Contemporary discourse (recent NYT articles and conversations) paints a portrait of faltering men and rising women—frustration abounds as women can’t find partners who can keep up. In contrast, many men disengage, unwilling to commit and/or submit.
The critique is double-edged: women feel penalized for power, men for weakness or fragility.
Yet the narrative conceals its own simplifications. Men often retreat not from "strong women," but from roles they feel destined to lose (unwinnable situations, hen pecking, or priorities alignment), all couched as fear of success. Meanwhile, women refuse to settle or take on mothering/emotional roles, as additional emotional work is unfair and unbalanced.
The commonality is that both have sought a form of "freedom" or autonomy, be it from ambition or contentment, but both are unhappy in their freedom. Yet neither is willing to dissolve or adapt, thereby reinforcing the barriers that maintain such discontent, despite the myriad examples that counter their worldview.