NRO on the cultural slow boat

No wonder they so enjoy their cruises:

Just had a conversation with a friend whose office assistant (in NY City) is female, 34 years old, smart, straight, and quite strikingly good-looking. I asked him why she isn’t married. He: “She says she can’t find a man. There are no men, she says.” Me: “In New York City? Come on.” He: “That’s what she says. ‘There are no men.’ My daughter’s the same. [His daughter is 35.] No men, there are no men to marry.”
– Derb

It’s plain from the email bag that the issue here is women (a) postponing partner-seeking till it’s too late (i.e. the man pool has been winnowed down to cranky bachelors, freaks, and bitter divorce survivors), and (b) having way too high expectations.
– Derb, many emails later

Having worked in Los Angeles for five years, then in the SF Bay area for another five years, yes, Ally McBeal clones are out there. They’re not the majority of single women, but they’re easily 40% — and climbing. These sorts of women don’t find any men because, well, they’re so self-obsessed that they don’t notice how men view them. At best, they’re seen as a quick flip in the sack, sans commitment of any kind. Why?

Well, men aren’t stupid, despite near-constant whinging to the contrary by women. Men look at some of these women and say “Let’s see: she expects me to earn more than she does, be her knight in shining armor, do the cooking, the cleaning, dress in bespoke suits and tuxes to go anywhere, listen to her constant, endless bellyaching about every little damn thing like one of her girlfriends and if I should marry her, when she gets into some midlife funk, she’s going to sue for divorce and take half of my life’s work and any kids we have.”

The male mind then turns the gears for a little while, netting this out on the bottom line of life: “Nope. No sale.”
– Lopez quoting a “somewhat representative” email

Of course, this notorious column kicked up a bit of a firestorm three years ago. Interestingly enough, neither of the two women who inspired it are married yet or even have any marriage prospects on the horizon despite being much more attractive than the norm. They both have excellent jobs, though.

What women would do well to understand is that they hit the height of their marriageability at around 24-25. This doesn’t mean that a woman shouldn’t be able to put marriage off until later if she so desires, but she is foolish to do so under the misapprehension that she will make a more desirable wife later because she has accomplished whatever it is that she wanted to accomplish first.