The Happy Couple

Liz Jones writes a column, frequently about her husband, Nirpal Dhaliwal. Dhaliwal is also a writer, and recently wrote a column of his own, about how even feminists secretly want big, bad cavemen instead of sensitive blokes.

He said: Deep down, women love men who stand up to them, who won't be pushed around. They love men who will look them in the eye and tell them to shut up when their hormonal bickering has become too much.[snip]

I'm always telling my wife, the writer Liz Jones, to shut up. She gets into a prissy huff about it, but I know she respects me for not indulging her neuroticism. Long ago, I realised it is unhealthy for a man to embroil himself in arguments with women.

She said: Was it worth getting married? My husband asked me that question the other day after one of our pointless, whingeing arguments (was it about who had forgotten to buy Comfort, or put out the recycling box, or bought dinner, or fed Snoopy, or left a towel on the floor? I really can't remember). "Well, was it?" he said, trying to goad me into a response. I told him he had, yet again, "ruined my weekend, which is mean because I work really hard all week"

He said: Real men don't pretend or even try to understand women. They simply love them for being the mysterious, capricious creatures that they are. And they don't take them too seriously, either. They know the vicissitudes of the female mind, its constant insecurities and the fluctuations in mood.

Rather than pander to them, they simply watch them drift by like so many clouds on the horizon. They don't get entangled in a woman's feelings and listen to her prattling on and on until she's talked herself out. Such strong and stoic men are exactly what women need to anchor themselves amid the chaos of their emotions.

She said: We sat in silence for a bit and then he said, "Do you really want to be a mum?"

"Pardon?" I said.

"It's just I saw you holding that baby and you looked 10 years younger. If you do, then we'll do it."

"But we don't even know if we're going to stay together," I said. "You keep changing your mind."

"The reason I changed my mind about adopting was that I thought I'd be home all day looking after it while you went to work," he said.

"That's weird. I thought I'd have to do everything, and, as usual, you'd do nothing to help," I said.

"Hmm, well, we need to talk more."

He said: The female orgasm is the natural mechanism by which men assert dominion over women: a man who appreciates this can negotiate whatever difficulties arise in his relationships with them.

Last Christmas, my wife threw me out after discovering I'd been cheating on her. On the night we got back together, I made strong, passionate love to her. Unfaithful as I'd been, I was not going to let her have me over a barrel for the rest of our marriage. I needed to keep a sense of self and not allow her to mire me in guilt and a desperate quest of forgiveness.

I needed to let her know what she would be missing if we broke up for ever. I gave her a manful bravura performance that night, and at the height of her passion, I asked her: 'Who's the boss?'

The question threw her. Initially she wouldn't give me a reply, but I enticed it from her. 'You are,' she finally gasped. 'You are!'

She said: "My mum rang to ask me if I am really gay," he said miserably. Ah. I had written down all the reasons why we might not be having sex. Pointing out that him being homosexual was just one of 10 didn't really make him feel much better.

I'm not even going to pretend to be going into the sociological aspect of these columns. This is just one of those train-wreck moments -- hard to look away. Part of me would like to say that the problem is just down to Dhaliwal's odd notions about women, but's clear upon reading her column that Jones, though possessing more self-awareness, might also be somewhat lacking in the sense department. Writing intimate, lacerating columns about your relationship in the newspaper upsets the husband? You don't say?