AIBU to think women escaped domesticity by hiring other women to do it?

[AlloaintheMiddle]

This has been on my mind for a while, give me your thoughts.

There’s so much talk about modern womanhood, career success, independence, “having it all”… but often, that freedom seems to rely heavily on other women stepping in to do the work they’re now too busy (or unwilling) to do: childcare, cleaning, cooking, eldercare….

It’s rarely men picking up the slack. It’s almost always other women, often migrant, often poorly paid, and working long hours to support their own families while making it possible for more privileged women to “lean in.”

AIBU to feel like this isn’t really liberation so much as delegation, and that it doesn’t dismantle gendered domestic roles, it just shifts the burden to women lower down the socioeconomic ladder? And men still get away with it?

What do you think?

I think that the majority of families with two parents who work don't employ the type of assistance that you are talking about, other than childcare. Most families don't have cleaners, for instance, or cooks. And if both partners are employed working the same or similar hours I don't know how the man would take over the child care duties.

There have always been some families who employed domestic help, regardless of whether the mother works.

I think you have a point.

All for minimum wage too.

Hasn't that always been the case. Normally paid help tends to be a female role as they can work around school hours etc.

Also, I as a woman, would much rather another woman in my house cleaning than a man. Or if it's child care, then again I would want a woman doing this. Not a man.

Note, I have neither a cleaner nor child care help.

No, I think the shift that allowed women to escape domestic drudgery was technological, with the invention of large appliances: washing machines, dishwashers, tumble dryers etc

Minimum wage? You must be joking. When have you last hired a cleaner or nanny?

Did men do that too when they hire plumbers, decorators, Gardner's, roofers, carpet fitters....or is it only women who are made to feel guilty for paying other people to the jobs that we don't want to do?

My sons all do equal shares. None of my families ‘hire women to pick up the slack’
Please don’t generalise based on just your experience

Hmm, potentially but as someone said further up the thread, most families I know use childcare (yes mainly female) but otherwise it’s a case of juggling between husband and wife.

in some ways it’s good there’s now an economic value on women’s work, and the focus can be on improving wages for the nursery / cleaning sector.

Sort of like how historically men would have done lots of their own growing crops / rearing animals but it’s outsourced to farmers who get a proper wage for doing so.

My cleaner charges more per hour than I earn per hour.

Or you could view that that increasingly this work is seen as it should be as actual work and is now being renumerated.

Why shouldn't someone get paid for it?

@Auldy said it better than me with plumbers etc!

I have a cleaner, and someone who does my ironing … neither are migrants, both local, and nicely paid. I am supporting local businesses.

A little true, a little false. Technology, and more equal roles has helped. But so do underpaid, often marginalised women. It’s worth talking about all of it.

We pay our cleaners £15 an hour
Its her job , she is much in demand
Works for us/works for her

Interestingly enough the phrase ‘having it all’ is rarely if ever used in the context of men.

I have had a male cleaner previously. Have a woman now. My new secretary is also a man.

But yes I do take your point.

No I don't think women in normal jobs are trapped in some sort of Victorian indentured servitude where they could have been an airline pilot but were systematically disempowered by nasty other women and forced to work as a cleaner instead. We can't all be astronauts. HTH.

I pay my cleaner £17x hour, she wouldn’t be able to feed her family without people like me. I’m not a woman of leisure at the expense of a smuggled migrant.

Women who don't marry or have children have generally swerved domestic drudgery.

Very interesting contribution OP. You definitely got a point.

Yep totally agree

FFS. Is there anything women can’t be blamed for?

It’s no different to a man hiring another man to clean their car, or their windows, or do the gardening.

It’s slightly different. Those “men” jobs are one off, not the daily drudgery.

I wasn’t trying to make anyone feel guilty, it’s just an observation that, when outsourced, our traditional women jobs are for other women not men.

I was a nanny for years. One employer didn’t even allow her daughters to play with dolls such was her contempt for caring and domestic work. Obviously, she worked in STEM and wanted her daughters to do the same.

Great but somebody has to look after the kids, cook the meals and clean the house. I get that you don’t want it be you, or your children, or your husband but it’s other women taking on these roles for you, and you’d be lost without them.