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I know probably two handfuls of couples that engage in trad gender roles, where the man is the provider, both lefties and righties. I think this is probably the biggest dealbreaker I've ever heard. There is a charitable interpretation that is barely acceptable in regards to a joint physically fit lifestyle or jointly modest/religious lifestyle but I think this is going to be a huge constraint for you. People just don't like others having control over their bodies. You are better off looking for values a partner should have that would lead them to converging to your "final say" rather than explicitly trying to exercise the control.
I'm sure, most people think they are giving folks grand ol deals.
Does it make it any better that I'm willing to reciprocate in that regard?
I don't know how else to describe "don't go out and get any tattoos, drastic hairstyle changes, or plastic/cosmetic surgery without my approval somewhere in the loop."
The whole problem is that objectively speaking, a huge majority of women have chosen to be obese, wacky haircuts and hair colors, and tattoos and ever increasing numbers of piercings.
All are factors that make them look horrible.
And all this whilst marriage and relationship rates are in the toilet.
Why do you suppose that is?
Here's the deal. Your wife will put on weight when she's pregnant. This weight may take time to come off, especially if she gets pregnant again within a couple years. She might spend most of her child bearing years overweight. If you try to control this or punish her, you put her health and the health of your children at risk. This comes across as really severe.
If all you mean is "Don't get tatoos or medical procedures without telling me first" then that's fine. But there's a spectrum between that and "I will track what you eat, how much you exercise, and select your wardrobe" which is how it kind of came across the first comment.
I've said it before (though I can't find the link at present), if she's willing to bear and raise my children, she will receive my reverence eternally even if her looks slide.
Indeed, that's part of the point. If she is willing to accept the travails of pregnancy, I will dig in deep to my provider role, and will accept the tradeoffs to her personal appearance because the outcome we're achieving is SO mutually beneficial I can't imagine deciding against it. My consent to her gaining weight is both implicit in the act of getting pregnant and I will happily make it explicit and praise her to the heavens for the sacrifice.
I'm mostly seeking the parts of a good and compatible personality that happen to correspond with keeping oneself healthy and aesthetically pleasing... while not overindexing on that measure.
Because guess what, those are traits I'd like to pass on to and inculcate in my kids! Its all tied up in the same ultimate objective.
Yes, and I'm suggesting you should interrogate a bit why you jumped to THAT interpretation from the rip rather than asking clarifying questions. "I will get a final say in how she dresses and maintains herself," to me, means closer to "she's making decisions independently (or with my counsel), but I hold veto power when I think it necessary." Tracking how much she eats and exercises sounds like a freaking DRAG, man. Although maybe more possible with AI agents. She wants to get ice cream for dessert I will provide without blinking. She wants to eat ice cream for every meal... imma put my foot down.
I try to be as specific as I can and avoid ambiguity in my language, and don't always succeed, but man, if I wanted to say "I WILL CONTROL ALL HER FOOD INTAKE AND WILL PHYSICALLY RESTRAIN HER FROM GETTING A HAIRCUT" I would have said that.
And whilst I can SEE how you could get to that interpretation, I would suggest that isn't the most charitable or straightforward takeaway unless your priors suggest any signal of wanting some control in a relationship indicates being a micromanaging overbearing control freak.
Hopefully I've given sufficient clarity now.
A lot of the language you used implied very strict control against a woman's wishes.
"additional authority... that a lot of women ALSO don't want to grant" "I will make final decisions...I will dictate I will get a final say in how she dresses and maintains herself"
So yes, control over her physical appearance, which would require control over her food and exercise.
"The whole house is indeed my castle," good luck with that when you get small kids. It's clear that you think of yourself as a benevolent dictator, but your still describing a dictatorship.
"fair and equitable for any woman willing to help raise my kids." Language imply that this control persists after she's had kids, and that the kids are yours (singular) not yours (plural).
I'm glad to hear that your expectations are not quite that severe but the language you used did encourage a more severe interpretation.
I mean, I noted that women left to their own devices have gotten fat, covered in tattoos, and do weird things with their hair. And they're abjectly unhappy too.
Who else should rein them in, if NOT their husbands?
Yes. Actual dictators have wives too.
But I only extend my dicatorship to the boundaries of my actual, personal property. And, it turns out, I don't view a wife as personal property.
Do you think the phrase "help raise my kids" implies that I'll be involved with and assisting this process too, as in there's mutual exchange here?
I dunno, once again I just try to use the terms that actually express my beliefs as precisely as possible. You're pattern matching them to a type of guy that is basically nonexistent in the modern era.
So have men. This is just a large part of Western culture at this point.
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It doesn't work like that. I mean, maybe you're the level of advanced autism where it does, but for a psychologically healthy man, you'll see those changes happen so continually and slowly that it'll barely even register. By the time you really notice she'll be the mother of your children and the reverence will come naturally.
My autism is sufficiently advanced that yes, I am simply predicting with confidence that the natural/inborn evolutionary psychology factors will kick in and I will feel that specific way in the future with near certainty.
But you realize how many steps have to happen at this point to even get there, what else can I do but talk in theoretical terms?
No, that's fair. I'm not trying to downplay your situation. I'm just saying that if you win, I don't think you'll have to be making explicit tradeoffs like "Well, she's dropped from a 9 to a 7, but I'll tolerate it for the two sons".
I do wish you the best of luck in your quest.
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I wouldn't really consider it 'choosing', at least in any sense narrower than that in which the victim of a mugger 'chooses' to hand over his wallet.
I use that term more deliberately in the age of GLPs. I myself am down quite a bit of weight, because I didn't like where the number on the scale was headed, and technology to address the issue was easily available.
So obvious steps were taken. I wouldn't hold anyone else to standards I myself can't adhere to.
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Now that's an insult to anyone who ever got mugged.
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The reason it comes across as weirdly controlling is that women in happy relationships don't suddenly dye their hair and get a new tattoo that they know their husband will hate. That's already a sign that the relationship is on the rocks, without any control rhetoric. This is true of most things (getting fat less so, especially after some children). If you say "wow, those huge pants that are trending sure are ugly!" And she goes out and buys the ugly pants you hate, that is already a sign that she doesn't respect you. That's less the case with things like getting fat and cutting her hair after bearing your children, because small children really do like pulling hair with surprising intensity, and all things cooking and exercise related can become harder.
Except when they decide the relationship ISN'T happy and, rather than actually discuss the matter with their spouse, they opt to listen to their local divorced friends or tiktok or a feminist podcast crew and just go full "my body my choice" and dares the husband to object.
Which, legally speaking, there's not much he can do but bear it, or divorce.
The risk exists, and men are not ignorant of this.
I will flip your point to its obvious corollary.
If the woman expects that the relationship will remain happy and trusts her husband's decisionmaking, then THE THOUGHT OF CHANGING HER APPEARANCE WITHOUT ASKING HIM SHOULDN'T CROSS HER MIND.
If the marriage is happy then why should she ever feel the need to challenge his authority on this point! It shouldn't even be an issue to start with! It can just be two parties who have mutually agreed that they are made better by the others' presence, and thus neither feels the need to disrupt things for the other party without discussing it. The woman going behind his back to change herself is a failure mode.
The only reason the man needs to exercise control in that fashion is that the woman has, for SOME reason, decided to test it! You say the control would be unnecessary in a happy marriage. I say that the acting out and drastic changes is also unnecessary in a happy marriage.
Basically, I find your logical construction of the situation incomplete.
See, this is what I mean by reciprocal. I CONSTANTLY hear that men who have expectations, standards, and want to exercise control over their local environment (i.e they one they acquired through their efforts/money and are charged with maintaining) as abusive or narcissistic.
And in some cases this may be true. But as per usual you never hear critiques of women who randomly decide to flout expectations and reject standards and act out of control when they had no actual reason to do so. If the woman finds herself in a good situation, it behooves HER to not act out in ways that demolish the status quo.
But this implies that she has to accept correction from SOMEWHERE.
So I just put the question to you: If a woman starts to act out and threatens to upend an otherwise happy, successful marriage... WHO aside from her husband, should be tasked with corralling her behavior?
Or is the thesis that nobody is authorized to correct such behavior?
I'm doubting the premise that 1) a woman in a happy relationship would disfigure herself in ways she knew would piss off her husband, or 2) if she did, whether him going on about Authority and Correctness and the he's got to corral her behavior, would do anything except make the situation worse.
Do you know many conservative women? The main danger is that they'll start wearing frumpy t-shirt dresses and let all their makeup expire, such that it become very difficult for them to dress up nicely, which is what I thought your initial comment was pointing to. If they're going full midlife crisis, I don't know what the solution is in that case, probably a change of social group. Perhaps an internet free religious retreat?
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Mostly its a sign the husband forgot to block social media sites on the router, as is his patriarchal responsibility.
All that shit is a social contagion and not a sign of anything except gas lighting.
Lol. Controlling the internet settings is a more reasonable and trad position than controlling your wife's fashion choices, anyway.
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You are supposed to look for women who value their husbands opinions, and they themselves don't value those things. Then give your opinion, but leave the ultimate decision authority to the individual. The problem is that what you've stated in this comment and the previous comment around "control" aren't really the same thing. This is pretty much the same thing as women who date abusive deadbeats, it's about vetting. You need to vet women for a propensity to do the above, and even if you have this meager dating pool, toss out the ones that would... have some standards.
Authentic choice is the most costly signal of all.
Ain't that the truth.
This is more of an aside, but it’s tangentially related to signaling problems.
Women who are trad lifestyle oriented are looking for signals that predict convergences to negative outcomes for their specific locality’s. Global red flags are a thing but local, contextual red flags are more tightly watched for. When you talk about control you evoke that local contextual red flag for trad behavior. Even if you never say it out loud those sort of ideas have a way of leaking into social responses that women are far more intuitive at picking up. I’d recommend you change your mindset about around it, let go of your own desires for control and converge to value-basis belief.
I never say it out loud in person with a woman I might be interested in.
I don't intend to change my mindset, when its everyone else's mindset that sucks.
If it were working for them, they wouldn't be in the same boat and also mentally worse off than I am.
Cognitive rigidity is a choice. You should get over it. You can be happy or you can be right, which would you prefer?
You might not say it around women you are interested in, but what about friends? Their partners? People talk, I’m not sure about your personal platonic ecosystem but are you really so spoilt for choice that you can afford to burn bridges and close doors of opportunity?
Trad women don’t want to date men who express controlling-abuse red flags, doing so puts them in a worse position. When you explain your thoughts it comes off much more mild, thus its a signaling problem.
Thus far I'm managing to be both.
Most people are managing neither, it would appear. I'm cognitively rigid insofar as my process has brought me towards what I actually want in life, and I see others processes do not.
Note, I may have a different overall set of priorities than the average person.
Which bridges and doors are you referring to?
People aren't getting in relationships at all these days. The doors have been closed already.
Its worst among the young. Nobody is reckoning with this in a meaningful way.
The whole problem is that whatever mindsets you're trying to talk me into has led to this disastrous landscape.
Why would I change MY mindset when I can directly observe that doing so doesn't actually improve the situation?
The ones that exist when you are a part of a community. When friends introduce you their partner’s friends, when you meet potential partners in your community, when people in your community vouch for you, when you bring your partner to your community and the women side conversation convey what a catch you are. Basic social things. Nothing reinforces a woman’s mate choice like a community that approves and lauds that choice as a good match.
If nobody is matching up then the obvious answer for you is to plant your feet in the sand and refuse to soften your language… because that will show them!
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Do you know a large number of trad women? You've polled them on beliefs?
I can't say I know any, so me saying what they want when dating would be pure speculation. I certainly know that liberal PMC women are repelled by even a hint of what they perceive to be "trad" thought, but that tells me nothing about a more traditional woman who regularly attends church.
As I said two handfuls, ~7-9 ish depending on your definition. I'm not so autistic as to formally poll them, but I have talked about dating, relationships, and I am friends with many of their husbands, I was in their weddings. I know how those husbands think, absolutely they have preferences around tattoos, hair color, and lifestyle fitness, but they married women with similar values. It's not control, its a shared agreement on values. It is also just intuitive. Would you want to date a partner who wants to control how you dress and how your body looks like, who has the final say in all of that, and even worse, it's against your beliefs to run, to divorce, so you are stuck with a controlling partner? Anyone saying yes has a fetish.
To be clear the dichotomy I am suggesting is:
vs
Faceh is expressing the latter but wants it like the former. He should give up his control issues and just converge to believing the later. It would be healthier.
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I know and have known a decent number of trad women. They're basically OK with "husband makes the final decision".
Focusing on controlling appearance is weird, though, since traditionally the woman manages not only her own appearance, but that of the children, and to some extent her husband and interior design as well. She is also forming the aesthetic judgement of the children. So it's best not to marry a woman with very poor taste.
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That part stood out to me as well. I couldn't imagine what it even meant. Sure, he could divorce her is she got too fat or something, I guess, but otherwise I'm simply confused.
Right but that would violate the sanctity of marriage that I am assuming he values. It's a rock and a hard place. I've observed he feels powerless about it. Leading to control issues creating a negative feedback loop. The ironic thing is that this would easily be resolved by just filtering for women that already have a similar outlook/values system. No need for the control if they already agree with and value your opinion.
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