Why do I struggle with the thought of having a cleaner?

[Flightattendant]

I deliberately didn't put this in aibu as I know it could get heated if I did...I don't want that to happen.

But for a while I have been feeling socially and perhaps ethically uncomfortable with the idea of people having their house cleaned by someone else.

I would really appreciate a discussion about this from all angles, because part of me feels I must be being ridiculous, there are good reasons for this situation etc but another part finds it quite objectionable...

I know several people who do employ a cleaner, and know that they also struggle with the concept in different ways - and have also taken in this kind of work for a friend of the family so have seen it from both sides in a sense...

but I have never, and would never, want someone (especially a similar-aged person) to come into my home and do the kind of jobs I don't particularly enjoy, for whatever reason - unless I was physically incapable of maintaining a basic standard of hygiene myself.

Can anyone help me sort this out in my head before I go all communist about it please and start to rant at strangers

I think you have to recognise that you can only view the job of a cleaner as demeaning, if you find cleaning demeaning - which it isn't.

I think it probably stems from an old culture of sevice in the UK in particular where servants lived downstairs and didn't mix with their betters upstairs.

Butthat is gone and is not what constitutes a cleaning job now.
My cleaner is a hard working young woman who hires a friend to help her, produces a great schedule, invoices, a tariff and turns up promptly and generally conducts herself in the same manner as the guy that comes to treat my lawn or the plumber who mends my boiler.

I can understand a subconcious discomfort IYSWIM. But to be honest, if we view plumbers cleaning blocked shit out of our toilets as professional tradesmen, but privately view our cleaner as a skivvy, I think we are in danger of perpetuating the notion that women do servile jobs in the home.

I take care of my house and i pay a cleaner, a decorator and a gardener. They areequally valued and equally professional in my opinion. I certainly wouldn't clean the garden a bit before the gardener turned up out of shame. Why so the housework

This is it though Pag.

Most of those jobs take some fairly serious training in order to do them...I have unblocked a few drains in my time, but wouldn't know how to do it properly if there was a serious problem. Nor would I be much cop at professional decorating...I am happy to do my own to my own fairly modest standards but I get it a bit wrong. Gardening also takes some training to get it right...we can all cobble it together if required but we would have less than super gardens unless we knew when to trim things, how to prune, etc etc

Cleaning a toilet...well it's not much fun, but it's fairly easy to do imo. It doesn't require a special skill or talent. And I suppose on those grounds I don't see why someone else should have to do it.

and yes, I do find it demeaning, cleaning after someone else...especially things like toilets or baths. Like blowing someone's nose for them, or worse! The kind of things one might need to do for a child or an elderly person, because they have gone beyond the capacity to do it for themselves...or have not yet learned to.

But to have someone do those kinds of things for me when I know I am able to do them myself, feels very very odd.

No offence, please...some of my best friends have cleaners and I don't like them less for it, especially as they too feel strange about it. Work commitments I think have been the main reason...I don't know, it just seems less justifiable than paying for someone qualified to do something you literally cannot do yourself without ballsing it up.

fair enough Flight.

I still don't really agree as I can't quite find a way to feel bad about giving someone a fair wage and respectable employment. And kiling myself and neglecting the kids to do what they would do quite happily seems irrational to me.
I also think there is a quality attached to it - a professionalism if you will. My cleaner makes my house look better than I do in the same time frame. I know she regards herself as excellent at her job, thorough, efficient and attentive to detail.
I can quite happily clear my own plates away at tesco cafe but don't feel bad when the waiter I tip heavily in a resteraunt does it.

I think we do have an issue with service in the UK

But I do understand your POV. It can be instinct to feel uncomfortable. But I can't shake the feeling that it is doing the people who do the job a disservice

I have a cleaner, a muslim lady who has left her husband. She would be hard put to find another job - she has no qualifications, and though she speaks reasonably good English, cannot read or write it very well. She is glad to have a job and her independence - it enables her to have a home of her own. She claims no benefits, I pay her £12.50 per hour with a bonus at Xmas.

If I told her I didn't want her to come any more because I though it was was demeaning for her she'd slap me up upside the head a few times till I saw sense.

(I clean the loos before she comes though ...)

Thankyou for your equanimity Pag!
I was hoping not to upset anyone - I think I have some PMT going on and my personal diplomacy filter is on high alert

I can see your point of view about people being truly professional about it,

also I feel it is obviously a lifeline for some migrant workers, but we need to be so, so careful in that regard to ensure that they don't end up doing it because - as Mumsnut says - they have no other option.

It is precisely because I don't like doing cleaning that I want to pay someone else to do so.

I wouldn't want to kill and pluck a chicken either - hence I buy them ready done at the supermarket, and tbh give no thought to the people involved in getting them there.

I totally get the 'getting someone else to do my dirty work' aspect of having a cleaner, it is a bit dodgy.

However, if we didn't employ a cleaning lady, I would be doing all the dirty work for DH and 3 kids (again), which is also quite objectionable to me

A big part of the reason I work is so I can afford - and justify - employing a cleaning lady.

I worked as a cleaner part-time myself about 15 years ago, and as long as you are treated with respect (I'd have quit had any of my employers been rude - which never happened) it's actually not the worst job in the world. Not the worst job I've had either

Riven!

You are not on my radar of people who should not have cleaners, whatsoever...if I had thought my mentioning stuff like this would make someone with a physical issue feel bad about having a cleaner I certainly would have stopped myself from posting...not that I want anyone else to feel bad either, but seriously - I hope I was clear that it ony bothers me when people can do it but just don't want to for some reason.

My elderly granny refuses to let my mother do her washing...she finds it too personal a thing, too private...and yet she is in her 80s and not really capable.

Yet people my age think nothing of it...there's something going wrong when people in need of this kind of service are feeling rotten about it, and others just take it for granted.
I'm sorry if I have upset you in any way.

I've been offered some hours for somebody to take care of my youngest, Riven, so I can get jobs in the house done. The fact is I'm bloody knackered looking after her and being up at nights etc etc and would probably just snooze!

I would actually rather the hours went on somebody cleaning for me really, but I don't think I'd be comfortable with it either tbh. I didn't realize social services could arrange it though- or is it on account of your own disabilities rather than your dd's?

I'm a very private person so I can't stand the thought of someone in my house on a regular basis. I think I would be OK as a one off, if someone came through and cleaned. I toy with the idea of an oven clean firm.
In a way I think it is a shame that people just don't have to get on and do it themselves! I think it would do celebrities good to have to wash their own kitchen floors-it keeps them in touch with reality!

Riven I feel for you and you shouldn't feel bad at all!

I wish I could justify expense of a cleaner, currently 26 weeks pregnant and when i go back to work after baby 2 really want to employ a cleaner as one of us ends up taking dd1 out for the morning on a Sat or Sun so the other can do housework! Which sucks! I'd much rather have time to do stuff together as a family!

I used to have a cleaner when i lived in Cyprus she was my landlady I paid her double what the going rate was and always cleaned before she arrived! I think she liked to do it as part of it was being able to have access to the flat to see how it was being looked after

However her and her husband used to come in when I was at work and do stuff without me knowing (I came home from work early one day and caught them) ....

Pisces, I lived in fear of our oven until I found this kind of pink cleaning paste in a tub, and a wire grill cleaning brush...did the glass door brilliantly and much fun

The inside bit I leave as it is supposed to do itself

but all a cleaning firm would do is come and squirt Mr Muscle inside it, leave for half an hour then rinse I expect. And they might not do it as well as you wanted them to - I am prob just a perfectionist and would get really fed up if someone didn't clean properly!!

Pisces/Flightattendant no need to fanny around with the oven cleaner the best oven cleaner on the market imho is

www.lakeland.co.uk/oven-mate/F/keyword/oven+cleaner/product/4972

Sorry don't know how to do fancy links! basically brush on leave for 30mins or so (no smell so can be done with DC in house!) come back and wipe clean, litterally!! ! I used kitchen towel to wipe it off my 5yr old oven that we had from day one looked like new when we moved house because of this stuff its great! best thing is it doesn't smell like Mr Muscle or any of the heavy smelling ones

Its sad that I love Lakeland I know but I can't help it they have some ace products

There is nothing demeaning about cleaning. I have done it loads of times when I was a student and liked it way more than other "unskilled" jobs such as factory work - better environment, better pay, can just listen to your walkman (this was pre-ipod), much less repetitive. There are loads of jobs I wouldn't want to do, but it doesn't mean that they are demeaning to those who do them. There are people who clean up after you the whole time, even if not directly employed by you.

I remember once when I started working after Uni, I was chatting to one of the cleaners at a client's office. She asked me what I was doing there, and I explained that we were the auditors and what that was. She said "God love, that must be so boring. I couldn't do your job." Then she went back to unloading the dishwasher for the eightieth time that week. It's horses for courses.

Interetingly, in many Asian cultures you are considered "bad" not to employ a cleaner/driver etc if you can afford it because many people rely on these jobs being available. It's seen as a bit socially irresponsible not to have one.

Good Lord it's not unethical to have a cleaner. Just be a fair and respectful employer.

Hard to have in the house though. Don't expect her to be a mind reader because you are too shy to tell her what to do and feel it would come across as being bossy.

Flight: if you need a cleaner, you need a cleaner. You can still do your own toilets to make sure she's not actually cleaning up other people's poo. But your cleaner can do everything else.

Arctic you are right about Asia. There is surprise and and disrespect at not having at least two people in the house.
In Asia it's unethical not to have a cleaner.

flight I totally get your thing about paying someone to clean your muck.

I have employed one twice and felt very uneasy about it. It never really worked out anyway as they were not very good!

As an aside, my second cleaner also worked for a friend , and......smacked my friend's son! (group GASP)

I gave her the polite heave ho after that

I really do think it is no different than paying any professional person to do anything for you.

Are you lot really mucky?!

I agree with the 'paying for a professional' line and am convinced that it IS sexism that makes us think 'women's work' is demeaning/less valued/whatever. Flight, I see what you said to pag about gardening/painting/plumbing/etc being different because they require some skills - they do, but not that much (and I speak as someone who plumbed their own bathroom in with no experience at all). I think they are seen as more skilled because men do them, not because they require more skill. Maybe you see your paint-job as not up to professional standards and so would get someone in to do it for you - but I would see some people's attempts at cleaning their own houses as not up to professional standards either. It's just that this type of work 'should be natural' for women, so it's 'wrong' to get someone in to do it.

I have a cleaner twice a week from an agency and I don't worry about having someone to do the cleaning jobs I don't have time for. I respect it's a job for her.