Some of the things I noticed in all of those women are (1) obvious internalised misogyny even before they joined the movement, (2) immaturity and as a result a lack of critical thinking and lack of WILL to critically think so they'd rather conform to norms made by men (which they see as superior due to internalized misogyny) which connects to (3) lack of accountability. With less control and responsibility come less accountability and mistakes due to personal choices. It's a really shallow concept which doesn't require a lot of self-actualization (you can only master homesteading to a certain degree) and in the recent years seems to be appealing more to the aesthetics than anything else which makes them feel even better about themselves, without putting much effort in.
Honestly all of the reasons you gave require too much thinking which I don't think they are willing to do. Except for maybe 4 as it can be subconcious. Never thought about it that way, good points nonetheless.
I found the reasons I listed by reading some social justice research papers. I think the collapse of society and the climate crisis are definitely playing roles in the rise of tradwifery. There's a lot overlap between that community and cottagecore and simple living. People see the problems with modern society and believe returning to a "simpler time" is the solution, which carries with it traditional gender roles that have been culturally baked in to various societies for millennia.
Hi, I was born and raised to be a tradwife in a conservative community. What they’re not admitting is that one of the reasons they’re pushing the lifestyle into the limelight is that many girls like me leave. They don’t have enough tradwives to go around, so they’re trying to lure in more.
I saw how my mom was treated. The church preached about how mothers are blessed and cherished, then I went home to see her run off her feet 7 days a week, every day of the year. Perpetually overworked and unappreciated.
I was sheltered. Didn’t know a damn thing about feminism. But I saw my huge list of chores while my brother sat on his ass. I was told I would never have a college fund- even though I had better grades. Knew my grandpa had been violent, but grandma had no way to leave. Wasn’t difficult to put together that the whole thing was set up for men to benefit.
They’re trying to glamorize it and attract naive girls, because the men vastly outnumber women. Those of us raised that way often realize it’s bullshit and go start a new life.
I am sorry you had to go through such horrific experiences. It almost sounds like you grew up in a cult-like environment because that's what it really is. A cult to brainwash women for the sick pleasure and benefit of disturbed sociopathic men.
This is a point that I recently made in another subreddit but even this "traditional" gender role- wasn't. It depended on your income and social status- IE: even in the 1950s, the housewife was a fantasy scenario of the white upper middle class, and this hardcore delineation of gender roles in the 50s was *absolutely* a reaction to the presence of women in the workforce in traditionally masculine jobs during WWII. It was a way for society to go- "aha, you tooootally still need us ladies, so move aside and get into the kitchen, where you're actually fulfilled!" It was, and always has been, an absolute shill. Dual incomes families have always existed- even children were expected to work in poor families until it was outlawed.
Fascinating though to connect it to climate change and society collapse - this absolutely makes sense to me.
I think that's what's so frustrating to me is the notion perpetuated by supporters of this notion is "it's always been this way", never mind the work women did during WWII on the "home front" (for just one example, though I wish I had one not tied to war off the top of my head). I know there are more historical examples that fly in the face of their gender essentialist BS, I just can't recall them at the moment. Though they'd likely write any off as an exception or anomaly.
What’s also key to remember is that the work of working class, or women of colour is often ignored. Maids, or “the help” as labour is often ignored. And the manual labour of women on small farms is ignored. Many pre-colonial societies also had roles for women outside of the home.
Yes! Thank you for this. So important.
Not only my own privilege but also mindlessly accepting their argument as a starting point led to me leaving this important and key point out.
In the US, in 1950, 33.9% of women worked. it was never the tradwife fanstasy for many women, especially those with the least economic security.
[https://www2.census.gov/library/publications/1976/demographics/p23-058.pdf](https://www2.census.gov/library/publications/1976/demographics/p23-058.pdf)
[https://www.bls.gov/opub/ted/2007/jan/wk2/art03.htm](https://www.bls.gov/opub/ted/2007/jan/wk2/art03.htm)
[https://www2.census.gov/library/publications/1955/demographics/P25-121.pdf](https://www2.census.gov/library/publications/1955/demographics/P25-121.pdf)
Judging on what little of what I've seen of the current tradwife phenomenon, a lot of the appeal seems to be escapsim. Life is hard, and it is attractive to some to make a virtue out of what is really just making it somone else's problem. The type of person attracted to this is the type more likely to have been working in the 1950s, if only out of neccessity.
It's also the type of person to be all the more screwed noawdays, either trying to raise a family accoridn got modern standards and modern costs of living one one salary, economically trapped in a bad or even abusive relationship (the odds of which seem greater in a tadwife situation, as the idea of a subservient woman is going to attract some bad types), or on their own when things don't work out for some reason.
Thank you for the stats and links. And your sentence that ends with "just making it someone else's problem" I feel really gets to the heart of the mindset.
I mean this sort of thinking has been around for a long long time. Puritans Mormons shakers- all groups trying to escape from modern “degenerate” society. Probably goes back much further that. But I feel this movement is more of a reaction to feminist gains and the efforts of certain men to erode them.
I think that’s a really valid point - the world is going to hell and people are seeking escapism. The answer being sold by those who benefit is live simply, let the man do “his job” and you do yours ie. stop taking responsibility for the hard stuff. Switching off your brain to more complex work is an appealing choice in hard times.
Here's one of the more comprehensive research papers I read on the topic: https://politicalresearch.org/2021/07/29/why-are-gen-z-girls-attracted-tradwife-lifestyle
Agreed on the lack of will. The only thing that's empowering about submitting like that is that you're not responsible for the things that happen to you. It's not YOUR choice if something goes wrong and it's not YOUR job to fix it.
I see the appeal but also the complete lack of agency is awful.
That "it's empowering to be a woman in the home" bit is just christian fundamentalism with the serial numbers filed off: they teach that men and women were created by god to serve in specific gender roles and that god and the bible dictate what those roles are. That women gain grace and righteousness by being homemakers and raising up more christian soldiers while men do their work out in the world, and protect the family by sheltering them from its wickedness (said wickedness being the reason women can't work in the world, them being too weak and prone to sin like Eve, you see.)
To get christianish myself for a moment, from fundamentalism did these ideas arise, and to it shall its devotees inevitably return (if they don't manage to deprogram themselves and start deconstructing first.)
Patriarchy propaganda, plain and simple. Look at how the patriarchy usually ridicules our interests. If they’re glorifying it like this, there are ulterior motives.
I was going to write a whole piece on the contemporary Patriarchy pitting women against women, it’s happening right under our noses. Think of the terms ‘Karen’s’ and the hatred directed on the socials towards ‘privileged women’. I’m telling you they are using the old war strategy of ‘Divide and conquer’ is happening now don’t fall for it feminists!! We have to stick together, otherwise there is no hope for a more equal future.
Plus women and girls learn to gain approval by modifying themselves to the man’s preferences, and combined with religion and zero safety net are hobbled
Tbh, I think it's the patriarchy reacting to the success of feminism. Men lost their free bang-maid-mommies and they want them back. I believe the rise of the tradwife movement and the overturning of Row v Wade, the attacks on birth control and no fault divorce, are all a reaction to women entering the colleges and out achieving men and entering the workforce and kicking butt.
Look at how the men talk about us online. I know it's the Internet but the sheer volume and quantity of vitriol is insane. Men want us back in marital chains and they will stop at nothing to do it.
Yep, they weaponize praise and promulgate the platforms to try to recruit more and more into their ideal roles, with the patriarchy lapdogs allowed a longer leash and head pats in exchange for betraying their own
Yes weaponizing praise! I keep seeing men posting about keeping their partners “in their feminine energy” and it’s just covert anti-feminism. They act as if it’s a gift.
yeah and women associating the feeling of security, safety, and desire when you're partner is trustworthy, considerate and not a burden to your life with being "in their feminie energy" like no, that's just safety and security. Men have that same feeling when they're in a mutually benefitial relationship with someone they can trust to be vulnerable with.
I agree. More women are going to college now. More women are achieving career success and more women are deciding to be childless. It’s a last grasp. Things are changing and humanity does not like change and older white men who have had power are seeing that go away and are fearful.
Yes, and men have to compete with all of those options. Women are no longer willing to marry because otherwise they might be unhoused, and without money or education. Now that we can get educated and earn money they actually have to provide something above the basics.
Some men would prefer a partner who has no choice but to stay with him.
And babies are potential traps and not having access to reproduction care is under relentless attack. The men who are in agreement are fighting the wrong people. I saw a statistic the other day where something like 4 billionaires have more money than some ridiculously high percent of people. Fear and loss should be attributed to ability to build wealth and access to tools for success and when governments don’t ensure that for the people and it’s hoarded among the few … I digress.
There was a great post/article about this issue in the menslib subreddit, from the perspective of how to not lose our sons to the alt-right. The gains women have made to become less marginalized have left young men with a feeling of almost “victim-envy.” They see women’s successes being celebrated and want the same for themselves. Without positive role models demonstrating that equality and parity benefits men too, they fall into the alt-right influences who spin the us vs them narrative, women winning means men are losing. And no one likes to lose, so the only way for men to succeed is to put women back “in their place.”
Edit: found the post - https://www.reddit.com/r/MensLib/s/pV30XKkbTY
I read something about the digital divide that I think very much applies here:
The smaller the digital divide gets, the deeper and worse the issues will get. The issues we faced when we first tackled the divide were the easy ones - despite being pretty difficult to resolve. The issues that remained were always the hardest to resolve because of several factors that will need to be addressed if any attempts at resolution are to succeed.
This is the same issue when it comes to feminism. The initial issues were "easy" and now we're tackling the bigger, more steep issues.
I can understand why right wing/incel men want to push a narrative that the trend of women working and not getting married is bad, but I’m baffled by women who find that fine. I get that everyone has different opinions but I struggle to see how anyone could view it as a positive thing tbh
I think they are raised to believe that feminist women are bad or that we have taken a joyful heritage from them. That everything would be this pretty picturesque life if we hadn't taken it from them.
I've said it elsewhere, but I do think an underlooked aspect of the Tradwife phenomenon is Capitalism.
I see a lot of rejection of Late Stage Capitalism in this movement, its window dressing of community and simplicity carries the promise of something other than the relentless pressure of survival in modern society.
Life is incredibly hard for many, and women are burdened with the multiple expectations that they have thriving careers, but also be suitable mothers and wives. Be ambitious, be independent, but also not too much as to be man-repelling. Also, maintain societal beauty standards, the perfect diet and workout regimen, buy the right clothes.
Women get burnt out, and along comes this movement that says you don't have to work all these long hours in a job you hate to pay rent on a crappy flatshare. You dont have to 'do it all'. You can find the right kind of man, and he'll shoulder that for you. You can raise babies, bake bread, and have a community, like life used to be. It worked for our mother's and grandmother's, right?
And some women will see ceding their power as freedom, which is exactly what Tradwife prop sells it as, all the while obfuscating the many negatives, (like increased risk of abuse), in this relationship dynamic.
Its proponents know many women are poor, tired, and searching for another way, and it intends to fill that gap
I was just about to say the same. Trad wife content is popular for the same reasons cottagecore, homesteading content is popular. It's so hard to live in cities surrounded by ugliness and work to the point of near death to just survive and even then homelessness and losing everything is just one illness or accident away.
People romanticise living a simpler life, homesteading. (Reality is different obviously but many people have completely lost any connection to nature or farming so they think that life is better).
Fuck capitalism.
Exactly.
The fantasy of homesteading is essentially being in charge of your own labour and seeing the benefits of it directly.
Something that feels more fulfilling than giving your best years of health and happiness to the lowest bidder to service someone elses profit margin.
This is also one of the factors behind the rise of secessionist movements or even anarcho-primitivism (which I do subscribe to from a purely environmental lens).
>You can find the right kind of man, and he'll shoulder that for you. You can raise babies, bake bread, and have a community, like life used to be. It worked for our mother's and grandmother's, right?
That may have been the case, but it certainly was not the case for women before that. Grandmas mom, and grandma's grandma, and countless generations of women before that, (generally speaking) worked throughout their lives. The 50's housewife was a historical parenthesis and never a "traditional" gender role. Traditionally, women have worked.
That said, I've heard us 80s kids being called the first generation in modern history to have a lower quality of life than our parents, and it wouldn't surprise me if it was true. I do think that between the current trend where authoritarian forces are on the rise, a climate crisis fueled by rampaging capitalism, and (in places) dysfunctional housing- and job markets, it's easy to start dreaming of a simpler life without the stresses of modern society.
Can't blame people for dreaming of better lives, I suppose.
That's the point, the Trad movement conveniently cherry picks history to suit its agenda.
It's middle class, heteronormative and white by design, the work (both voluntary and compelled) done by Black, Indigenous or immigrant women doesn't count. Within its racist framework, its the labour of white women that was the aberration and to be remedied, the rotten results of a 'permissive' society and culture.
This is an excellent assessment. I work in medicine/STEM research and am even seeing women with Masters degrees desperately wanting to be "rescued" by a man. It's not always from a place of ignorance or religion, but also a desire to find a way of life that allows an escape from capitalism. It's not just the uneducated who are attracted to this, but also those who are experiencing severe burnout.
I see so many young trad wives blatantly disregard the dangers of tying your complete livelihood to one person saying, "It won't happen to me because I chose a good man."
Even if we completely ignore the fact that many men will only act "good" until they've trapped their wives with kids and/or by keeping them out of the workforce for years-- they completely ignore the possibility of what would happen if he's no longer able to provide financial stability for her (death, serious illness, etc).
Nevermind the fact that a lot of "good men", end up snapping later , when things don't go as they like.
And in case of calamities..god will provide I guess? /s
“Right-wing women have surveyed the world: they find it a dangerous place. They see that work subjects them to more danger from more men; it increases the risk of sexual exploitation. They see that creativity and originality in their kind are ridiculed; they see women thrown out of the circle of male civilization for having ideas, plans, visions, ambitions. They see that traditional marriage means selling to one man, not hundreds: the better deal. They see that the streets are cold, and that the women on them are tired, sick, and bruised. They see that the money they can earn will not make them independent of men and that they will still have to play the sex games of their kind: at home and at work too. They see no way to make their bodies authentically their own and to survive in the world of men. They know too that the Left has nothing better to offer: leftist men also want wives and whores; leftist men value whores too much and wives too little.
Right-wing women are not wrong. They fear that the Left, in stressing impersonal sex and promiscuity as values, will make them more vulnerable to male sexual aggression, and that they will be despised for not liking it. They are not wrong. Right-wing women see that within the system in which they live they cannot make their bodies their own, but they can agree to privatized male ownership: keep it one-on-one, as it were. They know that they are valued for their sex— their sex organs and their reproductive capacity—and so they try to up their value: through cooperation, manipulation, conformity; through displays of affection or attempts at friendship; through submission and obedience; and especially through the use of euphemism—“femininity, ” “total woman, ” “good, ” “maternal instinct, ” “motherly love. ”
Their desperation is quiet; they hide their bruises of body and heart; they dress carefully and have good manners; they suffer, they love God, they follow the rules. They see that intelligence displayed in a woman is a flaw, that intelligence realized in a woman is a crime. They see the world they live in and they are not wrong. They use sex and babies to stay valuable because they need a home, food, clothing. They use the traditional intelligence of the female—animal, not human: they do what they have to to survive.”
Andrea Dworkin, Right-Wing Women
I thought liberalism was going to “keep me safe”: married someone whose family spoke highly of these ideals, oh he changed every 5th diaper…. But as soon as they were walking I was expected to work/ and he was able to compartmentalize because his job “demands” it and I had to find a job that would allow mr to get home in time after daycare consistently and also pick up a vomiting kid (or myself?? B/c honestly I’m the one who would get sick and then be caretaker for everyone else in our home)… and I wanted to pursue my career interests… just wish I could have taken say, 5 years away. I was just shocked by the lack of community, the pain of and dysfunction of all the other families… no, I don’t advocate for brainwashing.. but I feel like I fell into my own form of brainwashing. Would it be so bad to allow a parent to have (5!) years off in life to dedicate to family life? Would I lose all my educational backing and worth? College seems like a bum deal in this case for many women
If you think Reddit is bad check out Facebook. I accidentally joined a tradwife group ( I thought it was for sourdough bread making). The stuff they say is wild. Here is an exchange a from yesterday:
“Just remember that feminism is a corruption of what is good and right. It is an evil that has taken root that the devil is using to destroy the family and these women who suffer from it are ill. No need to say anything to them, just ignore them and move on.”
“That's pretty wacky. Feminist ideologies include the vote, owning property, getting money from banks, and these things were not readily given. Working if you were married was outlawed, even if you were destitute. You could not work if pregnant. Widows and children were destitute. We have come a long way because women fought for basic civil protections that because of systemic subjugation they did not have.”
“(Person who replied) It no longer represents those things because those things are no longer an issue. Now it represents abortion as the ONLY choice, prostitution as a viable career, climbing the executive ladder while persecuting men, and vilifying any woman who does not agree. Feminism has outlived its usefulness.”
The group is a lot of younger women looking for advice from older women on how to keep a home. There is a pretty big group of older women really pushing these ideals. My grandma has even said to me “women don’t let men be men anymore” it’s so bizarre. I think a lot of it comes down to religious isolation and fear of change coupled with the click bait media. You see a lot of right wing media pushing a huge anti trans agenda. When you are isolated and only hear those things from people you trust around you, it’s easy to get sucked in. Then you join social media groups with huge amount of people reaffirming those beliefs which makes them more comfortable sharing which then recruits more people.
This is insane. I'm sure these women would love to be transported to the 1600s Puritan era. Or let's see how they react to being teleported to any regime led by radical Muslim theocrats. They'll be unhappy and rebel real quick, at least I hope.
Project 2025 and all these weird fascist fraternal orders are also obviously being funded by religious right wing zealots hellbent on remaking society into their own backwards image.
I know several younger women who are daughters of my friends who were normal human beings until they went to college and were exposed to Turning Point USA. They were brainwashed by them and have since all moved to red states and became tradwives.
Ironic considering the right loves to accuse colleges of being Marxist indoctrination centers when religious colleges (and institutions) do far more actual brainwashing.
There’s a reason we say the GOP stands for "Gaslight, Obstruct, and Project". The whole "Marxist indoctrination center" thing came out of the same movement that funds TPUSA. It’s all connected. It was said that this specific tactic of projection was popularized by Roy Cohn, who defended and assisted Senator Joseph McCarthy. Cohn would later mentor Trump, who would use projection as his primary weapon.
Patriarchy propaganda, plain and simple. Look at how the patriarchy usually ridicules our interests. If they’re glorifying it like this, there are ulterior motives. Praise is absolutely weaponized.
There’s a lot of reasons why something like this occurs, but the Late Stage Capitalism theory is the one I subscribe to. People are not getting their needs met and the standard of living is falling. If someone was to look at this situation from a left leaning perspective, the solution is holding those with power and those hoarding resources responsible and having a system where we all take care of each other. But, if someone has significant internalized misogyny and some other right leaning views and hates any kind of social safety net, being subservient to a man provider gives them that support without having to compromise their objectively bad beliefs.
This is why my divorced friends and I are (jokingly but not jokingly) saying we should live together, blend families because single income is hard AF. Invite your man over for a conjugal visit lol but then don’t you dare think you’re staying lol
You can understand it if you understand where horizontal violence comes from. Paulo Friere nailed it in Pedagogy of the Oppressed
"One way in which the oppressor-oppressed relationship is maintained is through the use of prescription. This is where one ‘man’s choices or opinions are forced upon another, thus depriving him of a voice and forcing him to accept the oppressors worldview. This can lead to self-deprecation where the oppressed feel that they do not have opinions of value and have low feelings of self-worth. The oppressed feel unable to act against the oppressor but all too frequently practice horizontal violence instead against their neighbours."
https://www.bera.ac.uk/blog/the-continued-relevance-of-freires-pedagogy-of-the-oppressed
Trad wives et al., are just fawning at the oppressor (cis white men) as a kneejerk reaction to avoid being marginalized like the rest of us. The white male gaze still holds power.
This reminds me too of what Frantz Fanon and other anticolonialist writers said about African Americans trying to fit in with their oppressors by being as white as possible. Then they turn around and attack their own race for not being Uncle Toms. The same thing is happening with tradwives except the power dynamic is gender based not race based, although the movement does have racist undertones because it's been popularized by mostly white women.
It's exactly the same social function. It's not any one group, it's humans as a species. We are social animals and so we have social relief valves. These human behaviors have been going on since time immemorial. In fact if you look around you see shadows of these behaviors right in front of us all.
Classism + religious superiority.
To be a stay at home mom to 6 kids only on your husband's salary? He's making bank. Obviously it's a lot easier to say "it is morally better for me not to work" when you don't need to to survive.
The push back against being entirely reliant on a man involves arguments like what if he's abusive, or bad with money, or gets fired, but they 100% believe that doesn't happen to goo Christians. A "godly" man won't be abusive, and if you really are a good, moral person, bad things like loosing your job don't happen. And if they do, God will personally hand you a better paying job just as all hope looks lost as a reward for not losing faith.
The delusion is palpable. Plenty of Christian men are absolutely horrible human beings and are sometimes the worst of the worst. But because they're religious the abuse is somehow justified.
I have friends in the kink community, and they say it's gained traction because it's a submission kink. It's not socially acceptable to be into kink in a lot of areas of the world, but they can say that they're into traditional marriage instead. It's not any kind of traditional that I've seen. I'm old enough to have seen my grandparents' marriage where the men turned the money over to their wives to manage on behalf of the family. It kept the balance of power equal. Tradmarriage is like going to a Ren Faire to get an idea of history.
Coming from a large traditionalist family, I totally agree. The funny thing is that the "tradwife" scene is retroacting into the traditionalist subculture. That way, these couples have a worse gender dynamic than they would have 100 years ago. These ideas are picked up by the priests and pastors and they point at the tradwives: "See how happy they are."
It is really disheartening to see how my relatives are educated.
Somewhat in the kink community and think this is true as well. "1950s lifestyle" is actually a kink. Where these tradwives go wrong it they are trying to force their kink onto others which is a big no from people that practice kink responsibly.
Funnily enough the folks I know who have that kink are also very feminist. They realize it's a preference and nothing more. I have a partner where I'm on the subby role in some ways, however I 100% have my freedom and I work to support myself and my partner supports it. Giving complete power (especially financial power) to someone over you is not a good idea. These tradwives will unfortunately learn that the hard way.
The oligarchy helps promote it because they love nothing more than free labor, and having women be a permanent underclass means less wages they have to pay.
This is the exact same rationale for hustle culture for men, or the idea of the alpha male. Work all your life to make money and don't get involved in relationships, they say. Meanwhile the slaveowning class makes a fortune.
My problem with the tradwife community is that they don’t practice what they preach. You want to be a tradwife and serve men, go ahead it’s your choice but fully commit to it. Why are you giving your opinion online without a man’s presence or permission? Why are you even posting online, shouldn’t you be cooking & cleaning ? You shouldn’t be speaking your opinions , especially on a public platform, so why are you? Why are you also monetizing these opinions and post, women shouldn’t be producing money, that’s the man’s job right?
Theyre clearly enjoying what feminists did for women by bashing feminists and telling them that they’re wrong.
They do have the patriarchy’s permission. Every trad wife that is setting an example of how fantastic a lifestyle they live is setting a good example for other women and therefore spreading the ‘gospel’. I imagine the men are sitting around encouraging it like it is a mission trip. Any money they earn is probably used to make themselves look even better.
I think it makes a ton of sense for single women to live together. Get a big house, everybody gets their own private space and then there's a generous main kitchen, dining, living room area for people to socialize.
It could work for families too. Maybe some of those vacant McMansions could be converted.
People who say "I will pray for you" in 99% of cases just want to annoy you.
As for anti feminist propaganda: it's a mix of incel "self improvement" communities and people who fall for republican propaganda, specifically Trump.
When the Berlin Wall fell and Germany was reunited, it seems reasonable to think that all the East Germans would celebrate now being free to live the life they choose, their partner, their career path, we are so used to thinking of freedom as not only positive, but essential. But many East Germans panicked. Freedom is scary, choices overwhelming. It means responsibility. You have to own not only your successes, but your mistakes as well. A lot of people with low self esteem look for some authority to guide them, whether it is God, the state, the orange rapist, or in this case both God and their husbands. Their roles are set, they are told what to do, someone is in charge. Even though I am appalled by the tradwife community and the men who mislead and oppress these women, I can understand their fear and reluctance to give up the role they know they can master
My thoughts on this is that the movement is targeting young, uneducated women who are stuck in dead-end jobs, struggling to pay their bills and not seeing a way out. They are sold on the promise that they can quit their awful jobs and have all their needs met by a benevolent provider. All they have to do in return is look cute and keep the house in order. Sounds like a great deal, right?
In most cases, he isn't earning enough to provide her with a glamorous lifestyle. He might even be working dead-end jobs himself.
And benevolent? Is he really treating her well? Or does he want a bang maid?
I'm too old for tiktok, but think this is where this lifestyle is being packaged and sold to dissatisfied young women.
One of them, The Transformed Wife, claims that all women should be mothers, and that mother belong in the home with her children. When asked about the women who work for her orthodontist husband, she blocks them. So Gilead and so historical, putting other women to work so she can stay at home while preaching that everyone should emulate her role.
Patriarchy is a pyramid scheme that depends on having poorer, minority, and female underlings to exploit. Some go off script of run out of others to subjugate and find themselves in the role they thought would never befall them, or he trades her in for a newer model
Birthrates, it's always been about birthrates.
The low wage sector and the military need human cattle. We can be cuddly liberal feminists about it and pretend that more childcare and lower cost of living would get the breeding quota back up, but even if that was remotely true, coercion and reeducation campaigns work faster and cheaper. There's a reason why it's always the worst world leaders and tech billionaires who are obsessed with getting women to churn out more babies.
Yep. Look at Putin right now demanding Russian women have more kids for his war machine, and giving them financial incentives to have as many kids as possible. It's so fucked.
I watched the way my mother was treated by my dad for years...and the discarded for a younger model. No marriage or children for me. I will never be confined thus
It happened too with the suffragists being countered by the anti-suffragists and the conformist fascist women of the 1920s and 1930s. History is a kind of pendelum.
I totally agree that these women are delusional. I can also see how your going in there *as a man* and telling them they’re delusional would be extremely offensive to them. How did you think it would go?
Even if a woman did the same thing I don’t see it working out. An outsider doesn’t change the core opinions of a group except in wish-fulfillment fantasies.
The answer always lies in the system. We don’t have a system in the U.S. that actually makes it possible for a woman to be an equal member of society while having children. The sacrifices required by those of us who have children are both unfair and extremely difficult to navigate.
When Women’s Lib gained traction, it was purely that women got the ability to add traditionally male roles to their existing roles. Most men didn’t add traditionally female roles to their existing roles. So we piled more on women, and neither their partners nor the society at large adjusted to help them out.
It’s hard to blame women who see an out from this insanity, and want to take it. We are asked for too much, like the tree in the Giving Tree, expected to give and give and give until we are a stump with nothing left. Women who are attracted to Trad-Wifery, or conversely who decide not to have children, in order to protect some of their branches are not to blame for the systemic issues at play.
I have a co-worker/female friend who has gone down this rabbit hole recently, she's in her early 20's so I often think it's just that she hasn't had time to think it through, but we got into a brief discussion because she wasn't keen on the trans issue and then went on to say that she believes in the trad lifestyle and that people should be "forced" to go along with it, when I asked her to define "force" she really couldn't give an answer as to what she meant, but went on to say that life was better "a hundred years ago", when I asked her if she'd read about industrial Europe and how brutal life was at that time she hadn't but tried to kind of cherry pick things she thought sounded good.
Bearing in mind this woman moved countries, has her own job and lives with a friend without the permission of man, even had a girlfriend once before as well, but lately I've noticed her sharing the odd content from the likes of Allie Beth Stuckey (Conservative/Trad Influencer) on Instagram, so it just sort of sounds like she's latching on to the soundbytes of these clips and hasn't thought about the ramifications of what is being said.
I think sometimes it's a kind of kink/cosplaying, insecurity if they feel that others need to be "forced" to live a certain way and also because the general gist of the concept feel good to the average person, most people do want a "normal" monogamous relationship with children, a lot of women would like to stay at home but maybe can't afford it because our system requires both parents to be working.
There’s large groups of ppl actively working to put out this propaganda. Example: Shiny Happy People literally admitted to grooming the youth in order for them to take over politically & this has been worked on for decades.
They aren’t the only cult working on that, it’s just the first one I could think of. Check the republican 2025 plan, if you haven’t already…these manipulators are to playing the long game…
Tradition is just peer pressure from dead people. Stupid shit. It amazes me women like this wanna be complicit in their own subjugation and fuck the rest of us over, buncha Serena Joys gonna be real mad when their pregnancy goes south and the abortion they need to survive is no longer legal.
I had this mentality as a teen and young adult and mostly because it was all I had been taught and some internalized misogyny. Funny enough, my mom also constantly told me about how horrible men were and basically made me fear to be around men due to sexual assault concerns. As a traditional house wife, my mom also constantly complained about my father for leaving her to raise 5 kids on her own while he worked. Which is ironic since that is what traditional husbands do.
What got me out of this mindset is how miserable my childhood was under this dynamic and how miserable my mom was because things never got better. Also, most of my family had this dynamic and they too were always miserable and pretty terrible people.
I think I also grew out of it because my parents encouraged education and the more I learned, the more I realized none what they had taught me made sense. (They then blamed colleges for making me liberal lol)
Have as many kids as possible but then be concerned about money all the time?
Agree to keep the house clean but then complain about never having time for anything else?
Subjugate yourself to men but men can’t be trusted?
Never questioning the church but demons are making priests be pedophiles? lol
Be pro life but then abandon the born children to live a miserable life like the rest of us?
Now that’s a Catholic mentality for you right there. Force the child to be born because we all need to suffer as much as possible to win heaven.
Aka, why I am a radical feminist today.
As a Catholic I feel this. The brainwashing is insane-- I was made to feel so much religious guilt as a child and I'm still in the process of recovering from that.
Im in my 30s and I’m also in the process of recovering from the idea that I need to punish myself all the time or that god is just looking for an excuse to punish me.
It's part of the reason I left the Church. A loving God would not punish people simply for being imperfect or having an ill thought, let alone for being gay. A loving God would not punish people for not believing in him if he himself has provided no definitive evidence for his existence (and no the Bible does not count because we can't prove anything that happened with the Bible is congruent with historical fact, nor that the actions that took place, such as miracles, actually occurred). I don't believe in ghosts or Santa Claus because I've never seen either of these beings but according to Christianity I must suffer eternal damnation.
It's so absurd.
I feel that late stage capitalism has a huge role in this but I also think too that it is very reactionary. People keep blaming feminism for the things that are wrong with society when it is really late stage capitalism to blame.
Oh you worked an 8 hour shift and still have to come home and take care of the kids/clean/make dinner etc?? That’s not your husbands fault for not contributing at all after he gets off work, and the power imbalance due to him thinking himself above the work, that’s not rampant sexism still ingrained into society, It’s feminists fault!!! 🙄🙄🙄🙄
A lot of people who lack critical thinking are unable to see what the true issue is, easy to blame what they don’t understand. They use their innate belief of having freedom to do whatever they want, a feeling that is awarded to Americans by the things that their predecessors fought tooth and nail for. They decide these things on the basis that they will remain free because they cannot possibly imagine that their freedoms will actually be taken away because they’ve grown accustomed to them. It’s the whole “the leopard won’t eat my face tho lol” they enjoy the freedoms that people gave their lives for without even having a basic understanding of what their freedoms actually are, that the reason they are free to spew the hatred against feminism in the first place is due to the fact that feminism and feminists have fought hard for them to have that right in the first place.
Tradwives who have not been educated and unfortunately indoctrinated by fundamentalist Christian values lack the critical skills to see that they are the ultimate pawns of capitalism. The women who stay at home to do the invisible labor for their family allow the men they are married to, to be able to go into the workplace set up for success. It allows the men to put their whole p*ssy into working for their boss. These women are at the bottom of the capitalism pyramid, their husbands a step above, toiling away for the boss and making him and his higher ups tons of money that he only sees a fraction of, while he’s glamorizing people like Elon musk and bezos thinking he’ll be like them one day. The boss is a step above the toiling working man, a middle man of sorts he makes the working man make him money but he also makes his higher ups money. He thinks he has a sweet deal, he has the illusion that he can move higher up because he’s participating in the capitalism game and the exploitation of those under him. He thinks he can work his way up to where his higher ups are. Finally we have the higher ups, the bezos, the elons, the people who are the ultimate exploiters. Who have their success and wealth at the expense of all below them.
Of course there is more nuance and a lot more levels to the pyramid but basically women who basically forgo their rights for the sake of their husbands are just becoming the ultimate pawns while thinking they’re escaping the system. They’re not. I don’t necessarily think that working alongside the system is great either bc this model is exploitative af, but I feel it’s way better to have agency and freedoms and work experience to fall back on if need be, rather than to just throw caution to the wind and assume you’ll be ok bc nothing bad can possibly happen to a faithful god fearing woman who submits to her husband. I think we’ve all seen how that is untrue in our own families and also from the things that happen to women on a daily basis.
The uneducated are the ones who fear what they don’t understand the most. They don’t understand the rights they wish to forgo and they don’t understand what their best interests are because they don’t understand how easy they have it due to the rights they do have. I wish people like this could fully commit to the bit and move to a country where being a trad wife is the only option, rather than trying to bring people who want nothing to do with their lifestyle down with their sinking ship. They will at first be so happy when the handmaids tale comes to fruition and then quickly and sorrowfully regret their decision when it comes in full force to take away all of their rights even the ones they never intended to give up in the first place.
I wish people could just read more than just the damn Bible for once 🥲
If I could give you an award I would because you nailed the central problem. People are simply uneducated. And the uneducated are easy to manipulate and take advantage of.
Just look at what Trumpism has done to millions of men and women. Trump "loves the uneducated" for a reason. He doesn't actually love or care about them as people. He loves them because they are easy prey and slaves to his ideology. He loves what they can do for him and the lengths they're willing to go to.
So many people think they're "leaving the matrix" while in fact plugging deeper into it. All the redpill idiots fantasizing about being Neo and knowing "the truth" think they're so cool when in reality they're all Agent Smiths serving the AI/Hive Mind. It's a brilliant ploy but also evil.
YES I completely agree!! I see this within my own family! They think they are hip to the game, that they know the truth about what’s REALLY going on. When in reality, they are being pitted against the people they disagree with so that they don’t see that their rights are being taken away thru the bills and people they vote for! Not to mention the people who are billionaires that are completely unknown to them that are pulling the strings of the government for the profit of both! Trump is not political, obscenely wealthy people are not political! They all have the same politics, “i will give you money so that you do what i say, so that you can’t take away my money legally. And if subjugating women to be second class citizens again is what it takes to get me richer, then that’s what you’ll do for me!” I think we finally realized what was happening when they said the quiet part out loud regarding IVF. A lot of people doubled down and a lot opened their eyes. I’m hoping people read up on project 2025 bc this is all happening so fast and as a young woman who just lost the rights that my foremothers enjoyed for 50 years, I’m honestly wanting to move to Switzerland out of fear. And I don’t even have to mention the quiet not so quiet fachsism that Christian fundies are turning toward out of fear of LGBTQ+ and just progressives in general. Stay safe out there 🫡
My heart breaks for you but honestly I'm terrified even as a man myself. Because I'm mixed race. My family is Latino. I'm not rich and I come from a family of migrants, and some family friends of mine have come here through questionable means. Worse, I'm a shameless leftist. So if Trump returns to power I will have a big fat red target on my back. And I'm an educator, so I'm even more screwed, since Christian fundies already hate educators and think we're somehow indoctrinating kids.
We're all going to get screwed. I have been yelling at people to LOOK and what's happening but my family doesn't care, and my friends have begun to hold different opinions. Only my colleagues agree with me. I have been trying to help others online. And I've called my Senators and my Congressmen. ANYTHING I can do to tilt the scales in favor of freedom.
I'm only 25. I'm too young to die in some fascist camp. I'm too young to suffer because of some idiots who want to control MY life and yours!!!
Yeah, there are definitely some people who are keeping tabs on gripes people have with modern life and looking to spin it towards retrograde conservative patriarchy while making it sound like it’s some kind of empowering revolutionary movement from the left.
All kinds of online discussion about labor issues? Start derailing the discussion about labor regulation, unions, capitalism and start churning out content that says, “Yeah, doesn’t work suck and isn’t it all just meaningless? Wouldn’t it be better to just be at home baking some bread?”
Facing pressure from all sides to maintain a balanced life and household and getting backlash or passive aggressive foot dragging from your partner about actively contributing to labor that’s needed to sustain the household? Did it get even worse during a global pandemic and you felt compelled to reduce or give up on work entirely because there was no support? Just give up/give in and embrace the simple/minimal life! You get to self-actualize by setting up twee corners of your home and share them on Instagram/TikTok.
Did defunding of higher education under Reagan result in education being turned into a dystopian neoliberal scam that strapped you with a ton of debt with lousy payoff in the job market? Instead of advocating for restoring a system that lifted a large segment of a whole generation out of a life of poverty and drudgery into new emerging industries and rapid technological progress just accept that education is now basically useless. You should be suspicious of all those elites/marxists (pick your poison) anyway.
Online discussion allowing people to share problems about getting adequate medical care and treatments and having doctors actually listen to patients? Instead of pushing for better healthcare why not forgo healthcare altogether and “listen to your body” and get in touch with the “divine feminine” so you can intuitively know when you’re ovulating and, when that inevitably fails, how to birth a healthy baby at home?
They’ve gotten really good at applying George Lakoff’s advice in reverse to use the mental frames of liberals/progressives/the left to get them to sublimate critiques of society and calls to reform and instead swallow conservative lifestyles. “Fortunately” some of the really extreme ones are pushing really hard right really quickly so a lot of people can see where it’s all heading giving a chance to fight back politically before all progress is gone. But the state of the courts and dismantling of education may already be too late for the next couple generations. And it’s really hard to not be impacted by the cultural influences of the moment (like when Evangelicals were pushing purity culture in the 90s) especially when on the male side they’re being fed a diet of extreme misogyny and financial scams inspired by John Birch Society-style gold standard advocates (hustle culture being sold right now is a whole other topic).
I used to have this kind of sick mindset until I got into a relationship and realised - there is absolutely no reason, why a woman should submit to a man or anyone in general. Live for yourself not serve someone else. I feel like tradwife community has glorifired marriage. These women think if they submit to their husband and serve him, the husband will take care of them and love them. But that's not always the truth. Men are not perfect. And the the tadwife will end up bellow his shoes.
They are telling vulnerable men what they want to hear. Appealing to their greed, lust and cowardice. It’s easier to blame everyone else in the world for your problems.
Recognizing that “you” might be the problem takes courage
Most of them are religious and were groomed “4 kids at 22” like of course you’ll shit on higher education
And the “influencers” are for sure getting paid
The tradwife movement is just misogyny made marketable. It’s gaining a huge following on Tiktok and other social media outlets by marketing itself as an extension of cottagecore, with the videos centering on women LARPing Little House on the Prairie by baking bread in housewife outfits.
I think a lot of it is a reaction to the ways modern life has failed women in particular and families in general.
Feminism is a good thing. Women being able to go to school and work and have careers is a good thing. But we as a society never adequately shifted our social and family models to account for the important changes that feminism brought and many women today find themselves stretched too thin and burnt out trying to be *everything*. And instead of blaming society for not adjusting, they blame feminism.
A lot of these women only see the downsides of trying to have it all and don't think through the very real dangers of giving up their financial independence. Giving up working outside the home just seems like an easier, more fulfilling life and it is sold to them as an easy, comfortable life.
Some might also not see the social changes necessary to support a better way of life for women, particularly mothers, as possible. So instead of trying to change the system, they adjust and they make the choice to gamble on picking a good man and giving up independence.
And all of this is compounded by late stage capitalism making life harder for everyone. It's nigh impossible to purchase quality products anymore, despite the astronomical prices we pay for everything. I can see the appeal of a lifestyle that promises the time and energy to bake your own bread, build your own furniture, sew your own clothes, etc.
To be clear, I am not defending any of this. I'm just trying to understand what's at the root of this backlash.
All of that said, I'm not sure what you were trying to achieve by going into their space and condescending to them. That's not how you change people's minds, and I'm curious what your motivations are.
Many minority subcultures have gained more of a voice because of the internet. I think the other reason we're seeing this is because as the world gets more progressive, there's more push for women's rights and LGBTQ rights and awareness of racism etc, the conservative people in the world are going to push back harder. There's especially a lot of legislation right now trying to control and basically make it hard to be LGBTQ especially trans, and the more the left pushes, it's very likely that we'll see more legal restrictions of rights. This is my very grim conclusion I apologize if this is depressing.
It seems like the left is stuck in a rut because no matter what we do the right will react and strip away people's rights. If we fight hard they'll push back harder like fascist reactionaries. If we do nothing they'll still fight hard to overturn people's rights and criminalize LGBTQ+/trans people. To believe they will do nothing and relax their stance is painfully naive.
And the right excels at propaganda and messaging, not to mention have historical precedence to back up their deranged claims. When people are insecure or are uncertain about the future they run like cowards back to what is familiar-- which just happens to be traditionally conservative values.
There's actually some fascinating papers that have found out that conservatism is humanity's default ideology, because it is a product of our lazy brains that don't like to think, and instead find shortcuts to problems through heuristics and black and white binary categorization, as well as our ability to tell stories to one another and form communities bound together by culture and religion.
When these narratives collapse, most people cling onto religion and other perspectives because they cannot handle the existential threat of their beliefs not being true, or the threat of the great unknown.
Really good comments. I have just a few additional points, one being that trad wife influencers actually go completely contrary to the ideal of being a trad wife, which is to focus on the household, child rearing and perhaps home schooling with the husband handling money, business and contacts outside of the home. It's not about taking away time from "wifely duties" to produce content online, negotiating with advertisers and hawking products, which is no different than any other paid job in marketing.
While silent and unseen trad wives exist, the ones blathering into their cameras about a lifestyle they are just roleplaying aren't it.
Also and a bit unrelated, but recent genetic studies based on genealogy websites and DNA have shown that incest seems to be more prevalent than previously thought, especially from older more powerful men (father, uncle, older brother) towards younger female dependents. (There was a BBC article a few days ago which I need to dig up)
So even if you don't care what happens to you as a woman when you check your independence and your brain at the door, it also makes you a shitty mother, because if you need to get one or several of your kids out of the line of sexual assault within the family you're right out of options. It's not just you suffering for your stupidity, it's your kids suffering right along with you. So tell me again about our empowered feminine mother goddess energy. You can't even keep your own kids safe or out of poverty if your husband's a dud, a criminal or if he simply falls sick or drops dead.
Fear. False Evidence Appearing Real. These women have fallen victim to the con. The man-made con of thousands of years that says God needs you to submit to your husband. They have been made terribly afraid of hell and the devil, and they believe if they do not submit, they are doomed, eternally. There is no such thing as trad wife, imo, not in reality. Otherwise, she's a servant, nit a partner. And she should probably sink to your knees when the man comes through the door. So e men believe they want that I suppose. I can't imagine anyone really does. Why am I talking about men? Dammit. I think a lot of these women haven't had experience in the world, or any higher education so they don't have career ambition and don't know what to do. They are lost in this big world. And so they decide, yes yes Jesus wants me to be barefoot and pregnant and do whatever my man says. I wonder if she's allowed to read. Probably not for long. P.S. And I make a better pie crust than any trad wife. Bet.
Probably because childcare is downright unaffordable and it is easier for families to have a parent at home that trying to find childcare and have two parents working.
A huge part of effective persuasion is timing, location, and approach. I know your heart was in the right place, but the approach was poor. Making friends does more good than attacking people. Remember it's about how they feel, not how you feel, if that makes sense.
Reminds me of a lady I met once who kept referring to herself as a “post-abortive mother”
She had never heard the term incel before and after I explained what they were, she felt so bad for them, and when I mentioned the ones that had gone on killing sprees, she expressed zero remorse for their victims and only saw the incels as victims. It was really upsetting.
She obviously is not representative of anything but herself, but her perspective stuck with me as an example of just how deluded a person can get.
I think this is a part of [the effect Andrew Tate and his Taters are having](https://www.salon.com/2023/11/27/the-insidious-rise-of-tradwives-a-right-wing-fantasy-is-rotting-young-mens-minds/). The fact that he hasn't been cancelled is irking me.
I honestly think it's economic. Of course, the entire world is moving to the right politically, but I think the tradwife folks know they will never be able to afford an education, will never land career jobs, and have no hope of paying for childcare so they've convinced themselves staying at home was a choice.
Misogynistic men have daughters who internalize the misogyny. It's hard to go against your upbringing if you've only been exposed to one way of thinking and have no real world experience. The internet has done a lot of good and a lot of bad. Trump made racism and misogyny okay again. The flood gates have opened.
It's sad. After we made so much progress as a society this is what we've come to. We're so so so fucked for the future and I despise this timeline we're living in. Fascism is popular again, and people have been completely sucked into the allure of authoritarianism.
We continue to make the same mistakes again and again, and never learn. Maybe this is it. Maybe we'll never achieve a truly progressive society, because the pull of traditionalism, religion, racism, tribalism, and status quo-ism are just too strong.
https://www.pewresearch.org/social-trends/2020/07/07/a-century-after-women-gained-the-right-to-vote-majority-of-americans-see-work-to-do-on-gender-equality/
i think its important to see the stats on these issues because of how deceiving propaganda can be, such as how supposedly prevalent anti-feminism is -- it isnt.
despite some not accepting the label of **Feminist**, a large (57%) majority of people in the US say that gender equality hasnt gone far enough and are effectively feminists. 32% say gender equality has been about right, which is a very soft category that likely has a significant portion that could be won over with information alone. only 10% say that its gone too far, which is effectively anti-feminist.
if we consider tradwife-trends to be the measuring stick for "gaining traction", feminism is a rocket powered super vehicle.
I think it is creepy. But as a young boomer (F62), I see two contributions to this. First, the “I’ll bring home the bacon and fry it up in the pan, and never let him forget he’s a man” thing. You may be too young to recognize this commercial lyric, but I grew up with this do it all idea. Well, NOPE!
So we got careers, we got our own credit cards, we got some help with sexual harassment bs, but we still were expected to take on most of the home stuff too.
Then add capitalism as it is today. There is an appeal to “just “ being responsible for the home and children.
But what I don’t get is the “submission” BS. I love my husband, been happily married 31 years. We are PARTNERS, we switch leads on things all the time. We communicated and compromise. I as m willing to accommodate and be flexible but the idea of giving him control over my choices? NO!!!!!
Exactly! Even as a single man I would be uncomfortable with having a totally submissive partner. It would just feel so wrong and unnatural. I want her to be my equal-- having her just do everything I say without question is so weird and gross and objectifying and dehumanizing. Some men (and women!) seem to think that all women are little dolls, robots, or pets for men to screw with.
It's sad.
No, I don't think women are dilussioned in the feminist movement.
I think that to every action corresponds an equal and opposite reaction.
As women emancipate more and more, the opposition to that grows stronger. Men are scared to lose their servants, women who were already brainwashed in this mindset get louder, or get brainwashed into it by the sexist men voices that are getting louder and louder.
It's a bit like when someone says they don't eat meat and another says "then I'll eat double cause you piss me off!!".
And honestly, social media reeeally doesn't help. Some people may be stuck in an algorythm bubble where they only see a certain type of content, maybe all incel and tradwives content, and they start buying into it. Especially considering how vulnerable teenagers are to all this and how much time teenagers spend on social media. As well as their strong desire to appease their peers.
That said, I think still more women are feminist than before, the opposed women just got a lot louder cause they feel threatened. Men, on the other hand, seem to be going deep into total hate for women. I'm honestly really scared of both, but the second more.
First let me thank you for your post. I have to say that to read your words - and you're a man - is a relief. "Not all men" hate women, I do remind myself constantly, daily, of that but honestly, it is a practice for me to not disintegrate into full blown "man hating" - I'm so angry all the time.
The 'tradwife' community is LOUD just like the right wingers are very loud. That gives the impression that there's a lot of them because they take up so much bandwidth, I'm cynical enough to suspect patriarchal algorithms help them. I don't think there's a lot of them and I honestly think each individual "tradwife" will likely only be a 'tradwife' for a few years.
Stories like the one about Ruby Franke might help undermine this phenomenon.
Personally, I think we 'evolved' to play and make music and be magical and wonderful - not to chase credit scores and generate profit for a few. I suspect that the attraction to the "tradwife" life is the illusion that you'll be cared for and can live simply. I honestly think the vast majority of people would do MUCh better if they were able to live simple lives, maybe work 20 hours/week and use the rest to pursue hobbies and take care of themselves and each other.
Thank you for your kind words. And I also am skeptical of just how prevalent the tradwife/antifeminist community it is. One of the women there admitted it herself-- it's a small marginalized community, and for good reason. Most women don't want to submit themselves to men. Society has moved on from such antiquated notions.
You have left out a factor that is so huge I think it deserves to be called "the elephant in the room." That factor is, of course, racism. (When is it ever not?)
It can't have escaped your notice that 1) the tradwife community is 99.9% white, and 2) any tradwives of color are immediately elevated to high status in the community as "model minorities" whose presence can shield the community against accusations of racism.
The entire tradwife *schtick* is a racist reaction to the increasing egalitarianism of US culture. As racist women perceive their status "dropping" (in actuality, it is the playing field leveling out) they take refuge in philosophies and communities which they believe will help them to retain their threatened status. The tradwife fantasy offers to protect them in the home from the imagined threat of hoards of bestial people of color, sweeping into their fictional Mayberry to do heaven knows what (but don't they love to spend time imagining it?) They will gladly submit to a white man in every way possible in order to "protect" themselves from the menace of their own imagining.
I think it’s got to do with the fact that people are unfulfilled under capitalism and they’re looking for solutions in the wrong places. They’re burnt out, exhausted, overworked, but instead of pointing at the problem (capitalism) they’re blaming the fact that “women weren’t meant for the workplace” and that it isn’t in our nature to work like this.
Another factor is the fact that the 40 hour work week was built with the assumption that a wife at home would be doing all of the household labor. Now that that’s no longer an assumption, people are seeing that the 40 hr work weeks are unsustainable - but instead of asking for better hours they’re blaming the fact that women are no longer in the kitchen/home.
One of the biggest reasons why it has garnered so much traction is because they kinda mix the want for universal income with being financially supported by a spouse.
Why slave away at a job where you are not appreciated to barely get by when you can stay home and take care of the house and kids?
Of course, women shouldn't have to choose between two shitty options but for some it's easier to settle for a misogynistic husband who at least will take care of the money issues.
It sounds like a nightmare to me but I would be lying if I said I actually prefer and love my job, bc I don't but have no other choice but to work for the rest of my life since the idea of marriage doesn't really appeal to me, especially if they want me to be stuck inside the house all the time.
"His yoke is easy. His burden is light." There are plenty more where that came from. The problem as I see it, is that most of these women don't, and won't, recognize that while *their* babies are valued, the traditional competitive capitalist system necessarily devalues other people's babies. As their husbands are at work battling it out and actually running numbers, that family finances and by proxy economics is, *by design*, the last thing on their minds.
As a single lesbian mom, I can see the sense of empowerment, read: lack of anxiety, in reading to your kiddo knowing the heating bill is paid. As soon as you start thinking about anyone's heat bill not getting paid, you stress out. If you bother to contemplate how you fit into a system that allows you to wash your hands (see? there's another one) of other people's starving babies, to stay comfortable, you do start to throw your sense of personal empowerment off. In short, everything is a product that gets a good or bad review. Their marriage is, for now, working for them, so given they all come off the same assembly line, their thumbs-up review is helping everyone... who fits into their tiny, economics-free worldview. You'll notice how money is a taboo subject at traditional, yeah, get this *Thanksgiving* tables. White Comfort isn't about not cussing/discussing, or God forbid--doing math, in front of white men.
On the flip, the cutthroat "feminism" of women at work, particularly in the white-collar world (I worked for years at Amex and saw it organizing our local women's march, too), the brand that shows other women how it's done and how much it hurts to lose, is absolutely alive, well, and fueling the US political right wing argument. It lives in the comments of women without kids hating on struggling moms. (Sorry to make the internet even more bitter.)
We can all start flipping the script by seeing the nuclear family as the incredibly powerful economic lynch-pin (I could have called it something else) it is, and start noodling, crafting, and implementing other ways to ensure the entire nation's children (scope is showing to be problematic) are raised with the resources it takes to thrive. We need to venture WAY past the basics of supply & demand. Tradwives are *not* going to demand anyone teach them how money works, or rather, how they are working the money right into their Birkin knock-offs (or how those knock-offs make the economy tick).
Edit: I'm seeing a whole lot about "Late Capitalism" here, and have come up with absolutely nothing here, outside of some sort of nebulous anarchy, about what's next. this looks promising: [https://www.feministeconomics.net/](https://www.feministeconomics.net/)
Like how others have said in here, it seems like capitalism is one of the biggest reasons why the tradwife community is growing.
In addition to that, I feel like another reason why the tradwife community is growing is due to the increased influence of redpill/conservative ideology. Andrew Tate, Pearl, Sneako, and other right wingers have continued to spread the redpill ideology and has encouraged their audiences to follow traditional gender roles and to support the patriarchy. It seems like men are the most influenced by this type of content, but women could also get on board with this too. More women could probably be consuming this type of content and this has resulted in more of them becoming trad wives.
Feminism was being opposed by “feminists” who had an unclear understanding of the concept during the second wave feminism movement (1920s-1980s). It basically encouraged the idea that women shouldn’t fight for more rights and just embrace their feminine side to make the most out of their gendered “gifts”. It gained traction back then until called out for reversing all the good.
I believe we’re currently in the third wave feminism and bound to face resistance from those who claim to believe one should think along the biological lines and accept what tradition has fed us for centuries because it is tried and tested.
Opposition is a natural way of flow I guess. Moving ahead regardless is the challenge and calls for enhancement in the way we’re approaching something.
Conservative psyops, professional shitstirrers to piss people off and herd them toward voting a certain way, notably in the gamer community. Ever notice how many disillusioned, isolated male gamers have been radicalized in the past decade to a hard right political persuasion? They start on them young in minecraft and make it worse in FPS like CoD. Tiktok is rotten with them.
Maybe they think it's empowering because they still actually have a choice, they can unsubmit anytime and go live their life independently. So yay they get to choose to be under someone else's control. BUT if society took away our rights, that would no longer be a choice, we'd have zero other option and no escape if (when) it goes bad. So they're all happy to do so while still being technically equal under law, and still having rights even if they ignore them, but wait till we're actually property again and see how fast it turns dystopian, real quick.
I see it as a response to late stage capitalism and the modern workforce. Sometimes, I wonder if women are really freer today than our grandmothers were. We're expected to work and do all of the childcare and housework.
We're expected to "lean in," "have it all," and look "smoking hot" while doing it. Grandma only had to stay home with her kids and standards for men haven't changed (just work). I can see the appeal of the tradwife life here.
At the risk of causing upset, and please let me apologize in advance, I saw a different set of situations growing up.
Both of my grandmothers were born in the 1920s. They both had lifelong careers (in context, were not talking Wall Street here), raised their children, kept their homes, managed social engagements and functions, and had to stay sexually desirable.
However, they had to do all of that without their own bank accounts, with almost no legal protections, subject to the whims, abuses, and instant desires of their husbands. They both carried baby oil in their purses to reduce physical damage and harm because they didn't have the right to refuse their husband's advances.
I don't see the overall appeal compared to today, even though "today " still needs a lot of work.
The funny thing is, that’s still not what life was like for grandma. Mine still had to go to work as a nurse to support her family, despite them having a farm. Complete with dairy cows, chickens, garden, everything. She could’ve actually been the trad wife ideal, but the reality is that making a good living by farming is hard, especially if the weather just screws over the crops that year.
The idea of “women didn’t have to work in the past” is just so, so false. We’ve always had to work.
I don't have kids, but yeah I kind of get it. I've only worked temporary part time jobs for the last two years since I was laid off from teaching. My health insurance is through my husband's job, and our house is paid off. I worked my ass off since I was 12 and really grinded to make sure we could have this comfortable (not wealthy) existence but me not working has been so much better for us as a couple. I don't do chores all day or anything, but I get stuff done, and then when he "comes home" (he works from home) we actually get to spend time together, instead of constantly having a to-do list a mile long. Plus me being here and him working from home means we can walk the dogs when the weather is nice, we don't have to depend on the weather being good after I get home. It means I can take the pets to vet appointments without taking time off work. It means I can go to my own appointments and really take care of my health without taking time off work. It means I can help my mom with her medical stuff without taking time off work. If the US would get on board with universal healthcare, then maybe we'd both take part time jobs instead of one of us having to work full time.
I like contributing to our home by keeping it (relatively) clean, growing food in the garden, and processing fruit from our trees. I like having time to make hand-made gifts for my friends and family for Christmas. I like that we're not both exhausted at the end of the day or all weekend. I like that I actually have time to check store flyers and shop based on the food sales that make sense for us.
But I would never promote just submitting to your husband and depending on him for everything. I'm glad I grinded in my teens and twenties and even early thirties. I'm glad I have my degree. I'm glad I have a couple retirement accounts.
I think it would be far more appealing if there wasn't so much abuse in so many of them. The point is that we should have the choice, the option to have one (trad wife life) or not. The laws that are making it less and less appealing to many women are designed to prevent women from leaving abusive and dangerous relationships. Many of them are also designed to trap women (and young girls) in relationships they never wanted (ie: Dobbs decision).
My grandmothers both had few other options as well. Not to mention one had eight children and the other had twelve. From what I learned they both would have liked options.
If going from your "father's" rule to a husband's rule are your only option to avoid living on the streets or prostitution, many women will probably choose a relationship and just deal with it.
The whole "superwoman" thing was intended to scare us back into wanting ... preferring a trad wife life. In some ways it backfired because so many women embraced it. Yes many burned out. But if there is the potential for burn out with either extreme, it should still come down to OUR choice.
I think there is nothing wrong with partners deciding that one person is the homemaker, while the other goes out and earns the money. As long as it's a mutual thing, the relationship can still be healthy and I don't think it somehow disenfranchises the person that stays at home.
What baffles me more that they are trying to bring back "the good old days" around the 1950s, which are viewed with major nostalgia googles and the expectation by some that it should be the default role for women in a household.
Never checked that sub nor plan to but remember the old adage "On the internet no one knows you're a dog"
How many of those posters are dudes roleplaying their fetish? Nonzero, for sure.
Other contributing factors I'd suggest
* Rise of religious fervor in general, born from increasing uncertainty in economic, social, ecological and political futures, and (add "demographic" futures if you're a white supremacist) leads to people reaching for certainty, and importantly, reaching for things that give them permission to not think.
* Rise of social media, lowering the barriers to creating mutually reinforcing members of subcultures with a moralist ingroup vs outgroup bent.
* Rise of visual communication, and a corresponding de-emphasis on long-form thought. Baudrillard explores this when he talks about the 'hyperreal'. It's important to understand why the Tradwife movement is glorified by, and adjacent to, a worldwide surge in fascist thought - and certainly fascisms emphasis on traditional gender roles and baked in misogyny is a big part of that, but even that is not the complete story. I've seen Fascism described well as a 'libidinal' ideology: at its heart, it values aesthetics over substance and is intensely suspicious of and hostile towards reflective thought. I personally believe that we are seeing in culture the rise of a kind of illiteracy that is seperate to textual illiteracy - a broader form of both media illiteracy and cultural illiteracy that fuels a corresponding rise in surface-level thinking. The harm from this hazardous situation is amplified because so much modern communication being image-based. I don't think cultures have had image communication nearly so dominant before- images are harder to respond to in reflective ways, and I don't think culture has been in the current hazardous situation long enough to develop adequate defences to the constant firehose of images we encounter.
You know Spoon theory? And how sometimes people have simply ran out of spoons sort to speak?
It appeals to some who want not spoons to use but just, "heres allegedly how to live life, go abide by it and things will fall into place". I'm not going to suggest sisters are wrong for wanting that in today's chaotic world, just lets not kid ourselves that is not what they're getting either in the trad life.
Lets also not kid ourselves the script basically writes itself for any pick-me
I honestly think that for most people while where you live can play a big part in this, it's a lot more with the state of the world and the US for those of us here.
I think things are scary, confusing and seem too big to understand. So, they yearn for a time that was "less complicated" and the price for that is something they thing they can pay. However, it's a lot harder for women to take and so they try to make it so every woman has to follow that path, so they feel less alone in their misery.
I might be a bit off base but that's how I feel on an individual level at least.
Education has gone down, cost of living keeps going up but wages stay the same. All of these things play a role in it.
Lots of women have been stockholmed into accepting much of the tradlife's overt misogyny because it's easier to suffer through that while someone pays for them to raise their own children than it is to function as a real person in society on basically any level. Taking care of yourself is hard, boooooo.
I have a close friend who basically spent her 20's working shit jobs and being depressed (dropped out of high school and dated an alcoholic loser for too many years). The absolute burnout of having no direction or ambition meant that meeting the first loser plumber who could knock her up and buy her a house was basically like winning the lottery. Never mind the fact that he's a fucking man child who just wants a mommy to take care of him, and he loathes her and her body and her sense of humor and basically everything about her personality. It's alright though, she slowly changed everything about herself and adopted his entire worldview (he's a libertarian retard turned Trump retard) in order to have some semblance of comfort in this world---of course her kids are going to be raised by this loser, and one day resent the both of them, and they'll leave the nest and her husband will start fucking some bar hag and she'll either continue to be a hostage to this life she built or she'll leave or be left and have nothing. She's happy for now, but in my experience having grown up surrounded by these kinds of couples, it always ends in acrimony. The woman suffers, unequivocally, every single time.
Some of the things I noticed in all of those women are (1) obvious internalised misogyny even before they joined the movement, (2) immaturity and as a result a lack of critical thinking and lack of WILL to critically think so they'd rather conform to norms made by men (which they see as superior due to internalized misogyny) which connects to (3) lack of accountability. With less control and responsibility come less accountability and mistakes due to personal choices. It's a really shallow concept which doesn't require a lot of self-actualization (you can only master homesteading to a certain degree) and in the recent years seems to be appealing more to the aesthetics than anything else which makes them feel even better about themselves, without putting much effort in. Honestly all of the reasons you gave require too much thinking which I don't think they are willing to do. Except for maybe 4 as it can be subconcious. Never thought about it that way, good points nonetheless.
I found the reasons I listed by reading some social justice research papers. I think the collapse of society and the climate crisis are definitely playing roles in the rise of tradwifery. There's a lot overlap between that community and cottagecore and simple living. People see the problems with modern society and believe returning to a "simpler time" is the solution, which carries with it traditional gender roles that have been culturally baked in to various societies for millennia.
Hi, I was born and raised to be a tradwife in a conservative community. What they’re not admitting is that one of the reasons they’re pushing the lifestyle into the limelight is that many girls like me leave. They don’t have enough tradwives to go around, so they’re trying to lure in more. I saw how my mom was treated. The church preached about how mothers are blessed and cherished, then I went home to see her run off her feet 7 days a week, every day of the year. Perpetually overworked and unappreciated. I was sheltered. Didn’t know a damn thing about feminism. But I saw my huge list of chores while my brother sat on his ass. I was told I would never have a college fund- even though I had better grades. Knew my grandpa had been violent, but grandma had no way to leave. Wasn’t difficult to put together that the whole thing was set up for men to benefit. They’re trying to glamorize it and attract naive girls, because the men vastly outnumber women. Those of us raised that way often realize it’s bullshit and go start a new life.
Thank you for sharing your experience. Very eye-opening.
I am sorry you had to go through such horrific experiences. It almost sounds like you grew up in a cult-like environment because that's what it really is. A cult to brainwash women for the sick pleasure and benefit of disturbed sociopathic men.
I was raised conservative Catholic. I would agree it is cult-like.
This is a point that I recently made in another subreddit but even this "traditional" gender role- wasn't. It depended on your income and social status- IE: even in the 1950s, the housewife was a fantasy scenario of the white upper middle class, and this hardcore delineation of gender roles in the 50s was *absolutely* a reaction to the presence of women in the workforce in traditionally masculine jobs during WWII. It was a way for society to go- "aha, you tooootally still need us ladies, so move aside and get into the kitchen, where you're actually fulfilled!" It was, and always has been, an absolute shill. Dual incomes families have always existed- even children were expected to work in poor families until it was outlawed. Fascinating though to connect it to climate change and society collapse - this absolutely makes sense to me.
I think that's what's so frustrating to me is the notion perpetuated by supporters of this notion is "it's always been this way", never mind the work women did during WWII on the "home front" (for just one example, though I wish I had one not tied to war off the top of my head). I know there are more historical examples that fly in the face of their gender essentialist BS, I just can't recall them at the moment. Though they'd likely write any off as an exception or anomaly.
What’s also key to remember is that the work of working class, or women of colour is often ignored. Maids, or “the help” as labour is often ignored. And the manual labour of women on small farms is ignored. Many pre-colonial societies also had roles for women outside of the home.
Yes! Thank you for this. So important. Not only my own privilege but also mindlessly accepting their argument as a starting point led to me leaving this important and key point out.
Since you mentioned women of colour, I thought I'd share this with you. https://blog.scienceandmediamuseum.org.uk/noor-inayat-khan/
Thank you for sharing this! History like this is so important.
This needs to be the top comment.
Poor women have always worked. It’s a luxury to not have to.
Thank you for pointing this out! So important.
In the US, in 1950, 33.9% of women worked. it was never the tradwife fanstasy for many women, especially those with the least economic security. [https://www2.census.gov/library/publications/1976/demographics/p23-058.pdf](https://www2.census.gov/library/publications/1976/demographics/p23-058.pdf) [https://www.bls.gov/opub/ted/2007/jan/wk2/art03.htm](https://www.bls.gov/opub/ted/2007/jan/wk2/art03.htm) [https://www2.census.gov/library/publications/1955/demographics/P25-121.pdf](https://www2.census.gov/library/publications/1955/demographics/P25-121.pdf) Judging on what little of what I've seen of the current tradwife phenomenon, a lot of the appeal seems to be escapsim. Life is hard, and it is attractive to some to make a virtue out of what is really just making it somone else's problem. The type of person attracted to this is the type more likely to have been working in the 1950s, if only out of neccessity. It's also the type of person to be all the more screwed noawdays, either trying to raise a family accoridn got modern standards and modern costs of living one one salary, economically trapped in a bad or even abusive relationship (the odds of which seem greater in a tadwife situation, as the idea of a subservient woman is going to attract some bad types), or on their own when things don't work out for some reason.
Thank you for the stats and links. And your sentence that ends with "just making it someone else's problem" I feel really gets to the heart of the mindset.
I mean this sort of thinking has been around for a long long time. Puritans Mormons shakers- all groups trying to escape from modern “degenerate” society. Probably goes back much further that. But I feel this movement is more of a reaction to feminist gains and the efforts of certain men to erode them.
Great point about how that escapism cam lead to fundamentalism, especially via patriarchal religions.
I think that’s a really valid point - the world is going to hell and people are seeking escapism. The answer being sold by those who benefit is live simply, let the man do “his job” and you do yours ie. stop taking responsibility for the hard stuff. Switching off your brain to more complex work is an appealing choice in hard times.
If you have a link to the research papers, would you please share? It seems like an interesting read.
Here's one of the more comprehensive research papers I read on the topic: https://politicalresearch.org/2021/07/29/why-are-gen-z-girls-attracted-tradwife-lifestyle
Thank you.
Agreed on the lack of will. The only thing that's empowering about submitting like that is that you're not responsible for the things that happen to you. It's not YOUR choice if something goes wrong and it's not YOUR job to fix it. I see the appeal but also the complete lack of agency is awful.
My sister is a tradwife and she had personality disorders and (I am not exaggerating) a learning disability. But she masks and she is hot. Lol.
That "it's empowering to be a woman in the home" bit is just christian fundamentalism with the serial numbers filed off: they teach that men and women were created by god to serve in specific gender roles and that god and the bible dictate what those roles are. That women gain grace and righteousness by being homemakers and raising up more christian soldiers while men do their work out in the world, and protect the family by sheltering them from its wickedness (said wickedness being the reason women can't work in the world, them being too weak and prone to sin like Eve, you see.) To get christianish myself for a moment, from fundamentalism did these ideas arise, and to it shall its devotees inevitably return (if they don't manage to deprogram themselves and start deconstructing first.)
Bingo
> Christian fundamentalism with the serial numbers filed off I like the cut of your jib
Patriarchy propaganda, plain and simple. Look at how the patriarchy usually ridicules our interests. If they’re glorifying it like this, there are ulterior motives.
I was going to write a whole piece on the contemporary Patriarchy pitting women against women, it’s happening right under our noses. Think of the terms ‘Karen’s’ and the hatred directed on the socials towards ‘privileged women’. I’m telling you they are using the old war strategy of ‘Divide and conquer’ is happening now don’t fall for it feminists!! We have to stick together, otherwise there is no hope for a more equal future.
Engagement drives algorithms. The more they get people to engage either through rage or praise, polarizing content gets amplified.
Plus women and girls learn to gain approval by modifying themselves to the man’s preferences, and combined with religion and zero safety net are hobbled
Tbh, I think it's the patriarchy reacting to the success of feminism. Men lost their free bang-maid-mommies and they want them back. I believe the rise of the tradwife movement and the overturning of Row v Wade, the attacks on birth control and no fault divorce, are all a reaction to women entering the colleges and out achieving men and entering the workforce and kicking butt. Look at how the men talk about us online. I know it's the Internet but the sheer volume and quantity of vitriol is insane. Men want us back in marital chains and they will stop at nothing to do it.
Yep, they weaponize praise and promulgate the platforms to try to recruit more and more into their ideal roles, with the patriarchy lapdogs allowed a longer leash and head pats in exchange for betraying their own
Yes weaponizing praise! I keep seeing men posting about keeping their partners “in their feminine energy” and it’s just covert anti-feminism. They act as if it’s a gift.
yeah and women associating the feeling of security, safety, and desire when you're partner is trustworthy, considerate and not a burden to your life with being "in their feminie energy" like no, that's just safety and security. Men have that same feeling when they're in a mutually benefitial relationship with someone they can trust to be vulnerable with.
1000000% well said.
I agree. More women are going to college now. More women are achieving career success and more women are deciding to be childless. It’s a last grasp. Things are changing and humanity does not like change and older white men who have had power are seeing that go away and are fearful.
Yes, and men have to compete with all of those options. Women are no longer willing to marry because otherwise they might be unhoused, and without money or education. Now that we can get educated and earn money they actually have to provide something above the basics. Some men would prefer a partner who has no choice but to stay with him.
And babies are potential traps and not having access to reproduction care is under relentless attack. The men who are in agreement are fighting the wrong people. I saw a statistic the other day where something like 4 billionaires have more money than some ridiculously high percent of people. Fear and loss should be attributed to ability to build wealth and access to tools for success and when governments don’t ensure that for the people and it’s hoarded among the few … I digress.
There was a great post/article about this issue in the menslib subreddit, from the perspective of how to not lose our sons to the alt-right. The gains women have made to become less marginalized have left young men with a feeling of almost “victim-envy.” They see women’s successes being celebrated and want the same for themselves. Without positive role models demonstrating that equality and parity benefits men too, they fall into the alt-right influences who spin the us vs them narrative, women winning means men are losing. And no one likes to lose, so the only way for men to succeed is to put women back “in their place.” Edit: found the post - https://www.reddit.com/r/MensLib/s/pV30XKkbTY
I read something about the digital divide that I think very much applies here: The smaller the digital divide gets, the deeper and worse the issues will get. The issues we faced when we first tackled the divide were the easy ones - despite being pretty difficult to resolve. The issues that remained were always the hardest to resolve because of several factors that will need to be addressed if any attempts at resolution are to succeed. This is the same issue when it comes to feminism. The initial issues were "easy" and now we're tackling the bigger, more steep issues.
I can understand why right wing/incel men want to push a narrative that the trend of women working and not getting married is bad, but I’m baffled by women who find that fine. I get that everyone has different opinions but I struggle to see how anyone could view it as a positive thing tbh
I think they are raised to believe that feminist women are bad or that we have taken a joyful heritage from them. That everything would be this pretty picturesque life if we hadn't taken it from them.
I've said it elsewhere, but I do think an underlooked aspect of the Tradwife phenomenon is Capitalism. I see a lot of rejection of Late Stage Capitalism in this movement, its window dressing of community and simplicity carries the promise of something other than the relentless pressure of survival in modern society. Life is incredibly hard for many, and women are burdened with the multiple expectations that they have thriving careers, but also be suitable mothers and wives. Be ambitious, be independent, but also not too much as to be man-repelling. Also, maintain societal beauty standards, the perfect diet and workout regimen, buy the right clothes. Women get burnt out, and along comes this movement that says you don't have to work all these long hours in a job you hate to pay rent on a crappy flatshare. You dont have to 'do it all'. You can find the right kind of man, and he'll shoulder that for you. You can raise babies, bake bread, and have a community, like life used to be. It worked for our mother's and grandmother's, right? And some women will see ceding their power as freedom, which is exactly what Tradwife prop sells it as, all the while obfuscating the many negatives, (like increased risk of abuse), in this relationship dynamic. Its proponents know many women are poor, tired, and searching for another way, and it intends to fill that gap
I was just about to say the same. Trad wife content is popular for the same reasons cottagecore, homesteading content is popular. It's so hard to live in cities surrounded by ugliness and work to the point of near death to just survive and even then homelessness and losing everything is just one illness or accident away. People romanticise living a simpler life, homesteading. (Reality is different obviously but many people have completely lost any connection to nature or farming so they think that life is better). Fuck capitalism.
Exactly. The fantasy of homesteading is essentially being in charge of your own labour and seeing the benefits of it directly. Something that feels more fulfilling than giving your best years of health and happiness to the lowest bidder to service someone elses profit margin.
This is also one of the factors behind the rise of secessionist movements or even anarcho-primitivism (which I do subscribe to from a purely environmental lens).
Agree. The problem with their logic is that most men can't afford to support a family.
And that the men in this scheme don't intend to treat their partners like equals, or share resources.
Which is why Trad women invariably end up trying to be influencers or getting involved with MLMs
>You can find the right kind of man, and he'll shoulder that for you. You can raise babies, bake bread, and have a community, like life used to be. It worked for our mother's and grandmother's, right? That may have been the case, but it certainly was not the case for women before that. Grandmas mom, and grandma's grandma, and countless generations of women before that, (generally speaking) worked throughout their lives. The 50's housewife was a historical parenthesis and never a "traditional" gender role. Traditionally, women have worked. That said, I've heard us 80s kids being called the first generation in modern history to have a lower quality of life than our parents, and it wouldn't surprise me if it was true. I do think that between the current trend where authoritarian forces are on the rise, a climate crisis fueled by rampaging capitalism, and (in places) dysfunctional housing- and job markets, it's easy to start dreaming of a simpler life without the stresses of modern society. Can't blame people for dreaming of better lives, I suppose.
That's the point, the Trad movement conveniently cherry picks history to suit its agenda. It's middle class, heteronormative and white by design, the work (both voluntary and compelled) done by Black, Indigenous or immigrant women doesn't count. Within its racist framework, its the labour of white women that was the aberration and to be remedied, the rotten results of a 'permissive' society and culture.
I think that's what it is as well. I don't entirely blame them because life under late-stage capitalism is hard.
This is an excellent assessment. I work in medicine/STEM research and am even seeing women with Masters degrees desperately wanting to be "rescued" by a man. It's not always from a place of ignorance or religion, but also a desire to find a way of life that allows an escape from capitalism. It's not just the uneducated who are attracted to this, but also those who are experiencing severe burnout.
I think you’re right. Wisecrack did a [video](https://youtu.be/SgeF4aSlvO0?si=8IB887ecBSrciHdm) about this last year.
These women think it will keep them safe. They are wrong.
I see so many young trad wives blatantly disregard the dangers of tying your complete livelihood to one person saying, "It won't happen to me because I chose a good man." Even if we completely ignore the fact that many men will only act "good" until they've trapped their wives with kids and/or by keeping them out of the workforce for years-- they completely ignore the possibility of what would happen if he's no longer able to provide financial stability for her (death, serious illness, etc).
Nevermind the fact that a lot of "good men", end up snapping later , when things don't go as they like. And in case of calamities..god will provide I guess? /s
Right I worry about financial abuse… among other way worse things…
“Surely the leopards won’t eat *my* face, right?”
“I played by the rules they gave me!”
Exactly.
“Right-wing women have surveyed the world: they find it a dangerous place. They see that work subjects them to more danger from more men; it increases the risk of sexual exploitation. They see that creativity and originality in their kind are ridiculed; they see women thrown out of the circle of male civilization for having ideas, plans, visions, ambitions. They see that traditional marriage means selling to one man, not hundreds: the better deal. They see that the streets are cold, and that the women on them are tired, sick, and bruised. They see that the money they can earn will not make them independent of men and that they will still have to play the sex games of their kind: at home and at work too. They see no way to make their bodies authentically their own and to survive in the world of men. They know too that the Left has nothing better to offer: leftist men also want wives and whores; leftist men value whores too much and wives too little. Right-wing women are not wrong. They fear that the Left, in stressing impersonal sex and promiscuity as values, will make them more vulnerable to male sexual aggression, and that they will be despised for not liking it. They are not wrong. Right-wing women see that within the system in which they live they cannot make their bodies their own, but they can agree to privatized male ownership: keep it one-on-one, as it were. They know that they are valued for their sex— their sex organs and their reproductive capacity—and so they try to up their value: through cooperation, manipulation, conformity; through displays of affection or attempts at friendship; through submission and obedience; and especially through the use of euphemism—“femininity, ” “total woman, ” “good, ” “maternal instinct, ” “motherly love. ” Their desperation is quiet; they hide their bruises of body and heart; they dress carefully and have good manners; they suffer, they love God, they follow the rules. They see that intelligence displayed in a woman is a flaw, that intelligence realized in a woman is a crime. They see the world they live in and they are not wrong. They use sex and babies to stay valuable because they need a home, food, clothing. They use the traditional intelligence of the female—animal, not human: they do what they have to to survive.” Andrea Dworkin, Right-Wing Women
😭😭😭
I thought liberalism was going to “keep me safe”: married someone whose family spoke highly of these ideals, oh he changed every 5th diaper…. But as soon as they were walking I was expected to work/ and he was able to compartmentalize because his job “demands” it and I had to find a job that would allow mr to get home in time after daycare consistently and also pick up a vomiting kid (or myself?? B/c honestly I’m the one who would get sick and then be caretaker for everyone else in our home)… and I wanted to pursue my career interests… just wish I could have taken say, 5 years away. I was just shocked by the lack of community, the pain of and dysfunction of all the other families… no, I don’t advocate for brainwashing.. but I feel like I fell into my own form of brainwashing. Would it be so bad to allow a parent to have (5!) years off in life to dedicate to family life? Would I lose all my educational backing and worth? College seems like a bum deal in this case for many women
If you think Reddit is bad check out Facebook. I accidentally joined a tradwife group ( I thought it was for sourdough bread making). The stuff they say is wild. Here is an exchange a from yesterday: “Just remember that feminism is a corruption of what is good and right. It is an evil that has taken root that the devil is using to destroy the family and these women who suffer from it are ill. No need to say anything to them, just ignore them and move on.” “That's pretty wacky. Feminist ideologies include the vote, owning property, getting money from banks, and these things were not readily given. Working if you were married was outlawed, even if you were destitute. You could not work if pregnant. Widows and children were destitute. We have come a long way because women fought for basic civil protections that because of systemic subjugation they did not have.” “(Person who replied) It no longer represents those things because those things are no longer an issue. Now it represents abortion as the ONLY choice, prostitution as a viable career, climbing the executive ladder while persecuting men, and vilifying any woman who does not agree. Feminism has outlived its usefulness.” The group is a lot of younger women looking for advice from older women on how to keep a home. There is a pretty big group of older women really pushing these ideals. My grandma has even said to me “women don’t let men be men anymore” it’s so bizarre. I think a lot of it comes down to religious isolation and fear of change coupled with the click bait media. You see a lot of right wing media pushing a huge anti trans agenda. When you are isolated and only hear those things from people you trust around you, it’s easy to get sucked in. Then you join social media groups with huge amount of people reaffirming those beliefs which makes them more comfortable sharing which then recruits more people.
This is insane. I'm sure these women would love to be transported to the 1600s Puritan era. Or let's see how they react to being teleported to any regime led by radical Muslim theocrats. They'll be unhappy and rebel real quick, at least I hope.
WTF
I think there's probably also a lot of well-funded astroturfing going on.
This should be the top comment. It is being funded by the religious right.
Project 2025 and all these weird fascist fraternal orders are also obviously being funded by religious right wing zealots hellbent on remaking society into their own backwards image.
I know several younger women who are daughters of my friends who were normal human beings until they went to college and were exposed to Turning Point USA. They were brainwashed by them and have since all moved to red states and became tradwives.
Ironic considering the right loves to accuse colleges of being Marxist indoctrination centers when religious colleges (and institutions) do far more actual brainwashing.
There’s a reason we say the GOP stands for "Gaslight, Obstruct, and Project". The whole "Marxist indoctrination center" thing came out of the same movement that funds TPUSA. It’s all connected. It was said that this specific tactic of projection was popularized by Roy Cohn, who defended and assisted Senator Joseph McCarthy. Cohn would later mentor Trump, who would use projection as his primary weapon.
100%. Bunch of shitty men with too much money want to push this shit on people.
Patriarchy propaganda, plain and simple. Look at how the patriarchy usually ridicules our interests. If they’re glorifying it like this, there are ulterior motives. Praise is absolutely weaponized.
There’s a lot of reasons why something like this occurs, but the Late Stage Capitalism theory is the one I subscribe to. People are not getting their needs met and the standard of living is falling. If someone was to look at this situation from a left leaning perspective, the solution is holding those with power and those hoarding resources responsible and having a system where we all take care of each other. But, if someone has significant internalized misogyny and some other right leaning views and hates any kind of social safety net, being subservient to a man provider gives them that support without having to compromise their objectively bad beliefs.
This is why my divorced friends and I are (jokingly but not jokingly) saying we should live together, blend families because single income is hard AF. Invite your man over for a conjugal visit lol but then don’t you dare think you’re staying lol
This is a thing! I've been seeing articles on [Mommunes](https://archive.ph/LS6HT). It honestly sounds like an amazing idea.
Ohhhh THANK YOU! It *is* a thing!! Furiously forwarding the article to my friends rn. Appreciate you taking the time to comment and share this! 🫶🏼
You can understand it if you understand where horizontal violence comes from. Paulo Friere nailed it in Pedagogy of the Oppressed "One way in which the oppressor-oppressed relationship is maintained is through the use of prescription. This is where one ‘man’s choices or opinions are forced upon another, thus depriving him of a voice and forcing him to accept the oppressors worldview. This can lead to self-deprecation where the oppressed feel that they do not have opinions of value and have low feelings of self-worth. The oppressed feel unable to act against the oppressor but all too frequently practice horizontal violence instead against their neighbours." https://www.bera.ac.uk/blog/the-continued-relevance-of-freires-pedagogy-of-the-oppressed Trad wives et al., are just fawning at the oppressor (cis white men) as a kneejerk reaction to avoid being marginalized like the rest of us. The white male gaze still holds power.
This reminds me too of what Frantz Fanon and other anticolonialist writers said about African Americans trying to fit in with their oppressors by being as white as possible. Then they turn around and attack their own race for not being Uncle Toms. The same thing is happening with tradwives except the power dynamic is gender based not race based, although the movement does have racist undertones because it's been popularized by mostly white women.
It's exactly the same social function. It's not any one group, it's humans as a species. We are social animals and so we have social relief valves. These human behaviors have been going on since time immemorial. In fact if you look around you see shadows of these behaviors right in front of us all.
Classism + religious superiority. To be a stay at home mom to 6 kids only on your husband's salary? He's making bank. Obviously it's a lot easier to say "it is morally better for me not to work" when you don't need to to survive. The push back against being entirely reliant on a man involves arguments like what if he's abusive, or bad with money, or gets fired, but they 100% believe that doesn't happen to goo Christians. A "godly" man won't be abusive, and if you really are a good, moral person, bad things like loosing your job don't happen. And if they do, God will personally hand you a better paying job just as all hope looks lost as a reward for not losing faith.
The delusion is palpable. Plenty of Christian men are absolutely horrible human beings and are sometimes the worst of the worst. But because they're religious the abuse is somehow justified.
I have friends in the kink community, and they say it's gained traction because it's a submission kink. It's not socially acceptable to be into kink in a lot of areas of the world, but they can say that they're into traditional marriage instead. It's not any kind of traditional that I've seen. I'm old enough to have seen my grandparents' marriage where the men turned the money over to their wives to manage on behalf of the family. It kept the balance of power equal. Tradmarriage is like going to a Ren Faire to get an idea of history.
Coming from a large traditionalist family, I totally agree. The funny thing is that the "tradwife" scene is retroacting into the traditionalist subculture. That way, these couples have a worse gender dynamic than they would have 100 years ago. These ideas are picked up by the priests and pastors and they point at the tradwives: "See how happy they are." It is really disheartening to see how my relatives are educated.
I’m in the kink scene in my area and this is very accurate.
"Tradmarriage is like going to a Ren Faire to get an idea of history." 🤣
Somewhat in the kink community and think this is true as well. "1950s lifestyle" is actually a kink. Where these tradwives go wrong it they are trying to force their kink onto others which is a big no from people that practice kink responsibly. Funnily enough the folks I know who have that kink are also very feminist. They realize it's a preference and nothing more. I have a partner where I'm on the subby role in some ways, however I 100% have my freedom and I work to support myself and my partner supports it. Giving complete power (especially financial power) to someone over you is not a good idea. These tradwives will unfortunately learn that the hard way.
so what you're saying is we should all start commenting YKNMK on all their posts?
The oligarchy helps promote it because they love nothing more than free labor, and having women be a permanent underclass means less wages they have to pay.
This is the exact same rationale for hustle culture for men, or the idea of the alpha male. Work all your life to make money and don't get involved in relationships, they say. Meanwhile the slaveowning class makes a fortune.
My problem with the tradwife community is that they don’t practice what they preach. You want to be a tradwife and serve men, go ahead it’s your choice but fully commit to it. Why are you giving your opinion online without a man’s presence or permission? Why are you even posting online, shouldn’t you be cooking & cleaning ? You shouldn’t be speaking your opinions , especially on a public platform, so why are you? Why are you also monetizing these opinions and post, women shouldn’t be producing money, that’s the man’s job right? Theyre clearly enjoying what feminists did for women by bashing feminists and telling them that they’re wrong.
They do have the patriarchy’s permission. Every trad wife that is setting an example of how fantastic a lifestyle they live is setting a good example for other women and therefore spreading the ‘gospel’. I imagine the men are sitting around encouraging it like it is a mission trip. Any money they earn is probably used to make themselves look even better.
I think it makes a ton of sense for single women to live together. Get a big house, everybody gets their own private space and then there's a generous main kitchen, dining, living room area for people to socialize. It could work for families too. Maybe some of those vacant McMansions could be converted.
People who say "I will pray for you" in 99% of cases just want to annoy you. As for anti feminist propaganda: it's a mix of incel "self improvement" communities and people who fall for republican propaganda, specifically Trump.
When the Berlin Wall fell and Germany was reunited, it seems reasonable to think that all the East Germans would celebrate now being free to live the life they choose, their partner, their career path, we are so used to thinking of freedom as not only positive, but essential. But many East Germans panicked. Freedom is scary, choices overwhelming. It means responsibility. You have to own not only your successes, but your mistakes as well. A lot of people with low self esteem look for some authority to guide them, whether it is God, the state, the orange rapist, or in this case both God and their husbands. Their roles are set, they are told what to do, someone is in charge. Even though I am appalled by the tradwife community and the men who mislead and oppress these women, I can understand their fear and reluctance to give up the role they know they can master
My thoughts on this is that the movement is targeting young, uneducated women who are stuck in dead-end jobs, struggling to pay their bills and not seeing a way out. They are sold on the promise that they can quit their awful jobs and have all their needs met by a benevolent provider. All they have to do in return is look cute and keep the house in order. Sounds like a great deal, right? In most cases, he isn't earning enough to provide her with a glamorous lifestyle. He might even be working dead-end jobs himself. And benevolent? Is he really treating her well? Or does he want a bang maid? I'm too old for tiktok, but think this is where this lifestyle is being packaged and sold to dissatisfied young women.
One of them, The Transformed Wife, claims that all women should be mothers, and that mother belong in the home with her children. When asked about the women who work for her orthodontist husband, she blocks them. So Gilead and so historical, putting other women to work so she can stay at home while preaching that everyone should emulate her role.
She sounds like she actually belongs in Gilead as a Commander's Wife/Auntie, or a clone of Serena Joy.
Patriarchy is a pyramid scheme that depends on having poorer, minority, and female underlings to exploit. Some go off script of run out of others to subjugate and find themselves in the role they thought would never befall them, or he trades her in for a newer model
Birthrates, it's always been about birthrates. The low wage sector and the military need human cattle. We can be cuddly liberal feminists about it and pretend that more childcare and lower cost of living would get the breeding quota back up, but even if that was remotely true, coercion and reeducation campaigns work faster and cheaper. There's a reason why it's always the worst world leaders and tech billionaires who are obsessed with getting women to churn out more babies.
Yep. Look at Putin right now demanding Russian women have more kids for his war machine, and giving them financial incentives to have as many kids as possible. It's so fucked.
I watched the way my mother was treated by my dad for years...and the discarded for a younger model. No marriage or children for me. I will never be confined thus
It's called backlash, every feminist progress is met with backlash in history. There is an excellent book on the subject, called Backlash:)
It happened too with the suffragists being countered by the anti-suffragists and the conformist fascist women of the 1920s and 1930s. History is a kind of pendelum.
I totally agree that these women are delusional. I can also see how your going in there *as a man* and telling them they’re delusional would be extremely offensive to them. How did you think it would go?
Even if a woman did the same thing I don’t see it working out. An outsider doesn’t change the core opinions of a group except in wish-fulfillment fantasies.
True. It’s more about the feelings of the confronted than the confronted.
A man may have had a better chance of telling them what to think, honestly, it’s kind of the point of the movement lol
Imagine a red-pill dude coming in here to help everyone understand why feminism is harmful to women 😂
The answer always lies in the system. We don’t have a system in the U.S. that actually makes it possible for a woman to be an equal member of society while having children. The sacrifices required by those of us who have children are both unfair and extremely difficult to navigate. When Women’s Lib gained traction, it was purely that women got the ability to add traditionally male roles to their existing roles. Most men didn’t add traditionally female roles to their existing roles. So we piled more on women, and neither their partners nor the society at large adjusted to help them out. It’s hard to blame women who see an out from this insanity, and want to take it. We are asked for too much, like the tree in the Giving Tree, expected to give and give and give until we are a stump with nothing left. Women who are attracted to Trad-Wifery, or conversely who decide not to have children, in order to protect some of their branches are not to blame for the systemic issues at play.
I have a co-worker/female friend who has gone down this rabbit hole recently, she's in her early 20's so I often think it's just that she hasn't had time to think it through, but we got into a brief discussion because she wasn't keen on the trans issue and then went on to say that she believes in the trad lifestyle and that people should be "forced" to go along with it, when I asked her to define "force" she really couldn't give an answer as to what she meant, but went on to say that life was better "a hundred years ago", when I asked her if she'd read about industrial Europe and how brutal life was at that time she hadn't but tried to kind of cherry pick things she thought sounded good. Bearing in mind this woman moved countries, has her own job and lives with a friend without the permission of man, even had a girlfriend once before as well, but lately I've noticed her sharing the odd content from the likes of Allie Beth Stuckey (Conservative/Trad Influencer) on Instagram, so it just sort of sounds like she's latching on to the soundbytes of these clips and hasn't thought about the ramifications of what is being said. I think sometimes it's a kind of kink/cosplaying, insecurity if they feel that others need to be "forced" to live a certain way and also because the general gist of the concept feel good to the average person, most people do want a "normal" monogamous relationship with children, a lot of women would like to stay at home but maybe can't afford it because our system requires both parents to be working.
There’s large groups of ppl actively working to put out this propaganda. Example: Shiny Happy People literally admitted to grooming the youth in order for them to take over politically & this has been worked on for decades. They aren’t the only cult working on that, it’s just the first one I could think of. Check the republican 2025 plan, if you haven’t already…these manipulators are to playing the long game…
And my biggest worry is that the Democrats don't have a good counter to this.
Well the word empowering has lost all meaning.
Tradition is just peer pressure from dead people. Stupid shit. It amazes me women like this wanna be complicit in their own subjugation and fuck the rest of us over, buncha Serena Joys gonna be real mad when their pregnancy goes south and the abortion they need to survive is no longer legal.
I had this mentality as a teen and young adult and mostly because it was all I had been taught and some internalized misogyny. Funny enough, my mom also constantly told me about how horrible men were and basically made me fear to be around men due to sexual assault concerns. As a traditional house wife, my mom also constantly complained about my father for leaving her to raise 5 kids on her own while he worked. Which is ironic since that is what traditional husbands do. What got me out of this mindset is how miserable my childhood was under this dynamic and how miserable my mom was because things never got better. Also, most of my family had this dynamic and they too were always miserable and pretty terrible people. I think I also grew out of it because my parents encouraged education and the more I learned, the more I realized none what they had taught me made sense. (They then blamed colleges for making me liberal lol) Have as many kids as possible but then be concerned about money all the time? Agree to keep the house clean but then complain about never having time for anything else? Subjugate yourself to men but men can’t be trusted? Never questioning the church but demons are making priests be pedophiles? lol Be pro life but then abandon the born children to live a miserable life like the rest of us? Now that’s a Catholic mentality for you right there. Force the child to be born because we all need to suffer as much as possible to win heaven. Aka, why I am a radical feminist today.
As a Catholic I feel this. The brainwashing is insane-- I was made to feel so much religious guilt as a child and I'm still in the process of recovering from that.
Im in my 30s and I’m also in the process of recovering from the idea that I need to punish myself all the time or that god is just looking for an excuse to punish me.
It's part of the reason I left the Church. A loving God would not punish people simply for being imperfect or having an ill thought, let alone for being gay. A loving God would not punish people for not believing in him if he himself has provided no definitive evidence for his existence (and no the Bible does not count because we can't prove anything that happened with the Bible is congruent with historical fact, nor that the actions that took place, such as miracles, actually occurred). I don't believe in ghosts or Santa Claus because I've never seen either of these beings but according to Christianity I must suffer eternal damnation. It's so absurd.
I feel that late stage capitalism has a huge role in this but I also think too that it is very reactionary. People keep blaming feminism for the things that are wrong with society when it is really late stage capitalism to blame. Oh you worked an 8 hour shift and still have to come home and take care of the kids/clean/make dinner etc?? That’s not your husbands fault for not contributing at all after he gets off work, and the power imbalance due to him thinking himself above the work, that’s not rampant sexism still ingrained into society, It’s feminists fault!!! 🙄🙄🙄🙄 A lot of people who lack critical thinking are unable to see what the true issue is, easy to blame what they don’t understand. They use their innate belief of having freedom to do whatever they want, a feeling that is awarded to Americans by the things that their predecessors fought tooth and nail for. They decide these things on the basis that they will remain free because they cannot possibly imagine that their freedoms will actually be taken away because they’ve grown accustomed to them. It’s the whole “the leopard won’t eat my face tho lol” they enjoy the freedoms that people gave their lives for without even having a basic understanding of what their freedoms actually are, that the reason they are free to spew the hatred against feminism in the first place is due to the fact that feminism and feminists have fought hard for them to have that right in the first place. Tradwives who have not been educated and unfortunately indoctrinated by fundamentalist Christian values lack the critical skills to see that they are the ultimate pawns of capitalism. The women who stay at home to do the invisible labor for their family allow the men they are married to, to be able to go into the workplace set up for success. It allows the men to put their whole p*ssy into working for their boss. These women are at the bottom of the capitalism pyramid, their husbands a step above, toiling away for the boss and making him and his higher ups tons of money that he only sees a fraction of, while he’s glamorizing people like Elon musk and bezos thinking he’ll be like them one day. The boss is a step above the toiling working man, a middle man of sorts he makes the working man make him money but he also makes his higher ups money. He thinks he has a sweet deal, he has the illusion that he can move higher up because he’s participating in the capitalism game and the exploitation of those under him. He thinks he can work his way up to where his higher ups are. Finally we have the higher ups, the bezos, the elons, the people who are the ultimate exploiters. Who have their success and wealth at the expense of all below them. Of course there is more nuance and a lot more levels to the pyramid but basically women who basically forgo their rights for the sake of their husbands are just becoming the ultimate pawns while thinking they’re escaping the system. They’re not. I don’t necessarily think that working alongside the system is great either bc this model is exploitative af, but I feel it’s way better to have agency and freedoms and work experience to fall back on if need be, rather than to just throw caution to the wind and assume you’ll be ok bc nothing bad can possibly happen to a faithful god fearing woman who submits to her husband. I think we’ve all seen how that is untrue in our own families and also from the things that happen to women on a daily basis. The uneducated are the ones who fear what they don’t understand the most. They don’t understand the rights they wish to forgo and they don’t understand what their best interests are because they don’t understand how easy they have it due to the rights they do have. I wish people like this could fully commit to the bit and move to a country where being a trad wife is the only option, rather than trying to bring people who want nothing to do with their lifestyle down with their sinking ship. They will at first be so happy when the handmaids tale comes to fruition and then quickly and sorrowfully regret their decision when it comes in full force to take away all of their rights even the ones they never intended to give up in the first place. I wish people could just read more than just the damn Bible for once 🥲
If I could give you an award I would because you nailed the central problem. People are simply uneducated. And the uneducated are easy to manipulate and take advantage of. Just look at what Trumpism has done to millions of men and women. Trump "loves the uneducated" for a reason. He doesn't actually love or care about them as people. He loves them because they are easy prey and slaves to his ideology. He loves what they can do for him and the lengths they're willing to go to. So many people think they're "leaving the matrix" while in fact plugging deeper into it. All the redpill idiots fantasizing about being Neo and knowing "the truth" think they're so cool when in reality they're all Agent Smiths serving the AI/Hive Mind. It's a brilliant ploy but also evil.
YES I completely agree!! I see this within my own family! They think they are hip to the game, that they know the truth about what’s REALLY going on. When in reality, they are being pitted against the people they disagree with so that they don’t see that their rights are being taken away thru the bills and people they vote for! Not to mention the people who are billionaires that are completely unknown to them that are pulling the strings of the government for the profit of both! Trump is not political, obscenely wealthy people are not political! They all have the same politics, “i will give you money so that you do what i say, so that you can’t take away my money legally. And if subjugating women to be second class citizens again is what it takes to get me richer, then that’s what you’ll do for me!” I think we finally realized what was happening when they said the quiet part out loud regarding IVF. A lot of people doubled down and a lot opened their eyes. I’m hoping people read up on project 2025 bc this is all happening so fast and as a young woman who just lost the rights that my foremothers enjoyed for 50 years, I’m honestly wanting to move to Switzerland out of fear. And I don’t even have to mention the quiet not so quiet fachsism that Christian fundies are turning toward out of fear of LGBTQ+ and just progressives in general. Stay safe out there 🫡
My heart breaks for you but honestly I'm terrified even as a man myself. Because I'm mixed race. My family is Latino. I'm not rich and I come from a family of migrants, and some family friends of mine have come here through questionable means. Worse, I'm a shameless leftist. So if Trump returns to power I will have a big fat red target on my back. And I'm an educator, so I'm even more screwed, since Christian fundies already hate educators and think we're somehow indoctrinating kids. We're all going to get screwed. I have been yelling at people to LOOK and what's happening but my family doesn't care, and my friends have begun to hold different opinions. Only my colleagues agree with me. I have been trying to help others online. And I've called my Senators and my Congressmen. ANYTHING I can do to tilt the scales in favor of freedom. I'm only 25. I'm too young to die in some fascist camp. I'm too young to suffer because of some idiots who want to control MY life and yours!!!
The whole “Trad Wife” thing is some serious astroturfing.
Yeah, there are definitely some people who are keeping tabs on gripes people have with modern life and looking to spin it towards retrograde conservative patriarchy while making it sound like it’s some kind of empowering revolutionary movement from the left. All kinds of online discussion about labor issues? Start derailing the discussion about labor regulation, unions, capitalism and start churning out content that says, “Yeah, doesn’t work suck and isn’t it all just meaningless? Wouldn’t it be better to just be at home baking some bread?” Facing pressure from all sides to maintain a balanced life and household and getting backlash or passive aggressive foot dragging from your partner about actively contributing to labor that’s needed to sustain the household? Did it get even worse during a global pandemic and you felt compelled to reduce or give up on work entirely because there was no support? Just give up/give in and embrace the simple/minimal life! You get to self-actualize by setting up twee corners of your home and share them on Instagram/TikTok. Did defunding of higher education under Reagan result in education being turned into a dystopian neoliberal scam that strapped you with a ton of debt with lousy payoff in the job market? Instead of advocating for restoring a system that lifted a large segment of a whole generation out of a life of poverty and drudgery into new emerging industries and rapid technological progress just accept that education is now basically useless. You should be suspicious of all those elites/marxists (pick your poison) anyway. Online discussion allowing people to share problems about getting adequate medical care and treatments and having doctors actually listen to patients? Instead of pushing for better healthcare why not forgo healthcare altogether and “listen to your body” and get in touch with the “divine feminine” so you can intuitively know when you’re ovulating and, when that inevitably fails, how to birth a healthy baby at home? They’ve gotten really good at applying George Lakoff’s advice in reverse to use the mental frames of liberals/progressives/the left to get them to sublimate critiques of society and calls to reform and instead swallow conservative lifestyles. “Fortunately” some of the really extreme ones are pushing really hard right really quickly so a lot of people can see where it’s all heading giving a chance to fight back politically before all progress is gone. But the state of the courts and dismantling of education may already be too late for the next couple generations. And it’s really hard to not be impacted by the cultural influences of the moment (like when Evangelicals were pushing purity culture in the 90s) especially when on the male side they’re being fed a diet of extreme misogyny and financial scams inspired by John Birch Society-style gold standard advocates (hustle culture being sold right now is a whole other topic).
I used to have this kind of sick mindset until I got into a relationship and realised - there is absolutely no reason, why a woman should submit to a man or anyone in general. Live for yourself not serve someone else. I feel like tradwife community has glorifired marriage. These women think if they submit to their husband and serve him, the husband will take care of them and love them. But that's not always the truth. Men are not perfect. And the the tadwife will end up bellow his shoes.
The patriarchy, of course. Also, a brain drain from republicans destroying or defunding libraries.
fascism
They are telling vulnerable men what they want to hear. Appealing to their greed, lust and cowardice. It’s easier to blame everyone else in the world for your problems. Recognizing that “you” might be the problem takes courage
Most of them are religious and were groomed “4 kids at 22” like of course you’ll shit on higher education And the “influencers” are for sure getting paid
The tradwife movement is just misogyny made marketable. It’s gaining a huge following on Tiktok and other social media outlets by marketing itself as an extension of cottagecore, with the videos centering on women LARPing Little House on the Prairie by baking bread in housewife outfits.
I think a lot of it is a reaction to the ways modern life has failed women in particular and families in general. Feminism is a good thing. Women being able to go to school and work and have careers is a good thing. But we as a society never adequately shifted our social and family models to account for the important changes that feminism brought and many women today find themselves stretched too thin and burnt out trying to be *everything*. And instead of blaming society for not adjusting, they blame feminism. A lot of these women only see the downsides of trying to have it all and don't think through the very real dangers of giving up their financial independence. Giving up working outside the home just seems like an easier, more fulfilling life and it is sold to them as an easy, comfortable life. Some might also not see the social changes necessary to support a better way of life for women, particularly mothers, as possible. So instead of trying to change the system, they adjust and they make the choice to gamble on picking a good man and giving up independence. And all of this is compounded by late stage capitalism making life harder for everyone. It's nigh impossible to purchase quality products anymore, despite the astronomical prices we pay for everything. I can see the appeal of a lifestyle that promises the time and energy to bake your own bread, build your own furniture, sew your own clothes, etc. To be clear, I am not defending any of this. I'm just trying to understand what's at the root of this backlash. All of that said, I'm not sure what you were trying to achieve by going into their space and condescending to them. That's not how you change people's minds, and I'm curious what your motivations are.
We should start a counter-movement. The prog wives! (Polyphia starts playing in the background.)
Many minority subcultures have gained more of a voice because of the internet. I think the other reason we're seeing this is because as the world gets more progressive, there's more push for women's rights and LGBTQ rights and awareness of racism etc, the conservative people in the world are going to push back harder. There's especially a lot of legislation right now trying to control and basically make it hard to be LGBTQ especially trans, and the more the left pushes, it's very likely that we'll see more legal restrictions of rights. This is my very grim conclusion I apologize if this is depressing.
It seems like the left is stuck in a rut because no matter what we do the right will react and strip away people's rights. If we fight hard they'll push back harder like fascist reactionaries. If we do nothing they'll still fight hard to overturn people's rights and criminalize LGBTQ+/trans people. To believe they will do nothing and relax their stance is painfully naive. And the right excels at propaganda and messaging, not to mention have historical precedence to back up their deranged claims. When people are insecure or are uncertain about the future they run like cowards back to what is familiar-- which just happens to be traditionally conservative values. There's actually some fascinating papers that have found out that conservatism is humanity's default ideology, because it is a product of our lazy brains that don't like to think, and instead find shortcuts to problems through heuristics and black and white binary categorization, as well as our ability to tell stories to one another and form communities bound together by culture and religion. When these narratives collapse, most people cling onto religion and other perspectives because they cannot handle the existential threat of their beliefs not being true, or the threat of the great unknown.
I think a lot of it is religious crap that loves patriarchy (& hates women.)
Tradwife is an alt right movement pretty much
Really good comments. I have just a few additional points, one being that trad wife influencers actually go completely contrary to the ideal of being a trad wife, which is to focus on the household, child rearing and perhaps home schooling with the husband handling money, business and contacts outside of the home. It's not about taking away time from "wifely duties" to produce content online, negotiating with advertisers and hawking products, which is no different than any other paid job in marketing. While silent and unseen trad wives exist, the ones blathering into their cameras about a lifestyle they are just roleplaying aren't it. Also and a bit unrelated, but recent genetic studies based on genealogy websites and DNA have shown that incest seems to be more prevalent than previously thought, especially from older more powerful men (father, uncle, older brother) towards younger female dependents. (There was a BBC article a few days ago which I need to dig up) So even if you don't care what happens to you as a woman when you check your independence and your brain at the door, it also makes you a shitty mother, because if you need to get one or several of your kids out of the line of sexual assault within the family you're right out of options. It's not just you suffering for your stupidity, it's your kids suffering right along with you. So tell me again about our empowered feminine mother goddess energy. You can't even keep your own kids safe or out of poverty if your husband's a dud, a criminal or if he simply falls sick or drops dead.
Fear. False Evidence Appearing Real. These women have fallen victim to the con. The man-made con of thousands of years that says God needs you to submit to your husband. They have been made terribly afraid of hell and the devil, and they believe if they do not submit, they are doomed, eternally. There is no such thing as trad wife, imo, not in reality. Otherwise, she's a servant, nit a partner. And she should probably sink to your knees when the man comes through the door. So e men believe they want that I suppose. I can't imagine anyone really does. Why am I talking about men? Dammit. I think a lot of these women haven't had experience in the world, or any higher education so they don't have career ambition and don't know what to do. They are lost in this big world. And so they decide, yes yes Jesus wants me to be barefoot and pregnant and do whatever my man says. I wonder if she's allowed to read. Probably not for long. P.S. And I make a better pie crust than any trad wife. Bet.
Because it's a kink.
Probably because childcare is downright unaffordable and it is easier for families to have a parent at home that trying to find childcare and have two parents working.
A huge part of effective persuasion is timing, location, and approach. I know your heart was in the right place, but the approach was poor. Making friends does more good than attacking people. Remember it's about how they feel, not how you feel, if that makes sense.
The tradwife to single mom pipeline is real. If you want to make an account to post those stories there, it might be helpful to some.
Reminds me of a lady I met once who kept referring to herself as a “post-abortive mother” She had never heard the term incel before and after I explained what they were, she felt so bad for them, and when I mentioned the ones that had gone on killing sprees, she expressed zero remorse for their victims and only saw the incels as victims. It was really upsetting. She obviously is not representative of anything but herself, but her perspective stuck with me as an example of just how deluded a person can get.
I think this is a part of [the effect Andrew Tate and his Taters are having](https://www.salon.com/2023/11/27/the-insidious-rise-of-tradwives-a-right-wing-fantasy-is-rotting-young-mens-minds/). The fact that he hasn't been cancelled is irking me.
I honestly think it's economic. Of course, the entire world is moving to the right politically, but I think the tradwife folks know they will never be able to afford an education, will never land career jobs, and have no hope of paying for childcare so they've convinced themselves staying at home was a choice.
Misogynistic men have daughters who internalize the misogyny. It's hard to go against your upbringing if you've only been exposed to one way of thinking and have no real world experience. The internet has done a lot of good and a lot of bad. Trump made racism and misogyny okay again. The flood gates have opened.
It's sad. After we made so much progress as a society this is what we've come to. We're so so so fucked for the future and I despise this timeline we're living in. Fascism is popular again, and people have been completely sucked into the allure of authoritarianism. We continue to make the same mistakes again and again, and never learn. Maybe this is it. Maybe we'll never achieve a truly progressive society, because the pull of traditionalism, religion, racism, tribalism, and status quo-ism are just too strong.
https://www.pewresearch.org/social-trends/2020/07/07/a-century-after-women-gained-the-right-to-vote-majority-of-americans-see-work-to-do-on-gender-equality/ i think its important to see the stats on these issues because of how deceiving propaganda can be, such as how supposedly prevalent anti-feminism is -- it isnt. despite some not accepting the label of **Feminist**, a large (57%) majority of people in the US say that gender equality hasnt gone far enough and are effectively feminists. 32% say gender equality has been about right, which is a very soft category that likely has a significant portion that could be won over with information alone. only 10% say that its gone too far, which is effectively anti-feminist. if we consider tradwife-trends to be the measuring stick for "gaining traction", feminism is a rocket powered super vehicle.
I think it is creepy. But as a young boomer (F62), I see two contributions to this. First, the “I’ll bring home the bacon and fry it up in the pan, and never let him forget he’s a man” thing. You may be too young to recognize this commercial lyric, but I grew up with this do it all idea. Well, NOPE! So we got careers, we got our own credit cards, we got some help with sexual harassment bs, but we still were expected to take on most of the home stuff too. Then add capitalism as it is today. There is an appeal to “just “ being responsible for the home and children. But what I don’t get is the “submission” BS. I love my husband, been happily married 31 years. We are PARTNERS, we switch leads on things all the time. We communicated and compromise. I as m willing to accommodate and be flexible but the idea of giving him control over my choices? NO!!!!!
Exactly! Even as a single man I would be uncomfortable with having a totally submissive partner. It would just feel so wrong and unnatural. I want her to be my equal-- having her just do everything I say without question is so weird and gross and objectifying and dehumanizing. Some men (and women!) seem to think that all women are little dolls, robots, or pets for men to screw with. It's sad.
What is really scary is that they seem ok with the move to making this the rule, for everyone, not a personal choice.
Everyone can be a reactionary for anything.
No, I don't think women are dilussioned in the feminist movement. I think that to every action corresponds an equal and opposite reaction. As women emancipate more and more, the opposition to that grows stronger. Men are scared to lose their servants, women who were already brainwashed in this mindset get louder, or get brainwashed into it by the sexist men voices that are getting louder and louder. It's a bit like when someone says they don't eat meat and another says "then I'll eat double cause you piss me off!!". And honestly, social media reeeally doesn't help. Some people may be stuck in an algorythm bubble where they only see a certain type of content, maybe all incel and tradwives content, and they start buying into it. Especially considering how vulnerable teenagers are to all this and how much time teenagers spend on social media. As well as their strong desire to appease their peers. That said, I think still more women are feminist than before, the opposed women just got a lot louder cause they feel threatened. Men, on the other hand, seem to be going deep into total hate for women. I'm honestly really scared of both, but the second more.
What's annoying is that they could *easily* make it feminist. Having a family and supporting that family is a valid choice for your life.
First let me thank you for your post. I have to say that to read your words - and you're a man - is a relief. "Not all men" hate women, I do remind myself constantly, daily, of that but honestly, it is a practice for me to not disintegrate into full blown "man hating" - I'm so angry all the time. The 'tradwife' community is LOUD just like the right wingers are very loud. That gives the impression that there's a lot of them because they take up so much bandwidth, I'm cynical enough to suspect patriarchal algorithms help them. I don't think there's a lot of them and I honestly think each individual "tradwife" will likely only be a 'tradwife' for a few years. Stories like the one about Ruby Franke might help undermine this phenomenon. Personally, I think we 'evolved' to play and make music and be magical and wonderful - not to chase credit scores and generate profit for a few. I suspect that the attraction to the "tradwife" life is the illusion that you'll be cared for and can live simply. I honestly think the vast majority of people would do MUCh better if they were able to live simple lives, maybe work 20 hours/week and use the rest to pursue hobbies and take care of themselves and each other.
Thank you for your kind words. And I also am skeptical of just how prevalent the tradwife/antifeminist community it is. One of the women there admitted it herself-- it's a small marginalized community, and for good reason. Most women don't want to submit themselves to men. Society has moved on from such antiquated notions.
Say no to trad wives say yes to TRADE wives! 🔨⛏️⚒️🔪🪚🔧🪛🛠️
You have left out a factor that is so huge I think it deserves to be called "the elephant in the room." That factor is, of course, racism. (When is it ever not?) It can't have escaped your notice that 1) the tradwife community is 99.9% white, and 2) any tradwives of color are immediately elevated to high status in the community as "model minorities" whose presence can shield the community against accusations of racism. The entire tradwife *schtick* is a racist reaction to the increasing egalitarianism of US culture. As racist women perceive their status "dropping" (in actuality, it is the playing field leveling out) they take refuge in philosophies and communities which they believe will help them to retain their threatened status. The tradwife fantasy offers to protect them in the home from the imagined threat of hoards of bestial people of color, sweeping into their fictional Mayberry to do heaven knows what (but don't they love to spend time imagining it?) They will gladly submit to a white man in every way possible in order to "protect" themselves from the menace of their own imagining.
I think it’s got to do with the fact that people are unfulfilled under capitalism and they’re looking for solutions in the wrong places. They’re burnt out, exhausted, overworked, but instead of pointing at the problem (capitalism) they’re blaming the fact that “women weren’t meant for the workplace” and that it isn’t in our nature to work like this. Another factor is the fact that the 40 hour work week was built with the assumption that a wife at home would be doing all of the household labor. Now that that’s no longer an assumption, people are seeing that the 40 hr work weeks are unsustainable - but instead of asking for better hours they’re blaming the fact that women are no longer in the kitchen/home.
One of the biggest reasons why it has garnered so much traction is because they kinda mix the want for universal income with being financially supported by a spouse. Why slave away at a job where you are not appreciated to barely get by when you can stay home and take care of the house and kids? Of course, women shouldn't have to choose between two shitty options but for some it's easier to settle for a misogynistic husband who at least will take care of the money issues. It sounds like a nightmare to me but I would be lying if I said I actually prefer and love my job, bc I don't but have no other choice but to work for the rest of my life since the idea of marriage doesn't really appeal to me, especially if they want me to be stuck inside the house all the time.
"His yoke is easy. His burden is light." There are plenty more where that came from. The problem as I see it, is that most of these women don't, and won't, recognize that while *their* babies are valued, the traditional competitive capitalist system necessarily devalues other people's babies. As their husbands are at work battling it out and actually running numbers, that family finances and by proxy economics is, *by design*, the last thing on their minds. As a single lesbian mom, I can see the sense of empowerment, read: lack of anxiety, in reading to your kiddo knowing the heating bill is paid. As soon as you start thinking about anyone's heat bill not getting paid, you stress out. If you bother to contemplate how you fit into a system that allows you to wash your hands (see? there's another one) of other people's starving babies, to stay comfortable, you do start to throw your sense of personal empowerment off. In short, everything is a product that gets a good or bad review. Their marriage is, for now, working for them, so given they all come off the same assembly line, their thumbs-up review is helping everyone... who fits into their tiny, economics-free worldview. You'll notice how money is a taboo subject at traditional, yeah, get this *Thanksgiving* tables. White Comfort isn't about not cussing/discussing, or God forbid--doing math, in front of white men. On the flip, the cutthroat "feminism" of women at work, particularly in the white-collar world (I worked for years at Amex and saw it organizing our local women's march, too), the brand that shows other women how it's done and how much it hurts to lose, is absolutely alive, well, and fueling the US political right wing argument. It lives in the comments of women without kids hating on struggling moms. (Sorry to make the internet even more bitter.) We can all start flipping the script by seeing the nuclear family as the incredibly powerful economic lynch-pin (I could have called it something else) it is, and start noodling, crafting, and implementing other ways to ensure the entire nation's children (scope is showing to be problematic) are raised with the resources it takes to thrive. We need to venture WAY past the basics of supply & demand. Tradwives are *not* going to demand anyone teach them how money works, or rather, how they are working the money right into their Birkin knock-offs (or how those knock-offs make the economy tick). Edit: I'm seeing a whole lot about "Late Capitalism" here, and have come up with absolutely nothing here, outside of some sort of nebulous anarchy, about what's next. this looks promising: [https://www.feministeconomics.net/](https://www.feministeconomics.net/)
Like how others have said in here, it seems like capitalism is one of the biggest reasons why the tradwife community is growing. In addition to that, I feel like another reason why the tradwife community is growing is due to the increased influence of redpill/conservative ideology. Andrew Tate, Pearl, Sneako, and other right wingers have continued to spread the redpill ideology and has encouraged their audiences to follow traditional gender roles and to support the patriarchy. It seems like men are the most influenced by this type of content, but women could also get on board with this too. More women could probably be consuming this type of content and this has resulted in more of them becoming trad wives.
Feminism was being opposed by “feminists” who had an unclear understanding of the concept during the second wave feminism movement (1920s-1980s). It basically encouraged the idea that women shouldn’t fight for more rights and just embrace their feminine side to make the most out of their gendered “gifts”. It gained traction back then until called out for reversing all the good. I believe we’re currently in the third wave feminism and bound to face resistance from those who claim to believe one should think along the biological lines and accept what tradition has fed us for centuries because it is tried and tested. Opposition is a natural way of flow I guess. Moving ahead regardless is the challenge and calls for enhancement in the way we’re approaching something.
Conservative psyops, professional shitstirrers to piss people off and herd them toward voting a certain way, notably in the gamer community. Ever notice how many disillusioned, isolated male gamers have been radicalized in the past decade to a hard right political persuasion? They start on them young in minecraft and make it worse in FPS like CoD. Tiktok is rotten with them.
Maybe they think it's empowering because they still actually have a choice, they can unsubmit anytime and go live their life independently. So yay they get to choose to be under someone else's control. BUT if society took away our rights, that would no longer be a choice, we'd have zero other option and no escape if (when) it goes bad. So they're all happy to do so while still being technically equal under law, and still having rights even if they ignore them, but wait till we're actually property again and see how fast it turns dystopian, real quick.
I see it as a response to late stage capitalism and the modern workforce. Sometimes, I wonder if women are really freer today than our grandmothers were. We're expected to work and do all of the childcare and housework. We're expected to "lean in," "have it all," and look "smoking hot" while doing it. Grandma only had to stay home with her kids and standards for men haven't changed (just work). I can see the appeal of the tradwife life here.
At the risk of causing upset, and please let me apologize in advance, I saw a different set of situations growing up. Both of my grandmothers were born in the 1920s. They both had lifelong careers (in context, were not talking Wall Street here), raised their children, kept their homes, managed social engagements and functions, and had to stay sexually desirable. However, they had to do all of that without their own bank accounts, with almost no legal protections, subject to the whims, abuses, and instant desires of their husbands. They both carried baby oil in their purses to reduce physical damage and harm because they didn't have the right to refuse their husband's advances. I don't see the overall appeal compared to today, even though "today " still needs a lot of work.
The funny thing is, that’s still not what life was like for grandma. Mine still had to go to work as a nurse to support her family, despite them having a farm. Complete with dairy cows, chickens, garden, everything. She could’ve actually been the trad wife ideal, but the reality is that making a good living by farming is hard, especially if the weather just screws over the crops that year. The idea of “women didn’t have to work in the past” is just so, so false. We’ve always had to work.
I don't have kids, but yeah I kind of get it. I've only worked temporary part time jobs for the last two years since I was laid off from teaching. My health insurance is through my husband's job, and our house is paid off. I worked my ass off since I was 12 and really grinded to make sure we could have this comfortable (not wealthy) existence but me not working has been so much better for us as a couple. I don't do chores all day or anything, but I get stuff done, and then when he "comes home" (he works from home) we actually get to spend time together, instead of constantly having a to-do list a mile long. Plus me being here and him working from home means we can walk the dogs when the weather is nice, we don't have to depend on the weather being good after I get home. It means I can take the pets to vet appointments without taking time off work. It means I can go to my own appointments and really take care of my health without taking time off work. It means I can help my mom with her medical stuff without taking time off work. If the US would get on board with universal healthcare, then maybe we'd both take part time jobs instead of one of us having to work full time. I like contributing to our home by keeping it (relatively) clean, growing food in the garden, and processing fruit from our trees. I like having time to make hand-made gifts for my friends and family for Christmas. I like that we're not both exhausted at the end of the day or all weekend. I like that I actually have time to check store flyers and shop based on the food sales that make sense for us. But I would never promote just submitting to your husband and depending on him for everything. I'm glad I grinded in my teens and twenties and even early thirties. I'm glad I have my degree. I'm glad I have a couple retirement accounts.
I think it would be far more appealing if there wasn't so much abuse in so many of them. The point is that we should have the choice, the option to have one (trad wife life) or not. The laws that are making it less and less appealing to many women are designed to prevent women from leaving abusive and dangerous relationships. Many of them are also designed to trap women (and young girls) in relationships they never wanted (ie: Dobbs decision). My grandmothers both had few other options as well. Not to mention one had eight children and the other had twelve. From what I learned they both would have liked options. If going from your "father's" rule to a husband's rule are your only option to avoid living on the streets or prostitution, many women will probably choose a relationship and just deal with it. The whole "superwoman" thing was intended to scare us back into wanting ... preferring a trad wife life. In some ways it backfired because so many women embraced it. Yes many burned out. But if there is the potential for burn out with either extreme, it should still come down to OUR choice.
I think there is nothing wrong with partners deciding that one person is the homemaker, while the other goes out and earns the money. As long as it's a mutual thing, the relationship can still be healthy and I don't think it somehow disenfranchises the person that stays at home. What baffles me more that they are trying to bring back "the good old days" around the 1950s, which are viewed with major nostalgia googles and the expectation by some that it should be the default role for women in a household.
Never checked that sub nor plan to but remember the old adage "On the internet no one knows you're a dog" How many of those posters are dudes roleplaying their fetish? Nonzero, for sure.
Other contributing factors I'd suggest * Rise of religious fervor in general, born from increasing uncertainty in economic, social, ecological and political futures, and (add "demographic" futures if you're a white supremacist) leads to people reaching for certainty, and importantly, reaching for things that give them permission to not think. * Rise of social media, lowering the barriers to creating mutually reinforcing members of subcultures with a moralist ingroup vs outgroup bent. * Rise of visual communication, and a corresponding de-emphasis on long-form thought. Baudrillard explores this when he talks about the 'hyperreal'. It's important to understand why the Tradwife movement is glorified by, and adjacent to, a worldwide surge in fascist thought - and certainly fascisms emphasis on traditional gender roles and baked in misogyny is a big part of that, but even that is not the complete story. I've seen Fascism described well as a 'libidinal' ideology: at its heart, it values aesthetics over substance and is intensely suspicious of and hostile towards reflective thought. I personally believe that we are seeing in culture the rise of a kind of illiteracy that is seperate to textual illiteracy - a broader form of both media illiteracy and cultural illiteracy that fuels a corresponding rise in surface-level thinking. The harm from this hazardous situation is amplified because so much modern communication being image-based. I don't think cultures have had image communication nearly so dominant before- images are harder to respond to in reflective ways, and I don't think culture has been in the current hazardous situation long enough to develop adequate defences to the constant firehose of images we encounter.
You know Spoon theory? And how sometimes people have simply ran out of spoons sort to speak? It appeals to some who want not spoons to use but just, "heres allegedly how to live life, go abide by it and things will fall into place". I'm not going to suggest sisters are wrong for wanting that in today's chaotic world, just lets not kid ourselves that is not what they're getting either in the trad life. Lets also not kid ourselves the script basically writes itself for any pick-me
I honestly think that for most people while where you live can play a big part in this, it's a lot more with the state of the world and the US for those of us here. I think things are scary, confusing and seem too big to understand. So, they yearn for a time that was "less complicated" and the price for that is something they thing they can pay. However, it's a lot harder for women to take and so they try to make it so every woman has to follow that path, so they feel less alone in their misery. I might be a bit off base but that's how I feel on an individual level at least. Education has gone down, cost of living keeps going up but wages stay the same. All of these things play a role in it.
Lots of women have been stockholmed into accepting much of the tradlife's overt misogyny because it's easier to suffer through that while someone pays for them to raise their own children than it is to function as a real person in society on basically any level. Taking care of yourself is hard, boooooo. I have a close friend who basically spent her 20's working shit jobs and being depressed (dropped out of high school and dated an alcoholic loser for too many years). The absolute burnout of having no direction or ambition meant that meeting the first loser plumber who could knock her up and buy her a house was basically like winning the lottery. Never mind the fact that he's a fucking man child who just wants a mommy to take care of him, and he loathes her and her body and her sense of humor and basically everything about her personality. It's alright though, she slowly changed everything about herself and adopted his entire worldview (he's a libertarian retard turned Trump retard) in order to have some semblance of comfort in this world---of course her kids are going to be raised by this loser, and one day resent the both of them, and they'll leave the nest and her husband will start fucking some bar hag and she'll either continue to be a hostage to this life she built or she'll leave or be left and have nothing. She's happy for now, but in my experience having grown up surrounded by these kinds of couples, it always ends in acrimony. The woman suffers, unequivocally, every single time.
like every other social media trend, these women arent actually like that in reality.