Why women refuse to marry
Loneliness is a new reality for city dwellers and not only big ones. The recently published book by New York columnist Eric Kleinenberg, "Solo Life" only confirms that the lonely phenomenon is quite an international one, and the problem is too stagnant not to be thoroughly researched. We asked Tanya Simakov to meet with Anna Shadrina, the author of the study of the phenomenon of loners in Russia, and find out why the latter had the idea of writing a book about it.
The book by Anna Shadrina, “Not Married: Sex, Love, and Family Outside of Marriage,” published last December in the publishing house “New Literary Review,” is strictly contraindicated for all defenders of traditional values. This study for the first time describes the life of modern young women in the post-Soviet space, and it is primarily about those who have chosen other life scenarios for marriage and keeping a home.
The life of "loners", as the author calls them, has long excited the minds of Western researchers. This is understandable, for some time it was unmarried people who became the main engine of the economy: they spend more on food and entertainment, participate more actively in political and public life, go to cafes and restaurants more often and in general form the urban landscape . Singed in the TV series like "Sex and the City" and Girls, bachelorettes have found their own voice and place in Western media. Do not reckon with their opinion can not be. In her book, Anna Shadrina quotes American feminists Cindy Butler: "Speaking of" family values "as a union of a man and a woman with" legitimate "children, Republican candidates ignore 100 million unmarried people. This is a huge mistake because the loners make up about 30 percent of American adults. "
How many million people ignore Elena Mizulina? In Moscow alone, there are almost 3 million women out of 5 at the age of 25–50 years old - “single people”. According to the data of the All-Russian population census of 2010, about half of the inhabitants of Russia are not in a registered marriage. At the same time, it seems that for domestic researchers and the mass media they do not exist, these people are invisible.
Interestingly, the book by Anna Shadrina is partly based on personal experience. Ten years ago, Anna turned thirty, she had neither her husband nor child, and the experience of romantic relationships raised more and more questions: “Every time I thought, is this really what the books are written about and shown in the movies?” She recalls. "Maybe something is wrong with me, maybe for others differently? And why is it that what happens in everyday life is not at all like what happens in the movie? Why do men and women distribute differently responsibilities inside a romantic union? And why films promise unearthly bliss, but I do not feel it, but experience vay only dissatisfaction? "
Leaving her many years of work in journalism and the post of deputy editor in the largest newspaper in Belarus, Anna joined the master's program in gender studies at EHU, a Belarusian university in exile, due to the political pressure that moved from Minsk to Vilnius. In the introductory essay, she writes that she wants to understand why some women get married and others do not - then it seemed to her a problem. Subsequently, it turned out that the topics of interest to Anna - the institution of marriage, the concepts of intimacy and family life - have changed much more globally in the past 50 years than in the last millennium.
The basis of the new book was an interview with unmarried residents of large cities of the countries of the former Soviet Union, the same as herself. The researcher sought to find out how and why they choose exactly those, and not other life scenarios, but most of all she was interested in the issues of romantic love, sex and motherhood outside of official marriage. On the one hand, reading all these interviews is hard and scary, but on the other hand, hell raises the spirits and self-confidence. There is nothing unexpected in these texts, because each of these ordinary life situations one way or another faced.
For example, a 33-year-old unmarried IT manager says: “In fact, my independence is annoying. That I have everything. And I, of course, value my relationship, but if something happens, I will stay with my interest ... Sooner or later conflicts begin I spend a lot of time working. I was entrusted with conducting a very important project. I went to this for a long time and I cannot miss my chance. It’s very promising. I can come home from work at 10-11 o'clock in the evening. And it offends a man who he expected that at 18:00 he would come home from work and find a hot dinner. "
Which of us did not have a choice between career and relationships? Or, a typical bromance, in which, it seems, instead of marriage, almost half of Moscow lives: “For seven years we have been renting an apartment with a girl. Though we are completely different, we have become like relatives. We have different interests, different life style, but we have such a very interesting fusion. It can hardly be called a family, but it cannot be called just a communal neighborhood. " This tells the female dramatist 33 years. It is very exciting to learn that many people face the same problems as you and solve them on their own - with a sense of self-esteem, but not at all in the movies.
Trying to figure out why in Russia there is no local counterpart to “Sex and the City”, Shadrina says that the cinema and the press continue to cultivate the image of the marriage union as the only way of full realization for women. Loneliness is strongly associated with longing, fear and existential emptiness. Bachelorettes are inspired by feelings of guilt and shame for not complying with cultural norms. It is these emotions that really should cause "innocent" mother's questions about grandchildren and friendly advice on how to behave with men, columns about relationships, the funny horn of the neopatriarchal regime "Let's get married" and courses of female attractiveness.
Happiness is a political concept, it reflects how a person fits into the socio-hierarchical structures of a particular social structure. "Women's happiness" in the popular mind is entirely dependent on whether you want to marry or not. Other desires and life plans are not seriously considered and are perceived in the mass consciousness only as an excuse for women's insolvency. In other words, the universal solution to all "women's problems" is to "find the right man." The desire to comply with cultural norms makes women suffer inconvenience, give up life here and now, turning it into an expectation of the very prince who will come and repair everything.
In this sense, the book of Anna Shadrina has a therapeutic effect. Describing her own "loner" experience, she gives an example of how she waited for a man to appear so that he could fix the crane and move the heavy table closer to the light window, without thinking that it could be done quickly and quite inexpensively as a hired worker. Analyzing a number of similar stories, she comes to the conclusion that it is much more reasonable to rely on one’s own strength and not to wait for an event that will make life more comfortable at once. "In the face of imminent death and obscurity, constantly thinking about whether a“ fateful meeting ”will occur - in my opinion, this is an annoying waste,” writes Shadrina.
The most important thing now is not the issue of equality, but whether women are ready to bear responsibility for their lives and comfort on their own, or do they still want to entrust these concerns to someone else? The experience of modern bachelorette, described in the book, says that they are ready. Moreover, studying it, Shadrina came to the conclusion that no single women actually existed. All that is depicted as the prerogative of marriage: care, pleasure, entertainment, motherhood - all this can be outside of marriage and romance. Instead of thinking about how to find and keep a dream man, is it not better to understand what problems you want to solve with his help and start relying on your own strength?
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