Is it ever acceptable to hire a cleaner?

[Dances]

The fucking Guardian, where 'sex work is work' calling out women for using cleaners.

God I'm so depressed with these arseholes

mobile.twitter.com/guardian/status/1236572475154223105

My cleaner does a great job doing the things I genuinely don't have time for.
Turns out, after working all day at her job, she doesn't want to clean her own home. So she also employs a cleaner.

My grandmother took a minimum wage job at a discount shop so she could hire a cleaner, she hated housework.

I have chatted to a woman I know about this question more generally, and her perspective was interesting. She grew up in a country where everyone, including professional women, were expected to do their own housework, hiring a cleaner would have been socially unacceptable. She still felt uncomfortable with the whole idea and thought there was significant value in people being directly responsible for the non-glamourous work associated with their own existence. I can see that POV, it can be easy to take for granted that kind of work. On the other hand for middle class people, most probably still have to do the bulk of the daily work of that kind, it's really only the wealthy who can completely turn that kind of thing over to someone else.

Yes. You can be a feminist and employ a cleaner, a nanny, a childcarer.

However, the issue of middle and upper class women succeeding, partially on the backs of low paid working class women is a real one, and although it upsets many to speak about in the feminist movement, and isn't a popular topic for discussion, the conversation needs to be had.

I find it's a blind spot in most people's feminism.

However, the issue of middle and upper class women succeeding, partially on the backs of low paid working class women is a real one, and although it upsets many to speak about in the feminist movement, and isn't a popular topic for discussion, the conversation needs to be had

This is how the whole capitalist system works though. I'm not saying I agree with it, but the issue about women employing cleaners comes up far more than the existence of bin men or factory workers or other lower paid work.

Bollocks. Utter bollocks. If it isn't clear to whom I responding, it is Jane.

There is a huge range of skills and abilities in the work force. Offices need cleaners, typists, clerks, admin staff at various levels etc, etc. etc, all of whom support the people at the top of the pyramid who are the ones whose work brings in the cash.

You might as well accuse all of those people of succeeding, partially on the backs of low paid working class people.

The bottom line is if push came to shove I could do these vital but lesser skilled jobs, but the employees in these roles could not do mine.

I would concede some respect for what Jane has posted if it were from a Communist/ Marxist/anti- capitalist point of view that no one should be paid more than anyone else (still as an economic theory bollocks but at least not hypocritically only applied to women)

Perhaps jane but as a person who is def working class, dragged up by myself, I would have no problem paying other women to clean my house.

I would pay anyone I employ well.

Good cleaners are hard to find. 12-15 an hour is common.

I think the abuse previously is more if a class issue than a cleaner issue

Should it upset me to pay my window cleaner? Same rate of pay, same job but outdoors...one is a man, the other is a woman.
I sort of see your point, but equally, the cleaner chooses this work, it's more than minimum wage, flexible around other commitments, etc.
Different jobs attract different pay. I don't think the way we pay (as a society) necessarily reflects the value of different work and a large part of that is down to patriarchal values.

This is how the whole capitalist system works though. I'm not saying I agree with it, but the issue about women employing cleaners comes up far more than the existence of bin men or factory workers or other lower paid work

Exactly. Argue for the end of capitalism if you (general you) want. Personally I don't have a problem with capitalism- it's not as if the alternative has ever worked, but it is utterly hypocritical to focus on women who are successful in the way Jane has done.

12-15 an hour is common.

I'm a TA I'm way under that, where's the article about homeschooling ?

I would do it, if I found I couldn't work where I am. Same as I would drive a taxi, cut grass, work in a checkout, whatever.

Nothing fucking wrong with honest fucking labour.

It's the arses that won't pay honestly for honest fucking labour who are the fucking problem.

WTAF?
I was a cleaner until I had to give up work due to disability.
I now have a cleaner, she's been with me for three and a half years and has become one if my closest friends.
She's self employed and makes a good living.

Panic
Nothing stopping you changing jobs. Personally I'd rather clean lavs all day than deal with 5 years olds all day.
And of course that job deserve es better pay, but market forces etc...

I did say it was an unpopular topic of discussion! I've been round this one before.

Pink collar work, mostly done by women, is undervalued and underpaid. There's a pay gap, actually, between the bin man and the cleaner. This is feminism 101 - women's work is devalued in comparison to men's work. We can all acknowledge this happens, right? We are on a feminism board, so presumably no-one is going to dispute this? Only last year, my own union had to fight for pay parity between a (99% female) occupation and a (99% male) occupation which had been classed at the same level for decades.

Given that pink collar work, including domestic cleaning, aged care, childcare, is historically and currently undervalued as work done by women, feminists CAN employ these workers privately while retaining a sense of feminist ethics if they make sure they are the kind of employers who don't inadvertently reinforce the pink collar gap.

I don't care how successful you are as an individual, if you are paying your cleaner or your nanny or your nursery worker what is objectively sht for dealing with your or your children's sht, or their conditions have not been considered by you in the light of the ongoing devaluing of women's work, then you are not employing as a feminist.

It's feminist, for example, to lobby and act for better pay for nursery workers. It's feminist to pay other women a living wage. Doing that already? No drama. Not doing it? Ok. But also not feminist.

Cant hiring a cleaner be a good thing? Paying a woman money for working hours that work for her and enabling her the freedom a wage brings?

I dont have a cleaner btw but would rather like one.

Idid say it was an unpopular topic of discussion! I've been round this one before

I think that unless you couple your argument with an anti- capitalist/ pro- Marxist argument it is not so much an "unpopular topic" as a profoundly anti- women and irrelevant topic.

Good cleaners round here charge £13 pH minimum. They're well respected and can pick and choose their clients........a lot of micro businesses have sprung up in the last few years. Women who started off cleaning to make a bit extra have found they're bloody good at it and have gone on to employing other people.

There is absolutely no shame in cleaning. Or employing somebody to clean for you.

Cant hiring a cleaner be a good thing

I've cleaned myself. I actually quite like cleaning. I think its acceptable to employ a cleaner. I'd like a cleaner too, but I'm not in a position to employ a cleaner for a living wage. So I do my own cleaning.

It's not a choice, however, that is somehow outside feminism. That's just libfem choice bullshit.

You can be a feminist and employ a cleaner (who is more likely to be female) if you bring your feminist ethics to the act of employing her.

Many women don't.

Considering the issue of how we, as feminists, treat our female employees, is not somehow outside the remit of feminism.

That women's work is devalued, and that some women are complicit in that devaluing is neither anti-woman nor irrelevant.

As for pink collar work........an unskilled labourer on a building site will only earn minimum wage. Out in all weathers with little respect from the skilled workers.........I know what I'd rather do. And it doesn't involve ending up up to my tits in mud. 💁🏻‍♀️

There is absolutely no shame in cleaning

I didn't say there was. I've cleaned. It's a lot more dignified than plenty of other work. I'd quite enjoy cleaning again.

I'm not here for conversations which deny there is a historical and current undervaluing of work that is done mostly by women.

That's a conservative talking point, not a feminist one.

Employing your own cleaner doesn't happen in a social, economic or ethical vacuum.

So what you are saying Jane is that unlike men, women also have to think about how feminist they are are in paying women for doing jobs that they, as women traditionally do. To pay another woman is unfeminist and until they, a woman, have enough money to pay another woman a 'feminist' rate, they are non-feminist to pay another woman for a traditionally female job task.

It's a fucking wonder we have got anywhere at all.

Who the fuck did you think would start it all? The women with a little bit of power, or those with none at all?

What has hiring a cleaner go to do with feminism?

We have a cleaner but me and DH both used go clean. In an interesting twist my cleaners DH comes and does generally diy handyman type stuff too. Should either of us feel guilty?

You should flam

DH, not so much

Feminism isn't pick and choose, Dances.

Yes, in a capitalist culture, individual women can choose to make non-feminist choices that suit them best. Just because it's their choice, doesn't make it feminism.

Personally, I feel that men should also be held to a feminist standard re female labor.