[SoTrue1920]

Originally posted by James
I know that men over the last few decades have gone through a lot of role confusion and upheaval as to how we are supposed to behave in relation to women.

I see your point here, but most of the "role reversal" of which you speak has not only been beneficial to women. In some ways, there are men who believe that the role shift from "emotionally distant sole-breadwinner" has opened them up to develop other interests, to take more of an active role in the raising of children, and to learn to relate to their partners better. How is this a bad thing?

You say you're speaking from anecdotes you've heard from other men - in their conversations, did they say exactly what "roles" had been reversed? What relationship dynamics had changed in their eyes, and why? What roles do they want to inhabit, and what roles do they want their partners to play?

Some skills we have never been noted for (communication ability) but suddenly seems to be demand, whereas other behaviors such as door openings, tradtional date set-ups etc have become different also.

Is it so tough to ask a woman what she likes/expects? I really don't know, because I'm not a man, but before my husband and I got married -- heck, even before we started seeing each other seriously -- we had a conversation, albeit a light-hearted one, about relationship expectations.

In fact the expectations seem to be different enough on both sides that there are some real problems. And the media complicates it. Certainly Cosmo is enough to make anyone neurotic.

I don't buy that, and I'm not sure about any of the other women in the forum, but I'm kind of insulted that you seem to think that most women get their relationship notions from Cosmo. Most women would tell you if they got right down to it that the only things they care about in a relationship are mutual respect, communication and honesty. Those things don't have a gender associated with them, they're part and parcel of treating someone humanely.

Communication isn't hard, James. It really, really isn't. It may take some time to work out the particulars, and learn to negotiate the waters safely, but anything worth having is worth working for. Buying a wife out of a catalog because you don't want to have to work on a relationship is an easy way out.