One thought on “MenNeedToBeHeard: “Unpaid Labor? No Sweetie — It’s a Dishwasher, Not a Coal Mine.””

1. He says that when he was a house husband for a couple of years he “got the job done”. And that’s the key. I’ve bored readers many times with the many “Time Use Surveys” used by economists. These record both paid and unpaid “work”. They have been doing so for almost a century now. They find that in the most “advanced” nations in fact men to more “total work” than women. This has been so now for 30 years. They find that men orient to work in the house as a “job” to be done as quickly as possible, for instance single men take less time than singe women on domestic duties because they typically get it all done at once rather than weave it into other leisure and social pursuits during a day. Shopping being a good example where men tend to do one big shop for food etc. while women will do the same in a few visits woven in with meeting a friend for a drink or window shopping for clothes or furnishings or “trying” a new speciality shop or taking huge amount of time going to a number of Card shops to choose the “right card” while a man tends to pick one up in the supermarket while he’s doing the “big shop”.

   I was brought up in a single parent family, I and my brother did domestic stuff in the late 1960s and 1970s. When many of the current gadgets were not so affordable. And such stuff did take longer and was much more involved. I also benefitted at my school, a vocational “secondary modern”, from “Domestic Science”. Taught lots of practical skills from cooking from scratch to darning socks and sewing clothes to repair them to ironing and starching clothes. The logic being that some of us would work in catering or hospitality and others would spend time on contracts or for work and would have to “fend for yourselves. My point being unlike some of my contemporaries from the middle classes I met at University domestic chores were no mystery nor anything than needed much time or effort once you knew how to do it in the most efficient way. Too many had no experience and seemed to regard women who did these things as somehow incredibly capable, and believed the tosh about how hard it is.

   Many years later due to my wife’s prolonged serious illness and my elderly mother’s failing health I had to work (in fact with paid two jobs) look after my three small children and do all the domestic chores. I used to joke to the kids that meals were ” Cuisine 1970s Domestic Science” but in fact of course by this time the first decade of this century the house was full of appliances and tools with “programs” for everything. And so though it was sometimes tough in the mornings getting everyone up and to school generally it was perfectly doable. Probably MRAs would be aghast but I think every boy should have Domestic Science lessons, mainly to “demystify” this whole thing (as well as make efficient use of all modern aids if on their own) as I still find men who believe their wife is “busy” when in fact the task is simple, easy and frequently done by a machine.

   In recent years I suspect the feminists have cottoned on to the truth from the time surveys, and the “lived experience” of many men looking after themselves and others. Because now they make a big thing about “emotional work” which is not really defined and therefore not measurable. Because anyone looking at the actual data can easily see that generally in the affluent “west” the time spent working is pretty equal and in Scandinavia and Northern Europe men do more! Its all part of trying to position women as “special” when in fact they are just people, who in the rich countries have lots of choices and in fact plenty of time on their hands (Interestingly in the Time Use surveys women watch a lot more TV than men and time on smartphones/social media and “relaxing” all contrary to what is commonly said in MSM etc)

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