Women and Men: some issues

In My Humble Opinion
1

I started thinking about this while reading Wildest Bill’s thread about whether or not to put the toilet seat up or down. This seemed to touch a nerve with me and some of the other women who posted there.

Sam Stone brought up the fact that there may be other issues involved when people are upset about the toilet lid, or how the toothpaste is squeezed, etc. I think he is right (about that part of his post).

The Central Minnesota area where I live is considered to be, for the most part, quite conservative, and somewhat behind the times (by my way of thinking) politically and socially. Many of the women I worked with in a factory for many years thought nothing of going home after working all day, and then making supper, taking care of the kids and doing all the housework, while the hubby sat in front of the television (a few of them actually read the newspaper). Some of these women did the outside work also, such as the gardening and mowing the lawn.

My first ex-husband was somewhat like these husbands. We got along pretty well when we were first married, because I was young and stupid and didn’t mind doing all the housework even though we both worked full time. It made me feel like an adult (I was 21 when we married).

After we started having babies, I simply could no longer keep up. When I asked him for help, he refused. I asked him if he thought it was fair that we both worked full time (and for at least half of the ten years we were married, I out-earned him) but did not divide the housework. He replied, “I don’t care if the house is clean. If you want it clean, clean it yourself.”

The toilet seat was an issue in that marriage. There were other issues also, but it sort of boiled down to being a power struggle. He seemed to feel that because he was the man, he was the king of the house and I, as the woman, should obey him.

My dad, who is in his seventies, thinks that the women’s liberation movement ruined the fabric of this country. He believes that women used to have it pretty good when they stayed home and took care of the men, and Betty Freidan and Gloria Steinem ruined a good thing for us.

I think that times are indeed changing, but it seems to be difficult for those in power to let go of it, or to share it. Some people even want to revoke the 19th amendment.

So here, finally, is my question to the Dopers:

How do you work this out in your own lives, married, living together, seriously dating a member of the opposite sex (or even the same sex, if these issues somehow apply). Do you and your partner have a way of working things out that you feel is fair to you both, or is it a constant power struggle, a one-up-man-ship contest?

[slythe, I hope this belongs here and not in Great Debates. I’ll let you be the judge.]

2

Oooh, tricky question, Spider Woman, this is something that has been hashed and rehashed the entire time I’ve been with my husband.

Standard Disclaimer: I Love My Husband Very Much

I am a stay-at-home mother, and as such, I fully expect to do 95% of the housework. However, it gets on my last goshdarn nerve when Hubby does not do what little bit I expect him to. For example: I am more than willing to do the dishes, but I am not willing to pick them up from wherever he’s left them around the house. I do the laundry, but I don’t think I should have to go through every nook and cranny in the house looking for his dirty socks.

I see this as a respect issue, he tells me that he just “forgets”. I don’t think he realizes how much extra work he is creating for me…I did not choose to stay home because I love housework, I stay home to spend time with our son.

I’ll say this, perhaps if he could “remember” to rinse his icky facial hair, shaving cream scum and toothpaste out of the sink every morning, I might “remember” to be in the mood more that 2.5 nights a week.

Suffice it to say, that we have not completely worked through this problem.

3

A friend of mine who lives around here used to work full time. When she discovered that her husband expected her to do all the traditionally “wimmen’s work,” she told him “If I hold an outside job, you are helping with the housework.”

They solved this by her staying home to be a housewife and mother, and he has the job outside of the home. Eventually, they found they needed more money, so she began doing daycare in her home. He still stuck to the original agreement, and she still had to do all the housework.

Their kids are all grown up now, and I must say, her husband has grown up too. He stopped being an idiot and realized what a gem of a wife he has, but it was a gradual process. I admire her for having more staying power than I did, but I feel that she lost much, too.

I guess everybody has to pick their battles, but it seems like every married couple I talk to has some of these issues.

4

I would also like to add that I am training TinyTot to be different, but it would sure help if his father would set a better example.

This makes me so mad! You just described the family that I grew up in. And as I start taking on more freelance assignments, things had better change around the Tot household…grrrrr. I will be anxiously follwing this thread, trying to find ways to solve this problem.

(BTW, I would like to give a big raspberry to Redbook magazine for publishing those articles on how to get hubby to help with the housework. “Let him do it his way” they say. Don’t they know that husbands like mine take these magazines to the bathroom with them, trying to find pictures of boobies? Hubby reads that and thinks “Gee, I’ll just do things to my standards and then I’ll get wild monkey sex”. Umm, no. Do I get credit for half-assed work? Hell no. If I did things to his “standards” we would have all died from food poisoning or dust asyphiation a long time ago. I see their point, but these things should only be discussed at our top secret women’s meetings, not in a magazine that they’ll let anyone buy.)

Sorry for my rant - today is Fall Cleaning Day. :slight_smile:

5

I’m glad to hear that TinyTot may have a different outlook on things. Unfortunately, if he sees his dad not helping with things, he might have more of a tendency to slip into his dad’s ways if/when he marries (sorry to sound cynical), because of his dad being his main male role model.

The trick I heard some men telling each other at the factory where I worked: when you are asked to do something, do it so badly that they’ll eventually get tired of asking you to do it, and do it themselves.

The magazine articles like that bother me, because I don’t think men should have to be manipulated or tricked into doing what’s right. But those articles apparently sell magazines.

[tatertot, what kind of freelancing do you do?]

6

I think I might have painted MisterTot in a much more negative light than he deserves. He’s bad, but all in all he’s a good man. We do have to work on this issue, but it’s nothing I’d divorce him over.

Women’s magazines suck.

I do a little big of everything, actually. Mostly marketing, but since jobs are so limited here (and I don’t have a work permit), I find myself doing things all sorts of things. Right now, I’m translating French porn flicks into English. Go ahead, make a joke, everyone else has.

7

Uh, ladies, 'scuse me. I just gotta jump in on this one (and I suspect that it’ll be a popular thread). Sure, there are differnces in the way that men and women operate, but damn, ain’t that part of the mystique? Here’s my opinion, and it may seem a bit simplistic, but I think that most of us fail to choose wisely when selecting a mate. Blinded by lust, needs, desires or mind-altering substances we end up saddled with a mate or SO with whom we have very little in common. Having made this error it is only natural to allow little things to loom larger and larger as we search for justification to get the hell out of a lousy relationship.
Relationships of any type are hard work. As a single father with a 17 yo daughter living with me I have been required to make more adjustments than a chiropractor with an office next door to gym. It’s all about about compromise. I think that we make the man/woman issue way too complicated. Venus? Mars? Bullshit, we’re all from the same planet and wasting time searching for convenient excuses removes the focus from the real problem. Usually it turns out that we are our own worst enemies and fail to realize just how much power we have over our lives.
That’s the way I see it; what are your views?

8

Who did/does the housework in the relationship from whence the 17 year old daughter came?

I agree about differences being interesting. I just don’t believe in abuse of power, or doing (or not doing) something just because you know you can get away with it, as was the case in the marriages described to me by my factory co-workers.

I grew tired of arguing with my first husband over lots of issues, and I also grew tired of cleaning up his messes. He now lives alone, and his apartment is filthy, and he is a lonely man. But if that had been the only issue between us, I may have been willing to put up with him.

Thanks for your input; this is an issue for both men and women.

9

I don’t know any of the parties in question here- MAYBE the men in question ARE just lazy slobs who ought to pitch in and do more housework. Certainly, many men DO fall into that category.

BUT…

It appears that, even when women are working full-time, they STILL expect the house to look as if June Cleaver were home cleaning it every day. They THEN start resenting their husbands for not doing their “fair share” to create that Cleaver-esque household.

SOME men are just lazy. But just as often, men don’t see a NEED for a toilet so clean you can eat out of it!

Isn’t it possible- just possible- that women should accept a certain level of imperfection in their households, rathering than simmering at their husbands?

10

I think you have a good point there. Anyone looking at my house would tell you that I am not an immaculate housekeeper, but in this area there are many women who are, so that may be a bone of contention in those households.

But there are other “house cleaning” chores that simply must be done, such as laundry, and cooking, or people will wear dirty, smelly clothing, and have nothing to eat. And there are many men who refuse to have anything to do with these tasks also, even when both the men and women work full time.

11

Actually, thus far, it is not a problem. I am more organized than he is, but he likes things clean and does a fair share. As far as when we’re married and who’s doing what chore, we’ve mentioned that the inside of the house will be my forté and the outside (gardening, lawncare, etc) will be his. This doesn’t mean I won’t do any of the outside work, or that he won’t lift a finger inside. He is not the type, thank God, to sit on the couch while I cook dinner and then clean it up. When I do cook, he likes to help out–both in the cooking and cleaning up. We see it as a partnership…equals…both responsible for the mess we make. A certain amount of give will be necessary; I, the more anal one, will have to learn to live with a little more clutter, and he, the “casual” one, will have to learn to be a little more organized. Just a little meeting-in-the-middle.

12

Ruffian, that is lovely. I wish there were more guys like DeathLlama around, and maybe there will be for my daughters’ generation. Happiness to you both.

-----:slight_smile:
—////\\

13

I shared my first apartment with my on-again-off-again (now permanently “off”) boyfriend Éric. He was completely anal-retentive about housework. I didn’t know how to explain to him that the Pope wasn’t coming for mac and cheese tomorrow, so we ended up having some very large fights.

14

Well, me and Jim sorta share the work. If he has the day off and I’m at school, then he does all the house-work. If I have the day off and he’s at work, then I do all the house-work. If we are both off together, we divvy up the chores. (Me: You clean the kitchen, I’ll do the laundry. Him: Why don’t you clean the kitchen? Me: You are the only one who knows how to do it right, Dear.)
We rarely have fights about it. Though, no matter what, I always cook dinner. I know, I know, I should just teach him, and then he can do it too. But I’ve come to to the conclusion that no matter how patient I am, he will not learn to cook. It doesn’t bother me though.
FTR, he always puts the toilet seat down. His mother trained him well, I didn’t even have to nag him about it. And thankfully, neither one of us have issues over the toothpaste.

15

Lola and I seem to have it worked out because neither of us are traditionalists in any sense of the word. With me working 50+ hours a week and with her going to school we just do what has to be done when we have the time.

I get up in the moring and while Lola gets ready for school I make the coffee and help her get her stuff together. When it gets cold I’ll be going out to start the van and wipe the snow off in the mornings. (There is a remote starter in our future). After she leaves for school I get the boys up and get them ready and out the door to school. By then the girls are awake and there’s a baby who needs to be changed, fed, bathed, and cuddled. Our other daughter is three and is gettting almost too self sufficient. If the girls are content I can usually get the house picked up and get my stuff ready for the day. When Lola gets home I head for work. When I get home there is more stuff to do and I usually get the kids to bed so that Lola can work on homework…

I know men who are simply amazed that I cook, clean, and do laundry. These are generally older guys who had wives that stayed at home while they worked.

Don’t ever say that I “babysit” my kids. Moms don’t babysit and neither do dads.

I put the seat down and freak out when people leave clothes lying all over the place or mess up the bathroom.

Note: Our house always looks like a cyclone went through it even if it was cleaned five minutes before.

I just consider this the way men should be and don’t see myself as being unusual.

16

:::hooks thumbs in belt, assumes a prideful stance:::

“Ya shoor, our Minnesota vimmen, dey know dere place.”

Too bad I’ve never met any of 'em. :slight_smile:

In those instances that I’ve shared accomodations with a woman, housework/yardwork gradually evolved into each person assuming the duties that the other person disliked the most. For example, I hate washing dishes, but I don’t mind doing laundry. I don’t enjoy vacuuming, but I like to keep the bathroom clean. The ex- was not a good cook, and I am, so I did the cooking alot.

The biggest problem we had was after our son was born. I was working full-time, and she was staying home. In my mind, since she was staying home and could sleep during the day, she should be the one who got up in the middle of the night. She didn’t agree.

One more thing, I don’t need to be told that the lawn needs to be mowed. I can see that. It doesn’t, however, mean that I’m going to mow it this minute. Telling me, repeatedley, that it needs to be mowed won’t get it done any sooner. It can wait until this weekend.

17

I am glad to hear that there is more sharing in the younger generation of relationships, although I guess there will always be disagreement as to how clean or neat or well kept a residence needs to be.

What makes me sad is when people use an established power structure to justify what they want to do, even if it may not be right, as some men in this community do in invoking the old saw “That’s wimmen’s work.”

To paraphrase an Oskar Schindler quote from the death penalty thread, just because you have the power to do something, doesn’t make doing it right.

And some old power structures don’t die easily.

18

Same here. Mr. Scarlett leaves for work around 6:30 am and gets home around 6 or 7 pm; I’m self-employed and work at home. The house is generally on the sloppy side – but we’re in a perpetual state of construction/remodeling, and there’s just no keeping up with the dog hair.

The cooking is done by whoever has the most energy at the end of the day. Sometimes that’s both of us – and sometimes it’s neither, and we go out. Luckily there are no kids in the equation (and there won’t be, knock on wood). Same with housekeeping – although I must say I have relaxed my standards on how Mr. Scarlett does things, which is perhaps a good thing given my perfectionism. So now I don’t care if all the dishes don’t get done at once – at least some of them are clean now. Although I wish he would give the stove and sink a wipedown when he’s done.

We split the bills – he pays some and I pay others, and there’s no joint checking account. His income is roughly 1-1/2 times mine, so he pays about that share of the bills or perhaps a little more; OTOH, I tend to get paid in big chunks, so I often buy big-ticket items like appliances, furniture, and lumber. I also pay for most of our concert tickets and vacations.

He feeds and waters all our pets – one house dog, two yard dogs, six outside cats, and two cockatiels. He says it’s the farm boy in him – he can’t rest until the animals are taken care of.

**

We use a Laundromat. Mr. Scarlett sorts the laundry (minus my hand wash, which is considerable and which I do myself) at home and usually I go along to help load the machines. He does the final determination of dryness – he’s more fussy and doesn’t want his shirts fried. We learned this when we moved in together and it’s been status quo ever since. I help fold.

Once when he was sorting dry clothes, and I was asking him what was OK to start folding, I noticed a late-20ish chick watching us as she did her wash, her mouth slightly agape. I think she was stunned that he was running the laundry show.

We both put the seat and the lid down to keep the dog out of there.

Mr. Scarlett was the youngest of seven children, and his three next-older siblings were sisters. He grew up surrounded by women, and he also saw his mother and all three sisters get shafted by jerks. Consequently, he truly understands us (mostly) and respects us. He’s also kind to children, animals large and tiny, and old people.

Yes, ladies, I realize that I’ve got quite a catch. He’s a prince!

19

I would be interested in hearing from some people, if there are any at the SDMBs, who are currently in a relationship where both partners work full time, yet one of them ends up doing most of the housework while the other one relaxes. Is that mostly a Central Minnesota phenomenon?

Viewpoints from both sexes would be interesting to hear.

20

What younger generation? We’ve been married seventeen years (and did not marry young) and I do most of the laundry, most of the dishes, vacuum the carpet, and cook several times a week. It’s no big deal. My dad and mom were the typical he-works/she-stays-home couple of the 1950’s, and dad always helped with the cooking or cleaning when mom needed the help.

I cannot remember even discussing “division of labor” or anything similar. One does what needs to be done.

We have had occasions where I was doing all the housework and child-tending, but since those occasions coincided with my wife suffering an emergency appendectomy, a detached retina, or multiple broken bones, I generally don’t hold them against her. (My next wife may need to be a bit more durable, however.)