Is ERE more a thing for men?

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EREMMM
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Is ERE more a thing for men?

Post by EREMMM »

I was reading posts on this wonderful forum and my SO said something along the lines of "only men want to do that kind of stuff.. leave the normal life behind them and remove themselves from the mainstream community often to purue something alone.

I am not trying to convince my SO of pursuing ERE. I am more looking for resource that have looked into the psychology, wiring, environment, role models or something that drive men into the pursuit of... non-conventional lifestyles in the realms of money.

Or is it because men traditionally have been breadwinners making moeny, is it a patriarchal thing with men deciding more about money?

Or is it because women are more frequently targeted by marketing to increase consumption among women?

Is consumerism perceived/experienced differently among women and men?

ertyu
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Re: Is ERE more a thing for men?

Post by ertyu »

I have a radical suggestion for you, stop thinking about men and women and start thinking about people

EREMMM
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Re: Is ERE more a thing for men?

Post by EREMMM »

ertyu wrote:
Fri Jun 25, 2021 3:07 am
I have a radical suggestion for you, stop thinking about men and women and start thinking about people
I am not hung up on gender and gender roles. I do think people first. Nonetheless, I think the question is still interesting and would help me to understand the world better.

7Wannabe5
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Re: Is ERE more a thing for men?

Post by 7Wannabe5 »

Times they are a changing, but I think women have been more socialized to see the shit ton of work that does not get calculated into GDP. As in the old expression, “A man may work from sun to sun, but a woman’s work is never done.” So, for many women not engaging in paid work just leads to more life energy spent on unpaid social work.

Also, and this is quite possibly only reflective of my sour old lady perspective, what’s the point of freeing yourself from paid employment by other if “retirement” leaves you still stuck at home with a grouchy old retired guy who now has nothing better to do with himself than give you directions on how to better load the dishwasher?

Frita
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Re: Is ERE more a thing for men?

Post by Frita »

7Wannabe5 wrote:
Fri Jun 25, 2021 5:42 am
...what’s the point of freeing yourself from paid employment by other if “retirement” leaves you still stuck at home with a grouchy old retired guy who now has nothing better to do with himself than give you directions on how to better load the dishwasher?
Ha, this is so funny (and a little sad with a helping of disgust) because it’s true! It takes a lot of effort to train to hand wash dishes instead, reuse things that aren’t dirty, and actually **gasp** help. Mine says, “Leave the dishes. I will wash them.” but will let them pile up all day or more (while repeatedly telling me that he’ll take care of them). If I can do something in 5 minutes +/-, I just do it without any thought or verbal pronouncements. Is this why people get grey divorces?

Back to the OP’s question, I wonder if it is also partially explained by personality? Deferring to Jacob and Daylen on that one....

Dave
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Re: Is ERE more a thing for men?

Post by Dave »

7Wannabe5 wrote:
Fri Jun 25, 2021 5:42 am
... a grouchy old retired guy who now has nothing better to do with himself than give you directions on how to better load the dishwasher?
This got me, hahaha. When I am at my in-laws I will not load the dishwater because FIL never ceases to inform me (and everyone else) how we aren't doing it "right". Love the guy, but I just can't. So instead I do all the hand washing parts and help put things away, and everyone is happier.

white belt
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Re: Is ERE more a thing for men?

Post by white belt »

EREMMM wrote:
Fri Jun 25, 2021 2:42 am
I was reading posts on this wonderful forum and my SO said something along the lines of "only men want to do that kind of stuff.. leave the normal life behind them and remove themselves from the mainstream community often to purue something alone.
Well I’d challenge the assumption that ERE is about removing oneself from community and pursuing something alone. Maybe that’s a common FIRE trope but ERE is quite different. There’s an old thread somewhere called “What does ERE mean to you?” which may be useful to read.

One does indeed need to factor in personality type when looking at the appeal of such alternative lifestyles. This forum is way over represented for INTJ compared to the general population and I do believe INTJ skews male. The common INTJ trope is “I want to have financial freedom so I can drop out of the corporate world and pursue grand project/practice/goal X in peace!” However, to other personality types this will seem unappealing. They’d rather becoming a bigger participant in the community, or have freedom to take advantage of serendipitous opportunities, or have more time to raise children, and so on. Guardians would rather just continue their appointed role in society than do anything novel.

white belt
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Re: Is ERE more a thing for men?

Post by white belt »

7Wannabe5 wrote:
Fri Jun 25, 2021 5:42 am
Times they are a changing, but I think women have been more socialized to see the shit ton of work that does not get calculated into GDP. As in the old expression, “A man may work from sun to sun, but a woman’s work is never done.” So, for many women not engaging in paid work just leads to more life energy spent on unpaid social work.
I do think this is changing for a number of reasons. When I look at couples in my demographic, I see that they are mostly childless and both of them work full time. It would appear that millennial and younger generations are having children at way lower rates, which means there’s a good possibility there will be way less “house work” and that what work there is will be somewhat evenly distributed between partners because both are working full time (or it is outsourced to cleaning person, restaurant cook, etc).

Nevertheless, I do think what you are describing may be a universal grouchy old man phenomenon in combination with a leftover traditional gender role relic because I’ve seen it is the case that my mother does way more than 50% of the housework despite the fact that my father retired before she did.

Edit: I also think it’s the case that younger generations spend more time living alone or at least living with people other than romantic partners. This means they have more of an understanding of the “housework” required because they have to do it for themselves.
Last edited by white belt on Fri Jun 25, 2021 9:48 am, edited 1 time in total.

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unemployable
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Re: Is ERE more a thing for men?

Post by unemployable »

Well yeah, the primary way for women to "retire" is (still) to marry a man with money.

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Re: Is ERE more a thing for men?

Post by Sclass »

On an old thread I talked about retiring early and getting primary care giving responsibilities for an aging parent.

Somebody mentioned that they knew women who were reluctant to retire because it put the primary caregiver target on their back. I guess this could extend to caring for kids, a grumpy old husband who controls with purse strings.

During my time caring for my mom I realized the responsibility for this kind of work falls disproportionately on daughters and often youngest daughters or oldest granddaughters. I think this was my own data after watching a lot of elder care videos on YouTube and reading a bunch of “caring for mom” blogs.

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Re: Is ERE more a thing for men?

Post by IlliniDave »

Looking at broad demographic cohorts, the population of men is slightly biased towards interest in things versus interest in people, and the opposite for females. So a site like this might give the impression that it's more of a male-dominated endeavor because there's a lot of thing-y-ness to much of the discussion. But generally people adopt lifestyles in pairs.

Except for MGTOWs who don't have the energy to fight the good fight against being stereotyped a priori as curmudgeonly dishwasher loading cork-sniffers. We probably do make up our own incorporated area in the ER landscape, but it is relatively tiny and insignificant. Apparently the dishwasher loading cork-sniffers hold some sway over women though. Maybe a lesson for us MGTOWs in that.

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Re: Is ERE more a thing for men?

Post by jacob »

To answer the OP: No, ERE gender distribution is 50/50 within the level of uncertainty.

Knowing someones gender does not tell you much about whether they're interested in ERE or FIRE. Much better indicators are capacity for postconventional perspectives, typological temperament (INTJ, INTP, ISTJ), and scoring high on openness and conscientiousness on the Big5.

But are there culturally reinforced stereotypes that are used to excuse a limiting perspective or indirectly push or pull people into [mainstream] environments that encourage such limits? Of course there is. Crab mentality, etc. based on convenient conventional lenses which can certainly be gender-based. However, if the goal is to understand, I suggest starting with the other variables first. Framing the thread in terms of gender is likely to evolve into a regular train wreck due to the culture war environment we still find ourselves in, so I'm ending this thread now rather than later.

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