okay, now I'm feeling stupid.

[lyssie]

But need to be enlightened.

Someone please explain to me why all m/f relationships are 'unequal'. I really,really don't get this statement.

Is it that the men always think the woman is a fragile flower?

Or is it that only one is on top all of the time, or what?

Because, I don't get it at all.

(and furthermore, don't get why f/f or m/m are 'equal' if m/f isn't.)

Comments

[rosewildeirish.livejournal.com]

IMO, all well-balanced relationships are unequal. And that's for any pairing, or multiple numbers, same sex or opposite. A friend once said men and women weren't made to be equal, they were made to be complementary. (As in forming a complement [something that completes or makes perfect], complete.) If you bring equal amounts of things into a relationship, I think that relationship is doomed to either fail, stagnate, or be unerringly boring.

But that's my opinion.

[stexgirl2000.livejournal.com]

Well said! I agree.

:ponders for a moment:

It's the concept of how the characters complement each other (and cope with the trials and tribulations of being in a relationship) that ultimately draws me to a story--het or slash.

[redstarrobot.livejournal.com]

Equal and complementary aren't necessarily mutually exclusive.

And, in terms of gender or social roles, the idea of "complementary" is disturbing to me. "Slave and master" are complementary roles, but far from equal ones.

If your friend meant personalities and not roles, saying complementary personalities need to make up a relationship is probably true enough, but I don't see what it has to do with social roles. The two don't seem highly connected to me.

[rosewildeirish.livejournal.com]

Personalities, etc. Having two nurturers can work in a relationship, but sometimes it's better to have one who likes to nurture and one that likes to be nurtured, for example. And if it's the reverse, two people who keep expecting the other to pick up the slack...that's a recipe for stress and disaster, right there.

"Slave and master" is inherently ripe for abuse and disaster. It's rare you find a couple, het OR gay, that manages to make that kind of relationship work long-term. It's a question of balance, and those roles rarely balance.

[redstarrobot.livejournal.com]

I didn't mean consensual slave/master - non-consensual slave/master is "complementary" in terms of social roles as much as anything else is. That's my issue with using that adjective in a discussion of roles. Roles should be equal (or consensually negotiated not to be, which has at its base an assumption that they are equal at the start for that to be given).