'Provider, Protecter, Leader' is outdated.

Many men here or in the adjacent subs state that a man's role can be summed up in 'provide, protect, lead'.

The conditions that made women need these things, and specifically in one man - a husband - are not nearly as striking in 2023 as they were 500 or even 100 years ago.

Providing in the past Women were deliberately held back from high-paying professions. They were banned from university and specific trades that would lead to financial and social mobility. They were paid less for the same work (one of the reasons 19th century factory workers said that they liked to hire women). Until 1870 (UK), a Woman's property/earnings/savings/inheritance passed into her husband's hands for him to control. Women weren't just financially dependent because they earned less; they were financially dependent because the fruits of their labour was owned by their husbands, tying wives to their husbands.

Protection in the past The police force as we know it now is fairly modern. Until a few hundred years ago, it wasn't centralised at all, and villages, towns and cities tended to have their own forms of law enforcement, each subject to themselves and often not in communication with one another. Things that make life safer today like CCTV, fingerprinting, wiretapping, etc didn't exist, and so the world was much more dangerous. As women are physically weaker, women in the past often felt more safe having some kind of man in the house (father, brother, husband, son) to offer safety. They would marry and hope that their husbands didn't end up being the danger.

Leading women in the pastTo go along with the 'protection' men gave women, they wanted authority, and so organised laws, culture and families to reflect that. It was 'backed up' in religious texts and put into marriage vows/laws. Under 'coverture' in the UK (type of system marriages operated under from the mid 1200s to the mid 1800s), sometimes a woman who committed a crime would be spared punishment, because it was assumed she was 'acting under the direction of her husband'. There were many bad sides to this as well. Husbands could control, oppress, rape and even hit their wives with a lot of impunity under the idea that it was their right, going along with the 'cover' they were giving their wives.

2023

Providing today Most women, wives and mothers work in the west. A minority are housewives. 45% of women in the US earn as much or more than their husbands. People may claim that women still want to marry a man who earns more, even if she earns a lot herself*, but the fact is that needing to marry for 'financial security' isn't the incentive it once was for women to marry.

Protection today In most ways, the world is a lot safer today than it once was, including for women. So when men speak about a husband 'protecting' his wife, most women reply 'protection from what? Protection from whom?'. The sad facts are that a woman is most likely to be raped, beaten and murdered by her husband or boyfriend. She is the most likely to have these things happen in their home. Women also chafe at it being used as equivalent to the men here's expectation for a Woman's 'nurture'. If they both work (the most likely case), the Woman's Nurture is daily and tangible (cooking, caring when sick, organising, cleaning, etc); the man's 'protection' is vague, hypothetical and requires little actual sacrifice on his part the large majority of the time.

Leading in 2023 Most women don't want to be lead. This is the short and long of it. Many here will disagree with this and say that it is secretely what women crave/respond to, but there are also many here who are speaking of going abroad/repealing women's progress to get women in a state of needing protection and provision again and, therefore, willing to tolerate leadership again. Norway is one of the countries with the most equality in the world between the sexes. It is also one of the safest countries. You will find few women wanting to be lead there. Most women never wanted it. They just had no other option but to go along with it, because of the limited options for women in the past.

Men want to be needed. Both sexes do, to a certain extent. But when things are equal, when there are choices and freedom for all, we can actually choose who we sincerely want based on our unique preferences, and stick with the people who treat as best. Surely this is better than making things so unbalanced that women have no option but to settle and stay?

Mutual respect, effort, love and appreciation is far healthier. No one is trapped. No one is suffering.

*One reason that some women may be wary of being the sole breadwinner/primary breadwinner, is because there is evidence to show that many men get insecure at this type of arrangement, and have been shown to not do enough housework to make up for the 'reversal' in roles. They also cheat more and are more violent. Their fear of being 'emasculated' leads to the women suffering. It's not mere snobbery; it's a desire not to suffer.