Rachel Reeves crying in the House of Commons

[IdaGlossop]

AIBU to think it's possible to feel sympathy for Rachel Reeves for being visibly upset at Prime Minister's Question Time today, even if you revile Labour and its policies?

Lots of misogyny on Twitter - the UK is a laughing stock because of the behaviour of menopausal women in the Commons (including an example of Stella Creasy with her baby in a sling asleep and another of Angela Rayner flashing); women can't hack it etc etc.

I can only imagine it must feel dreadful to know the world has watched you in distress and that the financial markets have reacted because of fears of government instability. The phrase 'bring your whole self to work' is a piece of HR speak I can't abide but what we saw today was Rachel Reeves doing just that. Despite my sympathy for her, it would have been better all round for the upset part of her to have stayed in her Downing Street flat.

The markets may also have been concerned about the possibility of a new, high-spending chancellor from the left of the party. RR is trying to do what keeps the markets happy: restraining spending at a time when there is low growth and little wriggle room.

😹

Why wouldn’t anyone feel empathy towards her! I am aghast at the horrible replies on this thread and would hate to work for, or alongside many of the posters on here. So much for supporting women, Internalised misogyny is alive and kicking on mumsnet.

I'm not a fan of Rachel Reeves, who IMO has a bit too much in common with George Osborne as Chancellor, but yes, I think she's been badly treated here.

I don’t want a Chancellor who cries in public.
It’s not a strong look for our economy.
She should have stayed out of the public eye if she was feeling tearful.
Yes - everyone cries but they cry at home / with friends/ in a safe space.
teachers don’t cry in front of their pupils
doctors don’t cry in front of their patients
police don’t cry in public

If you have a position of responsibility you try not to cry in front of the people who depend on you .

So the stress she gave the disabled is fine by you then? It's got nothing to with her being a woman

You can care about more that one thing at a time, even things that seem contradictory.

Nothing to do with misogyny- certainly not this thread (can’t speak for those on SM who will be misogynistic, racist, homophobic regardless).
If Hunt or Sunak were crying everyone would be saying they are having a breakdown and can’t handle the job, need to step down and the markets would probably go into meltdown. No-one would say they are just having a bad day. If it was for personal reasons, then again they would be expected to excuse themselves from PMQs.

What has RR done to support women? Or are women just meant to support her whatever she does but it doesn't go the other way?

I don't support anyone in power crying when they're 'on stage'. A friend went to the GP depressed and the GP cried (about something else not my friend) and made my friend feel worse. It's not acceptable, and saying we should accept it because she's a woman is misogyny.

Strange how men cry in public and are called authentic but when a woman tears up after becoming the 1st female chancellor it’s suddenly bad for the economy. This is absolutely about gender, wrapped up in both respectability and identity politics. The Tories wrecked the economy after 14 years, but a woman crying - burn her at the stake!
As for your false equivalence and ingrained double standards:- Gordon Brown shed tears discussing his daughter’s death, David Cameron was extremely emotional and on the verge of tears after resigning, male police officers were openly weeping at the funeral of PC Dave Philips and remember Jonathan Gillis admitting he cried in front of his class? Those narrow, selective and gendered views of leadership are contributing towards the backsliding in women’s rights. Leaders crying shows empathy, challenges outdated cultural norms and helps break dangerous stigmas around emotions and mental health - it’s strength not weakness.

This is not about 'gender' (I think you mean sex) it's about doing your job professionally when you're in front of the world. You're giving double standards, crying talking about a child's death or at a funeral isn't really the same as crying while you're meant to be doing your job showing you're in control when you're in charge of the country's economy. If RR was crying about Dunblane or Lockerbie that'd be one thing, she was crying when she was meant to be showing strength but all she showed was feeling sorry for herself.

It'd be just as bad if she was a man, but if she was a man it's only be cast up as him being weak and not up to a top job, but because RR is a woman and all the fuss about being first woman in the job it'll be used as evidence that women aren't up to it. She's damaged women's rights, not the people annoyed with her.

You’re being disingenuous, nowhere did I say women should support Rachel Reeves because she’s a woman, that’s tokenism, not feminism.
I’m calling out how the criticism of her showing emotion is being judged far more harshly, because she’s a woman. Her professionalism is being debated on the public stage because of a few tears, it’s a misogynistic double standard whether it comes from men or woman.
As for your GP example - which is unrelated to the chancellor - that’s totally different. A doctor’s emotional control absolutely affects patients care, whether it’s anger, irritability, defiance or tears.
Rachel Reeves wasn’t about to perform a 13 hour surgical operation, she showed some emotion.
We need to stop holding women in public life to impossible standards where any sign of feeling is treated as a flaw.

And I think we should remember that Badenoch drew attention to Reeves looking miserable when Reeves was doing the pointing thing that MPs love so much. Reeves was being aggressive herself. Though it didn’t work out very well for her.

but because RR is a woman and all the fuss about being first woman in the job it'll be used as evidence that women aren't up to it

The way to combat such a reductive assessment isn’t to condemn someone for crying. It’s to challenge the idea that showing emotion (tears) is weakness.

Men often sublimate sadness into anger - that’s no better emotional regulation but they get away with it because anger is perceived as showing strength, particularly if that anger is directed at someone in a HoC debate.

Oh come on. This absolutely is about gender — and yes, I meant gender. Gender and sex are not the same thing. Sex is biological; gender is the social and cultural roles and expectations placed on people — like the idea that leaders should never cry. That’s gendered.

We’ve seen male politicians cry and be praised for their humanity — Obama after Sandy Hook, Cameron during his resignation — and no one claimed they ‘weren’t up to the job.’ But Rachel Reeves tears up for a few seconds on a historic day, and suddenly it’s ‘damaging to women’? That is a double standard.

She didn’t cry during a crisis. She wasn’t breaking down while announcing a budget. She showed emotion at a deeply symbolic moment — not weakness, not self-pity, but awareness of the weight of history. That’s human, not unprofessional.

And frankly, if your takeaway from a woman showing emotion is, ‘This proves women can’t handle power,’ that says a lot more about your view of women than it does about Rachel Reeves.

Quite honestly the tears were for herself and the pressure she is under (and the terrible job she is making of this!).

Comparing her crying to Sandy Hook or a death of a child? Really??

No, really it is not - crying about a child’s death or a massacre/mass shooting is wholly appropriate, whether you are a man or a woman.
Crying because your policy was not supported in front of colleagues and your electorate is not professional and any politician, man or woman, would be called out for that.
Calling it misogynistic is backwards step.

As for your GP example - which is unrelated to the chancellor - that’s totally different. A doctor’s emotional control absolutely affects patients care, whether it’s anger, irritability, defiance or tears

RR’s emotional control affects her politics, her party’s and, seemingly, the market. That’s why it’s being talked about in context of professionalism, which is applicable to men and women.

It’s valid to scrutinise a public figure’s influence, but attributing political or market volatility to Rachel Reeve’s ‘emotional control” crosses into subjective and gendered territory—especially when this language is rarely applied to male leaders under similar pressure. If your concern is professionalism, then ground that discussion in actions, decisions, and policies—not personal traits coded as emotional, which have historically been used to undermine credibility, particularly for women. I’d have a bit more respect for people making this argument if they just admitted they dislike Labour and are actively engaging in identity politics.

It’s ok, I don’t need your respect on this.
Personal traits, emotional control, whatever you want to call it are absolutely part of professionalism- crying, swearing, shouting etc at work whether a man or woman is not something to just dismiss and just say let’s judge them on their successes/failures.
Emotional control is very much applied to men, perhaps not in the past but definitely in recent years.

I am not a Labour or Tory supporter but I would love for a woman and POC to do well in these high ranking posts.

On the last line the way some posters descended on to KB was awful, if expected. The shitshow is Labour’s but of course the kicking goes to her.

Yes you can. But I carnt in this case. She has caused to much damage.

She's upset about not being able to make disabled people's life a misery. She can cry forever as far as I'm concerned.

Thanks for sanctioning my lack of respect, really grateful for that. Reeves has prioritised public spending to negate austerity, which disproportionately impacts women, has defended her fiscal policy which defends higher investment in public services, like childcare and welfare and stated support for women is economically and socially necessary. She’s also backed the abolition of the two‑child benefit cap and other reforms to protect low-income families, which also disproportionately affects women. Your sound bite about wanting to see women and POC do well is just that. As for disabled people, the Tories introduced PIP, which has negatively impacted disabled people more than any other policy introduced by previous governments.

I didn’t bring respect into it, you did: “I’d have a bit more respect for people…” so thanks for letting me know what I ought to say if I cared for your respect, thanks or gratitude.
The rest of your post also makes no sense/is of no relevance in this context.