You could easily equate that statement to a “mother protecting and caring for her children”
It’s pretty trite and meaningless to boil every dependent relationship into one of slavery.
In the past, most women had to pick between marriage with an established man so she can have many kids starting young, versus working for herself and having no or few kids.
Comparing it to children is not better. If anything, it's worse.
Women are not children. They don't want to be protected, especially when they've chosen not to be. Women don't want to lose agency in the name of being cared for. Children don't have that option, because they're not adults.
Adult women want to be treated as adults, and very much resent the implication that they need protection. Especially when that comes with losing control over their own bodies.
As an adult you should understand the financial realities of a stay at home parent.
If the breadwinner (man or woman) needs to make enough to support the kids and family. If they don't, the marriage and kids suffer.
The stay at home parent (man or woman) also has duties to the kids and family and home. Otherwise the kids suffer. If either party wants to divorce for any reason, the kids suffer. That's the reality of parenthood.
Protection is antiquated but it's foolhardy to think a healthy man would suppress his instinct to protect his pregnant wife. You're right though women don't need protecting all the time.
>Protection is antiquated but it's foolhardy to think a healthy man would suppress his instinct to protect his pregnant wife
Plenty of men beat their wives, up to and including miscarriage or death. Seriously you have an absurd notion of the realities of being a woman before like the 60s. Human men, especially when angry, are irrational beings, as all humans are, and are perfectly capable of harming those they "love".
And yet, I don't see many women turning down decades- or life-long spousal support when they walk away from a marriage (no-fault divorce remember) that they're no longer happy with. As a population, statistically, they certainly do want to be provided for at someone else's expense.
It’s pretty trite and meaningless to boil every dependent relationship into one of slavery.
In the past, most women had to pick between marriage with an established man so she can have many kids starting young, versus working for herself and having no or few kids.
It’s no surprise many women chose marriage.