Solitary Effects Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 2250 words

Solitary Effects - Essay Example The Male Dominance Effect Introduction In Chapter 12 of The Second Sex entitled ‘The Woman in Love’, the author gives a description of how women love inside and outside marriage or, in essence, how they want to be loved by their partners. As argued by Cecile Sauvage: â€Å"When the woman loves, she must forget her own personality. This is a law of nature. A woman does not exist without a master. Without a master, she is a scattered bouquet† (De Beauvoir 683). This statement suggests that women in intimate relationships want to be dominated or, in essence, they are attracted to dominant men. This research paper will examine this prevailing idea that women are attracted to dominant men. More particularly, this paper will try to answer the following questions: (1) Do women prefer dominant men as husbands? (2) Do women prefer to be dominated by their male partners? In order to answer the abovementioned questions secondary literature will be reviewed, particularly empi rical studies related to the topic. Essentially, the objective of this paper is to determine whether women themselves prefer to be dominated by their male partner or that they simply do not have a choice. De Beauvoir (2012) herself investigates how women strengthen their own subordination to male dominance. According to her, mystics, women in love, and narcissists accept their existence by inundating their self with an outside object, such as God or a spouse. De Beauvoir cites examples of women being blameworthy for their inferior position relative to men, especially in relation to marriage. The complexity of cutting loose from ‘femininity’, or from giving up comfort and security for an unpromising concept of equality, encourages numerous women to embrace the traditional, unrewarding domestic tasks of motherhood and wifehood. From the start of her analysis, de Beauvoir outlines the economic forces of women inferiority, as well as the economic causes of female emancipati on. Women can gain independence only through work. If they can be self-sufficient, provide independently for their own needs, they can also attain a kind of liberation. In the final sections of his book, de Beauvoir talks about the structural barriers women confronts in trying to achieve this objective. Male Dominance: What it really means for women? Numerous social scientists have made a prediction that women’s inclination to prefer dominant men as partners will vanish once they gain higher social standing and economic autonomy; specifically, once self-sufficient women no longer have to get resources and status through their male partners, such female tendencies will become less widespread. However, this is not taking place (Townsend 150). Women with greater resources have a tendency to improve their socioeconomic status for partners. The more determined, single-minded, expressive, and education woman is, the more she wants to be respected by her male partner. For instance, when asked what they want for a male partner, most of the women interviewed admitted they prefer a man who is dominant, someone they could respect and look up to. When asked why they need such protection from a male partner, they were uncertain and stated it was simply an irrational want. These women said they knew they would have enough resources, and they do not hope a man would safeguard them from any actual threat. However, they admitted that having a male partner they really respected would give