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Feminism: Sex and gender discussions

50's Housewife

71 replies

WhataRacquet · 05/02/2016 11:36

I was looking up money saving tips on Pinterest and came across this the50shousewife.com/2014/06/how-to-survive-on-one-paycheck-1950s-style/

I can't believe any woman would think like this!

OP posts:

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StealthPolarBear · 05/02/2016 11:41

I hope that's a spoof.
Anyway there's no risk in handing over all financial responsibility to your husband is there? In the 50s life was rosy and all women were cherished and cared for and had no bugger thoughts in their little brains than ironing, singing and looking pretty for when the great provider got home.
I'm not reading all the way though that. It's pure goadery.

Eggsandketchup · 05/02/2016 11:41

Ewwa

WileHallion · 05/02/2016 11:42

Eurgh.

I don't know if you were around then but a few years ago we had a thread by a real life 'Surrendered Wife' (vomits). It was hideous.

HelpfulChap · 05/02/2016 11:47

This could be an interesting thread. Place marking.

MiddleClassProblem · 05/02/2016 11:55

She's sounds like a Dick but if that's what she wants to do then that's fine for her. I just don't like any articles that say you have to do it this way because he will do xyz or the other way around. People are people. They are all different. I know my DH would never think I was miss spending money and fucking up the budget but then he's not some cut out version of a man which everyone must be like. It's bloody patronising to be told you should be an exact fit.

MiddleClassProblem · 05/02/2016 11:56

Dick with a capital D according to my auto correct

Lweji · 05/02/2016 12:00

"Resist the urge to show him how to do it. Resist the urge to remind him what to do. And do not check up on him. He is capable. Let him step up to the challenge. He may shock you with his abilities. And yes, he may occasionally mess up, but so what. Haven’t you occasionally messed up? Let him be. Remember when we talked about accepting him completely, just as he is?"

I think it's a wind up.

RudeElf · 05/02/2016 12:06

that makes for cringey reading.

StarCat · 05/02/2016 12:10

I have 100% control of our finances. I don't see anything wrong with this if both parties agree.

TheGreatSnafu · 05/02/2016 12:14

It must be a wind up?

HelpfulChap · 05/02/2016 12:17

We are a single income family. After bills are deducted the balance is split 70:30 in favour of DW. Seems to work OK for us.

StarCat · 05/02/2016 12:20

I also don't dent dh money, but yes I would end up very angry if he was allowed to budget our money. I expect this women is like my dh but she can't extrapolate that to all women/men. Play to your strengths.

Dh comes to me when he wants stuff and he gets spending money. He can also ask extras if he lets me know.

Want2bSupermum · 05/02/2016 12:21

You get people like that here in MN all the time. Drives me nuts. I work, do housework and parent. I expect my DH to do the same. We are a team and need to play to each other's strengths. He knows NOTHING about finance and I know ZILCH about making bacon.

What's the bet that this woman is divorced before she hits 50 and on a site like MN all confused about her finances, or lack of them?

TeaT1me · 05/02/2016 12:28

I don't think it's a spoof. I dint agree with her reasoning at all but I think when you have a sahm (which I might be for a few years) then things are differently balanced.

StarCat · 05/02/2016 12:31

Dh has been an SAHD and we have done it other way round. We have also mainly both worked. Either way dh comes to me for his allowance.

QuietWhenReading · 05/02/2016 12:36

What a lot of nonsense.

grimbletart · 05/02/2016 12:39

I was young in the 50s and let me assure everyone that my mum - a 50s housewife because of ill-health (she had been a 20s and 30s career woman) would not have put up with that crap for one moment.

She and my dad were a very equal partnership even though it was single income. Their money was shared, both budgeted.

To bear to read that I had to see it as a parody.

There was a lovely Freudian slip in it though i.e. "reigns" instead of "reins". She obviously really does see the dragon-slaying husband as an emperor!

stumblymonkey · 05/02/2016 12:43

Okay...I just got to this part:

"One of the things I was most shocked to learn about is the secret life of men. Secret to women, that is. It's a brutal, stressful world that they live in - far worse than anything a woman can imagine, simply because our brains don't work the same as theirs"
^^
Ha ha ha ha ha. I work in the City...my woman's brain has apparently no problem coping, and dare I say more than coping, with this world.

stumblymonkey · 05/02/2016 12:47

I wonder how the author of the article would prepare to move to her way of living in a house where the woman earns £100k and the man earns £15k.

So many assumptions made here. Pass me the sick bucket.

sleepyhead · 05/02/2016 12:48

I remember my grandmother speaking about a friend's husband who had just died. "He was a good man like your grandad. He never brought home a broken paypacket."

That was the way it was in their community. Men went out to work and if they were good men they brought all their pay home to their wives who did all the finances. They would get some money for their own spends, but it was the women who were in control because they knew what money the household needed to live on.

Not saying this was a golden age - there were plenty men who took their pay straight to the pub and left their children hungry and there was bugger all their wives could do about it - but I don't know where she's getting this 50s housewife thing from, there were many sorts of 50s housewife (and many, like my grandmother, also worked).

StealthPolarBear · 05/02/2016 12:51

Yes grimbe you're right and I apologise. My grandparents would have been of the age to have young children in the 50s. I'm not saying they had balanced relationships but it most certainly was not like this.

StarCat · 05/02/2016 12:52

That's how we are sleepyhead, and my parents, and their parents. I really couldn't imagine allowing a man to control a household's money, but I am aware that is my socialisation. Something about a man doing it makes me feel really uncomfortable. I expect the pintrest lady is socialised the other way round.

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WhataRacquet · 05/02/2016 13:02

"Back before the introduction of feminism, this is how it worked, and men woke every day with just a few things on their minds. After they got that first one out of the way, "

I think this annoyed me more than anything. She seems to think that equality is putting such a burden on the poor men!

OP posts:

katienana · 05/02/2016 13:16

I tried to read the post but I got too distracted thinking about fluffy kittens with pink collars. Can someone explain it to me in simple language?

RudeElf · 05/02/2016 13:27

Its telling that she thinks the introduction of feminism was after the 1950's.

At a guess i'll say she was a SAHM (with a financially controlling DH) with lots of spare time and got into the recent trend for everything 'vintage' particularly the 1950's and has decided to adopt more than the fashion of the era.

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