KOSHER DELIGHT - YOUR JEWISH ONLINE MAGAZINE!
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KD MAGAZINE!
Posted: May
22, 2006 - יום שני, כ"ד
באייר, תשס"ו |
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If you
can believe the media, the President’s ratings are down. The President and
his advisors have their own explanation why the numbers look like they do
and the media have theirs. If we take the issue out of the political arena
and ask the President’s wife though, the media is simply wrong. Mrs. Laura
Bush said that she does not believe her husband’s approval ratings are at
record lows. She said that she travels the country with her husband and she
sees how positively people respond both to her and her husband.
I
don’t know how accurate the polls are since the media can
manipulate the numbers to reflect anything they want them to or even phrase
a question in a way that will rate a Jew taking the poll as an anti-Semite.
I do admire something in Mrs. Bush’s sentiment though and perhaps we can
all take a moment and learn from her.
How
many spouses support their husband in public the way Mrs. Bush
has? I have witnessed scenes of public degradation of a spouse that I would
have rather not been privy to. Sometimes it was overt and other times it was
subtle - which personally offends me more - but it was always ugly. I have
heard complaints from men and women that their spouse not only doesn’t
support them in front of their children and among family, but that if they
are in a group of friends or other outsiders their spouse leads the pack in
mockery and degradation of their job, their weight, their earning potential,
their child raising capability, their homemaking ability, etc.
I am
always amazed when I hear these stories from couples coming in
for counseling and even more so when I witness it myself. How can a
self-respecting man or woman sit at the dinner table or at a public
gathering and degrade their own spouse? How can they turn the one whom they
married, whom they chose as their lifetime partner, into a public laughing
stock?
What
many don’t realize is that if their spouse is a laughing stock,
it doesn’t make them look very good either. How smart can they be
that they chose to marry someone so dumb, clumsy or insensitive etc.?
The
wife that pokes fun of her uncompetitive husband proves nothing
about her spouse, only something about herself. She is proof that her
husband got caught in a marriage with someone who doesn’t understand the
basic tenets of respect in a marriage. Conversely, the husband who pokes fun
of his wife’s clumsy attempts at housekeeping proves nothing about her
other than that she is human. He also demonstrates that she was unlucky
enough to marry an unsupportive spouse. In each case the spouse that pokes
fun can’t deal with public displays of human imperfection and has deep
insecurities so he/she attacks the other spouse no matter who is there to
witness it or what the repercussions will be.
Interestingly
enough, those who witness this public humiliation may laugh along
with the offending spouse, however people recognize the mean spiritedness in
such an attack and the one who does the embarrassing ends up hurting his/her
own image. On the other hand when people see that a spouse respects,
defends, and praises their “better half” they gain respect for the
couple. Those are the couples that are envied.
A
couple with real issues should see a counselor or therapist.
Certainly marital issues should never be discussed in public - even in jest.
We must
learn to respect our marriage partners - with all their strengths
and weaknesses - for respect will preclude criticism. No one is perfect. No
spouse is perfect. But imperfections notwithstanding, everyone deserves
support and respect from their partner in life. Thank you, Mrs. Bush for
showing us how to be supportive, and stand behind our spouse in private and
in public no matter what the numbers say.
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KOSHER DELIGHT MAGAZINE
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