Am I a inferior person to dh?

[onlyif]

Its that time of year again when the Christmas cards arrive an my irritation begins to bubble.
I write an send the Christmas cards to friends an family, dh does none at all.

I always write on them from onlyif and dh, as please correct me if I'm wrong here, I thought female is written first, and Im writing them.
All the cards we receive from friends an family say dear dh other family members an onlyif last then to add to the insult always finish with female first then their dh. I feel like a none person. I know this is small and petty on world scale dramas but is it me being unreasonable here?

There is no such thing as one person being "inferior" in comparison to another. We all have different strengths and weaknesses.

If he makes you feel "inferior" then he's a bully.

I put first the name of the person to whom I am closest or am directly responding. I always put my name first when sending as it's in my handwriting.

If I was no closer to either one of the I would write the family name, eg Merry Christmas to the Petersons or Happy Hanukkah Ficowicz Family.

I always make a point of writing the female name first! And then I sign from us from me first.

In my partner's family (on cards) it's always his name first. From my family we learnt it's the female name first. It's really not an inferiority question, it's just different. Like when people mention you both - from my family they would say "Sue and Ed" but from his side they would say "Ed and Sue" because of who they know best :) No, my name is not really Sue.

Seems to me that those bothered about always being left to do the "low value" roles are the most sexist of all! They are totally buying into the notion that anything in history that was ever done by women was of low value. In my personal opinion, that was just the value men chose to put on it and if you place equally low value on it, then you're as brainwashed as the next sexist person.

So it's entirely coincidental that traditionally 'female' roles in our society are the low-paid or unpaid ones, eg. caring for children and the elderly or ill, housework - not to mention the kind of emotional wifework of maintaining family connections on behalf of your male partner - and that idea that these roles purely coincidentally again, have a high moral, if not financial value, is to make women think they like doing it?

And it's again purely coincidental that the pattern both Hefzi and I note within academic departments, where male colleagues consistently delegate unprestigious pastoral and admin roles to women, nets the men high-profile research grants and publications, while the women are presumably supposed to take satisfaction in the fact that a student in trouble has been helped, while losing out on promotions to their male colleagues?

Thank you, CastaDiva, you said it much better than I would have (I have had a rather stressful day).

Bringing Joy and Caring: stuff that.

And especially stuff housework and card-writing.

It's not coincidental at all. And value has bugger all to do with prestige or enjoyment, either. It's because roles that women traditionally undertook - I did not say actively chose - were and still are seriously undervalued in a society where apparently the sun shines out of your arse if you get a research paper published.

I only sign my own name and then hand the pile of cards to DP with a pen and stand over him till he applies one to the other. If I were signing both of our names, though, I'd sign his first. Not because he's a man but because I was taught it is rude to name yourself first in any situation where you're summing up several people. I see here that's not a common thing? I wonder if my family is odd or if it's just different where I grew up (not UK) now!

This is why single middle aged men end up depressed, isn't it? They just don't bother keeping up connections with people.

(And then it ges inferred that women are just making a fuss if depressed, as we don't kill ourselves as often...)

Yep, you've got it: men are just killing themselves to make women look bad and minimise women's issues.

Jesus fucking Christ.

So it's entirely coincidental that traditionally 'female' roles in our society are the low-paid or unpaid ones, eg. caring for children and the elderly or ill, housework - not to mention the kind of emotional wifework of maintaining family connections on behalf of your male partner - and that idea that these roles purely coincidentally again, have a high moral, if not financial value, is to make women think they like doing it?

And also, how many women who are the breadwinners or work the longer hours ask their stay at home or at home more than them dh/dp if they have any clean knickers or leave their dirty knickers on floor next to laundry bin for dh to pick up for her, have him make her lunches for next day or the other trivial things that get mentioned on Mumsnet?

If the value of these type of things are equal then why isn't it equally split between couple, esp if the woman is the one working longer hours?

Dh has said in past it's just as easy for me to write his Christmas cards when I'm doing mine, and while it does sound logical, how often does it work the other way round, has anyone's dh here or does anyone know of anyone's dh who does his wife's cards for her as it's no extra effort as he's writing his own? Not a criticism, just curious.

Would people find a card given to them from a friend in their dhs writing odd? I would to be honest, and I'd wonder why she wasn't bothered to write it herself, but up until recently I've never batted an eyelid at cards from men in my family being in their dw writing.

Well, it isn't equally split even when couples work the same number of hours outside the home because we live in a sexist society, not because there is no value in putting your dirty knickers where they might get washed. How about throwing your dh's dirty underwear in the dustbin if he doesn't put it where it should go to get cleaned?
Of course, traditionally female roles have been so undervalued that a frighteningly large number of young people are now clueless when it comes to "basic skills," because some idiot thought that these things came naturally and instinctively to human beings without being taught. Mind you, some women wash clothes far too often...

I first noticed this in about 1988 when a close school friend's dad gave me a birthday card, signed from the whole family (except my friend who had done her own thing) and his own name last. It blew my mind, I had never seen a man acknowledge my existence before let alone do something as nice as pick a nice funny birthday card with a joke about my hobby on it. (I suddenly feel the need to say that it was truly in loco paternis and there was nothing remotely pervy about the situation!) I was an awkward teenager and a friendly card sent with affection and knowledge of me-as-a-person meant something to me.

Years later when my friends starting having babies my mum took an interest in people she hadn't seen for years and sent them cards and presents. Similarly when I finally got around to having mine, I was bombarded with a gorgeous celebratory avalanche of congratulations and presents, sometimes from people who had known me when I lived at home - all sent from the women. It was really touching (especially as my children were born out of wedlock, I know that sounds old fashioned but the people doing the sending were all old school catholics, teachers from my convent school and so on) and this sort of thing really holds us together. I wasn't in a great place and presents from people who had heard I had a baby and wanted to celebrate meant the world.

The fact that men can hardly ever be arsed with this sort of thing is part of why I have no respect or interest in the selfish lazy fuckers.

Er, I don't think I'd write off half the human race because a large proportion of them don't like writing cards. Equally I raise an eyebrow at those (and it will be 100% here) women who spend hours making strange cards by hand with bits and pieces stuck on and peculiar scrapbooks.

Do you have any sons, HowBadIsThisPlease? Are they part of your "selfish lazy fuckers" crew for whom you have no respect, or are they going to be trained in the art of card sending?

I stopped writing cards to my husband's relatives when I realised I was spending time writing to people I wouldn't recognise in the street and that I was perpetuating the myth that men are incapable of doing these things. He doesn't send any, but that's his choice. I write my cards (mainly to my aged relatives) with my name first, and theirs in whatever order trips off the tongue. Quite a few are widows now, so the male/female hierarchy isn't an issue.

We get quite a few cards addressed to Mr & Mrs Husband's initial and surname, which grates but not enough to start trying to get people in their 70s to change.

I am quite over Christmas cards now to be honest. We have a small overcrowded flat so don't even put most of them up now, and since postage went up considerably I've really cut down the number of cards I send (eg relatives and actual friends that I won't see in person, not people I worked with 10 years ago and haven't seen since).

Its family or friend first and then husband next if that makes sense

So it would be aunt flo and uncle bert if aunt flo was my dads sister or vice versa

There has got to be a better way to write that

So its my friend first and then his/her husband/wife

I dont understand why women write their husbands name first when its the woman writing the card, if i am writing the card i go first

Is there some sort of chromosomal link between being a bloke and not liking writing cards, then?

Rhoda, not replying for HowBad, but I have a three-year-old son, and I hope that him growing up seeing his parents dividing domestic and childcare tasks, and that his mother, whose job is just as important as his father's, isn't the caretaker for all family relationships, will counteract the messages he is almost certainly already receiving from elements in his wider surroundings that daddies do important work-y things, while mummies rush about doing the lunch boxes and Christmas cards that daddies are too busy and important for.

Er, that's a bit obvious, CastaDiva. I'm sure most of us - naturally - do all the dogsbody stuff and set our sons no good example at all, unlike you. I was just saying that JustHowBad's post sounded a bit vitriolic about all males - their lack of card-sending skills being the least of their sins.

CastaDiva - if you think cards and lunch boxes are unimportant, then why on earth do you bother with them?

I didn't think she was saying they are unimportant just they aren't really viewed as important.

Hang on, no need for the vitriol, Rhoda and Roundabout.

Rhoda, I agree that HowBad's post sounded very hostile towards men, and as the mother of a son, in particular, and the wife of a man I love, it's not a position I espouse at all.

I cannot speak for how other women conduct their lives, or how they model marriage for their children. However, the vast majority of the responses on this thread have indicated that married/cohabiting women do generally feel it is their responsibility to write Christmas cards to their husband's friends and family, so it's not as if I'm pulling this stuff out of my ass as a statistic.

In itself card-writing is completely unimportant, but as an indicator as to who does the 'unimportant' but time-consuming 'work' of maintaining relations with the world outside the home, it's significant. But men aren't born with a disinclination or a lack of skill to write Christmas cards or remember their children's lunches - from somewhere they are 'taught' that this stuff is unimportant, and women's work. My son will be as liable as any other little boy to pick this stuff up from the world at large. I hope the fact that he sees two parents sharing that stuff at home won't mean he grows up thinking domestic stuff is 'women's work'.

Roundabout, I never said they were unimportant. I said that the message from society at large that my pre-schooler is likely to be receiving is that cards and lunchboxes are not important enough for daddies to concern themselves with. It's important that my child gets a packed lunch, but it's as much DH's concern on the average Tuesday morning when we're all scrambling to get out of the house on time as it is mine. And he has in fact written and the vast majority of the few Christmas cards that have left this house this year...

I write all of the cards

Why?

Do men with wives and girlfriends REALLY not send a card to their own parents? They honestly expect their womenfolk to write it for them.

And why exactly do all these M/FILs accept that their feckless sons can't even send them a card? Something tells me they wouldn't accept it from their daughters.

CastaDiva - actually you did say card writing was unimportant. You may have meant to be sarcastic, but the whole point is that sarcasm is utterly lost on people who agree with that sentiment. Even as another woman myself, the message I get from women complaining about this is most certainly not that it is such an important activity that it must be done and the burden must be shared. Instead it is treated as a tiresome activity that must be tolerated for some reason, because that's what people do, for some reason, and if it has to be done, then why won't some men help? (Whinge, whinge, whine, whine, blah, blah, blah...). Well sorry, but I wouldn't feel inclined to join in on that either, if that is literally all it meant to me. Why do women always leave unspoken what isn't actually that bl**dy obvious to everyone? And then get angry when what seems obvious to them is not obvious to others? Would any of these women be severely castigated by their dhs if they didn't bother to send any cards at all?? Something tells me their dhs wouldn't particularly notice or particularly care. And if they did, then they would start writing a few cards.