Media personality Toke Makinwa has pushed back against the long-held belief that women are the chief gold diggers in relationships, boldly declaring that men are, in fact, the biggest gold diggers.
Speaking on her podcast with Tacha, Makinwa slammed society’s double standards—where women who marry wealthy men are judged harshly, yet men who do the same quietly slip under the radar.
She noted that this narrative ignores a growing trend: many men intentionally seeking out and marrying into affluent families, a reality she says is rarely discussed but increasingly evident.
According to Makinwa, a lot of men deliberately go after women from well-off families and marry into generational wealth, yet they never receive the kind of backlash women get. She added that men benefit from wealthy marriages without hesitation or shame.
People are constantly criticizing women simply for knowing what they want.
“You sit on all these podcasts as men, or share your opinions online, and accuse women of dating for money. But let’s be honest—men are the biggest gold diggers in the world. They marry into generational wealth, and they do it boldly, without shame,” Makinwa said.
She clarified that her point was not to demonise men who choose partners for financial stability. Instead, she stressed that marriage has always involved financial considerations from both sides, and pretending otherwise is simply dishonest.
Makinwa added that her stance isn’t rooted in dislike for men. “If my brother brought two women to me and asked for my advice on whom to marry, I’d tell him to choose the one with a solid financial background,” she said.