Traditional roles for men and women

[Xantippe]

I think there’s a basic problem here that anytime we tell a fellow human being, “You’re bad at your job, you spend too much time doing it, you do a lot of unnecessary stuff, and I can do it way better than you,” we significantly reduce the chance that the fellow human being is going to do that thing again, whatever that thing is.

If we want people to keep on doing stuff, we need to be appreciative and to show gratitude.

I strongly suspect that that has something to do with why over the last 100 years or so, women have bolted from the home.

 

[Regina7]

I think there’s a basic problem here that anytime we tell a fellow human being, “You’re bad at your job, you spend too much time doing it, you do a lot of unnecessary stuff, and I can do it way better than you,” we significantly reduce the chance that the fellow human being is going to do that thing again, whatever that thing is.

If we want people to keep on doing stuff, we need to be appreciative and to show gratitude.

I strongly suspect that that has something to do with why over the last 100 years or so, women have bolted from the home.

Yes. But I also think women have bolted from the home because society tells us we are wasting our time in the home. How many times have stay-at-home moms been asked, “Oh, so you don’t work?”

 

[The_Old_Maid]

So what do we know of Adam and Eve’s marriage?

–God made a human, Adam (Gen. 2:7).

–God said that it was not good for Adam to be alone (Gen 2:18).

–God decided to create an azer for Adam (Gen. 2:18). (Trivia note: Some translations spell it ezer, as in “here I raise mine Ebenezer.” Early written Hebrew didn’t have written vowels.)

–God created all creatures and introduced the creatures to Adam (Gen. 2:19), but Adam found nothing among them to be his azer (Gen. 2:20).

–Therefore God created a human azer. The azer that God created was a woman (Gen. 2:22).

–Adam said that this one at last was of his own kind (Hebr.* ish*; Gen. 2:23) and called her Woman (Hebr. ishshah; Gen. 2:23) and named her Eve, meaning, the mother of all living of their kind (Gen. 3:20). It’s possible that this was the closest thing he could do to taking a marriage vow, back then.

–God blessed them. Everyone knows Gen. 1:27, but there is an additional reference.

Gen. 5:1-2

1 This is the book of the genealogy of Adam. In the day that God created man, He made him in the likeness of God.

2 He created them male and female, and blessed them and called them Mankind in the day they were created.

That’s a keeper because it specifically says that God blessed the humans – both man and woman – before the Fall. It also means they are the only humans who ever lived, or ever will live, who could experience marriage in its original blessings and fullness before the arrival of sin. The closest that any of the rest of us will experience is in Heaven, but there won’t be marriage there.

…

Then, the Fall. Eve ate of the forbidden tree and gave its fruit to her husband who was with her, and he ate (Gen 3:6).

A lot of Christians – Paul sometimes sounds like one of them; I always hope it’s a faulty translation when he does – speak as if the woman is responsible for the entirety of the Fall. Well, she was responsible for her part. Adam was responsible for his part. He didn’t have to join in. If you don’t join in, you don’t have to try blame-passing later. (“But everybody was shoplifting!” / “If everybody jumped off a bridge, would you do it?”)

Eve didn’t sneak the fruit into his supper, either. (“Honey, this peach pie tastes funny.” / “That’s because it’s apple. If you have a problem with it, what did you cook?”) Adam saw the whole business between Eve and the serpent, what with Adam being there ("her husband, who was with her" – Gen. 3:6).

Interestingly, Judaism suggests that this is the only proof we have that Adam loved Eve, as opposed to just needing her. If God created one wife, couldn’t God create another one? Instead, Adam chose to die with her rather than to live without her.

By the way, there’s an interesting translational issue regarding azer. Ever since King James, Christians often translate it as “helpmeet” or some other word with connotations of “mate/spouse” and especially with implications of hierarchy i.e. submission. That’s not the original meaning.

Azer is a gender-neutral word meaning “to work alongside.” Translations like “fitting helper” are closer to that meaning. “Partner” is good too, except that it has been borrowed by elements of culture and that has changed it.

Also, at some places in the Old Testament (Deut. 33:26, 29; Hosea 13:9), God calls Himself Israel’s azer or Helper. Does this mean that Israel is the husband and God is the wife? Of course not. It means they’re a team.

Some writers in Judaism argue that the full phrase azer n’gedo means that a wife is a fitting helper in his face. That is, if he is worthy, she is there to tell him, and if he is unworthy, she stands before him to oppose him. This makes a lot of sense, since Christianity believes that one of the purposes of marriage is to have someone who will help you on your way to heaven.

…

Since we don’t have the kind of marriage available to us that Adam and Eve had before the Fall, we’ve been sort of stuck. What was the marriage like before the Fall? It’s possible we weren’t told more than the above because it would be unattainable for us in our Fallen state, even “not perfect, just forgiven” state, and so would make us unhappy.

Alternately, we might not have been told because it’s our parents, and therefore none of our business.

We do know that the Fall fouled up everything it touched, including relationships.

Since we can’t achieve the past ideal, Christianity tries to frame marriage relationships in terms of the future ideal, namely, the love Christ has for the Church, and the love the Church has or ought to have in return. But that’s hard too. Christ the Bridegroom is sinless. The Bride, which is a glorious Church, without spot or wrinkle, is washed in the Blood of the Lamb – but it only stays spotless and sinless in the afterlife. We who are living are in a realm of in-between, where a marriage includes two people who are, at best, not perfect just forgiven. No wonder it’s so hard!

 

[The_Old_Maid]

(Last of 3)

…

On how things got so messed up so badly:

Recently Biblegateway.org added a Jewish translation called the Orthodox Jewish Bible. It has a lot in common with the JPS version, aside from spelling. The JPS is used by Conservative and Reform Jews, and the Orthodox by the Orthodox Jews.

In the Fall, Eve was punished with pain in child-bearing, the rule of her husband, and that “thy teshukah (longing, desire, urge) shall be to thy husband, and he shall rule over thee” --(Gen. 3:16). JPS translates** Gen. 3:16 **and Gen. 4:7 as “thy urge.”

Before Cain kills Abel, God cautions him that “If thou doest right, shalt thou not be accepted? And if thou doest not right, chattat [sin, het] croucheth at the petach [door/threshhold]. And unto thee shall be its teshukah (longing, desire, urge), and thou must rule over it.” --(Gen. 4:7).

In other words – well, not in other words; those are perfect – the Hebrew word for Eve’s relationship with her husband is the same word as Cain’s relationship with sin.

The patriarchy movement isn’t the only group that tries to pass the curses of Gen. 3:16 as the “natural order” of things. It isn’t natural. It’s a description and a consequence, but definitely not God’s original plan and absolutely not a goal. What we have now is the unnatural order, unless we choose to emulate the new relationship of Christ and His Bride, the Church. So do what you like as long as it looks like that.

We Christians don’t read ancient Hebrew, so we miss stuff like this.

Personally I think that explains a lot.

…

On a lighter note, in Augustine’s day there was great consternation over Gen 3:16. The Christians of the day knew as surely as we do that Christ died and rose again, and therefore has freed us, is freeing us, and will free us from sin and death. But they came to the conclusion that because of their interpretation of Gen. 3:16, there would be no women in Heaven. Women would be resurrected and glorified as men. This, then, was why there would be no marriage in Heaven: no women to marry or to be married. The notion was that God would cleanse the redeemed from all vices. Augustine had to patiently explain in The City of God that being a woman is not a vice and therefore women didn’t have to be purged of any “vice” of being a woman.

In other words, in Augustine’s day, people honestly believed that say, your mother, your sister, your wife, and your baby daughter would be turned into men in Heaven. So would all of the female half of the human race who got in. Augustine did set them straight, thank goodness!

 

[white_sheep]

I think there’s a basic problem here that anytime we tell a fellow human being, “You’re bad at your job, you spend too much time doing it, you do a lot of unnecessary stuff, and I can do it way better than you,” we significantly reduce the chance that the fellow human being is going to do that thing again, whatever that thing is.

If we want people to keep on doing stuff, we need to be appreciative and to show gratitude.

I strongly suspect that that has something to do with why over the last 100 years or so, women have bolted from the home.

I would think it has more to do with birth control and wanting or needing more money.

What if the person was trying to show you how to be 5 times as efficient? You gave the standard female answer which is to get mad and leave. A man would listen.

 

[EasterJoy]

…The patriarchy movement isn’t the only group that tries to pass the curses of Gen. 3:16 as the “natural order” of things. It isn’t natural. It’s a description and a consequence, but definitely not God’s original plan and absolutely not a goal. What we have now is the unnatural order, unless we choose to emulate the new relationship of Christ and His Bride, the Church. So do what you like as long as it looks like that.

We Christians don’t read ancient Hebrew, so we miss stuff like this. …

If John’s account of the washing of the feet at the Last Supper and Our Lord’s admonition to the disciples when they got wound up in who was the most important doesn’t make it perfectly clear that a Christian should not feel himself or herself above doing any task or taking on any role, I don’t know what a better understanding of ancient Hebrew is going to do for somebody.

To place yourself in a position where some work is beneath you is not the mind of Christ. It is just that simple.

 

[Sarcelle]

I would think it has more to do with birth control and wanting or needing more money.

What if the person was trying to show you how to be 5 times as efficient? You gave the standard female answer which is to get mad and leave. A man would listen.

If I knew how to do a job five times more efficiently and I would like to teach someone the technique, the last thing I want to say is that the person who is doing that job is bad at it and I could do it better. I would phrase it in such a way as wanting to help but I would not dream of demeaning someone. What good would it do?

I have worked as an engineer for 15 years and if I were to say something like that to my coworkers most of whom are male, they would get defensive and then mad. How do I know? I’ve seen management do that to them and yes they got mad.

 

[The_Old_Maid]

If John’s account of the washing of the feet at the Last Supper and Our Lord’s admonition to the disciples when they got wound up in who was the most important doesn’t make it perfectly clear that a Christian should not feel himself or herself above doing any task or taking on any role, I don’t know what a better understanding of ancient Hebrew is going to do for somebody.

To place yourself in a position where some work is beneath you is not the mind of Christ. It is just that simple.

I strongly agree. I hope I didn’t give the impression otherwise.

BTW, the Augustine link is a little late, but here it is on why women won’t have to be turned into men to get into Heaven.

 

[Xantippe]

Yes. But I also think women have bolted from the home because society tells us we are wasting our time in the home. How many times have stay-at-home moms been asked, “Oh, so you don’t work?”

That’s essentially the same thing, I think.

 

[EasterJoy]

I strongly agree. I hope I didn’t give the impression otherwise.

BTW, the Augustine link is a little late, but here it is on why women won’t have to be turned into men to get into Heaven.

No! Sorry, I meant to add on to what you are saying, not imply you were saying otherwise! I only mean that it does not take advanced scholarship to see this point. The deeper you go, the more you see it has been there all along!

 

[Xantippe]

I would think it has more to do with birth control and wanting or needing more money.

What if the person was trying to show you how to be 5 times as efficient? You gave the standard female answer which is to get mad and leave. A man would listen.

As Sarcelle points out, nobody likes to be told their job. It’s a very delicate operation to tell somebody that is doing something how you’d like them to do it instead.

Women get told all the time (and quite correctly) that if we want help at home, we need to let our husbands do things their own way, even if it’s not the “right” way. I’ve been married for 17 years now, and this is really one of the most essential skills that any married person of either sex can learn–standing back and letting our spouse get on with a job, even if it’s not exactly the way we would do it.

On CAF and elsewhere, you often see people talk as thought feminism was as inexplicable as a bolt from the blue, but I more and more think that lack of appreciation and lack of gratitude played a substantial role in getting it going.

This is not feminism precisely, but I have an example from my own family of how domesticity breaks down. When I was at the end of high school, my family started a business. It was a thrilling and formative experience at the time and I worked in the business summers throughout college and even after coming home from working overseas. During those years, every summer the store did better and better and on a really good day, my dad would hand out $100 bills at the end of the day as bonuses. However, there was a dark side to the business in our family’s life, namely that the thing took on a life of its own, and ate our family’s home life. We went practically overnight from a set-up where my mom was at home to one where she was mostly at the store. Previously, 99.99% of house chores had been done by some combination of my mom, my sister and me. But, after the store opened, all three of us were suddenly much less available to do home stuff (laundry, dishes, dinner) and my dad never stepped up to do more. In fact, we were all much less interested in doing so. The store was where the money and the praise came from–there were no cookies or praise available for doing the normal home stuff that needed to be done no matter what, and you weren’t going to get paid for laundry or doing dinner. In addition, my dad had always been very critical of my mom’s housekeeping and cooking–I can’t recall him ever praising her for doing anything around the house–he was always noticing what she hadn’t done.

There was a real lack of work/life balance and years after I left home, it was more and more visible how serious the lack of balance was–boarderline hoarders type situation at home while the store was pretty pretty. They seem to have pulled out of that, thank goodness, but it’s the clearest example I have ever experienced of what happens when home and home work is not valued, and how easy it is for domesticity to disappear when it isn’t valued.

 

[Xantippe]

Here’s an example of the now traditional “let him do things his way” advice.

huffingtonpost.com/melinda-blau/dear-family-whisperer-5-s_b_5678645.html

 

[The_Old_Maid]

No! Sorry, I meant to add on to what you are saying, not imply you were saying otherwise! I only mean that it does not take advanced scholarship to see this point. The deeper you go, the more you see it has been there all along!

It’s interesting that you mentioned Jesus washing the feet of the Twelve as that was today’s sermon topic. (Before I forget, here are two commentaries that also make your point.)

Anyhow, our pastor tied this incident to the incident in which the disciples argued about which of them would be the greatest Mark 9:30-37. Their argument seemed perfectly reasonable to them until they had to lay it out before Jesus. Note that He did not criticize them. Instead He brought out a child to help them gain a fresh perspective. (Children often prompt us to re-examine our priorities.) In like manner, the disciples settled down and got comfortable at the Last Supper, until Jesus took the dirty work upon Himself to wash their feet. Their behavior – waiting to be served instead of serving – seemed reasonable to them until Jesus showed them something they considered unreasonable, even scandalous. And yet that is what right relationship with God and each other can look like.

It occurred to me that someone might think I was calling good marriages “unnatural,” and that was what I’d mistaken your follow-up post to suggest. What I meant was that the curses laid upon the no-longer-sinless Adam and Eve were not what God had created them to experience, and so their cursed lives and the legacy we inherited from them were in that sense unnatural.

Also, the world adds on many false beliefs and customs. Since the world’s ways are not God’s ways, that also makes the world’s ways unnatural.

Sometimes people blend these two flavors of Wrong to give Adam’s sons a reprieve but not Eve’s daughters. (If you can’t see the second article within the first article, here it is.

I simply meant that Christ has cured the curse of sin plus Christ has overcome the world.

On a lighter note, here’s a tongue-in-cheek discussion of the afterlife for half of the human race. (“Women: maybe you should submit to every man in Heaven, just to be on the safe side!”) In case there’s any doubt, it really is a parody.

 

[The_Old_Maid]

As Sarcelle points out, nobody likes to be told their job. It’s a very delicate operation to tell somebody that is doing something how you’d like them to do it instead.

Women get told all the time (and quite correctly) that if we want help at home, we need to let our husbands do things their own way, even if it’s not the “right” way. I’ve been married for 17 years now, and this is really one of the most essential skills that any married person of either sex can learn–standing back and letting our spouse get on with a job, even if it’s not exactly the way we would do it.

On CAF and elsewhere, you often see people talk as thought feminism was as inexplicable as a bolt from the blue, but I more and more think that lack of appreciation and lack of gratitude played a substantial role in getting it going.

This is not feminism precisely, but I have an example from my own family of how domesticity breaks down. When I was at the end of high school, my family started a business. It was a thrilling and formative experience at the time and I worked in the business summers throughout college and even after coming home from working overseas. During those years, every summer the store did better and better and on a really good day, my dad would hand out $100 bills at the end of the day as bonuses. However, there was a dark side to the business in our family’s life, namely that the thing took on a life of its own, and ate our family’s home life. We went practically overnight from a set-up where my mom was at home to one where she was mostly at the store. Previously, 99.99% of house chores had been done by some combination of my mom, my sister and me. But, after the store opened, all three of us were suddenly much less available to do home stuff (laundry, dishes, dinner) and my dad never stepped up to do more. In fact, we were all much less interested in doing so. The store was where the money and the praise came from–there were no cookies or praise available for doing the normal home stuff that needed to be done no matter what, and you weren’t going to get paid for laundry or doing dinner. In addition, my dad had always been very critical of my mom’s housekeeping and cooking–I can’t recall him ever praising her for doing anything around the house–he was always noticing what she hadn’t done.

There was a real lack of work/life balance and years after I left home, it was more and more visible how serious the lack of balance was–boarderline hoarders type situation at home while the store was pretty pretty. They seem to have pulled out of that, thank goodness, but it’s the clearest example I have ever experienced of what happens when home and home work is not valued, and how easy it is for domesticity to disappear when it isn’t valued.

I regret that I have but one “like” to give to this post.

 

[pensmama87]

As Sarcelle points out, nobody likes to be told their job. It’s a very delicate operation to tell somebody that is doing something how you’d like them to do it instead.

Women get told all the time (and quite correctly) that if we want help at home, we need to let our husbands do things their own way, even if it’s not the “right” way. I’ve been married for 17 years now, and this is really one of the most essential skills that any married person of either sex can learn–standing back and letting our spouse get on with a job, even if it’s not exactly the way we would do it.

On CAF and elsewhere, you often see people talk as thought feminism was as inexplicable as a bolt from the blue, but I more and more think that lack of appreciation and lack of gratitude played a substantial role in getting it going.

This is not feminism precisely, but I have an example from my own family of how domesticity breaks down. When I was at the end of high school, my family started a business. It was a thrilling and formative experience at the time and I worked in the business summers throughout college and even after coming home from working overseas. During those years, every summer the store did better and better and on a really good day, my dad would hand out $100 bills at the end of the day as bonuses. However, there was a dark side to the business in our family’s life, namely that the thing took on a life of its own, and ate our family’s home life. We went practically overnight from a set-up where my mom was at home to one where she was mostly at the store. Previously, 99.99% of house chores had been done by some combination of my mom, my sister and me. But, after the store opened, all three of us were suddenly much less available to do home stuff (laundry, dishes, dinner) and my dad never stepped up to do more. In fact, we were all much less interested in doing so. The store was where the money and the praise came from–there were no cookies or praise available for doing the normal home stuff that needed to be done no matter what, and you weren’t going to get paid for laundry or doing dinner. In addition, my dad had always been very critical of my mom’s housekeeping and cooking–I can’t recall him ever praising her for doing anything around the house–he was always noticing what she hadn’t done.

There was a real lack of work/life balance and years after I left home, it was more and more visible how serious the lack of balance was–boarderline hoarders type situation at home while the store was pretty pretty. They seem to have pulled out of that, thank goodness, but it’s the clearest example I have ever experienced of what happens when home and home work is not valued, and how easy it is for domesticity to disappear when it isn’t valued.

I think too that it’s because that kind of work has very measurable results. The vast majority of tasks that are commonly considered “women’s work” in the home are things that need lots of repeated doing, and people don’t notice them unless they haven’t been done - meal preparation, laundry, dusting, etc. There’s really no way to quantify it the way you can a bottom line. So appreciation is really important, because otherwise you can get into a rut of thinking that you’re working all the time but nothing ever changes and nobody notices you’ve done anything.

I have mentioned before here that both of my parents have hoarding tendencies and that my mom gave up on housework almost entirely after I left home. I used to judge her a lot for it, but I realized that she actually did do a lot of work at home, but she tended toward the projects that had measurable results - building a shelf, or planting a tree, or something that could be done and then not revisited. She’s actually very skilled at a lot of DIY-type things. Interestingly, my father was never interested in doing those type of “man things” around the house so she does them. She feels a real sense of accomplishment from them.

I know I was thrilled this year when we completed about 75% of our landscaping projects (basically undoing the damage done by the previous homeowners.) We actually got to plant stuff this year instead of just get rid of…whatever crazy stuff had been growing riotously all over. We planted bulbs yesterday and I’m already excited to see them come up in the spring. And that’s a task that’s done, and we’ll get to see the results every year. Regular weeding isn’t quite like that.

 

[Xantippe]

I think too that it’s because that kind of work has very measurable results. The vast majority of tasks that are commonly considered “women’s work” in the home are things that need lots of repeated doing, and people don’t notice them unless they haven’t been done - meal preparation, laundry, dusting, etc. There’s really no way to quantify it the way you can a bottom line. So appreciation is really important, because otherwise you can get into a rut of thinking that you’re working all the time but nothing ever changes and nobody notices you’ve done anything.

I have mentioned before here that both of my parents have hoarding tendencies and that my mom gave up on housework almost entirely after I left home. I used to judge her a lot for it, but I realized that she actually did do a lot of work at home, but she tended toward the projects that had measurable results - building a shelf, or planting a tree, or something that could be done and then not revisited. She’s actually very skilled at a lot of DIY-type things. Interestingly, my father was never interested in doing those type of “man things” around the house so she does them. She feels a real sense of accomplishment from them.

I know I was thrilled this year when we completed about 75% of our landscaping projects (basically undoing the damage done by the previous homeowners.) We actually got to plant stuff this year instead of just get rid of…whatever crazy stuff had been growing riotously all over. We planted bulbs yesterday and I’m already excited to see them come up in the spring. And that’s a task that’s done, and we’ll get to see the results every year. Regular weeding isn’t quite like that.

Right.

So much of domestic work is stuff that nobody notices…until it stops getting done. So there’s a very natural tendency for there to be a combination of no or little positive reinforcement, plus negative reinforcement for jobs undone or done poorly. Hence the urge to flee the home…

There’s an interesting book by Arlie Russell Hochschild (she’s the author of “The Second Shift”) entitled "The Time Bind: When Work Becomes Home and Home Becomes Work. Hochschild “concluded that the roles of home and work had reversed: work had become more attractive, offering a sense of belonging, while home had grown more stressful, becoming a dreaded place with too many demands.”

en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Time_bind

I totally relate to what you say about accomplishment-type work and parents. I see the same gravitation toward accomplishment-type work with my parents. With my dad, especially, he loves building stuff, but he doesn’t really get the concept of “maintenance” (at least with non-farm, non-vehicular stuff). So my parents built a beautiful house when we were growing up and did a lovely job on it mostly with their own labor–and then largely let it fall apart over the following 25+ years (there’s literally black fuzz in the window runners and it’s been there at least the last 20 years because of leakage issues).

I’m obviously not perfect (and I have lots of help at home from husband, older kids and commercial help), but one thing I am proud of is that I get the idea of maintenance. When you have stuff, it needs to be taken care of, and any major item you own (like a car or a house on down to a nice pair of shoes or a stroller) is going to require an outlay of effort to keep it working. Likewise people need maintenance, too–children’s grades need to be observed, homework needs to be monitored, kids’ health (mental and physical) needs to be monitored, their friendships need to be nurtured, diet needs to be kept on track, kids need exercise, medical and dental apts. need to be made and kept, medicine needs to be dosed, hygiene needs to happen, elderly relatives and new mothers need to be checked in with, etc., etc.

 

[pensmama87]

I’m obviously not perfect (and I have lots of help at home from husband, older kids and commercial help), but one thing I am proud of is that I get the idea of maintenance. When you have stuff, it needs to be taken care of, and any major item you own (like a car or a house on down to a nice pair of shoes or a stroller) is going to require an outlay of effort to keep it working. Likewise people need maintenance, too–children’s grades need to be observed, homework needs to be monitored, kids’ health (mental and physical) needs to be monitored, their friendships need to be nurtured, diet needs to be kept on track, kids need exercise, medical and dental apts. need to be made and kept, medicine needs to be dosed, hygiene needs to happen, elderly relatives and new mothers need to be checked in with, etc., etc.

I think that’s one reason I like checklists so much - every day I can make that little mark even for the routine stuff - yep, I did this, this, and this today! It’s very satisfying.

 

[GreyWings]

Traditional roles go way, way back. When hunting and gathering societies were the way of life, generally, men would hunt while women would gather and tend to the children, as women would be the ones who would nurse. But times have changed, women are more than willing to work these days and be the breadwinner, with some men being stay at home husbands.

 

[spunjalebi]

I would think it has more to do with birth control and wanting or needing more money.

What if the person was trying to show you how to be 5 times as efficient? You gave the standard female answer which is to get mad and leave. A man would listen.

This is EXACTLY the problem why threads like this always get banned and why people leave in emotional huffs (sighs). This is also why the mommy/wife wars began and why to this day, they continue to rage.

When people decide to take a step back and consider not everyone’s families are like theirs, and not everyone’s families function like theirs, it’ll be a big step forward.

“Efficiency” is why we have access to dishwashers, ovens, washing machines, etc. yet it doesn’t appear life has gotten simpler. Now, parents have to take trips from their homes with all their children in tow to go to the doctor, to grocery store, etc. Sure, you can get all of your housework done in an hour (btw, does that include cooking home made meals from scratch?), but there’s plenty of time spent out of the home.

 

[Xantippe]

This is EXACTLY the problem why threads like this always get banned and why people leave in emotional huffs (sighs). This is also why the mommy/wife wars began and why to this day, they continue to rage.

When people decide to take a step back and consider not everyone’s families are like theirs, and not everyone’s families function like theirs, it’ll be a big step forward.

“Efficiency” is why we have access to dishwashers, ovens, washing machines, etc. yet it doesn’t appear life has gotten simpler. Now, parents have to take trips from their homes with all their children in tow to go to the doctor, to grocery store, etc. Sure, you can get all of your housework done in an hour (btw, does that include cooking home made meals from scratch?), but there’s plenty of time spent out of the home.

That’s an important point–although stuff like laundry does function without supervision, it would be very unwise to leave a dryer running while sleeping or out of the house, so part of the trick of modern laundry or cooking is figuring out when you can do it safely.

Also, expectations for cooking (when it actually happens) are much higher than in the good old days. (I have some very funny quotes from Florence King on the subject of old time WASP cooking–glop out a can of Campbell’s, garnish with slivered almonds, enjoy!) I was raised on macaroni-ground-beef-spaghetti sauce-velveeta casseroles. I’d never feed that to my own children and I never want to eat one again.

Expectations have changed a lot about supervision of children. I spent many hours by myself watching TV at my grandma’s house while relatives worked the cattle when I was of Sesame Street watching age. Likewise, there were lots of occasions we were left in the car by ourselves as children while parents ran errands. And I used to walk by myself to the bus stop blocks away (not visible from home) as a 6-year-old. Nowadays, only CPS-worthy families do that stuff with little kids. All of that involves more work for parents.

There is an ongoing creep upward in expectations in many sectors of domestic life.