to be a bit sickened by the apparent 'feminism' under study in the Women documentary?

[mrsbean78]

Dad staying at home to care for kids = househusband
Mum staying at home to care for kids =
full time mum

Each man challenged about how much housework he does, yet "househusband" also challenged about how well he does the housework by a wife who is irritated that he shrinks her cashmere jumpers and doesn't clean the bins, when clearly, as she says, she couldn't be expected to work and do housework.

All participants apparently comfortably well off enough to make the 'choice' about who works and who doesn't, living in beautiful leafy-suburb/rural pad type homes.

I don't feel it is at all representative of my life and am finding it terribly patronising to the men, don't know how others feel?

what was the point about capitalism vs feminism? I can't remember it at the moment.

Feminism hijacked by capitalism- men seeing 'liberated' women as a new stock of cheap labour for the market meaning we've ended up not having it all, but doing it all.

Fine, rich women paying poor women to do "the" shit work.

The point is, liberal feminism, with no analysis of class, had failed women. If you're lucky enough to be rich enough you can pay someone else to do the domestic work, or you can do the domestic work yourself while your partner supports you financially.

For most women feminism means they do all the domestic work their grandmothers did, plus they have to work as well.

lubent, what did your dh make of how the doc was edited?

do we not think it possible that in actual fact, that as men in any domestic situation do fewer hours of housework that the heir average female counterpart (eg, as singles living alone, the woman will do more hours housework, when two singles move in together the gap widens, when they have kids even further...) Is it not possible that men relly don't (on average) face up to housework in the same way, and the SAHM does more than the SAHD in the way of housework (on average)?

My dad is 60 and still treats all housework as womens work...are you saying that has geuinely vanished in a generation and now any perception that men don't do housework as well as women do is pure bias? The statistics are against that.

and as the 'middle class' make up more than 40% of the population, i wouldn't say it was a minority demographic exactly (unless you actually mean that top 10% that refer to themselves as 'middle class' but are merely failing to recognise that they are an 'upper class')

I agree with the point about how incredulous it is how some men would feel to be viewed at work in the same hopeless, 'I'd ruin everything' tack that they sniggeringly adopt at home. Oh I'm useless me, don't even show me the iron... oh tee hee, what on earth does the machine that washes clothes look like... aren't i drole? GAH!

Trouble is, the young WAG obsessed young women seem to be taking it upon themselves to accept equality as doing exactly the same as these helpless men!

How many of these dreadful daytime House Guest programmes etc are there where the WAG wannabe spouts, Oh I'm useless in the kitchen, can't even boil an egg.

Doesn't it occur to them that someone has to do something...

My DH is a trained chef, cooks better than literally anyone I know, bar 3* chef...he irons better than me, again was trained to do so in one of his very first jobs.

He does however expect me to do pretty much everything, and not because he's working harder than me, purely because he's more lazy than I'm permitted to be. When it suits him he pitches in.

I'm sick of it, to be frank.

I've resolved that my DS will learn to cook, learn to wash and iron his clothes and will never resort to sitting on his hands wondering where the good fairy will come from to clothe and feed him. I'm hoping that he'll hold a pride in himself, his life and his appearance and also understand the work and effort it takes to maintain himself/home etc, and pitch in.

I'm hoping his future MIL is taking the same decision.

To me the goal of life is to self reliant. To me feminism is the choice and opportunity to be able to be self sufficient.

One good thing that is coming out of the new feminism, is the acceptance of the choice, if available, for women to decide to stay and look after children. Until recently it was kind of seen as a cop-out by some I felt.

agree entirely LuBenT. In fact I don't think capitalism was ever in opposition to feminism. Capitalism cares about nothing but profit. Class, race, gender, family etc. are all immaterial to capitalism. Capitalism only wants an increased labour pool from which to draw. The more labour available, the cheaper the labour becomes. The cheaper the labour becomes, the more labour that people need to supply just to be able to stand still. The illusion of liberty is hollow when people find out that all along they have been working for the Man.

He was totally paranoid- they did a real 'Mr and Mrs' job by chatting to me on camera then springing the joint interview as a last minute surprise. He thought he got off lightly compared to the bath-washing guy. Hilarious that my dh came across as being happy for me to do all traditional things AND take on 'male' tasks as well- this is so him!
I thought it was interesting there were no questions about how involved dads were with kids- this would have been more interesting than the washing powder chat.

yes i would have loved to have known how invloved the dads are with the children.

the surgeon dad, didn't seem to see them much at all.

bet that bath washing guy is getting some stick in RL LOL

Apparently one more of the couples has separated since filming...not sure which!

good point about dads involvement with children not being mentioned. Another example of how the programme was skewed to make its point. It came across as having more holes in it than Swiss cheese. Maybe that wasn't unintentional.

but it also didn't go into the number of hours he had to work. I bet they are paying him a good whack, but are expecting a pound of flesh in return.

the stupid thing about banker guy was, he wasn't prepared to do 50% of the household stuff when living in a family, but now he will have to do 100% living alone
ok he might get a cleaner but he will have to do alot of day to day stuff and organise things
also his kids will grow up to think he's a total shit

The idea of the second shift interests me.

I don't really have this. I am the Waynetta slob married to someone who is much cleaner/tidier than I am. My mother strongly felt that domestic work was not very important beyond the very basics (hygienic bathroom and kitchen, cooking) and I have retained this, really. My husband's family was much more traditionally domestic and he does far more housework than I do, in line with what he would like our home to be. He has always done the laundry and the dishes. I used to do all the cooking but he has done most of it since my early pregnancy (and now that I am breastfeeding).

I have no sense of house pride and view time spent with our boy much more important. So there are times in the evening when he is washing dishes and I am feeding; and then there are times that his dad plays with him when I rant online do other stuff.

My point is that the 'second shift' is not inevitable. Also, that you can have quite partnership within your own home negotiated equally based on your own individual preferences as a couple but remain constrained by the society you live in (which makes our ideal 4 day, 4 day, 3 day nursery childcare arrangement unlikely to achieve).

The childcare issue, for me, is a capitalist one - because it created the market forces that made a double income a necessity for most (due to house prices).

agree with mrsbean78, everyone's different and a lot of housework etc. falls on the partner who cares more about it. If it was a paid job then both partners would be more inclined to do it. But as it is voluntary it comes down to who cares more about it. I don't think you can legislate for who cleans the bath.

Capitalism wants to suck you into the system. House prices rising are part of the game. Once it has got its teeth into you, it's got you hostage.

dittany you're right, the men didn't do much childcare. I agree that they think that that is not their responsibility

wow thats great about spain, esp the affect the terms of a divorce settlement

good point about caring for elderly family members, yet another task that usually lands on the females!

when was it rapeing wives becae illegal in the uk?
was 1980/1990s or something wasn't it? quite recentley really

Interesting Spanish link. Thinking more about it, this is probably likely to come to a town near us one day. This is a socialist utopia, Big Brother's cameras will be in every house to check who's doing what. It is all about control, checking your bins etc. It will be done in the name of feminism and so will be welcomed by many, but its objectives are nothing to do with feminism.

dittany, bloody hell, i knew it wasn't that long ago as i remember as a child my brother saying how can a man rape his wife, really shocked at the change in the law and my mum replying, exactley.
agreeing with him!

outrageous!