MENZ Issues: news and discussion about New Zealand men, fathers, family law, divorce, courts, protests, gender politics, and male health.

Stephen: A commentary from USA but very interesting food for thought when applied to the NZ scenario.

Why Men Avoid Commitment

by Marc H. Rudov

In the past few months, I’ve encountered several single women who registered this common complaint about the men they’ve been dating: I just can’t find a man who wants to commit. To compound this chorus of woe is the recent rash of books and articles about why men can’t commit, don’t commit, or won’t commit to women. One would think, by seeing these literary titles, that men are socially inept, irreparably ambivalent, and emotionally stunted cavemen.

There’s a simple explanation for drawing such a dour conclusion: The overbearing feminist movement in our country—supported by the liberal media, spineless legislators, and a Napoleonic judicial/law-enforcement system that presumes men guilty before proven innocent—has made it socially acceptable to bash males.
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Take a gander at the social pages of any newspaper, and you’ll see that plenty of men are getting engaged and married—to women. It is true, though, that some men avoid commitment—not the simplistic can’t or won’t or don’t that dejected women will decry. Why is that? Anticipated pain. It’s that simple. A man who avoids commitment foresees a lot of pain. Tony Robbins, widely regarded as the world’s number-one success coach, teaches us that, in general, people will do more to avoid pain than to seek pleasure. This is true about every aspect of life, and it is especially true about relationships. Consequently, although a man believes that a particular woman—or, based on his past experiences, women in general—will bring him pleasure, he believes the anticipated pain will exceed that pleasure. Such a man will want no part of commitment.

Frequently, a woman will presume that a man’s commitment avoidance is a general intimacy problem, rather than accept the painful truth: he doesn’t want to commit to HER. So, if a woman becomes involved with a man who won’t commit to her, it’s her fault. Why? It’s very easy to determine his desire to commit by asking him, at their first meeting, what kinds of relationships he’s had and what kind he wants now. More important: she should listen to his answer! Too often, he will tell her he just wants to date casually, but she will assume she can change him. Lunacy. Whether he doesn’t want to commit to her, or to anybody, is irrelevant: he doesn’t want to commit. So, if a woman fails to discern and accept his answer, BEFORE getting emotionally attached to him, shame on her.

Read the full article: Why Men Avoid Commitment at MensNewsDaily.