(Links will be inserted later. Running)
It is totally unfair that women spend so much time agonizing over work/family decisions, while men free ride. Yes, there are some very enlightened men out there who put some thought into the matter, but the numbers are hardly equal. How about a little gender equality on the home front?
There must be errand parity. Both parties need to be responsible for picking up the kids after childcare, arranging for holiday gifts for the kid’s teachers, and drilling the kid on his spelling words.
There must be nurturing parity. Both parties need to snuggle the kid on the sofa while reading the train book.
There must be big picture parity. There should be regular discussions about whether both parties will work at low stress jobs or whether one person will assume the high stress job. (Keeping in mind that it is really hard to switch jobs and that poverty really sucks.)
How do we get more men to do more at home? Well, there’s the stick. Bitch and Amanda have two good posts on bitching at men to pick up around the house. Really excellent advice. In terms of house cleaning, I don’t think that there is any way around the bitching tactic. I could never try to spin cleaning as a fun task. I hate it too much. Gentle nudges don’t work either, because then they’ll just tell you to relax your standards. Then you give up, and assume that they are morons. (Exhibit A — My father who hasn’t done a load of wash since 1964 and who pretends that he’s too stupid to run the spin cycle.)
Bitching is the only way to go with housecleaning. What about things that relate to the kids?
You could go with passive resistance. You could go to work and forget to get your kid’s speech therapist a gift, and see what happens. You could stop reading stories to the kid at night and see what happens. Make the guy take responsibility for those actions. Being so responsible allows him to free ride.
This is a dangerous game. You could end up with a situation where the speech therapist doesn’t get any gift and takes it out on your kid. That wouldn’t be good. You could end up with an illiterate kid. That wouldn’t be good, either.
Bitching is definitely an option, but it should be a last resort. How much better to entice them into helping raise their kids? We could spread the news about how much fun it is to hear the kid chatter about his day, as you pick him up from daycare. How you heard him say his first word that morning and you almost cried. How you have invented a new game called “Supermom” which involves running around the kitchen and kicking each other in the ass. (It really is a marvelous game.)
Sure, homelife is isolating, repetitious, unappreciated, risky, and involves a certain amount of housecleaning. But being with the kid is just great.
The danger with the new Wall Street Journal feminism, aside from its rejection of economic liberalism, is that it shuts that door. If we say that all home life is unfulfilling, grunt work and that women should have no part in it, then we have no hope of bringing in the men, except by bitching. How much better to say that caring for kids is great and both should share in that fun.
Apt. 11d 
You’re supposed to get the speech therapist a gift? Or she’ll take it out on the kid?
:- )
(That’s an emoticon for “jaw dropping”.)
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grrrr, there was supposed to be a bunch of spaces before the close-parenthesis.
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Yea, we got Exhibit A in my family, too. “Honey, do we have a frying pan?” “Honey, *you* know how to operate the dryer…” If there was more perceived danger in housework, men would be all about competing for the most daredevilly househould chores you can imagine bragging about. So maybe we need to interject more danger. More cleaning devices that use flames, perhaps.
Here’s my actual question: are your “shoulds” directed at couples or do you envision a government role? My Intro to Public policy class is currently considering Charles Schultze’s arguments about the public use of private interest. If we subsidized the choices we wish men would come to through long heart-to-heart discussions we might actually get a much larger response. Just a thought.
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Oh, yes. I’m sure that his ST would still be nice to him, but I still don’t want to be the only parent to stiff her. He has six teachers that need gifts. help.
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Do not, under any circumstances, bake anything as a gift. (And that is not any statement about your cooking.) My wife has lots of private school experience. That’s lowest on the totem pole. Obvious regifting is second.
I’d go with a Border’s Gift Certificate, but then I’m part economist.
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In the 70s, my mom gave all my teachers Jean Nate bath soaps. Man, did that stuff stink. Yeah, I think we’ll go with the book gift cards. 6 X $20 = $120. Gag.
RC, I would love to bring the men in by public means, as well. The private heart-to-hearts still put all the burden on women who have to instigate these conversations. I haven’t read Schultze. Off to google him….
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I never know what to say to these discussions ‘cuz my husband helps. Sure, I’d like him to help MORE (as in, I’d like to never ever run the vacuum again) but he helps. I don’t know why. I don’t know if he has less testosterone or it was having a part-time working mom or if he’s just more of a neat freak than I am (wouldn’t be hard to be more of a neat freak). We both do our fair share of the scut work and we both do our fair share of the fun work (cuddling with train books) and I don’t know how I managed to marry a guy like this and not another kind of guy. Luck, I’d say. I had no idea the drunken but cute boy at the bar that I ended up marrying would turn out so nice. I was really just all about the cute. (Hell, I was 20 when I met him.)
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Big hug for Dawn. You did well. I did, too. He’s the champion of snuggle/train book time. Mine is having a harder time as his job keeps slowly twisting the vise grip. Intentions are good, but time is scarce. After we pay off our student loans, we’ll have to figure out how to change things.
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I married a man from a messy family. It’s not that his father didn’t do anything around the house. It was that no one did anything around the house. On year they kept their ‘live’ Christmas tree up until May!
For the first year or two we were married I thought that it was crazy that I did so much of the work. It wasn’t until later that I realized no one had ever told him he should be doing these chores (not a great excuse, but he did go straight from their home to ours). Ten years later, he’s better, but not perfect. I still have to ask him to do things. But I know I’ve won because he has to fight the urge to clean when we visit his parents’ home.
My point being that we are constantly setting an example for our children. Which makes it important for fathers to be just as involved as mothers. It seems to me that its one of the best ways to change the dynamic.
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You assumptions about work/family balance assumes an outcome to the discussion that is not necessarily where most women (or men) want to end up.
In the old days (three years ago), I worked and my wife stayed home with the kids. That was what we thought we wanted, and it worked well.
Then, I lost my job and had to take one that paid less (but was less demanding) and my wife had to take a part time job to make ends meet. (Yey avoidance of the “Two Income Trap”!) Since I could come earlier, I took on all the evening chores (putting the kids to bed, cleaning up the house), because my wife was exhausted from a day of part-time work/part-time child case.
I thought it was working out great. Until recently, when my wife started pressing for me to get a higher paying job (which would, assumedly, require more hours at the office) so she could quit her part-time job. But guess what? I LIKE being in a lower-paying job and reading the kids their bedtime stories!
So, no decisions have been made, and it’s not always easy to just “Go get a higher paying job,” but if my wife gets her way, there will be less “errand parity” and less “nurturing parity” and less “big picture parity.”
Sometimes, (and, judging from our friends, more often than you may think) it’s not the men standing in the way of equality, but the women.
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Domestic labors
Well, ladies (and gentlemen), let’s be perfectly clear on one thing: all domestic labor is not created equal. As I see it, there are three traditionally feminine kinds of domestic labor: childcare and related tasks, house cleaning and laundry, and co…
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“Until recently, when my wife started pressing for me to get a higher paying job (which would, assumedly, require more hours at the office) so she could quit her part-time job. But guess what? I LIKE being in a lower-paying job and reading the kids their bedtime stories!”
I hear you, Richard–by the standards of academia, and the world in general, I’m a slacker husband. My wife knows that if she’s ill anytime I’m not teaching, I can come right home to take over with the kids, and often do. That means, of course, less office time, less time to prepare for meetings, less research done. I’m not–and probably, given my work preferences, never could–wowing them with my results. But thusfar, as stressful as our situation is in terms of finding secure employment, we haven’t bailed on trying to make this work, because we both really value the flexibility that living a low-key, low-cost life often allows. And hopefully we can figure out just how much needs to be done to hang onto it. Yep, we’ve got debt and we’ve got problems, but we’ve also got a surprising amount of equity (considering how much time my wife puts into church and the volunteer groups she’s a part of). That amount of equity would actually be threatened by ramping up our wealth somewhat. (Not that we’ll be able to avoid that entirely; to a degree, I really need to put myself in that “vise grip” that Laura mentions regarding her husband’s work demands–I mean, our oldest needs glasses, and soon she’ll need braces, and my coming home from work early and fixing dinner regularly isn’t going to pay for that. But we’re still trying to hang onto to our tightrope.)
I’ve really loved this whole discussion, here and elsewhere. What it comes down to for me is pretty straightforward: if truly, finally, overcoming patriachy will require that every woman approach both their working and domestic lives with an eye towards matching the dismissive, protective, earning-and-work-based authority that patriarchs have traditionally enjoyed, then we’re screwed. Because such isolating “power” is exactly what so often makes fathers strangers to their children–and kitchen appliances–in the first place. Yes, there is capitalism, there is “realism,” there are the rules of the game; they are in place, you can’t ignore them, and so women should and must confront the casual way in which breadwinners benefit domestically and otherwise from the game. But we ought to be able to remember that it is far better, and much more necessary, to be willing to occasionally question the structure of the game entirely.
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I know how I got a guy who does his share of stuff in our family. I chose him. My husband didn’t have any good examples for this at home. He grew up in a multi-generational household where the women did all the traditional woman things (like cooking, cleaning, etch) and the men did all the traditional man things (like paint the house, tend to the cars, etc.)
In fact, I’ve never known a man who didn’t willingly participate in the details of life. Including my grandfathers (and great-grandfather). What I want to know is why would anyone marry someone who was incapable of cooking a meal or doing a load of laundry?
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Yes, there is capitalism, there is “realism,” there are the rules of the game; they are in place, you can’t ignore them, and so women should and must confront the casual way in which breadwinners benefit domestically and otherwise from the game. But we ought to be able to remember that it is far better, and much more necessary, to be willing to occasionally question the structure of the game entirely.
Thanks, Russell. Well said.
I’m really sorry, Richard, that you may lose your hours with the kids. I’m glad that you told us how much you value that time. Lucky for your kids that they have two devoted parents.
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Catie — Why would anyone marry someone who didnt’ do their share? I really don’t know. I gave this advice a long time ago in blog years:
My first thoughts were to advise all my single friends to stay away from careerist husbands. Girls, go for the slackers. They might not make senior partner, but they’ll make your dinner and play with the kids. You might not be able to afford a house in a town with a good school district, but so what. He’s made lasagna for dinner.
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I’d add that it’s very important to marry someone who is basically a good person, who has a good heart and is conscientious, and who LOVES YOU at least as much as you love him. Don’t ever, EVER marry someone who thinks you ought to be honored to be with someone as wonderful as him. That puts you on the begging end.
By marrying someone who is conscientious, good-hearted, well-disposed and who loves you, then you’re more likely to get cooperation when you want your spouse to be an equal partner in the marriage and childrearing (including the errand-running and so forth). This kind of person will want to make you happy, want to be a good dad to his kids, and want to make his marriage work.
I’ve seen too many women marry men who don’t have that basic good-heartedness, conscientiousness and love for their spouse and then it’s like pulling teeth to get him to help out because “it’s all about me” and “I don’t cheat on you or beat you up. Thank your stars, and don’t ask for the moon.”
In all fairness men should choose their wives this same way – marry a good-hearted woman who loves you, etc. Too many people think “I love him/her! We must get married!” without considering “does s/he love ME back?”
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“Marry the slackers”
That’s Laura’s advice on how to find a male partner who helps with the housework. It’s true — slackers have more time. I didn’t mean to sound glib in my hurried response to the Hirshman fiasco when I said I…
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“Marry the slackers”
That’s Laura’s advice on how to find a male partner who helps with the housework. It’s true — slackers have more time. I didn’t mean to sound glib in my hurried response to the Hirshman fiasco when I said I…
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Why would anyone marry someone who didnt’ do their share? I really don’t know.
This seems a little like blaming the victim to me. It’s women’s fault that they marry men who don’t do housework! It’s really hard to tell when you’re dating someone what they will be like when you are married. My husband kept a fairly decent apartment, but that was because he cleaned before I came over. Once I was living there (and not visiting), the cleaning stopped.
Also, I knew my husband would satisfy a number of my most important feminist concerns–didn’t want me to take his last name, was willing to move to a different state to advance my career, etc. HOWEVER, when it comes to housework and childcare, I have to nag, nag, nag, and then do it myself. I have a cleaning service (and I am still the only one who goes around picking stuff up so they can vacuum).
There are two reasons why I am in this situation–1) my husband is a total type-A personality who works 80 hours a week and doesn’t feel like cleaning(although not at a high-paying job–he’s a prosecutor, so he does a lot of work for the community but isn’t paid so well)
2) Growing up, he NEVER had to do any indoor chores. His mother made his bed and changed his sheets until he was in college. I hate to blame another woman for this, so I will simply say it was never a part of his culture for men to do housework.
An aside–I think women are still pissed off about this because most of us don’t feel like we have the option of being either a slacker (crappy job, but paying some attention to the house) or a breadwinner that doesn’t have to do any housework. We feel pressure (internally, from society, from our mothers, from our husbands and children) to be both the high-intensity career woman and the homemaker. Worst of both worlds.
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Bitching is the only way to go with housecleaning.
Or you could choose to partner with a man who would never think to expect someone else to clean up after him.
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