Let's talk about cognitive dissonance ...

[colditz]

My relationship with my children's father broke up because he lied about money and hit me, and I finally, after many years of misery, refused to tolerate it. But why did I tolerate it for as long as I did when I was miserable?

I believed that children need their parents to stay together and that I would not cope alone. The facts were that children do not need one parent to be abusing the other, and that my life would have been easier without him merrily fucking it up.

The stress caused by the gap between my own personal beliefs and the reality of my situation was causing an uncomfortable feeling, often described as cognitive dissonance.

Is this the reason that people who consider themselves fair minded nevertheless perpetuate an unfair system? Intelligent women who do all the housework and childcare 'because he goes to work' must see the difference between theirs and their husband's exhaustion levels - why do they accept it, and decide that 'going out to work is really hard' when they surely must remeber the time when they went out to work and had no home responsibilities as being a darned sight easier than the life they live now?

I think it's bcause cognitive dissonance is a very uncomfortable state of being, and if you cannot change your situation, you must change your way of thinking to bring it in line with your situation or suffer the misery of inner conflict.

Which brings me to the rejection of feminism.

Why do so many women reject feminism when it would clearly improve their lot to be treated fairly?

Is it because they cannot easily become fairly treated individuals, not without huge conflict and arguments in their home and at work, so they decide, unconsciously, to believe that they are already treated fairly? And therefore feminism is defunct in their minds.

Intersting.

sorry leaving him with the kids not for!

"MOst men have got lovely cushy jobs, long boozy lunches, earning triple figures"

Not in the real world Sakura! When DH came out of the Air force 15 years ago, he did 12 hour nights in a freezer/cold store warehouse, just to enable us to get a mortgage and he was the one who had to get up to pick up DD from school as I was working full time in a shop and he took care of her all weekend while I was working too.

He's always worked damn hard and done his fair share of childcare and housework, none of his jobs have been cushy and it's only the last 3 jobs that have been anything approaching highly paid, nowhere near triple figures though!

I don't know many families where it's any different tbh, all the dads we know pull their weight and all the mums have to work, in fact I'm the only person who actually has the luxury of choice, I don't have to work, as it is I only work ( a very cushy and well paid council job) for 14 hours per week - DH still gets the hoover out or cleans the loo if he sees it needs doing.

As for nursing being the most dangerous job, I don't think it really compares with being on IED work or on patrol in Helmand province.
My husband did bomb disposal in the 1st Gulf war so I know what I'm talking about - he was a Raf armourer, first in, last out of any dangerous situation, they were the ones to stay behind to blow up the airfield should the shit really hit the fan - now that's real danger. I'm not belittling nurses/ambulance crews/police etc. but there is no comparison, these days you are just as likely to get thumped working behind a till as you are working in A and E.

Men who are "businessmen", who are at the office 60 hours a week and who only see their children for an hour a day to pat their heads - that's not the real world for the vast majority of us.
Most people do shift work, through necessity not choice, probably opposing shifts to facilitate childcare between couples, if they're really lucky the grandparents are on hand to help.

Footlong's description of life bears no meaning to most working people's reality - I don't know of any family set up even remotely similar.

Exactly malifience a lot of feminisism in this sense is seen as silly as it is an upper middle class thing. Most people arent worrying about things like this as they are both muddling along and have hard aspects that they have to do so work as a team. Obviously some men are idiots and wont help but more often than not this is evident before you have kids with them so its the womans fault for putting up with it.

(I am not talking about DV etc but cases where the man never did anything before kids and then women expect him to do a complete turnaround after kids!)

The vast majority of couples I know both work, do the childcare and the cleaning and everything else and its not a big deal. Its just life and as long as you both compromise is not a problem. If you are incredibly busy on certain weeks then lower your standards I like a tidy house but I have had certain weeks where the place looks like a bomb site but so what? Its not all the time so neither of us worry about it and then we share it out at the weekend when things calm down a bit.

My husband and all the men I know look after their kids on their own. My husband wouldnt even bat an eyelid if I went away and he had to look after a load of kids and he has done it many times so I can go out and have fun. I would do the same for him and thats what marriage is all about.

Again nursing the most dangerous profession lol!! You again have never been in the military like I have and seen bodies flown back and had to deal with the inconsolable relatives or military personnel that have lost legs, arms, even parts of their penis etc. That is hardly a regular occurence in nursing.

Exactly Sunny, we we extremely lucky to see the start of the "Gumpathon" in New york last Friday - it is in aid of Help for Heroes and the respect these men deserve is endless, all had lost at least one limb and one had lost both legs and an arm to an IED - they are a real inspiration and are treated as heroes in the USA, when they find out you are ex-military in America, they can't do enough for you.

Lets not forget that not only jobs for women are low paid either - almost all essential service jobs are, teaching/nursing/cleaning/customer service/armed forces - men are just as likely to be in a low paid job.
Mumsnet is very guilty of thinking that everyone on here is middle/upper class - I'm very much working class, even though DH is now a senior manager, he values all his staff, from the cleaners up and treats everyone exactly the same, in the way he likes to be treated himself.

I do think that probably the majority of employed men have fairly unenjoyable, hard jobs - working on a dustbin lorry or up a scaffold tower is not particularly cushy (though assault by members of the public less common than if you are a nurse or a sex worker) - and many people's jobs are boring and tiring (shelf-stacking, burger-flipping, most retail work). Working in a call centre might sound like 'easy money' but the pay's shit and you spend most of your time getting called a cunt and told to fuck off (on a slightly flippant note, doing phone sex work from home is no worse and can be better paid...)
But looking after children day in, day out is hard and repetitive too. There's so much wiping - arses, noses, paint off the walls, food off the floor...
And I would have to agree that someone who is on active military service, for instance, or in the emergency services or any other job where being actually killed is a valid risk every day, probably does have it a bit harder than a SAH parent so should maybe get cut a little slack particularly after a bad day.
But sorry, that doesn't add up to 'the SAHparent is the wage earner's servant.'

I think that most women need look no farther than their partner's parental set up to see how things will pan out - it might be a huge generalisation, but if his father sits around doing fuck-all while his mum runs around doing everything, that doesn't bode well for an equal relationship.

Some men are dickheads, some are decent ( the same goes for women), it shouldn't take much to suss out, way before the committed relationship stage. Women have to take responsibility for choosing idiots and then thinking they can change them into decent husbands and fathers.

I think the point that's being made by Sunny and backed up by Malificence is how easy and pleasant life can be when one's partner pulls their full weight. Sunny mentions not having had time to do the washing up all week so collapsing with a pot noodle each - sounds lovely! It does sound like a great life if you can hack it. I couldn't, any more than I could have hacked the military or other tough jobs she's done. But for a strong-minded person who knows what hard work is and what they expect from their partner - and, as she acknowledges, with some luck - life can be good. It should be good, for both partners.

But suppose, rather than sharing a pot noodle and ironing his own shirts, Mr Sunny insisted on a pristine show house every day when he got home and knocked her about if dinner wasn't ready on the table, even if she never knew if he'd be going to the pub first or how long for? Insisted that his wages were his money to drink or gamble away if he wanted, but her childminding money was for them both to live off? Told her every day how f*ing easy she had it, how lazy she was, how fat her arse was becoming, how much more attractive the girls at work or in the pub are? Told her to keep those brats out of the way while he nursed his hangover?

A woman in that position has several options, of course. Cognitive dissonance kicks in when she tries to persuade herself this is fair, that she deserves knocking about, that she has it easy all day while he is doing "real" work, and most of all, that she has no choice other than to put up with it. (Not to mention the biggest myth of all, "he's a great dad"; a totally meaningless phrase, as we have often seen when questioning that line from an OP!)

Sorry, didn't mean to suggest you were slack on the housework, Sunny - just that you both realise it can't always be perfect, but that you'll both work at putting it right as soon as the emergency's over. That's realism and good teamwork.

I'm ever so slightly weary of the tone of blaming women for their DP's being slack.

On the whole, women don't get together with men who don't do the housework and don't pull their weight and decide to change them. As we've heard time and time again, men who stop pulling their weight, tend to do so at the time when the first baby comes along and the mother becomes a SAHM for the first time. Almost imperceptibly, the two fall into roles which are so familiar, so normal and so accepted, that you have to be extraordinarily on the ball and aware of it, like Megonthemoon, not to fall into those roles.

Please can we lose the tone of "oh those women whose men do nothing - they've only got themselves to blame, it serves them right"? It jars a bit, is in danger of looking very smug and seems to me to be just a bit off on a feminist thread - it's very unsupportive to masses of women who fall into this trap, not because they are stupid, or blind or whatever, but because it is an incredibly easy trap to fall into, both for men and for women. The way of making sure that people don't fall into it, isn't to blame them, but to raise awareness of it so that they are forewarned.

Oh and btw Sunny your job is my idea of hell. I am a gibbering wreck after a playdate, the thought of having a load of kids in my house every single day and having to do it, would drive me to the bottle.

Why shouldn't women shoulder take responsibility for the men they choose as partners and fathers for their children? It's the biggest decision of you life and you should know a man inside out before starting a family. I don't believe men suddenly change personalities when they have a child, the clues are probably there from the start.
It is actually their fault if they aren't a very good judge of character - don't people have conversations about what they want in the future and what their views on life are?

If a woman is led up the garden path, it's generally because she wants to be and no, I don't have much sympathy for them.

To be fair Annie, the nightmare situation you describe is hardly the norm and involves an extremely abusive man who has no respect for his wife. Nobody should ever put up with that sort of treatment from anyone and I think for most people no amount of cognitive dissonance will make them truly comfortable in that situation.

I think women are guilty of perpetuating the idea that "women's work" is not valuable to a certain extent and I believe that in a large way feminism, along with capitalism, is to blame for this. What I have fought against for years is the notion that I should value a high-powered career and that I should aspire to be "successful." I think where my cognitive dissonance comes from is when I'm at home washing up or cooking dinner for myself and DH and I realise "I'm loving this." Feminism has drilled into me that this work is not worthy of my (very highly qualified) skills and that by giving in to the role of homemaker I am somehow opting out of success and status. I have had prestigious high-paid jobs where my opinion was hugely valued but when I stayed at home I got huge satisfaction out of a clean house and well-made meals (even though I'm not the keenest cook in the world). I like looking after my husband (although this doesn't extend to washing his clothes lol) and my house and I don't expect to be paid for it. I have to keep reminding myself that wanting to be a housewife is not wrong or a cop - out it's a legitimate choice. Yes some of the work is shit and boring, but that's true of a lot of jobs.

On the subject of cognitive dissonance and feminism I highly recommend a book by Susan Pinker called The Sexual Paradox. In it she discusses the issue of the gender divide in pay and power and in her extensive research she found that while a very low level of actual discrimination exists in the workplace, the divide really exists because women choose not to go for high-powered roles. She interviewed a number of very highly paid successful women and was shocked to discover that a lot of them had taken these high powered roles because it was expected of them, because if they opted for a less stressful more social job (which females are traditionally, and as she found, psychologically attracted to) they would not be "living up to their potential." And many felt this attitude was perpetuated by women as much as men.

Pinker argues that the idea of success in the capitalist world is a male idea - progress up the ladder and earn more. Women, she found, get more satisfaction from social contact and work that has a societal impact. However, many jobs that afforded this social satisfaction have been changed to fit with the male ideal - so nursing has become a degree and has a number of management and specialist levels, and teaching is target-driven with management responsibilities. The change in these jobs has been driven by women, on the understanding that to give these jobs more status you need to make them seem like more male-oriented jobs like business style management. The result has been less job satisfaction for women, more stress and more women leaving these jobs.

I think you can tie yourself up in knots trying to ensure everything is fair and equitable but as I argued before men and women have different priorities and different agendas. I totally agree with Sunny and Mal that it's up to the women (and the man) to choose a partner who respects them and also not to turn housework into a battleground.

Thanks for your refreshingly simplistic take on life Mal. OK, women whose husbands don't pull their weight are all bad judges of character and it's all their own fault.

Can you tell me how that advice analyses the factors in how couples might fall into these traps and how it's supposed to be supportive to women who might be reading this thread and realise that they have gradually fallen into this trap without realising it? What should they do? Accept that they are bad judges of character and therefore conclude that they should divorce their husbands as his lack of housework demonstrates his bad character?

"Feminism has drilled into me that this work is not worthy of my (very highly qualified) skills"

It's not feminism that had drilled that into you. The only feminist I have ever come across who takes that view is Xenia. I have never met anyone in RL who thinks that.

I certainly don't think being a homemaker is a poor choice - it is as valid a choice as any that a man or woman can make in a free society, even if it is not actually so highly valued as other well-paid roles in society are. But I think it has to be something that a woman (usually it is a woman) actively chooses, and she and her partner need to be very clear about what is and is not expected of each party.

So my concern is that I don't fall into the trap of being a homemaker/SAHM/housewife just because it is the path of least resistance - because that is then highly likely to lead to the cognitive dissonance that colditz describes in her OP and is also likely to lead to the higher chance of unhappiness/depression that married woman can feel that was described in another post. So if I am to step away from my career to be at home, I need to ensure that I actively choose that because it is the best thing for me and hence my family, and need to be sure that my husband and I are very clear about what this change in roles means for both of us and not let it slip into something that suits one party (most likely, although not definitely, him) more than it suits the other. Because it is still easier to move from the world of paid work to the world of unpaid work than it is the other way round so it is a big big decision.

And I think this is why I find myself in the somewhat odd position of fighting it before it has happened, so almost fighting against something that may never be - but I would rather do that than find myself having set up a situation that I then need to change, because that will be harder.

You can be a feminist and a homemaker/SAHM/housewife/whatever: I don't think the two are mutually exclusive. But it needs to have been a free choice to take on that role and you need to feel happy and supported and valued fully by your partner, and not feel that you end up just facilitating your partner's and children's happiness at the expense of your own. And if you do find that is what is happening, then you need to be able to get out of that situation rather than feeling trapped - because then as colditz says there is a danger that you bring your thinking into line with your situation rather than the other way round.

So many of these issues are impossible to predict before marriage and particularly children, that while a woman can make every effort to pick a partner she thinks will provide all the support she deserves and needs, the reality may be that problems come to the fore when actually in that situation that you could not have predicted when thinking about it hypothetically while in a state of premarital bliss.

My dh is not like this at all.

He does the lion's share of housework plus macho DIY stuff plus childcare.

Why? Because his fabulously feisty mother taught him to do his own washing/cooking etc from the age of 15.

So he is not only is a domestic god but he also has always intrinsically respected women and their right not to be treated as slaves.

Ps he does sleep til midday most weekends and drinks too much and refuses to feed cat or change litter

i think it's impossible to generalise about whether being a sahp or a wohp is easier/harder. i definitely have it 'easy' atm - dd is in school, so each day i am free to arrange my own time. yes, i do 'waste' time, but then in the eve i am in my busy time, and I see this as me having the ultimate flexi time - so long as dd is cared for, i can fit other jobs around as i want.

however, that still doesn't mean that dh has no responsibility towards the family home, nor does it make me his keeper. i think that's the difficult line to draw in the sand. as an adult, he should contribute to the family lifestyle, but i have a lot more time to give than he does, so how do we stop it turning into me being his carer as well as dd's?

Good question angel. On a practical level I believe each adult or teenager no matter whether they're SAH or WOH should do their own laundry, pick up rubbish, cups, plates etc that they have used, scrub the toilet after using it (if needed), contribute to at least some of the cooking (especially at weekends) and help with planning. I find looking after someone, especially my hugely appreciative DH, very rewarding but at the same time I draw the line at being his personal slave.

and i also wonder how much of it is to do with the attitude - tbh, i'd be prepared to do more for someone who was appreciative & valued what i did, than for someone who trotted out the line, 'but you're at home all day'.

like most of life, it's a fine balancing act. my dh is not great about doing day to day stuff, but he does work v long hours & come home stressed & exhausted. however, if there's a big project going on - decorating, in the garden etc, then he does more of that, so it kind of balances out. you can't just look at each day, but try to get a broad picture of how much people contribute - emotionally as well as physically/financially.

You guys should charge for therapy. I feel so much better now I realise I don't live in the real world and it's all my own fault.

'Mr Sunny insisted on a pristine show house every day when he got home and knocked her about if dinner wasn't ready on the table, even if she never knew if he'd be going to the pub first or how long for? Insisted that his wages were his money to drink or gamble away if he wanted, but her childminding money was for them both to live off? Told her every day how f*ing easy she had it, how lazy she was, how fat her arse was becoming, how much more attractive the girls at work or in the pub are? Told her to keep those brats out of the way while he nursed his hangover?'

I would never have married him so would never be in that situation. My husband proved he would go above and beyond for me before we married. I wouldnt marry a man that didnt always compliment me, tell me he loves me every day, texts me lovely things every day, puts me first, does things for me etc. Same as he wouldnt of married me if I was an idiot either. I would never have kids before marriage so spent many years living with him and then being married to him before trying for kids so I knew what he was like etc.

I knew how broody he was and how much of a family man he was before marrying him. I didnt want a high flyer or someone that wanted a career working long hours etc. One of the most important things for me was how much he loved kids and wanted to be a daddy. He told me this when he was 18 and I knew it was very important.

If you suss out the person before and wait years of marriage and cohabiting before getting to kids then a woman would never get in this situation

What some people seem to be ignoring is the social pressure on women to take care of men. A woman who is single, especially if she is successful in a paid job, is constantly being told that she must be lonely and unhappy really, that she will regret not Having A Man, that 'love' is more important than money. NO ONE TELLS MEN THIS SHIT. And then if a woman has a partner, she's constantly being told that she has to 'work at the relationship', that if she's not obliging and accomodating and understanding (and thin and fashionably dressed and constantly up for sucking cock while she's at it) then she might end up single again. MEN ARE NOT CONSTANTLY TOLD THIS. There might be a certain amount of whining in mens mags or whatever that women 'only like guys with money'/'ony fall for bastards' but this is NEVER presented to men as something that's their fault, that they can put more effort into changing about themselves and that if they don';t put the effort in they deserve to be single.
THe bottom line is that men need women much much more than women need men, hence the long battle for women to gain economic autonomy - if women can earn their own living, they become less and less keen to put up with a lazy, selfish or abusive man simply in return for their keep. Hence the endless peddling of romance (and heteromonogamy) as essential to women.

Yeah yeah blah blah usual disclaimer, plenty of people do form heterosexual monogamous partnerships that do make them happy, there are nice men who pull their weight out there and really abusive ones are in a minority. However, I honestly think the majority of men do feel at some level that women are there to look after them, that housework is 'trivial' (so let the woman worry about it) and certainly many believe that they do far more shitwork than they actually do.

'THe bottom line is that men need women much much more than women need men, hence the long battle for women to gain economic autonomy - if women can earn their own living, they become less and less keen to put up with a lazy, selfish or abusive man simply in return for their keep. Hence the endless peddling of romance (and heteromonogamy) as essential to women.'

I 100% disgaree my parents have been together 40 years and my dad texts my mum to thanks her for all she does and does loads to help. My mum hardly ever has to cook and has never really done much in the last 40 years. That is his thing and he treats her like a princess and she does other things for him and they share it out but make sure they both put each other first.

He does loads for the family and always shared the work and the childcare. He made sure he didnt work long hours as being part of the family is more important and his main ambition is to be a good dad, husband and grandad. I know loads of couples like this and it is the way I am with my husband. I think if you have been brought up in a loving family where being part of a family is way more important than money and status it makes things look different. My parents have decent paying jobs now and a nice lifestyle but I have always known that family comes first and give and take is what makes a good family/marriage.

You sound like you live over the rainbow, Sunny. Lucky you

However, if all the relationships you have ever come across are as idyllic as they sound, then with respect, you're not really qualified to talk about what other women who find themselves in situations htat you don't, should have done about it. You actually need to have come across some of the issues people with less ideal relationships than the one your parents role modelled and which you have, regularly come across.

It's nice to hear about loving relationships though, makes a nice change on MN.

I do come across relationships where they arent idyllic. Like someone I know whos boyfriend cheated on her numerous times, twice right in front of her face and she didnt do anything, regularly called her names and dropped her at the last minute, also was renowned by the whole town for being work shy and lazy. She knew all this but then had a kid with him but now moans about him not helping! Her parents are normal and been together years but she just fell for him and that was her mind made up really.I know quite a few cases like that. So yeah it might be harsh to say but it is her fault for putting up with it.

With respect, you know nothing about what her parent's relationship is like behind closed doors and therefore what expectations she has gained of adult human relationships. Unless you are their family counsellor, you can't possibly have access to the psychological and emotional dynamics going on in anyone else's family.