Page 1 of 3 123 LastLast
Results 1 to 30 of 73

Thread: Women aren't nags, we're just fed up

  1. #1

    Exclamation Women aren't nags, we're just fed up

    WOMEN AREN'T NAGS—WE'RE JUST FED UP

    http://www.harpersbazaar.com/culture...nder-equality/

    Emotional labor is the unpaid job men still don't understand.

    By Gemma Hartley

    Sep 27, 2017

    For Mother's Day I asked for one thing: a house cleaning service. Bathrooms and floors specifically, windows if the extra expense was reasonable. The gift, for me, was not so much in the cleaning itself but the fact that for once I would not be in charge of the household office work. I would not have to make the calls, get multiple quotes, research and vet each service, arrange payment and schedule the appointment. The real gift I wanted was to be relieved of the emotional labor of a single task that had been nagging at the back of my mind. The clean house would simply be a bonus.

    My husband waited for me to change my mind to an "easier" gift than housecleaning, something he could one-click order on Amazon. Disappointed by my unwavering desire, the day before Mother's Day he called a single service, decided they were too expensive, and vowed to clean the bathrooms himself. He still gave me the choice, of course. He told me the high dollar amount of completing the cleaning services I requested (since I control the budget) and asked incredulously if I still wanted him to book it.

    What I wanted was for him to ask friends on Facebook for a recommendation, call four or five more services, do the emotional labor I would have done if the job had fallen to me. I had wanted to hire out deep cleaning for a while, especially since my freelance work had picked up considerably. The reason I hadn’t done it yet was part guilt over not doing my housework, and an even larger part of not wanting to deal with the work of hiring a service. I knew exactly how exhausting it was going to be. That’s why I asked my husband to do it as a gift.

    According to Dr. Michele Ramsey, Associate Professor of Communication Arts and Sciences at Penn State Berks, emotional labor is often conflated with problem solving. “The gendered assumption is that ‘men are the problem solvers because women are too emotional,’" she explains. "But who is really solving the bulk of the world's problems at home and in the office?” As the household manager for my husband and three kids, I’m fairly certain I know the answer. I was gifted a necklace for Mother's Day while my husband stole away to deep clean the bathrooms, leaving me to care for our children as the rest of the house fell into total disarray.

    In his mind, he was doing the thing I had most wanted—giving me sparkling bathrooms without having to do it myself. Which is why he was frustrated when I ungratefully passed by, not looking at his handiwork as I put away his shoes, shirt and socks that had been left on the floor. I stumbled over the box of gift wrap he had pulled off a high shelf two days earlier and left in the center of our closet. In order to put it back, I had to get a kitchen chair and drag it into our closet so I could reach the shelf where it belonged.

    “All you have to do is ask me to put it back,” he said, watching me struggle.

    It was obvious that the box was in the way, that it needed to be put back. It would have been easy for him to just reach up and put it away, but instead he had stepped around it, willfully ignoring it for two days. It was up to me to tell him that he should put away something he got out in the first place.

    “That’s the point,” I said, now in tears, “I don’t want to have to ask.”

    The crying, the snapping at him—it all required damage control. I had to tell him how much I appreciated the bathroom cleaning, but perhaps he could do it another time (like when our kids were in bed). Then I tried to gingerly explain the concept of emotional labor: that I was the manager of the household, and that being manager was a lot of thankless work. Delegating work to other people, i.e. telling him to do something he should instinctively know to do, is exhausting. I tried to tell him that I noticed the box at least 20 times over the past two days. He had noticed it only when I was heaving it onto the top shelf instead of asking for help. The whole explanation took a lot of restraint.

    Walking that fine line to keep the peace and not upset your partner is something women are taught to accept as their duty from an early age. “In general, we gender emotions in our society by continuing to reinforce the false idea that women are always, naturally and biologically able to feel, express, and manage our emotions better than men,” says Dr. Lisa Huebner, a sociologist of gender, who both publishes and teaches on the subject of emotional labor at West Chester University of Pennsylvania. “This is not to say that some individuals do not manage emotion better than others as part of their own individual personality, but I would argue that we still have no firm evidence that this ability is biologically determined by sex. At the same time (and I would argue because it is not a natural difference) we find all kinds of ways in society to ensure that girls and women are responsible for emotions and, then, men get a pass.”

    My husband is a good man, and a good feminist ally. I could tell, as I walked him through it, that he was trying to grasp what I was getting at. But he didn’t. He said he’d try to do more cleaning around the house to help me out. He restated that all I ever needed to do was ask him for help, but therein lies the problem. I don't want to micromanage housework. I want a partner with equal initiative.

    However, it’s not as easy as telling him that. My husband, despite his good nature and admirable intentions, still responds to criticism in a very patriarchal way. Forcing him to see emotional labor for the work it is feels like a personal attack on his character. If I were to point out random emotional labor duties I carry out—reminding him of his family’s birthdays, carrying in my head the entire school handbook and dietary guidelines for lunches, updating the calendar to include everyone’s schedules, asking his mother to babysit the kids when we go out, keeping track of what food and household items we are running low on, tidying everyone’s strewn about belongings, the unending hell that is laundry—he would take it as me saying, “Look at everything I’m doing that you’re not. You’re a bad person for ignoring me and not pulling your weight.”

    Bearing the brunt of all this emotional labor in a household is frustrating. It’s the word I hear most commonly when talking to friends about the subject of all the behind-the-scenes work they do. It’s frustrating to be saddled with all of these responsibilities, no one to acknowledge the work you are doing, and no way to change it without a major confrontation.

    “What bothers me the most about having any conversation around emotional labor is being seen as a nag,” says Kelly Burch, a freelance journalist who works primarily from home. “My partner feels irritated and defensive by the fact that I'm always pointing out what he's not doing. It shuts him down. I understand why it would be frustrating from his perspective, but I haven't figured out another way to make him aware of all the emotional and mental energy I'm spending to keep the house running.”

    Even having a conversation about the imbalance of emotional labor becomes emotional labor. It gets to a point where I have to weigh the benefits of getting my husband to understand my frustration against the compounded emotional labor of doing so in a way that won’t end in us fighting. Usually I let it slide, reminding myself that I’m lucky to have a partner who willingly complies to any task I decide to assign to him. I know compared to many women, including female family members and friends, I have it so easy. My husband does a lot. He does dishes every night habitually. He often makes dinner. He will handle bedtime for the kids when I am working. If I ask him to take on extra chores, he will, without complaint. It feels greedy, at times, to want more from him.

    Yet I find myself worrying about how the mental load bore almost exclusively by women translates into a deep gender inequality that is hard to shake on the personal level. It is difficult to model an egalitarian household for my children when it is clear that I am the household manager, tasked with delegating any and all household responsibilities, or taking on the full load myself. I can feel my sons and daughter watching our dynamic all the time, gleaning the roles for themselves as they grow older.

    When I brush my daughter’s hair and elaborately braid it round the side of her scalp, I am doing the thing that is expected of me. When my husband brushes out tangles before bedtime, he needs his efforts noticed and congratulated—saying aloud in front of both me and her that it took him a whole 15 minutes. There are many small examples of where the work I normally do must be lauded when transferred to my husband. It seems like a small annoyance, but its significance looms larger.

    My son will boast of his clean room and any other jobs he has done; my daughter will quietly put her clothes in the hamper and get dressed each day without being asked. They are six and four respectively. Unless I engage in this conversation on emotional labor and actively change the roles we inhabit, our children will do the same. They are already following in our footsteps; we are leading them toward the same imbalance.

    “Children learn their communication patterns and gender roles (kids can recognize 'proper' gender behavior by age three) from a variety of people and institutions, but their parents are the ones that they, in theory, interact with the most,” notes Dr. Ramsey. So if we want to change the expectations of emotional labor for the next generation, it has to start at home. “For parents, this means making sure that one spouse does not do more of that type of labor than the other. Speaking in terms of how emotional labor is currently divided, girls will hopefully learn not to expect to have to do that labor and boys will hopefully learn not to expect females to do that labor for them. Children watching parents share that emotional labor will be more likely to be children who expect that labor to be shared in their own lives.”

    I know it’s not going to be easy for either of us to tackle the splitting of emotional labor, nor do I ever expect it to be completely equitable. (I’ll admit that I probably enjoy certain types of emotional labor far more than my husband, like planning our meals and vacations.) I’m also more skilled at emotional labor on the whole because I’ve had my entire life to practice it. But if we’re lucky, he’s got a whole lot of life left to hone his emotional labor skills, and to change the course of our children’s future. Our sons can still learn to carry their own weight. Our daughter can learn to not carry other’s.
    Another mark of a tyrant is that he likes foreigners better than citizens, and lives with them and invites them to his table; for the one are enemies, but the Others enter into no rivalry with him. - Aristotle's Politics Book 5 Part 11



  2. Remove this section of ads by registering.
  3. #2
    What a Nag.
    Never attempt to teach a pig to sing; it wastes your time and annoys the pig.

    Robert Heinlein

    Give a man an inch and right away he thinks he's a ruler

    Groucho Marx

    I love mankind…it’s people I can’t stand.

    Linus, from the Peanuts comic

    You cannot have liberty without morality and morality without faith

    Alexis de Torqueville

    Those who fail to learn from the past are condemned to repeat it.
    Those who learn from the past are condemned to watch everybody else repeat it

    A Zero Hedge comment

  4. #3
    Well , yeah really many ladies are nags . Just lack the ability to grasp that men really do not care about some of the same things they do . Men do not understand that because they are not bothered by females lacking interest in what they like .

  5. #4
    I totally lost interest in her plight about four paragraphs in.

    I would not be engaged in a life contract with such a creature.

    I would compare the cost of a cleaning service to that of an asian sexbot rental.

    Heck, I could have both with the cost saved from losing 110-300 lbs of screeching bitch.
    Last edited by sparebulb; 09-29-2017 at 11:07 PM.

  6. #5

    Gulag Chief:
    "Article 58-1a, twenty five years... What did you get it for?"
    Gulag Prisoner: "For nothing at all."
    Gulag Chief: "You're lying... The sentence for nothing at all is 10 years"



  7. #6
    Quote Originally Posted by sparebulb View Post
    I totally lost interest in her plight about four paragraphs in.

    I would not be engaged in a life contract with such a creature.

    I would compare the cost of a cleaning service to that of an asian sexbot rental.

    Heck, I could have both with the cost saved from losing 110-300 lbs of screeching bitch.
    I made it three paragraphs .

  8. #7
    the unending hell that is laundry
    lol... I'm guessing she has a machine.. sorry, unless you are going to the laundry mat or using a washing board, laundry is not "work" except the folding part
    "He's talkin' to his gut like it's a person!!" -me
    "dumpster diving isn't professional." - angelatc
    "You don't need a medical degree to spot obvious bullshit, that's actually a separate skill." -Scott Adams
    "When you are divided, and angry, and controlled, you target those 'different' from you, not those responsible [controllers]" -Q

    "Each of us must choose which course of action we should take: education, conventional political action, or even peaceful civil disobedience to bring about necessary changes. But let it not be said that we did nothing." - Ron Paul

    "Paul said "the wave of the future" is a coalition of anti-authoritarian progressive Democrats and libertarian Republicans in Congress opposed to domestic surveillance, opposed to starting new wars and in favor of ending the so-called War on Drugs."

  9. #8
    Dang. I'm gonna need cliff notes, sorry, thanks.



  10. Remove this section of ads by registering.
  11. #9
    My husband does a lot. He does dishes every night habitually. He often makes dinner. He will handle bedtime for the kids when I am working. If I ask him to take on extra chores, he will, without complaint. It feels greedy, at times, to want more from him.
    Go with your feelings.

    When I brush my daughter’s hair and elaborately braid it round the side of her scalp, I am doing the thing that is expected of me.
    Wrong.

    When my husband brushes out tangles before bedtime, he needs his efforts noticed and congratulated—saying aloud in front of both me and her that it took him a whole 15 minutes.
    Meh.
    "He's talkin' to his gut like it's a person!!" -me
    "dumpster diving isn't professional." - angelatc
    "You don't need a medical degree to spot obvious bullshit, that's actually a separate skill." -Scott Adams
    "When you are divided, and angry, and controlled, you target those 'different' from you, not those responsible [controllers]" -Q

    "Each of us must choose which course of action we should take: education, conventional political action, or even peaceful civil disobedience to bring about necessary changes. But let it not be said that we did nothing." - Ron Paul

    "Paul said "the wave of the future" is a coalition of anti-authoritarian progressive Democrats and libertarian Republicans in Congress opposed to domestic surveillance, opposed to starting new wars and in favor of ending the so-called War on Drugs."

  12. #10
    Yeah, I couldn't finish it either. She took 2,000 words to say what a normal person could say in 3 sentences.
    Last edited by NorthCarolinaLiberty; 09-30-2017 at 04:22 AM.
    Quote Originally Posted by TheCount View Post
    ...I believe that when the government is capable of doing a thing, it will.
    Quote Originally Posted by Influenza View Post
    which one of yall fuckers wrote the "ron paul" racist news letters
    Quote Originally Posted by Dforkus View Post
    Zippy's posts are a great contribution.




    Disrupt, Deny, Deflate. Read the RPF trolls' playbook here (post #3): http://www.ronpaulforums.com/showthr...eptive-members

  13. #11
    My SIL posted this on FB. Yes she nags my brother. I was tempted to say something, but... Well, she's my brother's problem. Not mine.
    ...

  14. #12
    "Emotional Labor" is constantly mollifying Ms. Hormones.

    According to Dr. Michele Ramsey, Associate Professor of Communication Arts and Sciences at Penn State Berks, emotional labor is often conflated with problem solving. “The gendered assumption is that ‘men are the problem solvers because women are too emotional,’" she explains.
    When you call problem solving "emotional labor", then, you might be too emotional to solve problems.

    Walking that fine line to keep the peace and not upset your partner is something women are taught to accept as their duty from an early age.
    It must be opposite day.

    we gender emotions in our society by continuing to reinforce the false idea that women are always, naturally and biologically able to feel, express, and manage our emotions better than men,
    Da fuq?

    The woman is a control freak.
    Yet another reason to stay single.
    All modern revolutions have ended in a reinforcement of the power of the State.
    -Albert Camus

  15. #13
    How many active female posters do we have here these days, anyway?

    I count lily, angela, donnay, carly, charrob, HB, euphemia, cindy (rarely). Lindsey is likely just reading, if she's around at all, because I know she's involved with a local election up here.

    Other than that, am I missing anybody?

    That's 8. Eight. Those are slim numbers. Are they not?

    So, surely, the logical question must be why? Shouldn't it?
    Last edited by Natural Citizen; 09-30-2017 at 07:05 AM.

  16. #14

  17. #15
    Quote Originally Posted by Natural Citizen View Post
    How many active female posters do we have here these days, anyway?

    I count lily, angela, donnay, carly, charrob, HB, euphemia, cindy (rarely). Lindey is likely just reading, if she's around at all, because I know she's involved with a local election up here.

    Other than that, am I missing anybody?

    That's 8. Eight. Those are slim numbers. Are they not?

    So, surely, the logical question must be why? Shouldn't it?
    I think that is about right.
    Pfizer Macht Frei!

    Openly Straight Man, Danke, Awarded Top Rated Influencer. Community Standards Enforcer.


    Quiz: Test Your "Income" Tax IQ!

    Short Income Tax Video

    The Income Tax Is An Excise, And Excise Taxes Are Privilege Taxes

    The Federalist Papers, No. 15:

    Except as to the rule of appointment, the United States have an indefinite discretion to make requisitions for men and money; but they have no authority to raise either by regulations extending to the individual citizens of America.

  18. #16
    Quote Originally Posted by dannno View Post

    When I brush my daughter’s hair and elaborately braid it round the side of her scalp, I am doing the thing that is expected of me.
    Wrong.
    When my husband brushes out tangles before bedtime, he needs his efforts noticed and congratulated—saying aloud in front of both me and her that it took him a whole 15 minutes.
    Meh.
    DW used to get upset if I didn't completely comb-out/fix the kids hair before sending him on his way to school or wherever. Being a man, I problem solved. I talked the kid into going with a buzzcut like his old man. He digs it and likes that he doesn't have to have his hair fussed with in the morning. win.



  19. Remove this section of ads by registering.
  20. #17
    Quote Originally Posted by Natural Citizen View Post
    So, surely, the logical question must be why? Shouldn't it?
    Limited government conservatism, minarchism, liberatarianism, anacapism, the very concept of liberty and freedom, do not appeal to most people.

    But women, especially, do not want this.

    Terabytes of polling data and analysis backs this up.

  21. #18
    What struck me about this particular princess, was the fact that she makes it a point to announce how she runs the house and "manages" everything...and then breaks down into a crying hissy fit when she has to...manage something.

  22. #19
    “The spirits of darkness are now among us. We have to be on guard so that we may realize what is happening when we encounter them and gain a real idea of where they are to be found. The most dangerous thing you can do in the immediate future will be to give yourself up unconsciously to the influences which are definitely present.” ~ Rudolf Steiner

  23. #20
    Quote Originally Posted by Natural Citizen View Post
    How many active female posters do we have here these days, anyway?

    I count lily, angela, donnay, carly, charrob, HB, euphemia, cindy (rarely). Lindsey is likely just reading, if she's around at all, because I know she's involved with a local election up here.

    Other than that, am I missing anybody?

    That's 8. Eight. Those are slim numbers. Are they not?

    So, surely, the logical question must be why? Shouldn't it?
    True , we may not have many but they are great . I am thinking maybe a dozen . Euphema , Working Poor , Suzu....... We do need Suzanimal & Lucille back........
    Last edited by oyarde; 09-30-2017 at 07:58 AM.

  24. #21
    Quote Originally Posted by donnay View Post

  25. #22
    Quote Originally Posted by specsaregood View Post
    DW used to get upset if I didn't completely comb-out/fix the kids hair before sending him on his way to school or wherever. Being a man, I problem solved. I talked the kid into going with a buzzcut like his old man. He digs it and likes that he doesn't have to have his hair fussed with in the morning. win.
    You could always go the other direction to get out of combing.


  26. #23
    Today's feminist are nothing more than misogynist with boobs. The hate is equal, unfortunately.
    “The spirits of darkness are now among us. We have to be on guard so that we may realize what is happening when we encounter them and gain a real idea of where they are to be found. The most dangerous thing you can do in the immediate future will be to give yourself up unconsciously to the influences which are definitely present.” ~ Rudolf Steiner

  27. #24
    Quote Originally Posted by donnay View Post
    Today's feminist are nothing more than misogynist with boobs. The hate is equal, unfortunately.
    Women know each other, that's why they can't stand each other.



  28. Remove this section of ads by registering.
  29. #25
    Unless I engage in this conversation on emotional labor and actively change the roles we inhabit, our children will do the same.
    No. Your son will end up identifying as a female and wearing a dress. Check mate, ya harridan.

    “For parents, this means making sure that one spouse does not do more of that type of labor than the other.
    My car needs it's oil changed. Oil and filter is in the shed. The lawn needs a mow, but first the blades need sharpening. I'll do the laundry and make us some sammiches.
    Last edited by phill4paul; 09-30-2017 at 09:08 AM.

  30. #26
    Quote Originally Posted by Anti Federalist View Post
    Women know each other, that's why they can't stand each other.

    And men don't?
    “The spirits of darkness are now among us. We have to be on guard so that we may realize what is happening when we encounter them and gain a real idea of where they are to be found. The most dangerous thing you can do in the immediate future will be to give yourself up unconsciously to the influences which are definitely present.” ~ Rudolf Steiner

  31. #27
    Quote Originally Posted by donnay View Post
    Today's feminist are nothing more than misogynist with boobs. The hate is equal, unfortunately.
    This
    #NashvilleStrong

    “I’m a doctor. That’s a baby.”~~~Dr. Manny Sethi

  32. #28
    It is true wbout emotional work, though. I am required to have a running inventory in my brain of every item in this house. We live small, but it is quite a load to carry.
    #NashvilleStrong

    “I’m a doctor. That’s a baby.”~~~Dr. Manny Sethi

  33. #29
    Quote Originally Posted by euphemia View Post
    It is true wbout emotional work, though. I am required to have a running inventory in my brain of every item in this house. We live small, but it is quite a load to carry.
    How is that emotional?
    All modern revolutions have ended in a reinforcement of the power of the State.
    -Albert Camus

  34. #30
    Quote Originally Posted by otherone View Post
    How is that emotional?

    Everything with a female is emotional...
    Pfizer Macht Frei!

    Openly Straight Man, Danke, Awarded Top Rated Influencer. Community Standards Enforcer.


    Quiz: Test Your "Income" Tax IQ!

    Short Income Tax Video

    The Income Tax Is An Excise, And Excise Taxes Are Privilege Taxes

    The Federalist Papers, No. 15:

    Except as to the rule of appointment, the United States have an indefinite discretion to make requisitions for men and money; but they have no authority to raise either by regulations extending to the individual citizens of America.

Page 1 of 3 123 LastLast


Similar Threads

  1. New York City’s Plastic Bag Nags
    By Suzanimal in forum New York
    Replies: 8
    Last Post: 05-24-2016, 07:45 PM
  2. Replies: 72
    Last Post: 08-04-2015, 05:39 PM
  3. Replies: 273
    Last Post: 01-21-2014, 08:30 PM
  4. Texas state troopers caught on camera probing women's privates aren't isolated incidents.
    By Anti Federalist in forum Individual Rights Violations: Case Studies
    Replies: 7
    Last Post: 08-09-2013, 12:49 AM

Posting Permissions

  • You may not post new threads
  • You may not post replies
  • You may not post attachments
  • You may not edit your posts
  •