3 Ways Women Can Make Themselves More Marriageable

Just about every week announces new datapoints showing the feminism-fueled war between the sexes is hurting everyone. A recent Wall Street Journal feature explored how the male-female divide on everything from educational attainment to politics is killing off marriage and, thus, forecasting the end of society. It’s titled, “American Women Are Giving Up on Marriage.”

Compared to men, women are now more likely to: own a house, graduate from every level of education, say they’re not looking for a spouse, and express wholesale disdain and dislike for the opposite sex. Multiple women the WSJ quoted indicated they left relationships because they wanted to prioritize careers over motherhood, while the men they were dating wanted women who prioritized motherhood.

The people WSJ quotes just accept earning more credentials and dollars as obviously good without highlighting the disastrous tradeoffs for women and society — namely, the United States’s largest unmarried population ever. Is it really good or preferable for women to contribute taxes rather than the entire next generation?

Women used to have a more holistic understanding of our unique capacities. Women often gently taught men there’s so much more to life than making six figures, going on Instagram-worthy vacations, or owning a sports car. Marriage expresses a mature understanding of human life as being a lot more than bucks in a bank account. Men choosing to support a family tended by their wives typically creates an investment that pays off big for both of them and all of us.

Prioritizing relationships above money often results in married couples both getting happier lives and more wealth. Married people build more wealth long-term, both as measured in happiness and as measured in assets, because two people working together toward a goal are more effective than one — and because marriage motivates men to work smarter and harder.

“Married couples had $393,000 in median wealth in 2022, according to the St. Louis Federal Reserve, while unmarried people, including those who were partnered but not married, had $80,000,” the WSJ notes. That’s almost a five-fold difference — and note that married couples produce a lot more revenue for taxation than feminist-preferred singles.

Feminism owns much of the increasing divide we’re seeing among men and women, with civilization-ending consequences. Some who critique feminism yet still support the label, such as Mary Harrington, largely blame external factors such as the Industrial Revolution for separating families.

But it’s simply wrong not to also blame internal factors such as leftist ideology replacing Christianity. While how people live shapes what they believe, what people believe also shapes how they live. So feminism shapes how we all live now, estranging women from their own biology while also estranging men and women from each other.

Like just about every other woman in the United States, I grew up feminist even though my upbringing was in a conservative religious household and I attended one of the most right-leaning colleges in the world. So did my husband, both of us mostly without even knowing it. I put a career above children and viewed the latter as an obstacle rather than a pathway to fulfillment.

Marriage gives us both opportunities to challenge each other to grow in our respective feminine and masculine capacities. It’s a lot of fun to grow together, and it’s making us both a lot happier. Thanks to feminist-driven no-fault divorce laws, however, today most couples divorce when forced to confront how feminism is damaging their marriage, as psychiatrist Hannah Spier explains. The WSJ article shows how feminism also prevents marriages from occurring — women simply are more committed to feminist ideology than to their biology, and they reject men who remind them women’s bodies are designed to nurture a family.

Getting out of feminism’s civilizational suicide pact does require policy changes, as Spier also notes: “Everything from financial incentives for delaying family to tax penalties on single-income households, daycare subsidies, affirmative action, the two-income trap, and career penalties for mothers reinforces the same idea.” It’s the government preferencing civilizational suicide via unmarried adults instead of civilizational strength through promoting the raising of all children in their lowest-risk environment: households run by their married biological parents.

Today, however, I wanted to mention some things my husband and I have done together that have helped us deprogram our feminism for a happier home. Since how men are failing is exhaustively covered and even has superstars like Jordan Peterson, and because I’m a woman, I’m going to focus on what women can do to make ourselves more marriageable.

I say this because women just assume they’re marriageable if they have a college degree and a job. Those are male qualifications for marriage. Female qualifications for marriage include: mothering skills (practice raising children), housekeeping skills (like cooking without using a microwave), the ability to prudently manage finances (not racking up debt), communicating with men without contempt, and a general air of sweetness, gentleness, and kindness. These things attract men to women (besides the obvious — not being extremely overweight and having a generally feminine appearance).

1. Go to Church and Read the Bible

The inventor of a widget knows how it works, because he designed and created it. So too, God knows how human beings work, because He made us. This means that wherever what God says contradicts current social messaging, God is right and the messaging is wrong.

Anyone who wants a successful marriage and family should be going to church and reading the Bible, because these are where God promises to show up and instruct us. We all need this instruction, because we can always grow and do better, and we need the community of people that gathers around this instruction.

People who go to church are happier, have fewer divorces, and have fewer psychological problems. These are just material benefits surpassed by the spiritual and psychological development humans get from being part of a church focused on what the Bible clearly says (instead of a fake church dedicated to dismissing what the Bible clearly says and fitting it to leftist politics).

Christianity modifies men’s natural aggression and directs it in healthy ways, by commanding men to sacrifice on behalf of women and children, not abuse the vulnerable, and only to have sex in marriage. It also directs women’s natural aggression in healthy ways, commanding women to respect their husbands, prioritize family, keep an orderly home, refrain from sluttery, and not gossip.

Recognizing the authority of the Bible over our lives has helped my husband and I work through personal and marital difficulties to align ourselves with how God made men and women to function together. People without this authority to guide them are more likely to ruin their own lives by foregoing family or putting women in charge of the family.

2. If You Don’t Want Kids, Fix That

It’s natural for a woman to want and love children. Chances are, if you don’t, you have some unresolved family issues. That was certainly true of me. As psychoanalyst and author Erica Komisar responded to podcaster Alex Clark‘s question, “If you feel more comfortable and competent in an office than being a mom, what should that tell you?” “It should tell you that maybe you have an attachment disorder that needs to be looked at.”

Young women — and men who don’t understand why so many women today are psycho — need to learn to see resistance to family connections as a sign of deep emotional distress. Human beings are made to live within family ecosystems, not as loners. Much of today’s flight from family descends from no-fault divorce and the subsidization of single motherhood, both of which brutalize kids and lead them to run away from family when they can.

But running away from your hangups and disassociating through work will not make you a healthy and happy person. I know a lot of us have family “issues” now thanks to the paganization of our society and the increase in family disintegration. But the answer isn’t to increase these by ignoring them, it’s to take responsibility for who we are.

For many people, a good therapist can be helpful. For trauma, try one who specializes in EMDR. Feel free to try several therapists out before settling on one, as therapist quality and connection can widely vary. Pastors can also refer you to local options.

All kinds of books can also be helpful. I love Becoming Attached, by Robert Karen, which talks about how marriage and motherhood can naturally heal wounds from one’s family of origin. Komisar’s Being There is another great place to start. Re-Regulated by Anna Runkle discusses a simple, no-cost way to begin ordering your emotions (guided journaling) that she says worked for her better than years of therapy.

3. Cultivate Feminine Habits and Traits

Men don’t like fighting with women. This is why feminism can neuter men — because many are too polite to treat masculine women in a truly masculine way. Men intuitively know women aren’t sturdy enough to be physically or verbally punched even when we pretend we are. But many also resent the double standard that allows women all the benefits of aggressive behavior and none of the responsibility.

It is possible — and preferable! — to disagree and to work through differences without full-frontal confrontations. This is an ancient feminine skill that many women today know nothing about, because it’s rarely modeled for us. Ask me how I know! Two favorite resources I’m using to develop feminine communication skills at home are Suzanne Venker’s The Alpha Female’s Guide to Men and Marriage (I often give this as a wedding shower gift) and Crucial Conversations: Tools for Talking when the Stakes Are High.

Another thing I’ve started is immediately rewording statements after they come out of my mouth and I hear how harsh and bossy they sound. Instead of, “Honey, come here,” the other night, I tried again: “Honey, would you mind coming here?” Instead of, “These kids are driving me insane!” when he walks in the door, I wait, and after he’s caught his breath start with, “When would be a good time to talk about some struggles I had today with the kids? It should only take 15 minutes, it’s not a huge deal.”

Instead of immediate contradiction accompanied by an offensive roll of the eyes, I’m working on softening statements such as, “Well, have you considered … ?” Or, “Here’s my concern …” These are not manipulative tricks, they are ways of adhering to the reality that my husband and I are on the same team in every struggle, as men and women in general have to be for our society to survive.

Rather than helicoptering and micromanaging everything everywhere, women often also need to step aside and make room for men to lead. This doesn’t mean women aren’t needed. Of course we are needed. The human race cannot exist without our very active existence.

But women need to consider that often men aren’t leading because we’re not letting them or challenging them to. That’s out of order biologically and spiritually. General male leadership doesn’t mean women don’t have input. It means men need our petitions, help, counsel, and encouragement, not our nagging, whining, or control freakery.

Some Requests for Men from a Woman

On that note: If men are biologically designed to lead and protect — and they are — it follows to me that it’s men who have to lead everyone out of the civilizational mess we’re in now. “Men going their own way” is a cowardly, unmanly response to an existential crisis. Strong men don’t abandon a bad situation. They don’t wallow in despair and bitterness. They take charge and lead. They solve problems.

As a woman, my general request to men would be that they step up and lead. Leadership isn’t tyranny; it isn’t hoisting yourself on a throne and making others do all the work. That’s a slave-master relationship, and it’s unjust. I would like to see more men exercise just authority and develop true leadership skills such as the art of persuasion, patience, and the willingness to sacrifice for others.

Forcing other people to suffer so you can be comfortable is not leadership, it is weakness. That has been the general character of our society’s self-appointed “leaders” now for some time. We don’t need more of those. All the truly great leaders have led through sacrifice for others rather than forcing others to sacrifice for them. Become one of those.

Applied to the subject at hand, it seems to me that rather than flaccidly jeering at how stupid “women are these days,” it would be more manly to embark on the adventure of learning how to lead a woman, as my husband did. Yes, some women are going to be lifelong incorrigibles. I’m not asking you to be stupid or go white-knighting. Don’t marry if she’s not committed to a Bible that teaches the natural order and purpose of the sexes. Don’t marry if she’s steadfastly opposed to children or if she thinks men and women are interchangeable in every way. Prudently set your red lines.

But if she’s more of a passive victim of a feminist culture like you are, try leading both of you into a happy life. See what happens when you try to lead by leveling up instead of giving up, when you sacrifice your immediate comfort for what’s truly good for everyone. My husband had to put up with immature behavior from me, as did I with him, as do all married people, but he eventually got this career-minded woman to have six kids and like it well enough. Maybe more men could try to be that successful, and the rest of us can help.

Joy Pullmann is executive editor of The Federalist. Her latest book with Regnery is “False Flag: Why Queer Politics Mean the End of America.” A happy wife and the mother of six children, her ebooks include “Classic Books For Young Children,” and “101 Strategies For Living Well Amid Inflation.” An 18-year education and politics reporter, Joy has testified before nearly two dozen legislatures on education policy and appeared on major media including Tucker Carlson, CNN, Fox News, OANN, NewsMax, Ben Shapiro, and Dennis Prager. Joy is a grateful graduate of the Hillsdale College honors and journalism programs who identifies as native American and gender natural. Joy is also the cofounder of a high-performing Christian classical school and the author and coauthor of classical curricula. Her traditionally published books also include “The Education Invasion: How Common Core Fights Parents for Control of American Kids,” from Encounter Books.