to be shocked by the amount of Stepford wives on Mumsnet

[LoopyLoopsCorgiPoops]

So many women on here either this it's fine to do everything in the house and with the children, or don't think it's fine yet put up with it. I simply could not live with an adult who thought they were more important and more deserving of leisure time than me. Why do they all put up with it?

I think Betty nailed it pretty much.

I sometimes think "Stepford Wife" is MN Femspeak for "Women who actually like their men - the splitters!"

"Stepford Wife" is a derogatory term for SAHMs. Just as the German "Rabensmutter" is a derogatory term for WOHMs.

Throwing cheap insults rarely reflects well on the person speaking.

Don't be daft.
That just allows sexism to flourish, saying women who guard against it don't like men. Like the guys who all call feminists 'lesbians'.

I mean please move on!!!

A stetford wife is someone who allows her DH to consider family life beneath him.

Listen, I live in the la-la land of comutor belt. The men around here are almost all high rollers. A huge proportion of women are SAHM. This model is probably in the majoirty at DC's school.

Yet, most of these guys still play an active part in their DC's lives. They do school runs, they're at parnets evenings, they volunteer at things with the PTA. You see them out and about at weekends with their families.

But there are some who consider all that small stuff. They are, as Bonsoir rightly said, convinced it's all below them. And their wives collude, usually to keep the peace. They are the stetford wives.

Stepford wife here.

Thanks to feminism woman now know, as do men, that there is no such thing as "women's work", or "men's work".

However, some people still swing around a big stick if a woman chooses to do what was traditionally "woman's work".

Get a grip and move on man!

There is research that suggests households with very "stereotypical" roles have healthier and happier marriages .
Because each person knows and does their part as needed ...
Our house is like this at the minute ( im not working - but not through choice ).
We do argue less when I'm a SAHM. DH functions far better being the bread winner than he does trying to manage the house and children . Although i desperately do want to be working again , so it's a catch 22 !

I think that if you have a healthy degree of self-esteem and confidence in your own abilities (and you generally like your life and feel confident that you will get plenty more out of it in future), it isn't terribly difficult to understand that life will almost always be a mix of the interesting and the less interesting, the enriching and the menial.

If you have feelings of worthlessness, however, you might try to push away anything that reminds you of that.

Like Word, I'm surrounded by fathers who are interested and supportive.

At the sports days, the assembly, on the weekend and school pick up.

At first I thought given the expense of London and fees it wouldn't be so. It feels like the norm now.

I guess it's just about being fluid in your ideas of these things, and your set up.

Men don?t tie themselves up in knots the way women do to themselves and each other. There is no pressure on men to have it all ? and if that phrase means having a career and having significant time with our children, men who work outside of the home full time certainly don?t have it all either! My DH doesn?t tell himself his career defines him the way I used to do, because I was so restricted by being a woman and everything that is wrapped up in having a career. He doesn?t attach all these subtexts to what being a SAHD and house-husband means the way I did to myself at the prospect of being a SAHM when we were figuring out the best set up for us. He just is. He would be MrBettyBat, father, musician, athlete, doer of housework, etc, etc.

I feel like we have been sold a great big untruth about these things. Not lies, because the people that drove equality forward did not foresee a situation where women were killing themselves ?trying to have it all?. Just that ? God ? does it matter? If you let go of what housework means, it?s just work like any other. There is a base amount of work between couples that they need to sustain to manage their lives. Housework is just as needed as paid work. Childcare even more so. We?re all just divvying it up between us, surely?

I am not suggesting its all sweetness and light in the Bat household ? I get bored of cooking all the time, but I do not see it as my work ? I see it as things that just need doing. I had a lot of hang-ups ? see my friends with the same hang-ups ? about what doing the housework and what that means and I now I just think, screw it. I would rather do a little, care less about it, and spend the time I have with DH chilling out or having a laugh with him. And to add to that - if I was the breadwinner, the career person in our set up with DH at home - I would expect him to be looking after these things the way I do right now.

I probably will be the primary parent for our child, simply out of circumstance. But DH?s career is no more important than mine, or anything else I might want to do. He said to me the other day that if I wanted to go back to work full time after maternity leave, and if I wanted him to stay at home and be the primary carer of our child ? he?d be happy with that. Who knows ? maybe that?s what will happen! My only serious worry is that he gets time with our baby ? and I?m certainly not going to eat into the precious little time he has at home by letting my hangups about what housework means get the better of his time with our baby.

I dont think the term "Stepford Wives" refers to or has been used to refer to SAHM .
It implies that a woman is totally subservient to their DH - in the film they were brainwashed and drugged (I think).Most couples negotiate who does what and hopefully share things fairly whether they SAH or WOH.
I think the OP is referring to women who put up with very unfair home situations - for what ever reason-they feel they have no choice .

Hahaha whatmeworry - splitters!!!

It is so depressingly lazy and ignorant to spout the line that feminist= manhater. And offensive too.

Would you say that to be anti racism = hating white people? Or anti homophobia = hating heterosexuals?

And come to think of it, would you ever argue, for example, that some black people choose and in fact enjoy being subservient to white people so don't patronise them by telling them how to live?

Makes no sense at all

'It implies that a woman is totally subservient to their DH - in the film they were brainwashed and drugged (I think).'

No, the real women were replaced by robots, tailored to their husband's specific requirements.

No one has said the term refers to SAHMs. That's just sheer defensiveness.

It is perfectly possible to be a SAHM and have a fully equal relationship.

However, when you are at home more than your DH (I work from home but am here far more often) you do have to be careful that you don't fall into corrosive patterns.

Some women will let it slide though. To keep the peace. Their DHs duck out of most family responsibility and they just smile. Their DH sighs if the house isn't tidy when they return, so they make sure it is the following day. Their DH is no longer aware of just how much effort it takes to keep the home rolling, and they never point it out, they put up with comments about not having a real job. Their DH becomes all passive aggressive if she wants to go out in the evenings or at weekends, so she doesn't.

Some great posts on here. It seems that we're saying that, among those men who do the majority of work and breadwinning in their families, there are those who regard the homekeeping role as "lesser" in some way, and those who regard it as of equal value but just different. In my own case, my earning potential would always be much less than my husband's, and I just like spending more time at home than he does - that doesn't mean he thinks doing the ironing makes me less valuable as a person, and I find the idea that it might quite alien. Of course, we both know that we have similarly high levels of education, etc, and so the fact that I was able to have a good education and career when I wanted it does mean that my current situation really was a choice, which would not have been the case fifty years ago.
But we shouldn't be too quick to judge by appearances - my husband hardly ever goes to parents' evenings, for example, but not because he thinks it's beneath him, because he completely trusts me to deal with it and doesn't see the point in both of us going, since wild horses wouldn't stop me even if he were there. Of course there are some women who really are downtrodden, but it sounds from this thread as if there are many more relationships where the balance of tasks really is to the mutual satisfaction of both parties, however much it might make other people's teeth itch to read about it. Which is good, surely?

Thanks Fallen - I couldnt remember exactly how they did it !

Would you see the point in you both going to parents evening alice?

Glad that this isnt going into SAH vs WOH !

Its about unfairness/control - whether you SAH or WOH is irrelevent.

My DP and I attend DD's parents' evenings and other important school meetings together because she is at a bilingual school and we have different perspectives and experience on the two curricula that we find useful to share.

DP's exW doesn't often attend the DSSs' parents' evenings - two French parents for children at a French school is a bit redundant. DP takes the lead on the DSSs' school stuff and it's easier to keep exW out of the way as she doesn't understand much anyway.

Unfortunately over the years I have come to the conclusion that a lot note, I didn't say all of men from my generation are sexist pigs...

MissFaversham - you are not wrong, but more worrying still I find are the women of my generation who have copied that "sexist pig" behaviour to the letter in the name of feminism

I think the fathers at school thing can be slightly misleading as the ones I see most at school are 'older' and have either sold businesses or are semi-retired and their much younger wifes are still working.

We attend parent's evenings together but I do a lot of school stuff on my own as it tends to fall in the day.

Vis a vis school, if DH is here he comes along.
Of course he fully trusts me to act alone (as I trust him, if I am busy) but that's not the point, I think. It's more to do with prioritsing it IYSWIM.

That isn't the scenario in Paris, MrsCampbellBlack. Not many retired parents! I suppose that you are more likely to have retired parents outside a big city - who'd want to retire in central Paris or central London?

I'm always glad when a lot of fathers show up at school meetings. I'm not wild about large meetings just of women. They always seem to get out of control. A good mix is best.

MrsC I know a fair few Dads who don't have to work (they've made too much dosh), yet are still absent from their DC's lives.

They just don't see themselves as having a role or a responsibility. One wife actually calls her DH the lodger. She thinks it's a hoot! Or so she portrays. Actually she dances to his tune and always has done.

I dunno, I just don't see who gains in these situations. Certainly not the DC. Definitely not the DW. And though the DH may seem to have a great deal, he's actually missed out hugely.