Women are groomed to enslave men. This is no secret.

They openly, unabashedly, share their tips on how to capture and keep men as their possessions, and some writers make a good living by sharing their advice on how to be a good slave owner. Women’s magazines are filled with articles telling them how to get and keep a man and women read these articles enthusiastically because they want to learn all the tricks.

Sherry Argov is a New York Times bestselling author. Her books, Why men love bitches and Why men marry bitches use humour but the message is clear. “Men control the world, but women control the men.”

Having control in a relationship manifests in many ways but attempts at control are quite simple. Get the man you want, get him to marry you, make sure he doesn’t leave or cheat on you. Those are the basics. What happens in the daily manifestations of that relationship merely depends on how good you are at slave owning.

Books aimed at teaching those three principles are a self-help market unto themselves which generates significant income for the authors. Quite often these enslavement techniques go awry and they result in a different sort of book.

Feminists wish to tell us that men are toxic, abusive, and dangerous to women. Radical feminist lawyers wish to tell us that battered women get stuck in toxic relationships because they are vulnerable to male power. Dr. Lilian Glass, while still blaming men for being toxic, finally hints a bit of the truth behind the problem.

Dr. Glass says women become “toxic men magnets” when they convince themselves they can tame “bad boys” – that’s the ego talking, she says. Others quietly believe their love is like no other – that’s naiveté. Others still are addicted to drama, mistaking intensity for love.

The problem is not the men, it’s that women want to own them.

While Glass acknowledges that so-called toxic men can be completely non-toxic in other relationships, she doesn’t quite make the leap to switching who the victim in the relationship might have been. Given the advances in psychology, she feels that women “can do a lot more now than walk away – you have options. Sometimes a bully needs to be bullied.” Slaves are, after all, an investment. If you can tame your slave it’s better than trading him in.

In case you wonder if the word “slave” is hyperbolic, Sherry Argov clears that up.

That’s the big picture, your happiness. And health. You should never care what a man thinks of you — until he demonstrates to you that he cares about making you happy. If he isn’t trying to make you happy, then send him back from “whence” he came because winning him over will have no benefit. At the end of the day, happines, joy…and yes…your emotional stability…those comprise the only measuring stick you really need to have.

A good slave does more than just care though, he is a laborer. They work for you. If they’re a good slave they do it without question or lip, they don’t try to escape and, ideally, adopt a Stockholm syndrome response. Argov outlines the value of attaining this state of submission.

With a woman he’s crazy about, he’ll put in all the overtime in the world. He’ll be doing things for you, he’ll be considerate, he’ll want to please you, he’ll try to cheer you up if you are down, and he will enjoy every moment because you are the person he values most.

So the question that we need to ask of women is: why do they want a slave?