Pensioner advertises for nude cleaner creepy story

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www.bathchronicle.co.uk/Regional-news-pensioner-advertises-local-shops/story-26589897-detail/story.html

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Have name changed as I try not to link my location with my usual posting name.

Have just seen this on my Facebook feed from my local paper. So some dirty exploitative bastard wanting a naked cleaner warrants a jaunty little cartoon and some dodgy innuendo.

And I stated in a follow up post that a card advertising a lap dance service in your own home would have been a closer analogy. So not sure why you are busting out the shouty caps.

So hang on, this man is looking to hire a sex worker, but doesn't want to pay sex workers' rates. He also wants to control how much other sex work this worker does (i.e. none), and openly discriminates on the grounds of gender, age, and attractiveness. And none of this is exploitative? partial, in that case I'm sure you'd be happy if your wife or daughter took up this kind of work, right? I'm told it's really empowering.

I don't think so either, TBR. Recognising that there are socialisation reasons that mean more domestic cleaners are women than men may be a feminist issue, but that's not the same thing.

The woman who tried, and failed, to make me feel guilty about having a cleaner was also a counsellor for a rape crisis centre.

She droned on about feminism throughout a Sunday afternoon tea party thrown by a friend to absolutely no-one's interest. Fortunately she was there as someone's partner and they have now split up so have not seen her since.

I agree this is sex work. My reservations about prescribing it are it seems less exploitative than stripping in a club (where the woman is leered at by anyone and everyone )or prostitution where physical contact is made.

Ah, a RL proclaimed feminist, Lass?

Lass and Yonic - the trouble with domestic labour (and I've done a fair bit over the years, including cleaning) is it can be very hard to keep up professional boundaries. After all, you're working in people's homes. Some clients are very nice, they make you coffee and even give you lunch. And some people seem to confuse cleaning with wifework and before you know it, they're asking you to tidy up, do their taxes, look after the children, play marriage counsellor etc etc. I don't know if people do this to men, but I really doubt it. And you get people marching into your workplace in their underwear, cleaning their ears while they're talking to you and generally behaving as if you're part of the family. But you're not. You're not part of their family, you're there to do your job. And a lot of clients (whether you're a PA to self-employed clients or a cleaner) seem to forget that. Which is part of what makes this "job" offer so exceptionally creepy. I'm sure you're both great employers and I'm not saying it's unfeminist to employ a cleaner, far from it, but I do think that domestic work is a feminist issue as well as an employment issue.

Lass and Yonic - the trouble with domestic labour (and I've done a fair bit over the years, including cleaning) is it can be very hard to keep up professional boundaries. After all, you're working in people's homes. Some clients are very nice, they make you coffee and even give you lunch and chat to you like you're a proper person. And some people seem to confuse cleaning with wifework and before you know it, they're asking you to tidy up, do their taxes, look after the children, play marriage counsellor etc etc. I don't know if people do this to men, but I really doubt it. Plus you get people marching into your workplace in their underwear, cleaning their ears while they're talking to you and generally behaving as if you're part of the family. But you're not. You're not part of their family, you're there to do your job. And a lot of clients (whether you're a PA to self-employed clients or a cleaner) seem to forget that. Which is part of what makes this "job" offer so exceptionally creepy. I'm sure you're both great employers and I'm not saying it's unfeminist to employ a cleaner and that you should feel guilty, far from it, but I do think that domestic work is a feminist issue as well as an employment issue. #notallpeoplewhoemployadomesticcleaner

Yikes, sorry for the double enormous wall of text!

Thanks swan. I am always out when ours come ...

The very best sort of employer...

Well I hope it is the norm. I generally had my employers hovering around all the time (they were generally self-employed) - plus their partners, children and friends of children if I was really lucky.

OK partial, instead of a woman, you turned up to the job and it was a big hairy bloke who wanted to watch you and occasionally have you pose for a good long leer - would you do that for 20 quid an hour? Is it sex work now?

The power differential isn't just about money, it's also about physical size and lifelong socialisation

Good point pickle.

Swan, if I'm ever home, I'm working and shut myself in a room/go to a coffee shop. Why aren't your self employed employers getting on with their work?!?

i don't have a cleaner, I do have a nanny - I've gone out and got a desk in a shared office because I didn't want to cramp her by loitering around the house. She assured me it was fine and wasn't weird, but still - I want her to know I totally trust her.

And this is someone I would consider a friend, our eldest sons are best mates (hence me asking her to be my nanny for me), someone my kids will happily run to for a hug and a knee rub.

I'd do the same for a cleaner - find some way to excuse myself for a couple of hours. No-one wants to be watched while they do a job like that, let alone leered at for a measly double pay.

Yonic - that's all a thing of the past as I no longer work as a cleaner. But do you think I should have asked my employers whether they had no work of their own to do? I think the whole "you're part of the family" thing might have died a sudden death. Along with my job.

Rider - yes, that's just it! That is exactly what the man advertising for a sex worker/cleaner is openly announcing he wants to do. It's a shit combination of domestic work, sex work and constant surveillance thrown in.

Ah, no, I don't think you should have said that I just wondered why they weren't getting on with the stuff they clearly needed to do!

Well, it might have been boredom, procrastination, poor space/time management. It might have been misplaced politeness. Or the desire to make sure I was doing the job properly. Or perhaps it was my mesmerizing way with a mop . But I think a lot of people were under the impression that they were paying me for my time, not necessarily my labour. And so if they wanted to chat or have a moan, then I had to be there to listen. So many service jobs have that element of unpaid emotional labour, where just doing the job isn't enough. You have to talk, listen, agree with your clients, be smiley and cheerful and pretend you're actually interested in your employer. My best friend is a hairdresser and she says that that is the most strenuous aspect of her job.

Sorry I've completely derailed this thread with swan's tales of mindnumbing tedium, but I think it is relevant. In some ways, the kind of "job" described in the OP is the logical next step in how people see female domestic workers - the boundaries between workplace and the home, between professional and non-professional relationships are so easily tampered with, it leaves workers especially vulnerable to emotional and sexual exploitation.

I did have a nanny too. I'm not sure how the nanny and cleaner interacted as I was always out.

There was I'm sure an arty farty French film on a similar theme as this scenario a few years' ago but googling hasn't located it.