Who sacrifices more?

Women are allergic to sacrifice

All choices come with consequences.

For example, if you agree to date a woman exclusively (e.g., have a “relationship” with her), one consequence of that choice is by undertaking the “boyfriend” role, you will have additional responsibilities expected of you beyond what was expected of you when you were in the “guy she’s dating” or the “guy she’s hooking up with” role. Another consequence of your choice is that you no longer have the opportunity to date or have sex with other women, or at least that if you do so, this is regarded as “cheating” and is very likely to cost you your relationship if you’re found out.

Not all consequences are negative. For example, because this woman is now in a “girlfriend” role, there are additional expectations on her like more reliable and more frequent sex, doing nice in-a-relationship things for and with you, and her agreeing not to date or have sex with other men (or at least for doing so to be regarded as cheating).

Some of those choices require someone to sacrifice something. For example, not dating and having sex with other people could be regarded as a sacrifice for both of you. Having to devote time, thought, and money to doing nice in-a-relationship things for each other could also be regarded as a sacrifice.

Not all sacrifices are equal. If your girlfriend doesn’t buy you an awesome birthday present, you probably don’t care that much. Even if you do care, you’re probably not going to yell at her, sulk, withhold sex, or dump her. In fact, that sacrifice where she’s expected to do nice things for you probably isn’t much of a sacrifice since there aren’t any consequences if she doesn’t do it. But if you skip her birthday gift, she’s definitely going to yell, sulk, withhold sex, and/or dump you. Your sacrifice is very expected.

If you agree to marry a woman, you will have even more responsibilities and expectations for the “husband” role, above and beyond what the boyfriend role required. For example, you will have to manage a shared home and provide for everyone’s lifestyle, and you and she are probably planning to have some kids (if you’re not having kids, there is zero point to entangling yourself with marriage, ever), so the lifestyle you provide needs to be able to accommodate children.

But it’s not all negative. You get children out of the deal. And in her “wife” role, your woman is expected to do even better and nicer things for you than she did in the girlfriend role, do her part maintaining the home, have frequent sex with you, and so on.

So there are some expectations regarding a wife. Such as maintaining a home and caring for children, or alternatively contributing to the household income in a second provider role.

As above, some of these choices could be regarded as sacrifices. After all, does anybody really want to work 60 hours a week to pay the mortgage, buy groceries, and support children? Does anybody actually want to fold laundry? Of course not. But these things need doing. Most people think the lives they live are worth these sacrifices, but there are still sacrifices involved. All choices come with consequences.

Not all sacrifices are equal. For example, if your wife doesn’t have frequent sex with you, isn’t nice to you and doesn’t do nice things for you, doesn’t contribute to the household income, and does the bare minimum when it comes to maintaining the home and caring for children, you might be pretty incensed about that. But you’re married to her. Your only recourse if you find this situation unlivable is to divorce her, at which point she is highly likely to be awarded your home, primary custody of your children, more than half of your accrued wealth and assets, and a perpetual chunk out of every future paycheck you receive. In fact, her awards from a divorce are higher the less she works and the less income of her own she makes.

Meanwhile, if you do not measure up to her expectations for the husband role, that same tool to file for divorce and receive the house, kids, half the assets, and an ongoing future payment is always in her back pocket, ready to be used.

Up to this point, it seems an awful lot like men sacrifice a whole bunch, while women’s sacrifices are pretty optional, right? Maybe if her boyfriend or husband is the most awesome man in the world that she can never replace and she can’t bear the thought of screwing things up with him, she might choose to make some sacrifices. But if she’s dating or married to a normal guy, what’s the point of sacrificing anything?

Having children is where things get a bit more interesting. Children must be cared for, and doing so represents a significant investment of time and money and a huge change in lifestyle compared to life before children. Even doing the bare minimum job that is just adequate enough to not have the state seize your kids is a huge investment.

And while a woman can stomp her feet, scream, lecture, and threaten — and even divorce her husband — the children still need caring for. If Dad isn’t doing all the work and contributing all the resources, whatever he doesn’t do has to come from Mom.

If Mom isn’t measuring up, Dad has no recourse. He can suck it up and stay married and do all the work Mom isn’t doing. Or he can divorce her and give her the house, kids, most of the present money, and a chunk of all of his future money, and hope she honors whatever partial custody the courts give him.

If Dad isn’t measuring up, Mom has the recourse to divorce him and get all of those goodies, but once Dad’s out of the house and she’s getting a monthly check from her state disbursement office by way of Dad’s employer, the children still require an enormous investment of time and money, and a large change in Mom’s lifestyle. There’s no using her innate abundance for being female, or her state’s legal system, to get out of sacrificing anything this time.

Having children means Mom is going to have to sacrifice something, no matter what.

And surprise, surprise, there’s a birth rate crisis.

The best possible route for Mom to have kids is if she has a dutiful, whipped husband who does everything, or at least everything he’s able to do, which minimizes her responsibility and what she needs to sacrifice. But… that requires a Dad who actually does that. Someone she can (uh oh…) trust (yes, trust!) to do what’s needed. Because if he ever stops doing what’s needed, it will fall to her. He has the power to stop doing everything, and whatever he doesn’t do falls to her and now she must sacrifice. And all she can do is hope that he doesn’t do that.

Having children means that even though Mom still has more power than Dad, Dad actually has some power to force Mom to sacrifice.

Did I mention there’s a birth rate crisis?

The second best possible route for Mom is for her to divorce a Dad who isn’t doing everything so at least she has a big pile of money and some of Dad’s future money coming in, but that only works out well for Mom if her ex-husband is rich. If he’s normal (or worse, poor!), that’s not enough money once we account for Mom’s reduced ability to work and make herself rich when she’s single-parenting.

In ye olden days, it was just expected that everyone worked hard and sacrificed. Most people were peasants doing hard labor. So adding childcare to that pile was no big deal. If anything, taking care of kids was easier than tilling fields or blacksmithing or whatever the heck people did in ye olden days.

But modern women are allergic to sacrifice. After a coddled youth filled with attention simply for existing — and a dating situation, and a marriage situation, where she has all of the power and sacrifices virtually nothing — the decision to have children and actually have to sacrifice something no matter what the future brings? Terrifying!

Why should we have to do that, women complain. It’s so misogynistic that this is expected of us, they shriek. We’re only having kids if the system is engineered to give us lots and lots of free money and stuff and make it so we never have to work so it’s pretty much no sacrifice for us — and only if we make it the social norm that Dad does the childcare because it’s not fair that we have to. (We’re too used to not sacrificing!)

Of course, there’s not enough free money in the world to make it so all women can just not work forever, but every time some country offers a little bit of money, time off from work, medical care, childcare — not a zero-sacrifice situation, but just something to make it easier — those countries have even fewer women choosing to sacrifice. Because when you put that piddly handout next to a real income from a real job, plus zero restrictions on a woman’s lifestyle, it looks pretty lame.

You’ll never satisfy a woman with measures like that because the root problem isn’t money, stuff, or childcare. It’s a deep-seated allergy to sacrifice. A free handout? Sure, they’ll take it. Grudgingly. But then complain it’s not enough and that it actually demeans them to be offered crumbs when they could be out there living the high life, child-free and responsibility-free.

Look at the countries held out as examples. Even paid maternity leave for a year, and subsidized daycare, and tax breaks for families can’t compete with late nights out, a promotion at work, the freedom to swipe on a better option whenever the mood strikes. And most importantly: Never having to be put in a situation where she has to trust a man to keep her from having to sacrifice too much.

Men, on the other hand, have been sacrificing since day one. And are quite used to living in a disadvantaged power situation relative to the fairer sex. They grind jobs they hate to pay the bills, swallow their pride in relationships where the rules are stacked against them, and when the kids come, they know it’s on them to provide AND keep Mom super-happy, or they lose those kids.

But women? Any expectation on them is oppression. Dating? She gets wined and dined with no strings. Marriage? He commits everything while she can walk away with everything whenever he doesn’t measure up (or if she just gets bored). Kids? … Well, that’s where things crack, because there just isn’t enough free money or dutiful husband labor to fully erase the fact that having children requires actual sacrifice, day in and day out.

And that’s the real misogyny in their eyes. Not the system that lets them coast, but the biology and society that would dare expect anything of them. Even in a magical world where the free money was enough to hire a nanny, maid, and pay for spa days and the social expectation was childcare is the man’s job, most women would still say no thanks. Better to keep those options open.

Honestly, people like that shouldn’t be having children anyway. But kids are the perfect topic to illustrate the larger issue: Women are pathologically allergic to sacrifice. Because women innately know that whoever sacrifices more has less power.

If you ever want to give your relationship the litmus test and really see where you stand, just stop sacrificing. Take a week and just don’t. And ask her to do something that requires a sacrifice. See what she does.

All choices come with consequences. Hers are optional, at least until kids come. Yours never are. So choose wisely, internet men.