the paddling pool

[Alameda]

get your flotation aids here (don't look at me though, I genuinely can't swim)

No I don't it's believe biology. The means of production has sidelined women to the home and created the division of labour as part of our shared evolutionary development.

In early societies before we settled the land women were active participants in all social relations including all forms of labour. Anthropologists and historians are finding out and evidencing that women were hunters as well as gatherers. When we first settled the land many societies were very equal between men and women, women made a lot of the major dicisions, partly because we were better at supplying food. Men could not wage war without our active support. It was only when we developed better farming methods much later that women were confined to the domestic sphere. The patriarchy was born out of the fact that a division of labour was created when we were able to make a surplus which could be traded for other commodities. This is when women lives became lived in isolation and women became dependent upon the patriarch as provider and she as child bearer and domestic/private labour. A division of public and private life gave men power over women.

Now women are returning to the public sphere under advanced capitalism, not just to further our own aims as individuals and as women but because the social conditions under which we live means that businesses are using globalisation and the movement of global capital to exploit cheaper labour, we are it! this is evolutionary too.

Sgb - but it is very often a woman cleaning up your shit. We can't just ignore that and often women from the most disadvantaged backgrounds and education as well. Yes you can go some way to redress this by paying well above minimum wage, but the fact remains it is predominantly women who are cleaners and carers and these roles remain very low status, because basically anyone who has other choices doesn't have to do them.

Mini, does that mean that the patriarchy did not-start with oppression of women as the intent but that this has simply become a product of it as it evolved ? Do you think it took power or that women gave it up or is that too simplistic ?

Emphaticmaybe: Thing is, the shit has to be cleaned up by someone so I think it's better that whoever cleans it up gets a wage for doing so.

Mini- So it could have gone either way then. It was simply the efficiency of farming techniques allowing the same to be produced by 1 instead of 2? So if not our child bearing why did we take the domestic role and not the men? Was it just down to physical strength?

I don't believe women or men "Started Patriarchy" we did, all of us as part of our evolutionary process. Women were relieved (for want of a better word) of their public lives because we were needed to bare children, children that came under the direction of the patriarch in working the land to create a surplus that could be exchanged for other commodities and to make wealth.

Men as public peoples created the wealth, formed social hierarchies, much later guilds and councils for trade later on they formed governments. This put them at the heart of power and influence over all spheres of life, social and private. Thus it has remained ever since.

You have a point I think that's the idea of good socialism - I just think male or female we have a responsibility whenever we can to clean up our own shit then no-one gets lumbered with all of it, but like I've said up thread it's a bit emotive for me so I may not be seeing the issue clearly.

Louie that's my take on it too. I work f/t and my male dp does the majority of the child care and house work. I don't see myself as a feminist just someone who thinks people should have equality. I do find the feminist sections interesting though!

Mini- yes I can see the work would have been gruelling and women may have welcomed the respite but I presume they were bearing children all through this time too - they didn't stop working a long side men just to have children. Sorry just trying to get my head around why we were pushed into the domestic sphere after being in partnership. Sorry if being dense.

The equalist argument

I think it's a total fallacy that feminists don't want equality. I've never met any who say they are looking for women to take over and run the world or even do the very many horrible things that men do to women. Feminists want equality. Being a feminist doesn't mean you don't want equality.

SGB, who cleans up the cleaners' shit? Do they get paid for it?

I'm not having a pop at anybody who employs a cleaner, or who works as a cleaner. Doubtless cleaners (and carers, childcare workers etc.) would rather have the job than not. We all do what we have to to get by in a system which doesn't work in our interests. I do think it's important though to talk about who ends up doing the vast bulk of this poorly paid or unpaid work - women - and why that is.

But the majority of sewerage workers are men. Are they oppressed?

I have got to say this thread has been very interesting and has definitely answered some questions that I have been too afraid to ask.
Eatsbrains Thankyou for taking the time to explain so much, although I don't know where I stand on all of it you have explained it in such a way that at least now I know what questions I am asking myself

Ok, re the cleaning, I have been a cleaner, never felt oppressed or looked down on. I appreciate I was probably lucky with my employers but I was definitely made to feel they were lucky to have me and they never stopped telling me what a difference I made to them. I did tell my DD it was a worthwhile job and that I was proud of my work, was that wrong Also, if I could have picked up a couple of extra cleaning jobs I would have happily then paid for someone else to clean my house. Where does that leave me?

Don't know, Skiing. They earn more than legal aid lawyers apparently. I wonder how many of them do their own housework when they get home and how many of them have a wife who does the bulk of it so they can relax after a hard day's work.

Yes, and I spent several years working as a carer and it's good honest work, as is cleaning. I'm not criticising anybody's personal choice and the last thing I want to do is to devalue this work further. As I said previously, it's among the most basically necessary work on the planet.

It's still important to note that these are massively feminised, low-waged industries because this is still seen as women's work. It's something that usually gets overlooked when we talk about women's increasing career successes - that in order to hold down a career it's still necessary for this work to be done, it's still generally the woman's responsibility to find somebody else to do it and that somebody else is 99 times out of 100 another woman.

Out of interest, would you tell a DS it was a worthwhile job?

Plenty I do tell DS it is worthwhile, but this where I confuse myself, why did I mention DD in my last post and not DS? If I am going to be perfectly honest, looking back (because I don't clean anymore) I made them (DS & DD) know that it was worthwhile because 1 family Icleaned for spent so much time in hospital with their dying child and another family were elderly. So was I still justifying it? Could I have given my DC the same worthwhile talk if the families I had been cleaning for were your "average" family with no added pressures? this is what i am questioning myself about.

I am annoyed with myself for mentioning DD and not DS, why did I do that? My DS is good around the house and has no clue about constitutes "womens work" or "mens work" - if I asked him I know he would say that in our house the man cooks and hoovers and I do the decorating and mowing the lawn. Not sure what I am trying to say, it is all very thought provoking and I am glad that people are talking in simple terms that I can understand, because so many other threads that I have lurked on have gone way over my head. Think I need a "Basic A-Z guide to Feminism"

I've seen a lot of recommendations for The Equality Illusion as a good intro to feminism, although I haven't read it myself.

Sorry going back quite a few posts, but I would talk about the plumber, the solicitor, the builder. So what is wrong with the cleaner? Is it the word cleaner which is really the issue?

And if you are going to employ a clenaer it is better not to use an agency. Women are paid minimum wage, or pennies above and often treated badly. Directly getting a cleaner means that you can make sure their pay and conditions are fair. And as I said i loved being a cleaner for guilty lefty types - as they way overpaid me!

Eats, I think is right on this point about titles and the way we use them and why. The reason we are happy to call a lawyer a lawyer rather than "this is a very educated, well paid and worthy person who practices law" (bit of a mouthful) is because domestic labour and indeed quite a lot of labour within the wider socio/economic sphere is undervalued. If the work is undervalued then the title of those who perform that work is also undervalued. This effectively means that people that perform certain work are devalued.

This is what happens when people are classified under the socio/economic class system. What is interesting is the way we use language in terms of disability, we refer to "John has a disability" rather than "John is disabled"
If we refer to the fire alarm as being disabled, we assume it has no capacity to perform any function when disabled. This is why it is important to use descriptives that do not further devalue someone. The problem with the socio/economic class system is that descriptives are not used because we start from the point that some work is worthy and some work isn't. Changing the language from "This is my cleaner" to "This is a poorly paid person who works as my cleaner" we still have the problem that both terms devalue and will continue to do so until we have a classless society.

I'm not sure where Radical feminists or Liberals stand on this. But if we have a class system then we continue to value people according to the roles performed, irrespective of sex although perpetuating sexism and segregation.

Mini - Radical feminist recognise the class system and the oppression it causes. They just don't think that if the class system disappears that women are going to magically have their position transformed.

Eats: don't you mean "lefties who place a higher value on my devalued women's work than I do?"

This is a great thread - I am learning a lot. Thanks to all contributors.

Can I ask why? I believe it would but other people who want to know more about the radfem perspective might be interested too.

Speverend - Yes I know what you mean. But no I think they just felt very guilty that they had a cleaner. I don't think paying me more than the market rate was from any political analysis. But honestly, I didn't care why they paid me much more than the going rate - I was just happy to have the money!