Is it appropriate for married men to socialize with women alone? | The Tylt

The Pences' choice is not as radical or weird as liberals think. It's like a Rorschach test—liberals will look at Pence's situation and think it's misogynistic and beyond the pale, while conservatives or religious people will see nothing wrong with it. Many people are coming to Pence's defense, saying in their world, it would be inappropriate for a male boss to take out a female employee to dinner alone. It's a bad look. What Pence does is more common than liberals realize.

These comments show that the Pences have a distinctively conservative approach toward family, sex, and gender. This is by no means the way that all Christians, or even all evangelical Christians like the Pences, navigate married life. But traditional religious people from other backgrounds may practice something similar. Many Orthodox Jews follow the laws of yichud, which prohibit unmarried men and women from being alone in a closed room together. Some Muslim men and women also refuse to be together alone if they’re not married. These practices all have different histories and origins, but they’re rooted in the same belief: The sanctity of marriage should be protected, and sexual immorality should be guarded against at all costs.

How Mike and Karen Pence choose to conduct their lives is up to them. No one should judge them for it. 

But it’s also true that these aren’t just rules by, for, and about Mike Pence. This is how he and his wife, together, have chosen to navigate their marriage. That some people are so quick to be angered—and others are totally unsurprised—shows how how divided America has become about the fundamental claim embedded in the Pence family rule: that understandings of gender should guide the boundaries around people’s everyday interactions, and protecting a marriage should take precedence over all else, even if the way of doing it seems strange to some, and imposes costs on others.

However, Clara Jeffery, editor of Mother Jones, says if Mike and Karen Pence were normal people—it wouldn't be such a big deal. But Mike Pence is the Vice President of the United States and his choice to avoid being alone with women has real and serious consequences. If he is uncomfortable with being around women without his wife, it stands to reason he would be uncomfortable hiring women for top positions in his staff or meeting with world leaders who are women. Does he need to be chaperoned each and every time? It's absurd for a man of Pence's stature to avoid contact with half the population. 

It might be a personal choice but at the end of the day, it's a toxic practice that marginalizes women.