what is the damage caused and why does a family require the man to be the leader in the house?
First off, let me start with the usual disclaimer of "not all". But...
In general, most single female lead households tend to lead to dysfunction. The statistics back this up, especially in the black community where 70% of children today are born out of wedlock to single females. The fact is that nearly every negative social ill (drug use, teen pregnancy, incarceration, drop out rates etc) is directly proportional to the rate of out of wedlock/single female lead household rates.
In addition, even if you have a man that is in a household with a female head, the chances are that most of the time (again, not all, but most), the female and the larger society will still hold the man responsible and accountable when things go south in that household. Even though the female may have been the sole or chief decision maker, when times get tough or when things get bumpy, that woman and people in general will look at the man and hold him accountable. So, since the man will be held accountable and made to be the one to fix/clean up the mess anyways, he needs to be the one being the chief decision maker and having the control. What you have right now is women wanting the power of a man, the benefits of a woman (meaning that she will still want to be vatered to and allowed to fall back on her ovaries when the heavy lifting needs to be done) and the responsibility of neither. Meaning that, not only do they not want to be held accountable for decisions that they made in the household that men normally are held accountable for making, but they also don't want the traditional responsibilities associated with women, such as cooking/cleaning/raising children. Again, not all, but most.
This is an example of what I'm talking about in this video. Now I bet you that before the economic downturn when things were good, this woman (and women like her) were more than willing to grab on to the feminist mantra of being strong and independent and wanting to be known as a contributor (if not chief decions maker) in the household. But now, they want to hide behind their ovaries and all of a sudden, they want to hold the man accountable.
[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nkSV_R82xzI&list=FLhk81r7KHo2hhT683Fx0ufQ&index=86&feature=plpp_video[/youtube]