You Know...

...what I'm really tired of reading about? Some famous dude who's having all kinds of angst because his famous wife is more famous than he is.

If I had a dollar for every time I've read the construction, "He was the more famous of the two when they met, and now his career is on the wane while her star has continued to rise," I would have lots of dollars!

I'm sure in my history of reading things, I've read the reverse—wife can't take being eclipsed by husband's career. But I sure can't remember it.

(That is not, by the way, an invitation to offer up exceptions to the rule. I'm just making the point that it is, indeed, an exception to the rule. The very, very annoying rule.)

I'm not primarily directing my ire at the dudes about whom this is written, since who knows if it's even true, though it gets printed like it is; I know lots of straight/bi men whose wives are more well-known and/or make more money than they do who are super proud of their wives and not remotely threatened by a career disparity that doesn't conform to retrofuck notions of gender (im)balance.

A few famous dudes end up in "she's trouncing me!" stories, however, because they've said as much themselves in interviews, matter-of-factly, like, Of course it pisses me off and makes me feel small and kills my boner that my wife/girlfriend is more successful than I am. Have you not noticed that I am a man?

But it's more just that this shit gets printed at all, and the fact that it's still so easy for so many people to believe, in the year 2012, that OBVIOUSLY any man would be emasculated by a wife who surpasses him in any demonstrable way.

Oh, pardon me—not any demonstrable way. Straight/bi women are still allowed to be better than their husbands at "female" tasks, like changing diapers or cleaning the house. We're just not allowed to be better than our husbands at Man Stuff, like a career.