To think a lot of women are worse off than 50 years ago?

[Tsort]

A certain type of person is nostalgic for the old days when ‘men were men, and women were women’. I am not. However, it must be noted that at the time when women were expected to be docile acquiescent homemakers, men were expected to foot the bill. They paid for dinner, sorted the mortgage and brought home the bacon. Not for me, but a fair division of labour.

Now, we have a generation of women who ‘pay their way’, go Dutch and refuse to let men pay for them as they don’t want to be indebted. Grand.

But, these same women also do the lion’s share of housework, because ‘men don’t see it’ and shoulder the emotional labour because ‘that’s just the way men are’.

So, women are now shouldering some of the traditionally male burdens while the traditional female burdens have remained firmly in place. How is this an improvement for women? And why do so many tolerate it? This is a profound misunderstanding of feminism and it hurts so many of us.

Great post sums up the issues.

@BudgetBlast But we’re you an adult 50 years ago? Because I was and I agree with OP. Actually I was a (dramatic pause) housewife!😲😲

I'd add to antelopevalley's post

When a woman married it was expected she'd leave work because 'she was taking a job from a man with a family.' My widowed mother asked for training so she could have a promotion - she was told the job would go to a man because 'he has a family to support.' She very reasonably pointed out that so did she.

And let's not even start on the ageism. Even in the early 90s I was told by a recruitment agency that at 37 I was too old to go on their books for temp work.

No, life was not better for women in the 1970s. Watching Back in Time for the Factory on BBC was a good reminder for me of how very unfair life was for women at that time, especially in terms of equal pay and maternity rights.

There is no way my mother who was in her 20s/ 30s in the 1970s could have had the education or career that I had. Very few working class women in that era had the opportunity to stay on in school post 16, let alone go to university.

My mother suffered through a miserable marriage but was trapped in it, mainly due to finance. She finally was able to get free of it when she was in her late 50s.

I was an adult in the 70s (18 in 1972) and I agree with @antelopevalley's post.

@TinaPoopsy52 you're one person, as with any time period there are winners and losers, I'm pleased you were happy with your hand, but that doesn't mean it wasn't awful for many, and of course that's not to say today is better for all women. On the whole though women have more control over their lives today than 50 years ago, from more varied backgrounds, and ultimately, isn't it control of our own lives that we all want? (Still a way to go!)

I think OP the question should be "why do women still put up with shit?" Too many women put up with crap from men they are dating yet still go on to live with them or marry them. Just yesterday there was an article in the media about a woman who had but up with beatings from the start of a relationship but choose to marry him after 5 years but left him weeks later after he broke her back. So many women complain on here about boyfriends cheating but still stay ! So many complaining about doing it all while the lump sits on his games console. It us women that need to value ourselves more and put an end to shit relationships from the minute a very small red flag appears. We need to get tough.

@BudgetBlast

Also Its made up that an incredible amount of stay at home Mums were on tranquillisers. It’s been vastly exaggerated now by feminist types in order to create this myth of “see, see how bad it was to be a stay at home mum, you don’t want to do that” because they feel threatened by the possibility of women considering that an option for themselves. Unfortunately some in younger generations accept it as fact. It is not.

Its just as true to say today than working women are on tranquillisers as many of them are also on anti-depressants and other medications like that.

If you continue to do the work of course anyone will let you carry on.
Just stop doing everything.

I think it’s fair to say that for some women, life was better fifty years ago than now. But I think life is better now than it was fifty years ago for the majority of women.

The well heeled housewife and SAHM with the loving and caring breadwinner husband happily spending her free time being a girl guides leader and heading up bake sales and summer fayres with the church wasn’t a complete myth.

There is a kernel of truth there as some women who were SAHMs were happy with this role in life. Some women even today would be happy with this role, my DSiS certainly is, but society has flipped upside down and this role is now looked down on. Todays economy has also put this life out of reach for many more women who would like it for themselves, and so there’s a thread of truth in this.

As with any generalisation, there are always exceptions.

My issue, and I suspect I am not / wasn't alone with this:
My mil (rip) and my mum (rip) were both against me going back to work once dd came along. Even more so when ds came into the world.
They couldn't grasp the fact that we couldn't survive on dh salary alone.
They saw me working as a) selfish b) totally my choice, and couldn't understand the constant childcare stresses.
I was regularly told how lucky I was to have a dh who would let me work and even more lucky to have a dh who would occasionally 'help' with childcare and household chores; this re enforced my husbands belief that he didn't need to step up. Sadly I think a large number of women come across this very outdated attitude.

@TinaPoopsy52

'Feminist types'

Ah yes. Those pesky Feminists. Ruining everything

Shakes fists

I was a young, married SAHM in the 70s. Thought it was going to be great, but choices don’t always work out. DH had a bad spell employment wise, we were living in an old, cold house, with an outside lav. Cloth nappies, hand wash or launderette. No family nearer than a day’s journey, no childcare. No freezer, just a tiny fridge, and a coal fire which heated one room. Being a SAHM was the only option for a while. It affected my state pension, no NI credits in those days, or Child Benefit for the first child.

Work picked up, but it meant DH travelled a bit, when he was home I did agency work, for very low pay. We managed to save so we could buy a house, eventually I worked full time, and what a difference that made! When I bought an auto washing machine, we celebrated! Similar for our first freezer. I also learnt to drive, and we managed to take the DC on one holiday abroad. On a coach, and camping! Two earners gave us a sporting chance, and we hung on through double figure mortgage interest rates by the skin of our teeth!

Now, DH and I are retired and share chores, dividing them by preference. I know women of my generation who still carry all the domestic responsibilities in retirement! We need to be bringing up our sons to accept responsibility for any children they create, and teach our daughters to pick wisely! Life for many women is far better nowadays, for reasons many have highlighted, I look at my DC and their partners, all work full time, in well paying jobs. They can afford to lighten the domestic load, as do my young neighbours, by having paid help. Cleaners, decorators, childcare.

Completely disagree, I wouldn't want to live in any other time before today. All the women in my family worked, I wouldn't want to do so in a time where I would have no legal right to be paid the same as a man for the same job, when I couldn't get a mortgage on my own without a man's permission to have one, where it was very hard to do a million and one things that were considered men's jobs, and where it was very difficult to be financially independent as so many obstacles were put into women's way. I find any suggestion to turn back the clock on anything we've achieved so far utterrly abhorrent and repugnant.

This 100%.

@TinaPoopsy52 you were one person in the 1970s with one experience and that was not the experience of all other women I know which is where my views come from. My mother was educated to degree level where age herself worked to put herself through college, she then worked as a teacher but was given the heave hoe after marrying due to the marriage bar. My mother in law was in an abusive marriage all her life. Rosey in the garden it was not.

@Rosehugger

Pretty strong words considering you’ve never actually lived in those other times. Imo some things were better some worse. However there would also be plenty of women of times gone by horrified with today who wouldn’t want to live in this time - people usually think their own time is “the” time, because it’s what they’re conditioned to wanting.
When I was young and worked as a cashier I would have old women coming up to me in the store (this was late 60’s) and telling me how awful this or that that women did now was (one was steaming mad over miniskirts lol) and how much better things were in their day. I can’t see your attitude as much different to theirs.

@TinaPoopsy52 you do realise you're the "old women" in the story you've just told, you're the woman from a previous generation telling the younger generation your era was better.

Pretty strong words considering you’ve never actually lived in those other times. Imo some things were better some worse

But then you've not lived in those 'other times' either. Care to tell us when those times were when it was better for women than now? as for your example of 'old women,' people will always think things are changing for the worse and want to go back to the old ways. @Rosehugger 's point is that she doesn't want to, she prefers what she has now.

@

Hmm, not sure how posters can talk about housewives in the 70's unless they were THERE..
Yep, I had a twin tub washing machine - a Hoover Washdog, lol, if you're interested.. it was the bees knees! I had two children under two, both in (terry) nappies. The nappies were sparkling on the washing line at 6.30am every day. I made stews, shepherd's pie & hash & milk puddings in the oven. Life was good!

We had a car, & could take the kids places easily.
My DH at the time worked set hours - he was in for 5.15pm and when he was done, he was done. The night was our own. No computers, no phone, no stressing about the next day at work.
He would go to the match at the weekend. I would meet up with friends for a coffee in the daytimes. We'd have a night out now & again.

No-one worried about the state of the planet because no-one really thought about it, deep pits were still open at that time, & no-one foresaw Mrs Thatcher getting rid of them - coal was king!

I was never aware of domestic violence at that time - not that it would have had a title. I'm not so naive as to think it never went on, but the people I knew - no.

I never worried about switching anything electrical on, we could always pay our bills, no direct debit then, I'd get a bus into town & pay bills at the town hall or the electricity / gas board buildings. No mistakes, just paid in cash, the bill was stamped paid, & off I'd go.

Everything was EASY. Nothing to get stressed about.
As far as womens' rights or whatever, I've always believed in PERSONAL rights, man or woman. Never burned my bra (God no, I NEEDED my Gossard Wonderbra) just quietly got on with life & didn't let anyone grind me down.

Rose tinted specs? Well, I'm TRYING to think of downsides - but I really can't. Am sure I'll get flamed or whatever though.. but i hope not.

@BudgetBlast

And yet it was the experience of myself and many (majority) of women I knew. I respect your mothers experience, but don’t tell me what it was or wasn’t like for women on the whole, I was there, I certainly know more of it than you.

Oooh, lots of posts overnight. Will catch up.

It has to be a choice but here's the thing. You need to speak to potential partners about the set up you want. We have the "traditional" set up, he does win the bread, he does make major decisions, I do do all the housework and school stuff and my career suffers for it, but I, personally, am okay with it because I want to be with the children all day and I want to not work or have the responsibility. But I know for a fact my husband wants our family to stay together and we have a wider family who mostly share these values. It's a dream existence for me, and if I wanted to go out and get a career it would simply not work, but we have worked this out together.

What you can't do is want to have a career and get with a guy who wants you to do all the housework and realise this once married
because that spells disaster.

There are men and women who want either of these set ups and you just need to match with the right one, but what we do is never discuss it until it's too late. That's the problem.

Want your husband to do half the housework? Great, sort that out before you get married, not after.
Whether we like to admit it or not gender roles occur naturally on a large scale, pretending otherwise makes you miserable. I'm happy because I like that role and it works for our family and we agreed this before marriage. Our children have a mother who is home all day and available so they never miss out on that and feel secure and always know I'm here ready to get them from school and will never be home late etc. etc. etc. My husband is earning well because he can focus solely on his career and never have to think about cooking or cleaning. He also does great at parenting because he has the mental and physical time and energy to do so as I'm never nagging him about housework etc. because that's my job.

This set up worked well for many for a long time for a reason.