Wifework- I don't get it...

[louloutheshamed]

I have lurked here for a while and thought I'd try and boost my feminist credentials by doing some reading. So i read delusions of gender which I loved, I felt it articulated a lot I what I feel and experience in my life.

I have moved onto wifework and I'm just a bit baffled by it. It's Fascinating and coherently argued but the thing is I just don't recognise her description of marriage in my own marriage or those of many of my friends and peers. A typical husband as she describes would be generally accepted as a useless sorry waste of space by me and my friends, we just would not accept it. obviously I know these types
Of husbands/marriages exist but they are generally accepted to be crap. So many threads in relationships describe unequal
Partnerships but then there is always virtually a unanimous Condemnation of this behaviour by other posters.

I accept that I am slightly unusual in that I work full time and my husband went pt on the birth of my son. He does huge amounts of what is described as 'wifework' in the book, probably more than me. Moushart often starts sentences with 'I don't suppose there is a woman alive who hasn't experienced this..." and I am Screaming "well I haven't!!"

Perhaps I am the exception that proves the rule but it doesn't feel Like it in my experience. I don't even recognise my parents or in laws marriages in it as much as she suggests...

I also think, having read delusions first, that Moushart relies a lot on 'essentialist' (not sure if that is correct term) differences between genders rather than social constructs. I find it all a bit negative and bitter. When she describes how when she first got married suddenly felt like she had to be a domestic goddess type-??? I just felt like saying 'more fool you!'

Can anyone enlighten me as to what I am missing?

Also I think this was discussed on an old thread ages ago, but women tend to be more houseproud in general because we are brought up to believe that the state our houses are in are a reflection on us personally. Men don't have this same conditioning, in general. The stereotypical idea of a single man's house is messy, it's not expressed as a reflection of his personality or "worth" and he would be less likely to feel embarrassed or apologise for it than a woman might do. I always feel embarrassed to let people in when my house is messy, and it's nowhere near as bad as some single men's houses I know yet they never say "Sorry about the mess" or go around cleaning as people are coming in (as I do and I am really NOT houseproud!)

You see it on here, even - people saying that leaving washing hanging out overnight or in the rain is "lazy" - a man wouldn't be judged for that. Similarly if you went to a woman's house and found that there were no clean plates or cups but she washed one up when she needed one, most people would be shocked or consider this lazy. In a man's house, the same arrangement would be regarded with amusement.

So I think in a way the standards are conditioned. It matters - if you're just considering your own preferences and your standards are low, then they're low. If you're always considering the potential preferences of visitors then your standards are likely to be very much higher than your own personal preference.

I have never encountered anything like that tbh. I do think its probably because Im younger. When I met dhs mum she was 39 when we met we spent all our time together drinking and playing with the xbox. I would of thought she was nuts if she had said that to me.

That took me about 3 hours to write (kept getting distracted) so the conversation has probably moved on, sorry...

the daft thing is, MIL always worked full time whilst her husband finished at 3pm and went straight to the pub

she used to get in from work and start peeling potatoes without even pausing to take her coat off

she admits now it was madness but she was brainwashed and indoctrinated and took a long time to accept that it didn't have to be like that in the next generation

she thinks I am fab now, of course and applauds my "assertive ways" as she calls them

AOF imagine it rhyming with "Privet hedge" or the privilege being a ledge that people stand on and don't notice what difficulties the people below are in (or, perhaps,they can see some of the suffering/difficulties far out off the edge of the ledge, but don't realise that this extends underneath and behind the spot that they are above, also)

I believe that people who study how oppression works in all sorts of different contexts find that it's most efficient when you get people to believe that they really do just happen to want to do x, and that wanting to do x makes them inferior. It's the exact same pattern with women's appearances - we're constantly told that it is shallow to care about how you look, and we're also constantly told that women do care, a lot.

If you started a thread on AIBU now asking 'who judges women for [insert activity] and is [insert activity] a bit shallow really?', you would get at least some responses insisting that women are their own worst enemies, and women judge other women, and we're very shallow to care.

This same pattern will hold whether it's about housekeeping, or social relationship stuff like sending thank-you cards or organizing parties, or appearance, or whatever.

All of these things are big money spinners, too.

So, effectively, there is pressure on women to prop up a sexist, capitalist system whilst also feeling shit about it, and believing it's all our own fault really.

How old are you, petey? I think I was 8 or 9 when I realized this sort of thing was a crock of shite, but I grant, I did have a fairly extreme case of it to watch in my parent's relationship, as I've said.

I do also think, however much I think I've cracked it, there's always something that catches me out. I've had threads on here where I was in tears trying to work out why DH was doing what he was doing. That's not because he's like, OMG, the worst man evahhh ... it's just because we don't escape social conditioning by wishing it were so.

Another lurker here who has just signed up. :)

My relationship bears no resemblance to the Wifework depiction either, and I wouldn't tolerate anyone who expected me to do more than my fair share. My OH is a fantastic chef and we share out the housework between use. If others do more than their fair share, then more fool them for letting some lazy swine take advantage of their good nature.

I completely agree with the person who pointed out than men are described as ''helping'' with housework when it should be about doing half of it. As for ''babysitting'' their own children... don't get me startedon that idiotic term.

Yoni, that is most enlightening, thank you (in more ways than one)

I am a good speller, I have a blind spot for certain words though

perhaps it's the ones that stick in my craw that cause me the most difficulty, who knows eh

Or you could realise air freshner ads etc are made by marketing conpanies and if any of your mates are in your toilet judging your toilet they are probably a bit batty and need to get out more.

If you anything like me and dh then your friends have been around since you were partying three days straight, ate last nights cold pizza off the box and the floor, and used every single plate in house and were eating supernoodles out a pan with a spatula andso they arent really going to be bothered now.

Lrd Im 29 and dh is 28.

I think it is true that people have different expectations and standards. A lot of it is based on their own childhood experience. In our household I am responsible for organising everything and take the lead with childcare / entertaining. My dh does all the housework and cooking (and I mean everything). It's because we have fallen into a pattern of playing to our strengths. We're both happy as I hate housework and he isn't very good at entertaining the kids. We both work fulltime which makes it easier to split as neither of us has time to do everything.

I doubt it's your age, TBH, then. I think some people just come to it later than others - which is not a criticism, or me suggesting you're naive or privileged (I struggle to spell that too AF) - it's just different people are different.

I'd say enjoy it while it lasts! Why not?

Same here. I couldn't spell privileged for ages. Still can't spell horiffic. My spellchecker keeps trying to correct it to "Triffid" . One of my beloved old English teachers used to remind us how to spell certain words by drawing cartoons and the habit stuck.

I always want privileged to have a d in it.

Sorry come to what later?

priveliged

fuck

privileged

who would think I used to win spelling bee week in week out ...

Yoni Is the state of our houses a reflection on us personally, or a reflection of our personalities?

It's a bit like the clothes we choose to wear, and actually all of our appearance that we present to people. Consciously or not, we think that we are betraying or displaying our character traits with our outward appearances...and our homes. A slovenly appearance or home is, we fear, indicative of a slovenly mind or person.

In similar ways, generalizing greatly, men don't care so much about their appearances. Either they don't have the insecurity, or the intelligence to make the link, or they just plain don't care.

I think this is part of what's behind this unequal division of labour. Some women just care about things more than men, but because it's a shared space, feel they should be helped to maintain their own higher standards.

Yeah, but kim, it's not wildly likely to be us doing the judging (though I say that, and I do catch myself at it at times).

Thing is, there genuinely are judgy people out there - obviously judgy people, some of whom are family (as AF says), and some of whom are strangers. And yes, to an extent you can just tell yourself to ignore them.

But I think there are also pressures that are subtler and harder to ignore, and that's what I found most interesting about Wifework, that she was talking about how we can't entirely control our perceptions.

I don't think the big problem is the conscious judging.

I think (some) women work harder than they used to and (some) men work less hard. the wifework thing is an issue because it is a way of hiding work. you have visible work - what would once have been called men's work - and invisible work - which would once have been called women's work. In some families (I hear - I don't know any) the wifework is equally shared. In many, the visible work in shared and the the invisible work is done on top, by women.

My grandparents had a very typical traditional marriage. Gpa was a GP, worked hard early and late, but if he had light house calls could sometimes get in a round of golf in the afternoon. Gma worked hard as a dr's wife (which was a job then - receptionist + looking after a big house including consulting rooms)+ garden + bringing up 4 children. but she had help, especially for heavy work and entertaining and always had a rest after lunch. they were happy. then she got very frail in later life. Gpa was retired but very fit and well. He learnt her "job" in order to let her retire. He learnt to cook, he learnt to clean, he learnt to plan and shop (including for big and rather grand dinner parties) and he threw all of his intelligence and energy into it (he had a lot). he had systems for everything; remembering birthdays, rotating food in the freezer, etc. (I am crying a bit now, he was ace)

anyway I think that their traditional set-up enabled him to have respect for her work and when necessary to see how it had to be learnt properly. It was never invisible, he never took her for granted. And when they were both working "full time" in their peak busy years, they both had down time.

I am a feminist. Women need to work, at least to have access to work if they choose to work, because to be economically inactive as a class is to be very vulnerable. but frankly I think we fucked up in taking all all the work. many men - hell, many people- don't even recognise it as work. I'm tired. I have visitors coming on Friday for 3 days and even thinking about what has to be done for that is exhausting me and it is only Monday. how did we get to this?

But women have never been economically inactive as a class. That's the biggest myth ever, surely?

What would happen if women hadn't worked at the wifework?

Wifework is actually a lot easier, in the West in 2013, than it's been anywhere else. I have a hoover and an electric cooker and a washing machine, just for starters.

(I do like 'visible' vs 'invisible' work a lot, btw, I just find 'economically inactive' a crap term because I just don't think it's true at all.)

LRD - yes, but also it is not about judging. some things have absolute value, let alone what her next door thinks. Ironing boxers, not so much; clean shirts and birthday cards, these are nice things. If we all just drop them, in defeat because the fuckers we live with don't bother, isn't that a bit sad? I think the world would be a grimmer place without them, but that doesn't stop me wanting it to be someone else's turn to sort them out sometimes.