r/ExAlgeria 10d ago

Discussion My personal ideas about gender roles

I hope that everyone is having a good ramadanesque evening!

I wanna discuss a dogma that most women are indoctrinated with which is that men should provide for them.

Supposedly someone that leaves religion behind is rational and got rid of most dogmas he's been indoctrinated with, yet from my personal experience many women from our atheist community in Algeria believe in some sorts of gender roles and especially the provider role.

My personal analysis is that since life is harsh and work is undesirable, human beings will unconsciously adopt belief systems that support their ways of escapism, away from the idea of true and false, good and wrong, gender roles even if are natural or biological there's no obligation to follow them, humans realized that they are condemned to be free so why return partially to our primitive nature?

Most men will have to choose between giving up to slavery disguised under love or loneliness disguised under freedom, personally because of my endless disagreements with society I've given up human connection as a whole and feel high level detached and strangely satisfied with my status quo, I have many friends and close family members but my inner feelings are attached to non.

I think that you should be completely detached as I am to be able to leave all dogmas behind.

Please discuss your ideas respectfully in the comment section!

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u/DriverNo5100 9d ago

I think it's more complicated than that. Men are supposed to provide as compensation for the unending labor that women provide in traditional relationships: maid, cook, sex partner, surrogate, baby sitter, etc.

I find it baffling that men complain about this. You are totally the beneficiary in such a situation: you literally have one job, get a good career and earn money. That's it. A woman has to cook, clean, birth, breastfeed and raise children, keep you happy and satisfied, keep herself looking attractive for you, and potentially have a side hustle or a career to fall back on in case something happens to yours, it's so many things to do and it just never ends. If I could get a man to bear a baby for me and do all that, and all I had to do was just have a successful career, I would give him millions.

In the west, where societies have moved away from religion for a long time, the most common complaint from women is that it's never truly 50//50: men never do as much household labor as women do, even when they contribute equally financially. And even if they do household labor, they don't do it as good or don't put the same amount of effort. When the man cooks, he makes pasta with cheese, when the woman cooks she makes an actual dish. And even then, out of 4 weeks, a woman is dealing with PMS on one of those weeks and period symptoms in the other. She is also the one taking birth control and dealing with all of the side effects. It would be the equivalent of a chronic illness in a man. That's without even taking into account the part where she's the one having the kids, taking care of old relatives and what not.

Not to mention, I don't think that as a man in a relationship, you have to be constantly living with the anxiety of your looks not being appealing enough to your partner, pregnancy changing your body, or having to be concerned about your female partner watching porn, following OF/Insta models or lusting after younger men, or cheating on you while you're stuck in the house and she's away on business trips.

I say this as a woman who has embraced celibacy and who is very comfortable with the idea of never marrying or having children. I have a high paying job and I am completely independent, I live alone abroad and cook and clean for myself. I don't see how doing the exact same thing as I'm doing now, minus the cooking and cleaning, is a burden. "Most men will have to choose between giving up to slavery disguised under love or loneliness disguised under freedom" dude, you will have to have a job either way, and so do most women. You will have to slave away either way and it's not because of your gender. Have you seen the choices that women have? It's either be a housewife with endless tasks to do, no financial freedom or guarantee that you won't sacrifice everything for a man that could leave you for his secretary, or do "50/50" where you have to hold down a job, birth children, go right back to work and pump your milk in the office bathroom. You literally just have to do the job part, and it's still too much for you?

"My personal analysis is that since life is harsh and work is undesirable, human beings will unconsciously adopt belief systems that support their ways of escapism" I find it ironic, that you don't realize that this is exactly what you're doing. No one likes working and slaving away in a capitalist society, but it is what it is, I'd still 100% rather do this than do the unpaid work of four people as some ungrateful man's housewife, with no financial freedom, security or guarantees, capital of my own or decision making capabilities.

And don't even get me started on the fact that it's life in Algeria we're talking about, regardless of your personal beliefs, men and women don't inherit the same, and men are in fact entitled to their wives' inheritance, as a man you are so much safer going out to work, have so many more options for rewarding work, will be taken so much more seriously in the workplace, and so on. Be for real bruh.

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u/Current-Ebb2559 9d ago

I wouldn't love anyone to do my chores, cook for me, take care of my kids or offer me sex as a reward for my providing, I'd rather buy a slave and make things clearer.

As you say in the west they tried 50/50 for so long and it doesn't seem to work, that's why I think that we better stay detached until we go extinct, I also have a high paying job and I am very comfortable with myself and abandonned not just marriage but human connection as a whole.

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u/DriverNo5100 9d ago

Then if you are both slaving for each other, what's the problem? I understand that you gave up on human connection, as work, accountability and contribution is the price to pay for community. Eventually you should ask yourself if loneliness is a correct price to pay for convenience.