{"id":22313,"date":"2014-07-12T05:00:26","date_gmt":"2014-07-12T09:00:26","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/lovejoyfeminism\/?p=22313"},"modified":"2014-06-29T01:19:48","modified_gmt":"2014-06-29T05:19:48","slug":"michael-pearl-what-to-do-if-your-wife-embarrasses-you","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/lovejoyfeminism\/2014\/07\/michael-pearl-what-to-do-if-your-wife-embarrasses-you.html","title":{"rendered":"Michael Pearl: What to Do If Your Wife Embarrasses You"},"content":{"rendered":"\n<\/head>

So I recently came upon this video:<\/p>\n<\/iframe>\nI transcribed it for you so you don\u2019t have to watch it.<\/p>\n<blockquote>Debi: Hi, I\u2019m Debi Pearl<\/p>\nMike: And I\u2019m the big boss Mike.<\/p>\nDebi: We\u2019re here to day to read a question that came in in our mail and to answer it.<\/p><\/blockquote>\nOh goody, a letter! Are you ready?<\/p>\n<blockquote>Hi Mike,<\/p>\nI love my wife, but I find it hard to like her sometimes. Over the years she has gotten more and more competitive or at least I think of it as competitive. But this is an example of what she does. We\u2019ll be in a restaurant and she sort of punishes the waitresses by not tipping them, if they do anything wrong at all. This embarrasses me. If the food is not exactly the way she wants it, she calls the manager out and complains and wants the meal free. She\u2019s a good wife to me, but she is over assertive in many other areas. What should I do?<\/p><\/blockquote>\nTalk to your wife<\/em>. No really, talk to your wife about this. <\/em><\/p>\nSeriously, there is nothing in that letter to indicate that the guy has even tried telling his wife how her actions are making him feel. If I were in this situation\u2014and who isn\u2019t in a similar situation at some point?\u2014I would let my wife know that the way she was acting in restaurants was embarrassing me. And then we could talk, and she could explain how she feels, and I could explain how I feel, and we could talk it out.<\/p>\nFor instance, Sean used to do this self-deprecating thing about the state of our home. You know, this whole \u201cit\u2019s a bit of a mess, it usually is, sorry about that,\u201d and such. Now first of all, he made our house out to be worse than it usually was. But more than that, because of the cultural idea that women are more responsible for the house cleaning, I knew that his deprecation in this area came back more on me than on him. It made me really uncomfortable and, yes, embarrassed. So guess what I did? I told him how I felt! And guess what? He stopped doing it! He hadn\u2019t even realized how uncomfortable he was making me.<\/p>\nNow obviously, the situation in the letter isn\u2019t completely identical. But still, if one spouse\u2019s behavior is embarrassing the other, the two should talk it over. I mean, that\u2019s kind of the first step. Now if this man\u2019s wife continues to act this way in restaurants, he could tip the waitress on the sly, or he could stop eating out and just say he doesn\u2019t want to go. And if one party doesn\u2019t care about the other\u2019s needs, or if they are fundamentally incompatible, it might be best to part ways. Or goodness, go to couple\u2019s counseling if talking it out doesn\u2019t work!<\/p>\nSo now let\u2019s turn to Michael\u2019s advice.<\/p>\n<blockquote>Mike: I tell you what I\u2019d do, I\u2019d get up and walk out of the restaurant and leave my wife sitting there if she was asking in an embarrassing way, or when she treated the waiter or the manager unkindly I\u2019d tip them twenty dollars and apologize in front of her for her actions. Sometimes people, you know, the way we all learn to be socially responsible is by being in social context and bouncing our actions off of other people. if we act in ways that are inappropriate and other people respond to it negatively, then we learn what the boundaries are socially. So I would become boundaries.<\/p>\nIn other words I wouldn\u2019t just sit there silently, I would speak my mind about it and try to curb that kind of action. It\u2019s selfish, it\u2019s not considerate of other people, it\u2019s not loving, it\u2019s not kind, it\u2019s not generous, it\u2019s not merciful, it\u2019s not forgiving, it\u2019s not the kind of things we as Christians are toward other people. It\u2019s haughty, it\u2019s arrogant, it\u2019s elitist, it\u2019s acting as if you are the one that matters and the establishment doesn\u2019t, these are just human, these are just people. If you don\u2019t like the cooking, just eat at home.<\/p><\/blockquote>\nShorter Michael Pearl: If your wife embarrasses you in a restaurant, embarrass her back.<\/p>\nBut what I really can\u2019t get over is that he goes on and on about how unkind and unloving the man\u2019s wife is being by not tipping and by complaining to the manager, but he can\u2019t see that apologizing for your wife\u2019s actions to the manager, in front of your wife, might also<\/em> be unkind and unloving.<\/p>\nAnd notice what he does not even think to suggest? Oh, I don\u2019t know, talking it out privately<\/em>. Is it really that hard for the man to go to his wife and tell her how embarrassed her actions make him feel?<\/p>\nWell, once Michael finished Debi weighed in as well:<\/p>\n<blockquote>Well I read all the letters the man wrote, some of the examples were on the line, I can see why the woman would think some of these things, but it wasn\u2019t merciful. And how can a man curb his wife if he hasn\u2019t got the kind of personality Mike has, if he\u2019s a gentle, loving husband?<\/strong> You know, I don\u2019t know how a man could do that that wouldn\u2019t be aggressive like Mike except sit his wife down and say is this merciful, or maybe just have a bible study with his wife on mercy, and kindness, and gentleness. But a woman is supposed to be gentle first. And anyway, this is a hard thing for a man to go through.<\/p><\/blockquote>\nIs it just me or did Debi just let it spill that Mike is not<\/em> a gentle and loving husband? I mean I know she\u2019s said things along these lines before, but this is so blatant!<\/p>\nDebi gets closer to saying that the two should talk it out than Michael does. Of course, she\u2019s still seeing it in a dictating-type way, but that\u2019s to be expected. I suppose, then, that in the Pearls\u2019 world \u201caggressive\u201d husbands are to publicly embarrass their wayward wives while \u201cgentle, loving\u201d husbands are to sit their wayward wives down and chide them. It\u2019s a pity the Pearls have to make things so complicated when a good, solid egalitarian marriage built on communication and compromise makes these things so simple.<\/p>\n<\/body><\/html>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Debi gets closer to saying that the two should talk it out than Michael does. Of course, she’s still seeing it in a dictating-type way, but that’s to be expected. I suppose, then, that in the Pearls’ world “aggressive” husbands are to publicly embarrass their wayward wives while “gentle, loving” husbands are to sit their wayward wives down and chide them. It’s a pity the Pearls have to make things so complicated when a good, solid egalitarian marriage built on communication and compromise makes these things so simple.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":845,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[40,25],"tags":[96],"class_list":["post-22313","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-evangelicalism-fundamentalism","category-christian-patriarchy","tag-michael-pearl"],"yoast_head":"\n<title>Michael Pearl: What to Do If Your Wife Embarrasses You<\/title>\n<meta name=\"description\" content=\"Debi gets closer to saying that the two should talk it out than Michael does. 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