The Journal Of The InnKeeper

zen_shooter  wrote a post not too long ago about Man Caves.  It's a very harsh post.

And I agree with every word he said.

Apparently there's a trend now where men are allotted a room in the house to be their sole domain where they can decorate and do as they please.  The rest of the house belongs to the wife.

I have a problem with this trend for several reasons.

1)  In the days of yore, when men earned the income necessary to purchase living space, there were two basic ideas on who the house belonged to.  One philosophy said that whoever earned the money owned the stuff bought with it.  Such phrases as a man is King of his Castle are indicative of this mindset.  On the one hand, I can understand this, a person works hard for his money and it's all his money that goes towards the purchase of something.  But in the days when women could not earn an income, or could not earn enough income to support herself if she found herself minus a breadwinner for whatever reason, this mindset is harmful because it creates a situation in which the woman is never independent.  She absolutely relies upon someone else to provide for her very survival.  And, chances are, she's the one who has to spend all her time in said house while he's out earning the money that purchased it, so it's not unreasonable for her to want to make the home comfortable for her.

2) The other philosophy says that a Man's place is out in the real world and a Woman's place is in the home, thereby giving her complete dominion over the household.  Again, I can understand why someone would think this is fair (if you remove the "should"s from the sentence and just say that one person earns money and the other stays home).  In the last philosophy, the wife has nothing of her own, she is completely dependent upon her husband even though she is the one who puts all the labor into the maintenance and upkeep of the house.  She may not have "paid" for it in terms of dollars, but she certainly "paid" for it with her labor.  In the scenario where she doesn't earn an income, if she were to be separated from her husband for any reason, she would have no way to take care of herself, no shelter, nothing, without that house, whereas the man, with his income could purchase other forms of shelter for himself should he lose his wife.  The downside here is that it's the man's money that made the house possible in the first place, so to immediately wrest it away from him is not fair either.

In today's double-income, gender-equality society, I do not subscribe to the home being either spouse's sole domain, regardless of who earns how much money and who puts in what work.  With the cost of living versus income, it really requires at least two people's effort to maintain a home.  If it's not two incomes, it's one person working enough to afford everything and the other person staying home and doing those things that can't be paid or people hired for with only one income.  And, thanks to the common-property laws that were specifically designed to protect against philosophy #1 above, both spouses own equal shares of that house, unless they do something specific to change that.  So the idea that either spouse is prevented from having any input into the decorating and use of the entire house except for one room is just appalling to me.  

It's his fricken' house, dammit!

Yes, it's hers too, so I'm certainly not suggesting he take it away from her.  But did I miss something?  I thought marriages nowadays were all about compromise and two people sharing their lives together?  I thought the days of marriage purely for survival were over.  I thought we no longer married off our women as quickly as possible so she won't starve because she can't earn a living.  I thought men no longer married as quickly as possible to gain household labor through their wife and future children for their own survival.  I thought we decided back in the '20s that marriage was all about LOVE.

Oh, wait, if I watch sitcoms, I'll quickly learn that marriages are not about two adults engaging in meaningful, interdependent relationships, but about men finding women to mother them and take care of them because men can't think for themselves or take care of themselves, let alone decorate or possibly relax and enjoy themselves in their own home.

I mean, what the fuck?

Now we come to another problem I have with this article.  People don't seem to actually like the people they get into relationships with.  Here's Brian, from the article, who likes sports memorabilia and even played well enough to earn some trophies of his own.  These are important enough to him that, when given space to decorate for himself, he displays them.  Yet, his wife has forbidden the presence of these artifacts in the public areas of the house.  She doesn't like the look and she obviously doesn't find her husband's emotional attachment important enough to compromise and put aside some of her pink flowery knick-knacks and make room for her own husband in her life.

And, he married a woman who thinks her husband's place is a closet-sized room in the basement where all his important objects are safely hidden from view.  He has to carve a chunk of space out of her house where he can effectively be someone she doesn't like and where he can escape from her and her decorating ideas.

Now, I happen to be in favor of each adult in a household having a space that they can consider their own, private, personal space.  I don't care if it's a bedroom, a basement room, an office, a shed or garage, whatever.  I believe it's very important for the mental and emotional health for adults to have a space for those parts of them that they do not have in common with their partner, or even just time to recharge and be alone for a while, perhaps after a fight or a long day at work, or to feel good even.  Different people need different types of space, different amounts of time alone, and that's all fine.  But I do think it's important to have, even if that space is a mental separation rather than a physical room, because people are individual, and no matter how compatible you may be with your partner, you are still two unique individuals.

But the rest of the house is shared.  The home is not one room = husband, 3 rooms/kitchen/livingroom/bathroom/diningroom/yard/garage = wife.  Or, it shouldn't be, anyway.  He has to use the kitchen, the family room, the bathroom, the yard, too.  But in this house, he is not a significant presence in the home.  She is.  Her life is all about her.  He is fit into whatever space she found convenient, to be taken out when she wants and hidden away those parts she doesn't want.

This is not about having different interests from your spouse.  This isn't about making compromises ("You can't put that wagonwheel coffee table in here, but I'll cut back on the lace and flowers").  This is about one person saying "I do not like this significant part of you.  This part will not be allowed in my life and certainly not where other people can see it.  I give you this space where I can ignore it and pretend it doesn't exist.  You will be a guest in my life and in my home."

Regardless of who makes more money or who does more home maintenance, this is just wrong.

Why is it so difficult for people to marry people they like?  I mean, if we are going with the assumption that marriage is all about love, shouldn't "like" be in there somewhere?  How can you love someone when you don't like them, or you don't like significan't parts of them?  If we're going back to marriage as a practical survival thing, then I suppose you don't have to actually like your spouse as long as you can make the practical arrangement worthwhile.  

But fuck, people!  If you have to disallow your spouse from doing anything, let alone being himself in his own home, I can't see as how you really like him at all.  It's not like she asked him to only cut his toenails in the bathroom.  She won't allow in a million years the golf trophy he won during a melanoma benefit he played in honor of is fucking father.  

The women speak about their husbands in this article like children.  Viki (Brian's wife) mentions his friends coming over to play in the basement like That 70s show.  

The article does throw in at the very end that some women want their own space in the house too and, as I mentioned above, I think each adult should have his and her own personal space.  But the idea that only one room belongs to one spouse and the other spouse has complete and total control to dictate what the entire rest of the house looks like and is used for just pisses me right the fuck off.