to take the mick out of male colleagues who bring in shared food that their WIVES have made

[morningpaper]

this makes me both scornful and slightly depressed and I resort to extreme sarcasm

Only last week I was nibbling lemon cake from a colleagues WIFE.

What IS that ABOUT?

AIBU?

"I reserve cake-baking for friends and family, where cake baking, IMO, belongs." This bothers me, tbh - it feeds too much back into the WifeWork thing - it's in the house, it's intimate, it's not to be demonstrated outside.

Oh I agree - we are not allowed to send in snacks for break time; why would cakes sold outside school at 4.15 pm be so much more nutritious than a mid-morning snack?

Anyway, I don't want to use my time or energy baking cakes for the school; I want to use it to create a better learning environment.

hypocratic? Did I say that? hypocrytical is obviously what I meant.

Pass the hypocras! Oh- and don't forget a slice of that cake

It's good to be intimate and to reserve domesticity for those you love. There is a difference between private and public life.

i'm all for equality...but i prefer my dh under a car than making cakes.

Hab, no. I would never wish to address these things at the level of the individual. And indeed no-one should be made to feel bad because of the stuff they just do or are used to. But MP was using pointed humour to show up what is in reality a pretty massive gender division in our culture that hasn't really been challenged. Yes, individually, we're all free agents; yet overall many women get to do these things because they feel they should. Or they don't question why they enjoy it (and why should they?) And don't get to do other things (fixing their car?) because they feel they shouldn't or don't get the opportunity to learn.

So yes, when people are happy with the arrangement and feel the deal is fair, no problem. The cracks show though when analogous behaviour ends up someone's responsibility (child care is a case in point) and relationships are configured as if one gender is just 'better' at it or enjoys it more.

I think MPs objection to cake-provision might have been unpicking these seams...

iykwim

Yes, but we don't all have to agree that cake-baking belongs to the intimate sphere. To me, it's basic hospitality. Not something rare and special that I have to keep for a select few. Mixing up another cake just isn't a big deal to me.

That was to Anna's post.

Cake baking is hospitality when it's in your own home - you bake a cake for people you have invited over to share your private life.

Sending a cake with your DH into his office is not hospitality because you aren't there and in any case it isn't a party.

Yes, Wilf makes good points. One thing I would to ask though is, would you feel the same way about a bloke doing things to the car or changing a plug. Again, this is something certain people might expect him to do because he's a man. Is he demeaned by it? If not, why? Discuss.

Anna, we just see these things differently. I'll be sending biscuits in to dcs childminder, teacher and the man who drives the disabled taxi. It's just a small gesture of appreciation in that case. They are not invited to share my private life.

If dh gets to take cakes to the office, it's most likely because one of us made too many.

Well, yes - I wish I'd had the opportunity to learn car maintenance and DIY at school - my dad tried, but wasn't that good at them himself, so that rather failed. DH comes from a family of roofers and slaters. And is much worse at DIY than I am. But we are lucky, I agree - to be aware of being able to make the choices we have.

Anna - I just don't see cake-baking as domesticity - that, to my mind, is part of the problem here - baking is women's work, it's domesticity, it's private. Unless you're James Martin, and then it's a moneyspinner. I don't feel nurturing when I give DH cakes to pass around. I'm showing off AND getting unwitting guineapigs in the process.

I think you are talking about giving biscuits as a present to people to whom you owe personal thanks, cory. Which is a very different story again.

Oh well, maybe I would rather show off other talents than cake baking .

I wonder if the reason Anna and I feel so differently about home/outside sphere is that she lives in France where I believe the home is quite an intimate place, whereas I have my roots in Sweden where if you joined a new firm you would expect to be invited to your colleagues' homes and given a complete tour of the house, including the bed rooms .

I feel the UK is somewhere in between.

But it seems I'm not the only one to fail to spot a link between baking and domesticity. To me, it's no more intimate than buying somebody a drink.

Anna, I'm MUCH better at baking than DH. So if he has a thing to which he needs to bring food, I'll do it because I like it, I'm better at it. If someone at my work needs help with something he's better at than I am, I'll ask if he'll help. I guess I see our skills as shared, iyswim?

There's nothing wrong with feeding people at work - in one office, there was a chap who had an allotment and routinely brought in raspberries or tomatoes or blackcurrants to share with the rest of us. The core issue that so many people keep missing is: women don't have to bake cakes if they don't like baking and have no talent for it, just because some men are actually tragic enough to think that other men care whether they have managed to subdue their wives into obedience. (hint. A cake is a cake. It either tastes nice or it doesn't. If someone at work offers you a cake, you generally don't actually give a flying fuck who made it.) I have no interest in baking, so don't do it. WHen DS starts school, any requests for cakes from the PTA or whatever will be responded to with a nice cake from Lidl or Asda. In its box, of course. I won't be duffing it up to make it look home-made. A cake's a cake. I don't need to create one to prove I have a fanjo.

If dh's colleagues got cakes made by me, it would be a sort of overflowing of baking day. Particularly at Christmas time, when the house is overflowing with food. It does that- overflows. At other times, we've been given garden produce by his work mates, and he regularly gets rid of excess apples that way.

"maybe I would rather show off other talents than cake baking". Fair enough, surely, but it shouldn't mean that cake baking isn't a talent that should be shown off if you so choose.

I'm very good at reading 14th century manuscripts, but to being this up in general conversation is odd, and impresses far fewer people than my cakes...

Not read all of the thread but I would quite happily send in stuff with dh to work if asked - their job is pretty stressful and hours can be long so if I can help raise a smile or two have no objections. Sometimes if dh is on night shifts I've sent him in with enough dinner for at least two to help break the monotony of micro meals which tend to be a staple on that kinda shift. Wouldn't by any means bake/cook constantly for dhs work but don't mind on occasion - he would do himself if he had the time. Think food is a fab social/bonding thing and partic in stressful jobs can be a nice way of bringing people together.

If I were to bake a cake for DH to take to work (it is most unlikely actually, his colleagues send me cake) it wouldn't be to show off a talent, Anna, it would be for the pleasure of sharing. You do have a very funny way of looking at things.

I still want to know what your husband does and why your baking would expose him to ridicule...

Anna got that from me, georgie. I told her I was a show-off cake-baking ponce.

georgimama - I wasn't the one who brought up "showing off". Read the thread