hearing accounts that divorces are 'contagious' in social circles, as the first one to pull the trigger on divorce will get a lot of sympathy from the others... and will immediately start trying to sell the others on the idea of divorce so she's not the only one in this embarrassing social situation.
But if it comes out "oh my husband doesn't want me to use social media" that same hivemind will probably label him an abuser and redouble efforts to 'rescue' her from his influence.
And this is why I fear its a downward spiral of feedback effects. The women who do this have to be HIGH STATUS for other women to follow suit. And 'they' have made 'girlbossing' and 'free spirit' women the pinnacle in the media lens, and shunted motherhood and being a pillar of one's community to second-class status in the majority of womens' minds, so there's no corrective mechanism arising!
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