Ian, it's interesting that you bring up the issue of percieved ownership. I'm reading a book, Choice Theory, and the author states this as well. He says that we operate quite differently with those we see as "owned" by ourselves such as spouses, children, employees etc. We expect those people will do what we want and are much less willing to allow them choice. He says we operate much differently with friends where we seem to recognize that we don't own them and therefore are much more tolerant with our demands and expectations. He says "We recognize that good friends are our most reliable source of long-term happiness. We seem to know we could lose them, and the happiness that goes with them, if we tried to force them to do what they don't want to do." yet, we have few qualms about trying to force our spouses to live up to what we think they should be. The kicker is that we usually don't succeed but keep on trying to force people to be what they don't want to be. I don't know if that is just men though. Maybe we should all look at how we treat friends, acquaintances and apply some of that to how we treat our spouses, I'll bet there is a little more detachment there.
