I think wife rolls of the tongue uniquely well here due to ‘wife’ rhyming with ‘life’, creating the pun. Outside of that I don’t buy it. In Denmark, wife-jokes are common despite wife being a two syllable word (kone) and husband-jokes are rare despite husband being a one syllable word (mand).
My model of why we see this has much more to do with gender norms and normalised misogyny than with catchiness of the words.
I think wife rolls of the tongue uniquely well here due to ‘wife’ rhyming with ‘life’, creating the pun. Outside of that I don’t buy it. In Denmark, wife-jokes are common despite wife being a two syllable word (kone) and husband-jokes are rare despite husband being a one syllable word (mand).
My model of why we see this has much more to do with gender norms and normalised misogyny than with catchiness of the words.