I feel like there's a subtle, unspoken thing among a lot of "trad" types where they don't actually want to meet *each other*, per se. It's a proselytical movement, there's a tinge of not "I want this" but "this is how it should be" that they can only really satisfy by meeting a normie and converting that person. It's not what they say out loud, but that's how a lot of their rhetoric reads to me.
I do think that's a big portion of the difference they note between the actual, IRL trads who simply live a life with a more "traditional" family model and a bunch of kids, and the aesthetic trads who post pictures of twelve-fingered white children praying with their blonde Socialist Realist father.
It's the right wing equivalent of the Discord anarchist who explains that "late capitalism" is why they got fired from Starbucks, not for showing up late and high to their shift again.
I might be wrong because I haven't actively followed the "trad movement" the last few years, but it really seems like a handful of influencers kicked it off. I wonder if young people interested in the movement subconsciously feel the need to proselytize it because that's how it was presented to them.
In another lifetime, I had some experience with this dating market and I’d say there are a number of challenges for religious trads (I can’t speak to non-religious trads). 1. Subcultures are just weird. If you’re super religious in a secular environment, you’re pretty much dating in a subculture. It’s not just a microcosm of the larger population but its own thing. 2. Small dating markets with small town problems – People know of each other in these circles which creates a fishbowl problem that I think is particularly trying for men. You can’t really ask someone out and go on a few dates without everyone knowing. And then what if it doesn’t work out and then all the women you know are mad because you dumped Caitlin? I think men would rather date outside of these circles, but that’s tough for the women in these circles who are hoping to meet men there, because where else would they meet them? 3. The male/female ratio can skew too much either way depending on church, location, etc. In my observation, churches in major metropolitan areas skew female, though Traditional Latin Mass goers are a subset that tends to skew male. 4. Strict gender roles that reflect how the religion sees itself, but doesn’t reflect the population they actually have. Men are supposed to initiate and lead, women are supposed to be receptive and responsive. This only works if the men are highly confident about approaching women, otherwise the women have nothing to respond to. I think a lot of missed opportunities happen here because religious circles tend to draw men who are more on the introverted side. Why would “Chads” go to church and try to date women who won’t have sex with them? It would make sense for religious women to initiate more, but they won’t because religious culture makes them think the earth will stop spinning if they do. 5. Christians have no culture of matchmaking like Jews or Hindus, but still face enormous pressure (both internal and external) to date within their religion and often within the specific denomination. 6. Even religious people find other religious people off-putting. There’s a big difference between believers who want to marry and have a family but are otherwise normal people vs. fundamentalist types who have made their religious identity their entire personality. I suspect that once you get into circles of self-identifying trads, you’re dealing more with the latter. These types turn off the very people most likely to share their values.
On mobile so I can't respond in depth but for now, (6) really hits me, but in reverse. I'm religious and subscribe to the Nicene Creed, praying, church every week, blah blah blah, but I'm probably too secular for other religious people. Essentially, "too liberal for the conservatives and too conservative for the liberals."
I think there's hope here, especially with previously-but-not-currently religious types. Lots of people identify as "spiritual but not religious" and would even engage in religious rituals with you, even if they aren't full believers.
And there's the rub! "previously-but-not-currently religious types." I get on better with non-religious people but you have the verse on not being "unequally yoked," they'd have to be fine with any kids (which I want) to be raised Christian (that's a hard requirement), all these little things that on paper it's easy to say "sure, I'm fine with that" but what we say we're fine with and what we _are_ fine with are often completely different.
I'm putting myself out there and doing things to meet people so God willing I'll meet someone! If not, well, at least I can tell younger people what not to do. Maybe they can avoid the mistakes I've made (which are many 🤪).
Oh my God, you have nailed this subculture perfectly. This is what I've perceived as well, but you have described it so perfectly and succinctly. You should literally write a book about this. Bravo!
I think a common misconception that comes from weird internet people is that trads are the same as red pillers, wanting a beautiful mid 19 year old wife to homestead with but not getting it because the jews made all the 19 year olds into tiktok addicted hoes. But these are separate groups albeit with an overlap. I've known personally many "trad" singles and they were usually just socially awkward
I also think most people who *are* like this are initially motivated by more comprehensible feelings and are just really far down the pipeline of a warped ideological “solution” to those feelings
Yes, most actual religious trads are totally disgusted by Andrew Tate-style redpill garbage.
Christianity (and also Judaism and Islam) teaches that sex before marriage is sin. So being a religious pickup artist is just a nonstarter.
I think the misconception probably comes from the fact that religious conservatives don't call out this kind of thing very often. But that is because they don't consider Andrew Tate to be a part of their side. Same reason they don't call out white supremacists - "Oh that's not us, why would you think that's us?"
Liberals have this tendency to combine religious conservative + pickup artist conservative into the same group, probably because they are thinking "Well, they both hate women". But religious conservatives totally don't see it that way. They see this as "more liberal slander."
The problem is that for people on the outside, religious conservatives seem adjacent to redpillers/incels or whatnot. Take Jordan Peterson for example, he has fans in the incel community, but then also has his fans in the religion community. Any wonder why liberals seem to think this isn't a coincidence?
A note on big age gaps in the past: they were more common among upper classes, as men could only afford to give their wife a lifestyle similar to what she had with her parents once he inherited, so he had to wait until his father died or was no longer able to manage his assets. Men of other social classes would earn their own money through labor and lived with their extended family so they didn't mind marrying young
I think “internal/external locus of blame” does not necessarily map onto “internal/external locus of control.”
The self-loathing incel is incredibly likely to say things like, “I’m unattractive and awkward,” by which they mean “i am inherently unlovable because I have emotions and a jaw that’s shaped ‘wrong’.” I honestly think this is both inward or outward facing - this self-loathing is often what’s fueling loathing of others, whose perceived perceptions reinforce one’s sense of inherent failure
I tend to read “internal locus of control” as meaning “taking responsibility for change,” which is not the same thing as “who you blame.” This is clear with women dating men; a lot of women who are insecure and passive will blame themselves for dating failures, whereas women who are more confident and successful will often blame the dudes they’re dealing with. The former can’t change who they are. The latter can pick up and date someone else.
ALSO, the marriage assortment thing was really interesting, and meshes well with the “fertility is about standards” argument. It’s hard for me to comprehend why one would *want* the “mad men” marriage
My theory, which is consistent with this survey data, is that "trad" is a label adopted mostly by extremely online, neurodivergent people who were not raised in a traditionalist household. It's basically a bunch of nerds cosplaying traditionalism online. Dating is already tougher for nerds, all else equal, and in addition their trad identity will probably not be super appealing either to mainstream people or actually traditionalist people (the latter will see them as cosmopolitan nerds cosplaying traditionalism). So basically they're dating on hard mode by fishing in a very small pool.
Also, a lot of the trad stuff is LARPing. I have a friend who considers himself trad because he has 3 kids, a garden and smokes meat a lot. I have another friend who is a moderate liberal who reads the NY Times, but also has 3 kids and hunts deer regularly - and doesn't consider himself trad.
Trad is just a phony label like "hippie-mom" or "health nut."
Yes, I think a big part of it is men who make upper middle class salaries and who feel like dating would've been easier for them 100 years ago (notwithstanding that there were not software engineers back then, soooo...)
What was the methodology of the survey? Just opt-in online? How many men compared to women were there?
My "sense" is that #trad is basically a male dominated fantasy for a cohort of incel-adjacent online guys, and this survey seems to support that. I also think male and female definitions of what "trad" means could vary significantly.
I'm sorry, but any subculture in which nearly half of the men say they want 5 or more kids operates in the land of jelly beans and unicorns and not planet Earth.
I know many men who want 5+ kids, my husband included. Wanting is different than expecting or demanding. Most of these guys who get married end up having 3-4 and are content even if they’d prefer to have more.
I think one of the issues with surveying trad people is that people can’t settle on a clear definition for the term. For one person, it’s modest young churchgoers/temple-goers/mosque-goers who want three kids, a golden retriever, and a white picket fence. For another person, it’s homesteading but ~aesthetic~. For another person, it’s alt-right edgelords with roman statue avatars. That’s a pretty broad umbrella.
Right, I mean at least a third of the country is "traditional" as in "lives in a traditional, religious patriarchal marriage setup." But those folks/communities have been around forever. To me the whole "trad" thing is moreso a reactionary online trend led by dudes largely not having sex. And several opportunistic female influencers saw that audience and make cleavage-bearing fantasy baking clips for their consumption.
You'd be surprised! Those are the circles I operate in IRL. One of my friends has 9. You have to really be committed to the sacrifice, and ideally be in a child-conducive environment, but some people with those values really do make it happen.
Ig my take on trad men is prejudicial but I basically discounted that statement bc men in general don’t have a super great understanding of childbirth on avg and guys looking for ai milkmaids probably have a more distorted take.
Reading other comments it strikes me again that the Internet has a weird way of flattening discourse such that I expect men who describe themselves as trad to also be the men I personally know who describe themselves that way
You should get out of your bubble. I know a half dozen families with four plus children. They are traditional religious folks from varying background and beliefs, but they all make it work.
I see a lot of the Substack traditionalists are jumping on my statement, as if no larger families exist. Yes, I know. But they are the definite minority.
In addition, the curtain unveiling of the whole "trad" thing is that large swaths of the country have plenty of conservative, religious women who would accept a more traditional, SAH family set-up. But are these guys moving to those places and getting a wife? No, they're bitching about feminism and Sydney Sweeney online. Because they want the fantasy, not the reality.
I suspect that when you ask people to describe their perfect partner, they’ll shoot for the moon. And why not?
If a self proclaimed trad guy meets a college grad who will have two kids (not 5) and stay home for the Pre K years, but work after, and who only goes to Mass on Christmas… my sense is that he’ll think, “Eh, close enough.”
My wife and I are libs who prefer things to be as egalitarian as possible. But with kids, it turns out she has more patience than I do with younger kids, and since I’m the breadwinner, we compromised on the perfectly egalitarian lib thing a kittle bit. Trads will do the same, IMO.
I think it depends what "trad" means to these people. If it means something like "I'd prefer a male breadwinner/female caregiver division that ideally involves the woman staying home with the kids," then sure, but I frankly don't associate that belief with "trad" in any way. I've had discussions with atheist lefty former partners that aligned with "trad" values if they are defined as the above, and none of us would ever claim to be "trad."
I frankly think that most people who identify with "trad" basically mean some form of a right wing patriarchy that is basically just kink, as CHH's article from a little while ago discussed.
The purity culture comments are quite interesting to me, and I would be really fascinated to learn how attitudes towards women's sexual purity compare with those associated with Christian purity culture movement of the 1990's-2000's during its heyday.
These attitudes are also interesting because it seems like a lot of capital-C Conservative thought has moved from "being horny is terrible, premarital sex is turning you into chewed bubblegum" to "why aren't the youth horny enough??" It seems like a majority of respondents took Purity Culture seriously (even if they are largely too young to have experienced it firsthand as a vital cultural *thing*) whereas pundits/commentators on the right have decided that college students not banging is a sign of the Apocalypse. H/t to Jane Coaston for bringing this point up again and again.
“Traditionally, step parents were a big part of family life, mostly because it was common for a parent to die young (childbirth, war, etc.)”
Commonplace scenario in the Victorian era:
Man marries wife, has children. Wife dies while at least some of the children are young. Being too old now to attract a woman in her twenties, man marries “spinster” in her thirties or maybe early forties. Man is glad he has a mother-figure for his children; second wife is glad to be saved from spinsterhood. Man and second wife possibly have a couple kids together, but often not.
As someone who might count as trad (depending on the definition), I've noticed what you pointed out about churches skewing male vs female. I heard that men just started outnumbering women women in church after decades of it being the reverse. In my experience (idk if the data bears this out), men are largely concentrated in specific denominations -- confessional and/or high church, liturgical (eg Eastern Orthodoxy) ones-- whereas there are still a lot of women in more low-church Evangelical denominations. My last church was *very* male dominated (confessional reformed Baptist) -- but that could have also been because it was in Silicon Valley lol. It's funny because people in both types of denominations complain about not being able to find people of the opposite gender, but at the same time, the types of people who choose male vs female dominated denominations seem fairly different temperamentally so they might not be a good fit for each other.
My experience with Catholic churches (which was admittedly 15 years ago) was that even if there are people your age there often wasn't really great opportunities to talk to them. Sometimes there would be an awkward coffee time after mass that was mostly old people or like the super keen parish council types. And the groups that met up regularly outside of church tended to be rosary groups or Bible studies that were again lots of old people. And also there's going-to-church-every-Sunday trad and then there's church every Sunday AND doing the Bible studies/rosary circle extracurriculars on top of that level of keener. My own experience was that there weren't great ways for the young people who go to church but are otherwise more normal to find each other. Especially because, as CHH pointed out, church people often tend to be more shy and reserved
Fair! Going to church doesn't guarantee you'll actually build strong relationships with fellow parishioners. I don't have as much experience with Catholic parishes but from what I gather it seems Protestant ones place greater emphasis on creating a community beyond just showing up for liturgy and stuff, so that might be more conducive to finding a spouse (but Protestant churches are a very very mixed bag so I probably shouldn't generalize.)
>the types of people who choose male vs female dominated denominations seem fairly different temperamentally so they might not be a good fit for each other.
I'm curious - do you think these differences map onto traditional gender roles? (I've gotten the sense from the outside looking in that it does - and it seems ironic to me that that would be an issue here).
Not sure if this answers your question, but it seems like the more female dominated denominations are generally more focused on the experiential aspect of spirituality (relationship with God, etc.) Whereas the more male-dominated ones are heavier on theology and rules/structure. I wouldn't say any denomination is purely one or the other (many blend the two pretty evenly, and any perceptions to the contrary might be more due to marketing than anything else), but different denominations seem to attract people who approach Christianity differently. I wouldn't even say that the two are incompatible, just that members of each group might write the other off as either too rigid/legalistic or too woo-woo/unserious and limit their dating options by only looking within their own groups.
I think I was picking up on this distinction but forcing it into a gendered lens - basically, women being interested in spirituality vs men being interested in Rules - and thinking it jibed with trad values I know of which tend to codify this in the expected personalities of women and men - nurturing, empathetic, emotional vs. pragmatic, striving, just. As a foreigner to trad land, it seemed interesting that those personalities would bounce off each other there just as much as they do in my neck of the woods.
Ofc thinking about it more, probably back in ye olde days these personality distinctions led to a lot less lifestyle and and belief system difference, since there wasn't so much choice in where to live and worship.
Oh yeah, maybe! I do think the female dominated denominations are less likely to be trad compared to the male dominated ones. More likely to have female pastors, egalitarian values on gender, etc. But again, I'd love to see actual data on this; that would be interesting.
Also, something to take into account is the internet skews introverted. *Especially* the kind of trads who would be responding to such a survey anonymously, and not on, say, Facebook. That’s the other thing. I noticed that introverts are drawn to anonymous social media.
> When you and I were in school, people slotted into fairly large categories like the nerds, the jocks, the popular kids, the goths, the skate punks, etc.
My experience was that When We Were In School, the "types" combined made up maybe 40% of the school, and the rest were normies. There were tons of kids (like me) who didn't douse themselves in any particular culture, and no one would have applied any of those labels to.
It seems that now there is both 1) lots of pressure to find some kind of category-based identity -- find *some* kind of weird clothes or hobby or other public performance to mold yourself into -- and 2) as you mention, lots of new labels for things that would have been slotted as normie back in the day, or just didn't factor into people's judgment about whether you were a normie or a "type". And those labels have been promoted to whole-ass identity categories even if the label represents something tiny like what house architecture you have a slight preference for.
Watching the weird relaunch process of the Unplugged dating app for self-described trads was interesting. The founder is I think Catholic or Eastern Orthodoxy, and the evangelical women who promoted the app pre-launch were dragged a bit in the comments for this mismatch in faiths.
The online trad women appear to be searching for a guy that will lead them theologically…but they already have strong theological beliefs themselves. Not just in denomination, but in the gritty details. It must be hard to find a guy that ticks all the boxes.
My perception (which may entirely incorrect), is that this hyperfocus on wanting to find someone who is theologically compatible on really specific elements of Christian doctrine is almost entirely on the female side of this particular equation, and that Christian men are more likely to be persuaded to whichever of Christian beliefs gets them a wife (which is, somewhat ironically, the opposite of how this is 'traditionally' supposed to work).
Hmmm, given men are flocking to the more right wing segment of the RCC and Calvinist sects (which are not babe bastions by any means) I'm not sure that's correct. What those sects do provide is an orderly explanation of the world and at least on the surface, a disciplined formula for how to live a "good" life, which these men clearly crave. It's why the Jordan Peterson-tradcath pipeline is long.
It's very easy for me to slip into seeing this all as a sort of funky roleplay issue... women who loudly protest that no one is leading them are being pretty domineering, and the men who swear they'd like to do that would really not be equipped to. Like, it just feels very normal contemporary dating issues, but with a sectarian identity which forces you to pretend you actually want a different dynamic
Yeah, I'm sure this is absolutely true! Like Allison said, the men are expecting to be the leaders theologically so it likely matters less to them if there's a bit of a mismatch. Their "job" is to guide their wives spiritually anyways. For the women, it's more of a "managing up" situation.
It could also just be that men care less about them ever matching perfectly theologically, but I imagine it's hard to disentangle from the above.
What was the general age cohort of the survey respondents? I wonder if the number of kids answer reflects a sort of culture war signaling around fertility rate doomerism, as opposed to a genuine desire for such a large family.
My experience talking with people that come from large families (my wife included), is that most of them would never want to inflict that on their children. Quiverfull types aside - something about such a large proportion of people saying 5+ just seems performative.
I feel like there's a subtle, unspoken thing among a lot of "trad" types where they don't actually want to meet *each other*, per se. It's a proselytical movement, there's a tinge of not "I want this" but "this is how it should be" that they can only really satisfy by meeting a normie and converting that person. It's not what they say out loud, but that's how a lot of their rhetoric reads to me.
This makes sense. The Twitter Trads seem to be very obsessed with what the Blue Haired Feminists are doing
I do think that's a big portion of the difference they note between the actual, IRL trads who simply live a life with a more "traditional" family model and a bunch of kids, and the aesthetic trads who post pictures of twelve-fingered white children praying with their blonde Socialist Realist father.
It's the right wing equivalent of the Discord anarchist who explains that "late capitalism" is why they got fired from Starbucks, not for showing up late and high to their shift again.
I might be wrong because I haven't actively followed the "trad movement" the last few years, but it really seems like a handful of influencers kicked it off. I wonder if young people interested in the movement subconsciously feel the need to proselytize it because that's how it was presented to them.
Yes. The power trip associated with conquest is part of it. Certainly for the men.
In another lifetime, I had some experience with this dating market and I’d say there are a number of challenges for religious trads (I can’t speak to non-religious trads). 1. Subcultures are just weird. If you’re super religious in a secular environment, you’re pretty much dating in a subculture. It’s not just a microcosm of the larger population but its own thing. 2. Small dating markets with small town problems – People know of each other in these circles which creates a fishbowl problem that I think is particularly trying for men. You can’t really ask someone out and go on a few dates without everyone knowing. And then what if it doesn’t work out and then all the women you know are mad because you dumped Caitlin? I think men would rather date outside of these circles, but that’s tough for the women in these circles who are hoping to meet men there, because where else would they meet them? 3. The male/female ratio can skew too much either way depending on church, location, etc. In my observation, churches in major metropolitan areas skew female, though Traditional Latin Mass goers are a subset that tends to skew male. 4. Strict gender roles that reflect how the religion sees itself, but doesn’t reflect the population they actually have. Men are supposed to initiate and lead, women are supposed to be receptive and responsive. This only works if the men are highly confident about approaching women, otherwise the women have nothing to respond to. I think a lot of missed opportunities happen here because religious circles tend to draw men who are more on the introverted side. Why would “Chads” go to church and try to date women who won’t have sex with them? It would make sense for religious women to initiate more, but they won’t because religious culture makes them think the earth will stop spinning if they do. 5. Christians have no culture of matchmaking like Jews or Hindus, but still face enormous pressure (both internal and external) to date within their religion and often within the specific denomination. 6. Even religious people find other religious people off-putting. There’s a big difference between believers who want to marry and have a family but are otherwise normal people vs. fundamentalist types who have made their religious identity their entire personality. I suspect that once you get into circles of self-identifying trads, you’re dealing more with the latter. These types turn off the very people most likely to share their values.
These are excellent insights.
On mobile so I can't respond in depth but for now, (6) really hits me, but in reverse. I'm religious and subscribe to the Nicene Creed, praying, church every week, blah blah blah, but I'm probably too secular for other religious people. Essentially, "too liberal for the conservatives and too conservative for the liberals."
I think there's hope here, especially with previously-but-not-currently religious types. Lots of people identify as "spiritual but not religious" and would even engage in religious rituals with you, even if they aren't full believers.
And there's the rub! "previously-but-not-currently religious types." I get on better with non-religious people but you have the verse on not being "unequally yoked," they'd have to be fine with any kids (which I want) to be raised Christian (that's a hard requirement), all these little things that on paper it's easy to say "sure, I'm fine with that" but what we say we're fine with and what we _are_ fine with are often completely different.
I'm putting myself out there and doing things to meet people so God willing I'll meet someone! If not, well, at least I can tell younger people what not to do. Maybe they can avoid the mistakes I've made (which are many 🤪).
Bro 😭😭😭 you’ll find happiness I swear
God willing!
I feel this big time
Oh my God, you have nailed this subculture perfectly. This is what I've perceived as well, but you have described it so perfectly and succinctly. You should literally write a book about this. Bravo!
I think a common misconception that comes from weird internet people is that trads are the same as red pillers, wanting a beautiful mid 19 year old wife to homestead with but not getting it because the jews made all the 19 year olds into tiktok addicted hoes. But these are separate groups albeit with an overlap. I've known personally many "trad" singles and they were usually just socially awkward
I also think most people who *are* like this are initially motivated by more comprehensible feelings and are just really far down the pipeline of a warped ideological “solution” to those feelings
Yes, most actual religious trads are totally disgusted by Andrew Tate-style redpill garbage.
Christianity (and also Judaism and Islam) teaches that sex before marriage is sin. So being a religious pickup artist is just a nonstarter.
I think the misconception probably comes from the fact that religious conservatives don't call out this kind of thing very often. But that is because they don't consider Andrew Tate to be a part of their side. Same reason they don't call out white supremacists - "Oh that's not us, why would you think that's us?"
Liberals have this tendency to combine religious conservative + pickup artist conservative into the same group, probably because they are thinking "Well, they both hate women". But religious conservatives totally don't see it that way. They see this as "more liberal slander."
The problem is that for people on the outside, religious conservatives seem adjacent to redpillers/incels or whatnot. Take Jordan Peterson for example, he has fans in the incel community, but then also has his fans in the religion community. Any wonder why liberals seem to think this isn't a coincidence?
But religious conservatives don't get it.
A note on big age gaps in the past: they were more common among upper classes, as men could only afford to give their wife a lifestyle similar to what she had with her parents once he inherited, so he had to wait until his father died or was no longer able to manage his assets. Men of other social classes would earn their own money through labor and lived with their extended family so they didn't mind marrying young
I think “internal/external locus of blame” does not necessarily map onto “internal/external locus of control.”
The self-loathing incel is incredibly likely to say things like, “I’m unattractive and awkward,” by which they mean “i am inherently unlovable because I have emotions and a jaw that’s shaped ‘wrong’.” I honestly think this is both inward or outward facing - this self-loathing is often what’s fueling loathing of others, whose perceived perceptions reinforce one’s sense of inherent failure
I tend to read “internal locus of control” as meaning “taking responsibility for change,” which is not the same thing as “who you blame.” This is clear with women dating men; a lot of women who are insecure and passive will blame themselves for dating failures, whereas women who are more confident and successful will often blame the dudes they’re dealing with. The former can’t change who they are. The latter can pick up and date someone else.
Yeah pinning your lack of success on personal traits that you view as immutable does extrernalize the locus of control.
ALSO, the marriage assortment thing was really interesting, and meshes well with the “fertility is about standards” argument. It’s hard for me to comprehend why one would *want* the “mad men” marriage
My theory, which is consistent with this survey data, is that "trad" is a label adopted mostly by extremely online, neurodivergent people who were not raised in a traditionalist household. It's basically a bunch of nerds cosplaying traditionalism online. Dating is already tougher for nerds, all else equal, and in addition their trad identity will probably not be super appealing either to mainstream people or actually traditionalist people (the latter will see them as cosmopolitan nerds cosplaying traditionalism). So basically they're dating on hard mode by fishing in a very small pool.
Also, a lot of the trad stuff is LARPing. I have a friend who considers himself trad because he has 3 kids, a garden and smokes meat a lot. I have another friend who is a moderate liberal who reads the NY Times, but also has 3 kids and hunts deer regularly - and doesn't consider himself trad.
Trad is just a phony label like "hippie-mom" or "health nut."
It doesn't mean anything. It's all posturing.
Aw man now I’m just sad
Yes, I think a big part of it is men who make upper middle class salaries and who feel like dating would've been easier for them 100 years ago (notwithstanding that there were not software engineers back then, soooo...)
What was the methodology of the survey? Just opt-in online? How many men compared to women were there?
My "sense" is that #trad is basically a male dominated fantasy for a cohort of incel-adjacent online guys, and this survey seems to support that. I also think male and female definitions of what "trad" means could vary significantly.
I'm sorry, but any subculture in which nearly half of the men say they want 5 or more kids operates in the land of jelly beans and unicorns and not planet Earth.
I know many men who want 5+ kids, my husband included. Wanting is different than expecting or demanding. Most of these guys who get married end up having 3-4 and are content even if they’d prefer to have more.
I think one of the issues with surveying trad people is that people can’t settle on a clear definition for the term. For one person, it’s modest young churchgoers/temple-goers/mosque-goers who want three kids, a golden retriever, and a white picket fence. For another person, it’s homesteading but ~aesthetic~. For another person, it’s alt-right edgelords with roman statue avatars. That’s a pretty broad umbrella.
Right, I mean at least a third of the country is "traditional" as in "lives in a traditional, religious patriarchal marriage setup." But those folks/communities have been around forever. To me the whole "trad" thing is moreso a reactionary online trend led by dudes largely not having sex. And several opportunistic female influencers saw that audience and make cleavage-bearing fantasy baking clips for their consumption.
You'd be surprised! Those are the circles I operate in IRL. One of my friends has 9. You have to really be committed to the sacrifice, and ideally be in a child-conducive environment, but some people with those values really do make it happen.
Ig my take on trad men is prejudicial but I basically discounted that statement bc men in general don’t have a super great understanding of childbirth on avg and guys looking for ai milkmaids probably have a more distorted take.
Reading other comments it strikes me again that the Internet has a weird way of flattening discourse such that I expect men who describe themselves as trad to also be the men I personally know who describe themselves that way
External locus of control - so the internet made you prejudiced?
You should get out of your bubble. I know a half dozen families with four plus children. They are traditional religious folks from varying background and beliefs, but they all make it work.
I see a lot of the Substack traditionalists are jumping on my statement, as if no larger families exist. Yes, I know. But they are the definite minority.
In addition, the curtain unveiling of the whole "trad" thing is that large swaths of the country have plenty of conservative, religious women who would accept a more traditional, SAH family set-up. But are these guys moving to those places and getting a wife? No, they're bitching about feminism and Sydney Sweeney online. Because they want the fantasy, not the reality.
I suspect that when you ask people to describe their perfect partner, they’ll shoot for the moon. And why not?
If a self proclaimed trad guy meets a college grad who will have two kids (not 5) and stay home for the Pre K years, but work after, and who only goes to Mass on Christmas… my sense is that he’ll think, “Eh, close enough.”
My wife and I are libs who prefer things to be as egalitarian as possible. But with kids, it turns out she has more patience than I do with younger kids, and since I’m the breadwinner, we compromised on the perfectly egalitarian lib thing a kittle bit. Trads will do the same, IMO.
I think it depends what "trad" means to these people. If it means something like "I'd prefer a male breadwinner/female caregiver division that ideally involves the woman staying home with the kids," then sure, but I frankly don't associate that belief with "trad" in any way. I've had discussions with atheist lefty former partners that aligned with "trad" values if they are defined as the above, and none of us would ever claim to be "trad."
I frankly think that most people who identify with "trad" basically mean some form of a right wing patriarchy that is basically just kink, as CHH's article from a little while ago discussed.
Yeah I do think in general survey answers like this can be taken seriously but not literally for this reason
The purity culture comments are quite interesting to me, and I would be really fascinated to learn how attitudes towards women's sexual purity compare with those associated with Christian purity culture movement of the 1990's-2000's during its heyday.
These attitudes are also interesting because it seems like a lot of capital-C Conservative thought has moved from "being horny is terrible, premarital sex is turning you into chewed bubblegum" to "why aren't the youth horny enough??" It seems like a majority of respondents took Purity Culture seriously (even if they are largely too young to have experienced it firsthand as a vital cultural *thing*) whereas pundits/commentators on the right have decided that college students not banging is a sign of the Apocalypse. H/t to Jane Coaston for bringing this point up again and again.
“Traditionally, step parents were a big part of family life, mostly because it was common for a parent to die young (childbirth, war, etc.)”
Commonplace scenario in the Victorian era:
Man marries wife, has children. Wife dies while at least some of the children are young. Being too old now to attract a woman in her twenties, man marries “spinster” in her thirties or maybe early forties. Man is glad he has a mother-figure for his children; second wife is glad to be saved from spinsterhood. Man and second wife possibly have a couple kids together, but often not.
Sound of Music vibes
As someone who might count as trad (depending on the definition), I've noticed what you pointed out about churches skewing male vs female. I heard that men just started outnumbering women women in church after decades of it being the reverse. In my experience (idk if the data bears this out), men are largely concentrated in specific denominations -- confessional and/or high church, liturgical (eg Eastern Orthodoxy) ones-- whereas there are still a lot of women in more low-church Evangelical denominations. My last church was *very* male dominated (confessional reformed Baptist) -- but that could have also been because it was in Silicon Valley lol. It's funny because people in both types of denominations complain about not being able to find people of the opposite gender, but at the same time, the types of people who choose male vs female dominated denominations seem fairly different temperamentally so they might not be a good fit for each other.
My experience with Catholic churches (which was admittedly 15 years ago) was that even if there are people your age there often wasn't really great opportunities to talk to them. Sometimes there would be an awkward coffee time after mass that was mostly old people or like the super keen parish council types. And the groups that met up regularly outside of church tended to be rosary groups or Bible studies that were again lots of old people. And also there's going-to-church-every-Sunday trad and then there's church every Sunday AND doing the Bible studies/rosary circle extracurriculars on top of that level of keener. My own experience was that there weren't great ways for the young people who go to church but are otherwise more normal to find each other. Especially because, as CHH pointed out, church people often tend to be more shy and reserved
Fair! Going to church doesn't guarantee you'll actually build strong relationships with fellow parishioners. I don't have as much experience with Catholic parishes but from what I gather it seems Protestant ones place greater emphasis on creating a community beyond just showing up for liturgy and stuff, so that might be more conducive to finding a spouse (but Protestant churches are a very very mixed bag so I probably shouldn't generalize.)
>the types of people who choose male vs female dominated denominations seem fairly different temperamentally so they might not be a good fit for each other.
I'm curious - do you think these differences map onto traditional gender roles? (I've gotten the sense from the outside looking in that it does - and it seems ironic to me that that would be an issue here).
Not sure if this answers your question, but it seems like the more female dominated denominations are generally more focused on the experiential aspect of spirituality (relationship with God, etc.) Whereas the more male-dominated ones are heavier on theology and rules/structure. I wouldn't say any denomination is purely one or the other (many blend the two pretty evenly, and any perceptions to the contrary might be more due to marketing than anything else), but different denominations seem to attract people who approach Christianity differently. I wouldn't even say that the two are incompatible, just that members of each group might write the other off as either too rigid/legalistic or too woo-woo/unserious and limit their dating options by only looking within their own groups.
I think I was picking up on this distinction but forcing it into a gendered lens - basically, women being interested in spirituality vs men being interested in Rules - and thinking it jibed with trad values I know of which tend to codify this in the expected personalities of women and men - nurturing, empathetic, emotional vs. pragmatic, striving, just. As a foreigner to trad land, it seemed interesting that those personalities would bounce off each other there just as much as they do in my neck of the woods.
Ofc thinking about it more, probably back in ye olde days these personality distinctions led to a lot less lifestyle and and belief system difference, since there wasn't so much choice in where to live and worship.
Oh yeah, maybe! I do think the female dominated denominations are less likely to be trad compared to the male dominated ones. More likely to have female pastors, egalitarian values on gender, etc. But again, I'd love to see actual data on this; that would be interesting.
Oh for sure, I come from a liberal Christian tradition and I totally get why none of them would be dating a trad guy.
I mean, mostly because it's a lot of very old gay men ... but also the values difference
Also, something to take into account is the internet skews introverted. *Especially* the kind of trads who would be responding to such a survey anonymously, and not on, say, Facebook. That’s the other thing. I noticed that introverts are drawn to anonymous social media.
> When you and I were in school, people slotted into fairly large categories like the nerds, the jocks, the popular kids, the goths, the skate punks, etc.
My experience was that When We Were In School, the "types" combined made up maybe 40% of the school, and the rest were normies. There were tons of kids (like me) who didn't douse themselves in any particular culture, and no one would have applied any of those labels to.
It seems that now there is both 1) lots of pressure to find some kind of category-based identity -- find *some* kind of weird clothes or hobby or other public performance to mold yourself into -- and 2) as you mention, lots of new labels for things that would have been slotted as normie back in the day, or just didn't factor into people's judgment about whether you were a normie or a "type". And those labels have been promoted to whole-ass identity categories even if the label represents something tiny like what house architecture you have a slight preference for.
Watching the weird relaunch process of the Unplugged dating app for self-described trads was interesting. The founder is I think Catholic or Eastern Orthodoxy, and the evangelical women who promoted the app pre-launch were dragged a bit in the comments for this mismatch in faiths.
The online trad women appear to be searching for a guy that will lead them theologically…but they already have strong theological beliefs themselves. Not just in denomination, but in the gritty details. It must be hard to find a guy that ticks all the boxes.
My perception (which may entirely incorrect), is that this hyperfocus on wanting to find someone who is theologically compatible on really specific elements of Christian doctrine is almost entirely on the female side of this particular equation, and that Christian men are more likely to be persuaded to whichever of Christian beliefs gets them a wife (which is, somewhat ironically, the opposite of how this is 'traditionally' supposed to work).
Hmmm, given men are flocking to the more right wing segment of the RCC and Calvinist sects (which are not babe bastions by any means) I'm not sure that's correct. What those sects do provide is an orderly explanation of the world and at least on the surface, a disciplined formula for how to live a "good" life, which these men clearly crave. It's why the Jordan Peterson-tradcath pipeline is long.
It's very easy for me to slip into seeing this all as a sort of funky roleplay issue... women who loudly protest that no one is leading them are being pretty domineering, and the men who swear they'd like to do that would really not be equipped to. Like, it just feels very normal contemporary dating issues, but with a sectarian identity which forces you to pretend you actually want a different dynamic
Yeah, I'm sure this is absolutely true! Like Allison said, the men are expecting to be the leaders theologically so it likely matters less to them if there's a bit of a mismatch. Their "job" is to guide their wives spiritually anyways. For the women, it's more of a "managing up" situation.
It could also just be that men care less about them ever matching perfectly theologically, but I imagine it's hard to disentangle from the above.
I think part of this is because of “male headship” and the idea that the female needs to submit to her husband.
My paternal grandfather coded fr
I remember filling this out last year
What was the general age cohort of the survey respondents? I wonder if the number of kids answer reflects a sort of culture war signaling around fertility rate doomerism, as opposed to a genuine desire for such a large family.
My experience talking with people that come from large families (my wife included), is that most of them would never want to inflict that on their children. Quiverfull types aside - something about such a large proportion of people saying 5+ just seems performative.