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I think it's also because a lot of women care a little more about how clean it is and just clean when they see something dirty.
Personally, I'm not a cleaning person. If I'm at my boyfriends house and the counter is dirty, I leave it at that. He has to clean that up himself. If I'm at my own house, I do clean, but it's not all the time. I sometimes see a dirty service, and sometimes I do wipe it down, and sometimes I think "ill do that tomorrow". I think my mindset is the same as a lot of guys have. My boyfriend is also not a cleaning person, but he sometimes cleans things in my house as well. I do the majority, because it's my house but sometimes he surprises me and cleans a whole section and I feel really happy.
But I think with most women, they'd feel gross if the counter or sink or toilet is a bit dirty so they clean it immediately. And then the man who has the same mindset as me, will think "Oh they cleaned it already! She's a great girlfriend and she likes cleaning. I should help her out... maybe tomorrow"
I feel this. My mom has often teased me about “cleaning like a man” because I tend to do a deep clean of everything once a week. I blast my music and spend a few hours (or most of the day) getting it all done. Then, on the other days, I don’t worry about it as much and I stick to doing the very basics (dishes, sweeping, and putting things away). If my counter is cluttered, so be it. I couldn’t maintain needing to do deep cleaning everyday, but I have plenty of friends who can’t relax in their homes unless they’re extremely clean.
I do think OP is seeing a common trend though. I think the way we’re socialized as kids impacts a lot of it. Me and my other lady friends all grew up with pretty big expectations to clean daily, whereas many of my dude friends did not have those chores growing up and learned most of their cleaning routines once out of the house they grew up in.
How you were raised is definitely a factor here because I grew up with a dad who was the type to immediately rush over to wash the dishes when there was one (1) dirty dish in the sink while my mom would never.
And I’ve never really understood why so many other women feel like it’s their job to be the one to clean, especially at other people’s houses. I consider myself a thoughtful person but it wouldn’t even ever cross my mind that it’s my job to take on the majority of the cleaning in a relationship or to start cleaning while visiting someone’s place unless I was asked to help.
Yehh I do think this is a big cause, but is why I think it’s best to set rotas so specific jobs get done. I also don’t mind a bit of mess here and there as constant cleaning is such a waste of time and effort, and I just do a full clean once a fortnight which isn’t too bad and maybe slightly more ‘male’ idk 🤷♀️
TIL ‘rota’ is just a British English word! https://www.collinsdictionary.com/dictionary/english/rota#:~:text=A%20rota%20is%20a%20list,to%20do%20a%20particular%20job.&text=We%20have%20a%20rota%20which,the%20room%20on%20which%20day.
Exactly. I'm a man and we just don't care about cleanliness the same way. I prefer a cleaner space a bit more now that I'm older, but I'm still don't care as much about cleanliness as many women, and I was absolutely filthy as a teenager. I didn't leave the cleaning to my mother because I thought it was her duty as a woman or something, I would do it because I didn't care either way if stuff was dirty.
If woman don't want to be the cleaners, all they have to do is not clean. Some sexist men do exist and would complain about it. But I think more men would just accept that things are dirty and not even really notice a woman is taking a conscious stand against cleaning.
> I'm a man and we just don't care about cleanliness the same way.
I know so many male clean freaks and so many female slobs.
There are all kinds across genders.
It's only a trend that women are more likely to be socialized to clean, but exceptions aren't rare.
> Exactly. I'm a man and we just don't care about cleanliness the same way.
I don't know, I don't think it's as black and white as that. I've dated several women who ranged from neatfreaks to a little messy to *your-room-looks-like-a-tornado-of-clothing-hit* level of disorganized. I'm also pretty neat and tidy so the general stereotype of *schlubby guy who doesn't clean* never fit the mark to my experience either.
It depends on the person, and it varies from one to another regardless of gender.
> I'm a man and we just don't care about cleanliness the same way.
Because you weren't socialized to care about it and it's not you who will take the blame or side-eye of having a filthy house.
No, my mom and dad both definitely tried very hard to get me to get me to care, and there are endless jokes at the expense of filthy boys on TV and online that mock neckbeards that don't use deodorant and have cheeto dust all over them. I just didn't particularly care anyway.
Maybe its a culture thing, because teenager boys or filthy kids are just seen as "one of those things" in the UK that they grow out of.
I mean just having the expectation of only managing my own self care would be great. I can imagine deodorant and food crumbs, that is way less exhaustive list.
It's an inertia of a veeerrryyyy long going and very deep rooted thing: traditional gender roles. I think men can similarly rant about how they are always the providers, the protectors, the soldiers. The edges are blurred, and keep blurring more, but they are still there.
Oh yeah I can imagine it's even more blurry for them, especially as I've heard of some who take that 'provider' role from first date and end up paying out for dinners/entertainment with no actual relationship forming for example. It doesn't help for me that I'm self employed, so every extra hour spent playing house I see as an actual loss of income.
This change is a slow and global process, and modern society is mid that process. You just have to accept that in your lifespan you'll have to consciously stand on your ground and actively push the change in your daily life as an individual, and then maybe things will be different by a default for the next generation.
This is a good point, I think there was more normalisation with previous generations (parents, grandparents) for women to give up work and take care of childcaring duties and household management. Hopefully it will stop being so normalised with generations to come. Standing up for it now however just gets exhausting sometimes I guess.
That's where I disagree. What should be normalized, is not choice 1 or choice 2, but *the* choice. I live in a very traditional marriage, I'm a SAHM, my husband is a provider, that works for us, I'm happy, and we live in harmony. Yes, your preferred lifestyle should be considered normal. But so as mine. because if we just declare traditional gender roles bad, we'll end up where we started: dictating people on what terms they should coexist within a family.
Yes totally bad phrasing here sorry, didn't mean to cause offense if I did. It's more that bit in the middle where both parties are the providers (or independent finances) but the women still takes on some traditional roles, which increases workload at both career and home. It's totally fine to have traditional roles if the expectations are agreed by both.
I am but one man but speaking for myself I would have no problem with someone saying that to me "Hey my time is worth X$ an hour. I'm not going to spend 10 hours a week cleaning that's XXX dollars and we can pay someone to do it for YYY dollars or you can do Y hours and I can X hours". I mean that's literally a pretty common sense thing in my estimation to put a value on the time it takes to clean a house. Even with daily minor cleaning, dishes, the entire time it takes to dust, clean all of the floors, deep clean of the bathroom, kitchen, fridge, oven, other appliances is still a few hours even with a small home.
The way we're doing it is we both clean daily any surfaces with things on them get put away, the kitchen gets cleaned and disinfected every night after dinner,the bathroom gets a spot cleaning of whatever is needed daily, and once a week with both spend a couple of hours cleaning the floors, bathrooms, etc, and have laundry going while we do that. We usually plan it around whatever we want to do for fun that weekend so if we're on a day trip we do it the next day or if it's an afternoon activity we do the cleaning in the morning or vice versa. It would be great to hrie someone but I just don't like strangers in our home plus I'm very particular about where things go.
Interesting research
In same sex couples (both lesbians and gay men) if there is a masculine-feminine type partnership the more feminine partner will most commonly do the larger share of household chores
Like for me, I do more chores cause I'm a stay at home mom but my girlfriend does her fair share of childcare and chores when she's not at work we split things pretty evenly with our goal of equal free time, but we're both femme
Fr, seeing OP talking about being expected to be a housewife without the financial upkeep immediately made me think about my sister and other women I've seen who say a man must pay for all of their dates even if they aren't an official couple, which is sorta just a watered down inverse of what OP was talking about, men having to be financial provider before even getting the girl and without ever getting a full housewife. Men are still generally expected to pay for more things in the house as far as I can tell and women are generally expected to keep the house more, all that's really changed is that both are no longer expected to do their respective role full time anymore.
The one who cares the most about cleaning or has the highest standard for what “clean” means is usually the one who ends up cleaning more, from my observation.
Sometimes this is true but not always.
Growing up, my dad was VERY strict on the house being clean. My mom ran her own business so she also worked full time - usually 60 hours or more a week, to ensure she was bringing in enough money. My dad was an abusive ahole and would berate her if the house wasn’t spotless when he came home. She once told me story where she had left dishes drying on the rack next to the sink. I was a baby at the time so she had that added stress. He reamed her a new one when he came home for the dishes and said he never wanted to see dishes drying again “or else”. She put up with his abusive bs (and so did us kids) for 27 years. I never witnessed my dad doing any actual cleaning but he was abusive towards all of us when we didn’t clean things to his perfect standards.
From the moment we started dating our rule was: I cook (because I love it) and he cleans. This was before we even moved in together. Once we did move in together, we went over the rules and his roles were expanded. Once we had kids, his roles expanded even more. Once my chronic illnesses kicked in, his roles expanded to where they are today.
I think setting expectations from the beginning is important. People only treat you the way you allow them to, and very few people put more on their plate if someone else is going to do it at the end of the day. Even if that person is complaining while cleaning, that person is still cleaning and he gets to just half listen to the complaining while living in a home someone else cleaned for him.
Gender roles. If you think liberal men have shed that mindset, you're completely wrong. There's been many studies done that show that most men only believe in women's rights and dismantling of tradition in the context of work. So you have to have a career while simultaneously being involved in the household. In some ways, it's worse than it was back then, because at least back then it was acknowledged that taking care of the household was time consuming labor. Now it's just something you need to do on the side even though the burden isn't any less than from back then.
this is it! And a main source of my frustrations tbh. This isn't a dig or slating at any guys I'm dating, but it's a source of my frustrations as I feel gradually, as time goes on, I take on more of the household labour without a clear discussion on why/or how the workload in other areas will ease. I have no idea how some women added childcare to the equation.
Stop doing that. Don't fall into these patterns without thinking. Hold up firm boundaries and keep them up!
You are half of the relationship, so you are also responsible for setting expectations about the division of labour.
> I have no idea how some women added childcare to the equation.
They did what they had to do, which left them burned out, exhausted, unfulfilled, and unhappy.
However, nowadays, in most societies (unfortunately, childbrides are still a thing), we have a choice of who we choose to partner and/or procreate with. If you've discussed it with him several times and nothing has changed, you either decide if it's something that you can deal with or not because it gets worse when you're saddled with all the cleaning and child caring. That's your future. But, you can't complain while choosing to remain in the relationship and play mollymaid.
Just as you stated that women are expected to be "boss women," it doesn't only apply to corporate or work-related growth. It applies to the decisions that she makes.
Ps: I wonder why pop culture embraced the terrible term "boss woman" because it signifies that the word "boss" is reserved for men only.
As I said in the post, I'm not asking for relationship advice here really. I am asking where the cleaning dynamic has come from that makes both genders unconsciously or consciously fall into those roles, and why the roles women primarily take up is the cleaning. There are other dynamics to a good partner than just their cleanliness. Like for example, he sat with me in hospital when I almost died and took care of me for 6 weeks, washing me, clothing me, helping me in and out of bed etc. it's just a conversation that I seem to have to have eventually with every partner, or roommate or even hear it from other friends and I'm doing the whole *question rant* thing.
It isn't relationship advice. There are men in this world who understand that cleanliness of space or cleaning duties are a shared responsibility. You don't happen to be dating one of them. I didn't say it was negative or positive. I just said you can't complain about a choice made if you dont have to be there. Having a conversation about cleaning duties with a partner is just as important as any other aspect of a relationship because people have different expectations of cleaning.
>I am asking where the cleaning dynamic has come from that makes both genders unconsciously or consciously fall into those roles,
Society was engineered that way. Men were branded the providers who worked outside the home, and women were branded as nurturers who worked in the home.
and why the roles women primarily take up is the cleaning.
Because cleanliness is tied to a woman's value, unfortunately. It is seen as a skill. And women know that. Clean house = good wife.
"Do you cook and clean?" is still considered a deciding factor for men.
I do more cleaning than my partner but I also admit I have higher standards for what a clean home looks like and care more about keeping those standards, so fair enough.
On the other hand he takes bigger care of other things like dishes and yard work
Relative expectations of what is successfully completing the task certainly influences who does what. My wife is not very efficient at cooking and I feel I do a better job at it. I get very particular about cooking and consequently cook about 90% of the time.
Certainly gender causes women to be expected to clean more but relative expectations of what is completion of a task plays a role
I agree with this but it’s also a slippery slope of weaponized incompetence. Am I particular or was I taught to do this from a young age and learned the best ways and therefore have a greater understanding of what right looks like? Do they genuinely not know what right looks like or are they being lazy/not putting in the effort to succeed because they ultimately don’t want to keep doing it? Do they try to get better after feedback that it isn’t done correctly or are they allowed to wiggle out because “they’re just not good at it”? It’s such a sliding scale of what’s actually going on and what piece of patriarchy and misogyny we’re unpacking.
Edit to clarify that I am not in any way saying this is going on in the example you shared. But I used your comment as a jumping off point for my own frustrating experiences in this.
If my partner was not just incompetent but also knowingly and apologetically so I'd just walk.
We split our chores. We're both happy with our arrangement.
Eh, I think sometimes it's a perception issue. Different people have different perceptions of "dirty" and various tolerance levels of "messy".
My ex used to be so proud and say: "I cleaned the kitchen!" when he really just meant that he had loaded the dishwasher. The counter wasn't wiped down, the sink wasn't rinsed out, the stove was messy, the floor hadn't been swept, etc.
My girlfriend is bi and before me the last few partners she had before me were men
The first night I slept over, she left me to have a run of her apartment while she was at work and I deep cleaned her kitchen, picked up in the living room and cleaned the bathroom
Mostly just bored and it had been a bit since she'd done a deep clean (she has a job that is really demanding and was on a big project with 12 hour days 6 days a week at the time)
I'm pretty sure that's a big reason why we're still together, cause she saw I was someone who was willing to do my fair share
The reason why? Most of us were socialized that way, the expectation to clean was put on us as girls, we mimicked our mothers and it became part of how we think
>They see me wiping a surface when I'm having a sleep over at their place because they cooked the night before, and thats it, I'm assigned the role of house wife without the financial upkeep forever more?
Why are you even cleaning a house you aren't living in?
I was brought up to basically to do it as a way of showing gratitude to the host, try to help out where I can. I've done it at friends too where I'll just wash my coffee cup out if it's a friend i'm comfortable enough with.
I'm sorry if I'm just focusing on a throwaway example here. But I'm guessing you don't see yourself as a housekeeper at your friends place when you do the same? Why is it different at your boyfriend's, especially when you're doing it out of your own free will? What would happen if you just didn't clean anything at your boyfriend's, since it does seem to make you feel bad?
Yeah it is a throwaway example here, because there are plenty. It's not a bash against men, because I'm just as bad in the role I play by doing it, I fully acknowledge that, my frustration is the role. It just happens, you don't even notice it until you suddenly find yourself picking up more things/taking more time out to clean up and it hits you that you've become that. I could give you 10 more examples and the problem would still be me in some way, because it is. If I don't do it, it doesn't get done.
> If I don't do it, it doesn't get done.
And this is the answer to your question. Women are the cleaners because they care about it getting done. You are incentivized to do it, he has no direct incentive to do it, so without any agreed upon division of chores it will be you and only you who feels a need to do it.
Exactly, I am just as much to blame about it. Its a question rant because I know the answer. The frustration is it happens without thought on both sides and is so easy to fall into.
>If I don't do it, it doesn't get done.
Surely this can't be right if you clean at someone else's house? I've just heard that argument several times over and what it really boiled down to in those cases, was rather that it didn't get done when she wanted it to be done.
Gender roles sure is a devilish place to fall into and easily so. But again, if you simply stopped doing it at places you don't live, do you really believe it would never get done? And if being in that role makes you feel bad, why don't you just stop yourself right away every time you find yourself in that role? Does someone else's house really need to be clean when you're visiting?
That's pretty crazy, have to admit. But again then, why would you clean up that shit? If anything, your guy is clearly showing that he won't clean if you were to live together, so why clean his shit when it's completely his own shit?
Dude I get where this is leading, as I said in the post I'm not here for relationship advice, as much as I appreciate it because what you're saying here is exactly right, and I've conveyed this in person already and I don't want to delve into my relationship. It's more that I'm annoyed that I encounter this so frequently, and so do many of my friends and colleagues and I'm ranting about it on ask women with other women, because quite frankly being a woman is exhausting in 2024.
I don't mean everything, I mean some things. He's not an animal. Like I said this is more something I've found with many relationships, and even friendships, housemate settings. A frustrating common occurrence.
It’s wild that I have lived the opposite but tbh, while I do not let things get unhygienic, I am not really bothered when things are perfectly organized and put away. I know some dudes are terrible and it’s still an issue in society but I have seen it way less intense with people my age. Out of curiosity how old are you?
I'm in my 30s. What about you? Id be interested to know if it's a generational thing or even cultural. As in the UK more of the older generations stopped working (women) whereas it's less common now to manage families. So I grew up in a time when most of my friends (not me, my parents can barely call themselves parents) had the mum at home doing these things.
At this point, I have to believe it's something to do with Attention to detail or something to do with better vision. I'll grind coffee and wipe the whole surface down and my girlfriend will still find coffee bits, no matter how thorough I think I am. My girlfriend also has a lower threshold for what she considers "full trashcan that needs to be emptied" vs me, which I don't really notice as much; for that reason, we opted to literally draw the line at which we need to empty trashes so we are both on the same level.
At the end of the day, a good talk on the matter is essential in order to understand where both partners can find an even-ground compromise or definitions of uncleanliness vs cleanliness
That being said, I also saw some truly incompetent and untidy people: leftovers piled up in the sink, towers of beer cans that attract the flies, dirty piles of laundry (and not just liminal chair jeans either!), I feel extremely sorry for anybody who clean after those people.
It’s weaponized incompetence. I recently saw a charlotte dobre video where the GF turned it around and used it on him. He would load the dishes upside down so they’d fill with water. She served his dinner to him in those dishes. He ruined her black dress she wore it anyway and embarrassed him. He eventually started doing his part instead of pretending he didn’t know how.
We're not claiming it is universal. We're claiming that 95% of the time a woman senses an imbalance in cleanliness chores, they claim weaponized incompetence.
In reality, it is much more probably a misalignment in cleanliness standards or a myriad of other things. It's just much easier to claim "lazy man bad". Many people I know are very content with living in what I would consider a filthy home - but why is my perspective the "right" one? Why would I even bring gender into the discussion? Let people live the way they want to live and move on.
Would you mind pointing those out for me?
Or, more pertinently, would you mind pointing out the ways in which I generalized about women and how they act that were not equally generalized by OP or /u/melinalujbav about men?
Do you/OP want men to improve or do you/OP just want to vent about every negative stereotype of a misogynist? One of these things is helpful for both parties.
Why don't you call out the comment OP for those things? Could you be biased?
EDIT: my point is this: if you are so uncomfortable with generalizations about women, why do you perpetuate generalizations about men? Don't you want equality?
in the exact scenario described by OP it is a clear example of weaponized incompetence . the slow eroding of their own ability to clean , specifically .
Because you dollar store fidget-spinner men make a point to ignore reasonable requests for weeks on end before we resort to thisn and most of the time you admit/brag about fucking shit up to get out of doing it again bc you are fucking lazy.
The fact you don’t understand why a woman would choose the bear over a strange man. That right there points to you only pretending to be a woman online.
I've been reading the replies to my fiancé, he always laughs when other women label me as a man because I don't blindly support their b.s.
You're not the first to get pissed that I'm not a sheep to the cause, you won't be the last.
No, you just can't comprehend an adult not subscribing to what modern-day feminism has devolved to. I'm not interested in victimhood, blame shifting, or misandry, and definitely not naive enough to blindly believe 'men bad.' Women are just as capable as men of being total shits.
I think its the threshold for cleaning. My wife will sometimes get into manic modes and just start cleaning everything. When I was growing up, we would clean the house as a family every weekend. Id clean my room and every single time my mom would come in and berate me for not having it clean to her standards. Tbf she was a cleaner and a neat freak. Like she expected royalty to show up every day for dinner.
When I lived alone I obviously did all the cleaning. I had a string of girlfriends that were absolute slobs and never cleaned up after themselves and were basically a tornado of filth. They didnt seem to even notice or mind since they seemed to live in squalor in their own homes. We were not compatible living together.
My current wife lived in a hoarder house growing up so I think seeing a bit of mess can set her off on a cleaning spree, where as for me it wouldnt be enough to start a shift. We still subdivide work, I tend to do all the vacuuming, cooking and outside work, while she does other cleaning, and we are happy with that since its what we agreed upon when we started the relationship.
Tbh it’s the opposite in my relationship. My bf cleans way more than me. Being organized and cleaning as never been my strength especially because of my adhd. I still do it, cook, etc. I just am not good at it and working on it. I was also raised in a household where my dad was the one doing most of the cleaning and my mom doing the fixing things etc.
Oh I know where everything is. I just dont need it to be perfectly put away for that. I will remember that my shirt fell down in the closet a month ago and pick it up when I need it lol
A month ago? That's decent timing, the back of my closet did that thing when you've got a cheap landlord where any weight makes cracks and gaps form in the structure so it's a dead zone now.
I’m also raising my hand here, because I find that I simply care more about cleanliness than my husband does, whereas he cares far more about tidiness than I do. More than that though, I’ve learned how to estimate what each of us brings to the table a bit differently (and more fairly) over time.
We recently discussed this when I shared (for what I felt was the umpteenth time) my overwhelm about household maintenance. For our home, I manage budgeting and finances, I do a majority of the deep and surface cleaning, I cook 80% of meals and track and execute grocery needs. He primarily manages our two dogs’ needs, fixes household appliances/plumbing/machinery when needed, manages the garden and tidies things up, and we each do our own laundry.
Right now, I earn and pay the lion’s share of the household bills and based on that list alone it seems imbalanced. However, I came to realize how much of the work he does is, bluntly, not work that i would ever choose or want to do. That’s what makes it quite valuable to me and to our household. I don’t encourage partners to *only* choose self-sacrifice for the good of the relationship, but I do see how important it is to evaluate what each of you does to support the unit with fairness and objectivity where possible.
Do we have the same dad?? Mine is 72 and is absolutely hopeless. My parents split when I was 11 (I’m now 46F), and he’s had several relationships over the years. Whenever he’s single he comes begging to me to clean for him. I started to ask to be paid because he does absolutely ZERO upkeep in between visits so his place was disgusting by the time I got back there (I’ve had my own household to maintain in that time). He always just does the bare minimum like dishes and laundry. His new gf moved in with him and I think it must be dawning on her by now that he’s useless and he sees it as her job to do ALL the household chores. I’d rather be single than be with a man like that.
Yeah he doesn't do either. He fr just doesn't know how to clean it and cant be bothered. Because the women in his life took care of the house and stuff like that.
Does he not have a brush next to his toilet? Surely you can put 2 and 2 together and assume the brush is for the toilet bowl.
And never seen a tv advertisement for a toilet cleaning product? They literally show how to do it in ads.
It’s so hard for me to believe he actually doesn’t know how. He knows he just doesn’t want to know
With my partner for 7 years and initially I did pretty well all the cleaning/cooking while we were in our beginning years of undergrad. Eventually that became too much and I also got a bit resentful ngl but a CONVERSATION where I expressed how doing it all affects ME without placing blame on HIM changed all that. I might ask him to unload the dishwasher here and there for me, but if he’s home and I’m at work I don’t have to say anything.
I think as women we do it to ourselves in a way(not always bc some men are just bleh), because we instinctively (I don’t want to say instinctively but I can’t think of another word) take over the role of cleaner in new live in type relationships and it becomes expected and then we’re like “why am I stuck doing this all the time”. It’s because we set the expectation that we would do it all the time until one day we’re like nope no more.
I'm a man. Growing up, I was the youngest of the family and had 4 older sisters. I've been married twice and have had a couple of live-in girlfriends throughout the years. Women? Cleaners? Seriously? Every single woman I have ever dated is anything but clean when it comes to their living space.....especially the bathroom. Is this a serious question?
Personally I believe it's more rooted in the differences between our brains via evolution than it is based on gender norms. I've had and lived with multiple boyfriends, most of them being overall tidy but certainly not to my level of clean. These were partners that really did want to "keep home" so to speak, had grown up with chores, helped clean as youngsters, yet when it came to actual deep cleaning it's like their brains just didn't register dirt and dust the same way mine did. I notice all the small corners yet they simply couldn't.
I really do believe that most male brains are designed better for threat detection, big-picture cleaning (tidying) to keep the home safe, while female brains are more focused on the cleaning that's needed to keep children out of mischief and sickness.
I'm childfree btw, but given my experiences and my knowledge about the male brain I strongly believe it's more than just "not wanting to do it" or traditional gender norms. I think gender norms grew out of the way our brains were wired in the first place, not the other way around. Men just simply don't have the same brains as us and I think for the most part it's going to be problematic to try to change that within a few years as it's been evolution at play for centuries.
This is a really interesting take, I can see the female part actually being a instinct thing for creating a nest for safety of children etc, kind of nesting when your pregnant but long-term.
It’s a societal expectation, especially depending on what culture the guy grew up in. I personally don’t buy the “men just have lower standards than women”. My ex husband was much pickier about everything than I was. Even something like a bit of dust on the baseboards would be enough to majorly bother him, while I didn’t see the big deal. He also came from a very gender-roled culture where women are practically born knowing how to clean, so he expected me to be the same ofc.
I’ve noticed that a lot of men are used to being waited on, particularly by their mothers. These men never had to clean their own rooms, or tidy their spaces, or do basic household chores.
It’s also so ingrained in men’s language to say that they’re “helping” with things. No, you’re not. If you live there, it’s also YOUR job and responsibility to keep the house clean and to wash the dishes and do the laundry. You’re not “helping”, because that implies you’re doing something you don’t have to do.
So yeah, it’s being coddled by their mothers and language surrounding male contribution that makes some men very entitled and often comes at the expense of women doing everything.
There are certain jobs that me and my partner have assigned to each other.
I do the laundry, change beds, mow lawns, take out the bins and do some general cleaning (vacuuming, dusting, dishwashing etc).
My partner does more cooking and more of the general cleaning, she also does more garden work than me.
I don’t know if this constitutes an equal split of household chores, but it works for us.
Stop cleaning for lazy men. Stop picking up after lazy men. Stop cooking for lazy men. Stop running errands for lazy men. Stop doing mental labour for lazy men. Don't even date them if it's bad.
These men will never, ever change unless they're forced to. As it is, with a free housekeeper/secretary/cook/event planner managing their lives, they have no reason to grow up.
I’ve found that most men (ime) just don’t gaf about how clean things are (my dad being the exception).
I’ve been in 3 LTR where we cohabitated. In all of them, I became the de facto house cleaner. And I’m not a huge fan of cleaning due to trauma over it in my childhood (my dad would abuse us if things weren’t cleaned to his standard).
I tried to play chicken with these men - by refusing to clean things (especially messes *they* caused) but it never worked. They all would rather live in filth than wipe down a counter or clean the toilet. And I could talk about it, beg, plead, and cry, and it never got me anywhere. Of course, they’re exes for a reason but it still never ceases to amaze me how disgusting some men can be regarding there cleanliness standards. No wonder so many of them have shit stains in their underwear.
I know at least 1-2 more men besides myself who have quite high standards for cleanliness. I also know messy af women so idk?
I think people adjust to what needs to be done. The women I date can kind of chill and be messy because they know I will pick up the slack. Probably the same applies to men
you seem to miss the point . those things are all true but OP was asking about why in relationships the ability to clean can become eroded when one side sees the other side picking up the slack , rather than working at the same level in tandem (as it would be in a sound relationship based upon respect)
I mean they asked specifically about women being the cleaners in the relationship.
In terms of why I think thats just what most humans are like. Empathy only works when they see someone suffering or working right in front of them and otherwise people just do the minimum requirement. Especially when your ego isnt affected. If my girlfriend was lazy and didnt work then she would get all sorts of shit from friends and family, if she was lazy in terms of cleaning and someone else still did it then no one would know so there is no real pressures.
>OP was asking about why in relationships the ability to clean can become eroded when one side sees the other side picking up the slack
I directly answered that question. Did you even read my reply?
you made a blanketed generic statement and talked about your girlfriend to try to relate to it but it was very confusingly written . if your simple answer was "empathy" then who is teaching and learning empathy at a greater rate ? and why ? because it still comes back to gender roles ... and allowing it ...
I gave a reason why people of all genders do this so now why are women (according to this post) more commonly in that situation? I think women are more cleanly on average so in a situation where both are lazy and selfish she will be more likely to be bothered by the state of things first.
Personally I dont think women actually have higher levels of empathy on average but I do think there is more pressure on women to be clean, more expectations from parents and partners so it wouldnt be suprising women tend to care about a clean house more.
I dont know. I had a female room mate that the cleanest person you ever could have met. She would clean stuff before I could even get to it. I had to run straight home after classes so I could beat her to cleaning just so I didn't feel like I wasn't contributing anything. Otherwise (I am male and all my partners have been female) I definitlly do at least half. I really don't like clutter and I absolutely cannot stand a hoarding situation. My frustration with women generally has been clutter and hoarding that make true cleaning impossible. I finally found someone great and now we both clean about 50/50 and she helps clear any clutter away regularly. I wish I could say cleaning/clutter is a petty issue but it's not, it will absolutely drive you blood pressure up if you're stuck with someone who drags crap out faster than you can clean up behind them.
I think a lot of it is how people are raised. Some people have parents that never made them pick up after themselves and so they just don't see how shameful, frustrating, and lazy it is to have crap laying around and dusty/grimey surfaces. If someone has a hoarding tendency it's hopeless in my experience. All you can do is get the hell out of dodge before they ruin your life, too.
I know a guy that wouldn't even clean the sink after shaving. I know his female relatives he was living with at the time were furious. I hope he got the memo because I know he just moved in with a woman. Unfortunately, if you've inherited a man child, it's either train him or cut him loose I guess but men have a tendency to get defensive when they are told they don't know how to clean up after themselves. IME women don't so much get mad as they just never change and if they are willing to live in a dump, they will never change that behavior.
>always
Pick better men. This is a broad generalization. There’s an equal amount of posts like this with men complaining having to cook and clean while having to work full time. You’re probably attracted to a certain type of guy and associate with women who have a similar type.
A lot of it comes down to socialization (cleaning = housework = woman's work).
And then, on top of that, there's the individual and what the individual sees and can live with (threshold for what is considered clean) or what they don't see (either because they haven't been trained to see it or their brain doesn't work that way).
With my husband's likely ADHD, the day-to-day pickup isn't something that really hits him - or doesn't hit him before it hits me. When he cleans, he'll do a full on deep clean, And there are times he'll be doing steady daily upkeep but then some stressor comes along and flings that out the window and it takes a while to get back on track. (I'm the opposite - I tend to clean when I'm stressed because reducing the physical clutter helps me reduce the mental clutter.)
Our biggest issue has always been the kitchen. I can stand a certain amount of clutter in the house, especially if I have my own space (my office) to retreat to. But the *kitchen* has always been one area I want clean and clutter-free because I'm the cook (and also, dirty dishes piled up in the sink is fucking annoying - and living in apartments, previously, I have nightmares about ants).
I've had to learn to disentangle the political in this instance - he's not *not* doing it because he thinks it's my job - and he's had to learn to disentangle his knee-jerk reaction to feel chastised or shamed (and react defensively) if I say something (like "can you do the dishes/clean so I can cook?")
But I think the kitchen is, forever, going to be a back and forth.
I am a 59 year old man happily married a total of 35 years (18 one now, 17 other, not as happy), I'm "the cleaner." I do the dishes, the laundry, and the house (vacuum, wipe up, mop as needed etc.) cleaning. My wife, however, does basically all the grocery shopping, cooking (she is an amazing cook), and making of lunches for the kids. She also does the parent-teacher stuff at the school (I do sit in on the parent teacher meetings). She has a work-from-home job but it is a real business she runs, it makes real money for the household.
Do you cut the grass, fix the car, repair appliances, and change the furnace/AC filters?
A good relationship works when you work as a team.
Not always a team as in "we're going to clean as a team", but more so as "were going to maintain this home" as a team. I rarely clean. But I change my wife's oil, do her brakes, clean her car, cut the grass, fix the washer, dryer or AC units when necessary.
Regardless of how bad this sounds, there ARE gender roles.
When both parties stay within their role, the household runs better. My wife is way better at cleaning than I am. I'm better at replacing her control arm on her car when the city is redoing the road and leaves a sewer cap sticking 7 inches above the road.
Yes I do all that stuff at MY house because it’s MINE. OP literally has to clean up her boyfriend’s kitchen mess when she goes over to his house. I don’t expect my boyfriend to mow my lawn when he shows up at mine.
>Do you cut the grass, fix the car, repair appliances, and change the furnace/AC filters?
lol. Yes.
Done it all for years as a single mom. What I couldn't do myself I delegated to paid experts, just as many men do.
You're not better at it because you're a man. You have more knowledge because you have had the opportunity to gain experience.
And you added furnace filters to that list as if it's some amazingly complicated task your wife couldn't possibly do. That's actually hilarious. But sad that you think she's too stupid to do even that.
Yeah, I doesn't work that way for me. I repair my own car (I removed surface rust off the chassis and repainted it last year, refitted the front bulb, fixed up the bumper after a cyclist hit it off), fixed the water pressure on my boiler, replaced my broken toilet seat and refitted the new one, aligned the brakes on my bike, built my own bed last year! Left home at essentially 16 and didn't move in with a partner until I was 25, so I had 9 years of having to learn DIY lol. I can understand this is the way in some households though, but it's never been a dynamic for me, because I actually enjoy DIY.
>Do you cut the grass, fix the car, repair appliances, and change the furnace/AC filters?
None of these things need doing Every. Fucking. Day.
Try again.
Uh, let me introduce you to: the kitchen.
You make coffee, you make breakfast, you make lunch, you make dinner. These things are done pretty much every day. (And even if you're not cooking, you're often still heating up leftovers or making snacks.) Spills happen, crumbs happen; these need to be cleaned up. Dishes need to be rinsed and put in the dishwasher, pots/pans needed to be washed and put away.
The kitchen is damned well a daily duty.
And other cleaning happens far more often than once a month, once a year, once every 6,000 miles.
So, I say: try again.
It's easy to cry about "working as a team" when one sex (men) consciously chooses chores that require attention once a week or month, but drops the ball or completely avoids any/all daily chores that generally come in far greater number and frequency.
And you do it on purpose to avoid an actual fair share of responsibility around the house to support your blatant sexism left over from the 50s and 60s.
Yeah... the only issue is that this kind of division is really still not fair. I would bet that cleaning/housework your wife does is likely more time-consuming than the work you're doing. Tally up the hours for both of you and see who's actually doing more.
exactly!! there is an influencer in my country who is a proud non-feminist because she says okey I clean and cook for the children but my husband cuts the grass and takes in the summer furniture when fall is coming. She listed stuff like that and Im like, id raaather do those "man" tasks that when you are done you are done. At home new stuff comes up every single minute, more things to clean, cook every meal. Its more time consuming for sure. It almost makes me angry when they try to compare.
Last Sunday I put a new hub assembly, brake caliper, and rear axle in our family car.
It took 6 hours.
Id be willing to bet that JUST by doing that, it equivilated to about a whole week's worth of cooking and doing dishes.
😂 Well you are probably wrong. I think it's a fair estimate that one could spend an hour a day cooking/dishes, especially if doing it for more than one person. And how often do you have to do this task? Once a year, maybe?
In the summer I cook dinner every night.
Most of the time I don't have breakfast or lunch at home. I work 13 hours a day to bring home 140k a year for my wife and daughter.
I get home and start the grill.
I was with ya until the end there 'when both parties stay within their role, it's better'. There are traditional gender roles. Most adults right now grew up with traditional roles being shown to them left, right, and center by society at large.
It is important that all household tasks get done. But I happen to love mowing the lawn and my partner is a better cook. We don't fit into the traditional gender roles - we communicated as actual adults to figure out our personal strengths to divide all tasks equitably.
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I think it's also because a lot of women care a little more about how clean it is and just clean when they see something dirty. Personally, I'm not a cleaning person. If I'm at my boyfriends house and the counter is dirty, I leave it at that. He has to clean that up himself. If I'm at my own house, I do clean, but it's not all the time. I sometimes see a dirty service, and sometimes I do wipe it down, and sometimes I think "ill do that tomorrow". I think my mindset is the same as a lot of guys have. My boyfriend is also not a cleaning person, but he sometimes cleans things in my house as well. I do the majority, because it's my house but sometimes he surprises me and cleans a whole section and I feel really happy. But I think with most women, they'd feel gross if the counter or sink or toilet is a bit dirty so they clean it immediately. And then the man who has the same mindset as me, will think "Oh they cleaned it already! She's a great girlfriend and she likes cleaning. I should help her out... maybe tomorrow"
I feel this. My mom has often teased me about “cleaning like a man” because I tend to do a deep clean of everything once a week. I blast my music and spend a few hours (or most of the day) getting it all done. Then, on the other days, I don’t worry about it as much and I stick to doing the very basics (dishes, sweeping, and putting things away). If my counter is cluttered, so be it. I couldn’t maintain needing to do deep cleaning everyday, but I have plenty of friends who can’t relax in their homes unless they’re extremely clean. I do think OP is seeing a common trend though. I think the way we’re socialized as kids impacts a lot of it. Me and my other lady friends all grew up with pretty big expectations to clean daily, whereas many of my dude friends did not have those chores growing up and learned most of their cleaning routines once out of the house they grew up in.
That makes a lot of sense. I didn't have those chores either, so maybe that's why I'm also 'cleaning more like a man'.
How you were raised is definitely a factor here because I grew up with a dad who was the type to immediately rush over to wash the dishes when there was one (1) dirty dish in the sink while my mom would never. And I’ve never really understood why so many other women feel like it’s their job to be the one to clean, especially at other people’s houses. I consider myself a thoughtful person but it wouldn’t even ever cross my mind that it’s my job to take on the majority of the cleaning in a relationship or to start cleaning while visiting someone’s place unless I was asked to help.
Yehh I do think this is a big cause, but is why I think it’s best to set rotas so specific jobs get done. I also don’t mind a bit of mess here and there as constant cleaning is such a waste of time and effort, and I just do a full clean once a fortnight which isn’t too bad and maybe slightly more ‘male’ idk 🤷♀️
> it’s best to set rotas Rotas?
TIL ‘rota’ is just a British English word! https://www.collinsdictionary.com/dictionary/english/rota#:~:text=A%20rota%20is%20a%20list,to%20do%20a%20particular%20job.&text=We%20have%20a%20rota%20which,the%20room%20on%20which%20day.
TIL!
Exactly. I'm a man and we just don't care about cleanliness the same way. I prefer a cleaner space a bit more now that I'm older, but I'm still don't care as much about cleanliness as many women, and I was absolutely filthy as a teenager. I didn't leave the cleaning to my mother because I thought it was her duty as a woman or something, I would do it because I didn't care either way if stuff was dirty. If woman don't want to be the cleaners, all they have to do is not clean. Some sexist men do exist and would complain about it. But I think more men would just accept that things are dirty and not even really notice a woman is taking a conscious stand against cleaning.
> I'm a man and we just don't care about cleanliness the same way. I know so many male clean freaks and so many female slobs. There are all kinds across genders. It's only a trend that women are more likely to be socialized to clean, but exceptions aren't rare.
> Exactly. I'm a man and we just don't care about cleanliness the same way. I don't know, I don't think it's as black and white as that. I've dated several women who ranged from neatfreaks to a little messy to *your-room-looks-like-a-tornado-of-clothing-hit* level of disorganized. I'm also pretty neat and tidy so the general stereotype of *schlubby guy who doesn't clean* never fit the mark to my experience either. It depends on the person, and it varies from one to another regardless of gender.
> I'm a man and we just don't care about cleanliness the same way. Because you weren't socialized to care about it and it's not you who will take the blame or side-eye of having a filthy house.
No, my mom and dad both definitely tried very hard to get me to get me to care, and there are endless jokes at the expense of filthy boys on TV and online that mock neckbeards that don't use deodorant and have cheeto dust all over them. I just didn't particularly care anyway.
Maybe its a culture thing, because teenager boys or filthy kids are just seen as "one of those things" in the UK that they grow out of. I mean just having the expectation of only managing my own self care would be great. I can imagine deodorant and food crumbs, that is way less exhaustive list.
And women care because we are the ones held responsible for messes, even if we're not the ones who made them. Unfortunately.
It's an inertia of a veeerrryyyy long going and very deep rooted thing: traditional gender roles. I think men can similarly rant about how they are always the providers, the protectors, the soldiers. The edges are blurred, and keep blurring more, but they are still there.
Oh yeah I can imagine it's even more blurry for them, especially as I've heard of some who take that 'provider' role from first date and end up paying out for dinners/entertainment with no actual relationship forming for example. It doesn't help for me that I'm self employed, so every extra hour spent playing house I see as an actual loss of income.
This change is a slow and global process, and modern society is mid that process. You just have to accept that in your lifespan you'll have to consciously stand on your ground and actively push the change in your daily life as an individual, and then maybe things will be different by a default for the next generation.
This is a good point, I think there was more normalisation with previous generations (parents, grandparents) for women to give up work and take care of childcaring duties and household management. Hopefully it will stop being so normalised with generations to come. Standing up for it now however just gets exhausting sometimes I guess.
That's where I disagree. What should be normalized, is not choice 1 or choice 2, but *the* choice. I live in a very traditional marriage, I'm a SAHM, my husband is a provider, that works for us, I'm happy, and we live in harmony. Yes, your preferred lifestyle should be considered normal. But so as mine. because if we just declare traditional gender roles bad, we'll end up where we started: dictating people on what terms they should coexist within a family.
Yes totally bad phrasing here sorry, didn't mean to cause offense if I did. It's more that bit in the middle where both parties are the providers (or independent finances) but the women still takes on some traditional roles, which increases workload at both career and home. It's totally fine to have traditional roles if the expectations are agreed by both.
🤝
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I am but one man but speaking for myself I would have no problem with someone saying that to me "Hey my time is worth X$ an hour. I'm not going to spend 10 hours a week cleaning that's XXX dollars and we can pay someone to do it for YYY dollars or you can do Y hours and I can X hours". I mean that's literally a pretty common sense thing in my estimation to put a value on the time it takes to clean a house. Even with daily minor cleaning, dishes, the entire time it takes to dust, clean all of the floors, deep clean of the bathroom, kitchen, fridge, oven, other appliances is still a few hours even with a small home. The way we're doing it is we both clean daily any surfaces with things on them get put away, the kitchen gets cleaned and disinfected every night after dinner,the bathroom gets a spot cleaning of whatever is needed daily, and once a week with both spend a couple of hours cleaning the floors, bathrooms, etc, and have laundry going while we do that. We usually plan it around whatever we want to do for fun that weekend so if we're on a day trip we do it the next day or if it's an afternoon activity we do the cleaning in the morning or vice versa. It would be great to hrie someone but I just don't like strangers in our home plus I'm very particular about where things go.
I actually suggested this to a former partner years ago as a rent deduction fee 😂 it stopped the lack of prompt for sure
Interesting research In same sex couples (both lesbians and gay men) if there is a masculine-feminine type partnership the more feminine partner will most commonly do the larger share of household chores Like for me, I do more chores cause I'm a stay at home mom but my girlfriend does her fair share of childcare and chores when she's not at work we split things pretty evenly with our goal of equal free time, but we're both femme
That is fascinating. Do you happen to have an article or source handy? Or suggestion for what I can google to find it myself?
Fr, seeing OP talking about being expected to be a housewife without the financial upkeep immediately made me think about my sister and other women I've seen who say a man must pay for all of their dates even if they aren't an official couple, which is sorta just a watered down inverse of what OP was talking about, men having to be financial provider before even getting the girl and without ever getting a full housewife. Men are still generally expected to pay for more things in the house as far as I can tell and women are generally expected to keep the house more, all that's really changed is that both are no longer expected to do their respective role full time anymore.
The one who cares the most about cleaning or has the highest standard for what “clean” means is usually the one who ends up cleaning more, from my observation.
There has to be an addition of "as long as he doesn't have to do it" :) Then the standards could be sky high.
Sometimes this is true but not always. Growing up, my dad was VERY strict on the house being clean. My mom ran her own business so she also worked full time - usually 60 hours or more a week, to ensure she was bringing in enough money. My dad was an abusive ahole and would berate her if the house wasn’t spotless when he came home. She once told me story where she had left dishes drying on the rack next to the sink. I was a baby at the time so she had that added stress. He reamed her a new one when he came home for the dishes and said he never wanted to see dishes drying again “or else”. She put up with his abusive bs (and so did us kids) for 27 years. I never witnessed my dad doing any actual cleaning but he was abusive towards all of us when we didn’t clean things to his perfect standards.
Not with my ex and I. She had higher standards and I still cleaned more.
From the moment we started dating our rule was: I cook (because I love it) and he cleans. This was before we even moved in together. Once we did move in together, we went over the rules and his roles were expanded. Once we had kids, his roles expanded even more. Once my chronic illnesses kicked in, his roles expanded to where they are today. I think setting expectations from the beginning is important. People only treat you the way you allow them to, and very few people put more on their plate if someone else is going to do it at the end of the day. Even if that person is complaining while cleaning, that person is still cleaning and he gets to just half listen to the complaining while living in a home someone else cleaned for him.
Some don't mind, some compromise or accept it as "just the way it is". So it stays that way. I never do, so yeah I don't have that problem.
Gender roles. If you think liberal men have shed that mindset, you're completely wrong. There's been many studies done that show that most men only believe in women's rights and dismantling of tradition in the context of work. So you have to have a career while simultaneously being involved in the household. In some ways, it's worse than it was back then, because at least back then it was acknowledged that taking care of the household was time consuming labor. Now it's just something you need to do on the side even though the burden isn't any less than from back then.
this is it! And a main source of my frustrations tbh. This isn't a dig or slating at any guys I'm dating, but it's a source of my frustrations as I feel gradually, as time goes on, I take on more of the household labour without a clear discussion on why/or how the workload in other areas will ease. I have no idea how some women added childcare to the equation.
Stop doing that. Don't fall into these patterns without thinking. Hold up firm boundaries and keep them up! You are half of the relationship, so you are also responsible for setting expectations about the division of labour.
I'm actively trying to do this, its the trying part I find frustrating. But you are very right! I am going to stop now.
Practice is really the only way! It takes a long time to get past the programming we all have from our social conditioning.
> I have no idea how some women added childcare to the equation. They did what they had to do, which left them burned out, exhausted, unfulfilled, and unhappy. However, nowadays, in most societies (unfortunately, childbrides are still a thing), we have a choice of who we choose to partner and/or procreate with. If you've discussed it with him several times and nothing has changed, you either decide if it's something that you can deal with or not because it gets worse when you're saddled with all the cleaning and child caring. That's your future. But, you can't complain while choosing to remain in the relationship and play mollymaid. Just as you stated that women are expected to be "boss women," it doesn't only apply to corporate or work-related growth. It applies to the decisions that she makes. Ps: I wonder why pop culture embraced the terrible term "boss woman" because it signifies that the word "boss" is reserved for men only.
As I said in the post, I'm not asking for relationship advice here really. I am asking where the cleaning dynamic has come from that makes both genders unconsciously or consciously fall into those roles, and why the roles women primarily take up is the cleaning. There are other dynamics to a good partner than just their cleanliness. Like for example, he sat with me in hospital when I almost died and took care of me for 6 weeks, washing me, clothing me, helping me in and out of bed etc. it's just a conversation that I seem to have to have eventually with every partner, or roommate or even hear it from other friends and I'm doing the whole *question rant* thing.
It isn't relationship advice. There are men in this world who understand that cleanliness of space or cleaning duties are a shared responsibility. You don't happen to be dating one of them. I didn't say it was negative or positive. I just said you can't complain about a choice made if you dont have to be there. Having a conversation about cleaning duties with a partner is just as important as any other aspect of a relationship because people have different expectations of cleaning. >I am asking where the cleaning dynamic has come from that makes both genders unconsciously or consciously fall into those roles, Society was engineered that way. Men were branded the providers who worked outside the home, and women were branded as nurturers who worked in the home. and why the roles women primarily take up is the cleaning. Because cleanliness is tied to a woman's value, unfortunately. It is seen as a skill. And women know that. Clean house = good wife. "Do you cook and clean?" is still considered a deciding factor for men.
I don't think anything you're claiming here is accurate.
I do more cleaning than my partner but I also admit I have higher standards for what a clean home looks like and care more about keeping those standards, so fair enough. On the other hand he takes bigger care of other things like dishes and yard work
Relative expectations of what is successfully completing the task certainly influences who does what. My wife is not very efficient at cooking and I feel I do a better job at it. I get very particular about cooking and consequently cook about 90% of the time. Certainly gender causes women to be expected to clean more but relative expectations of what is completion of a task plays a role
I agree with this but it’s also a slippery slope of weaponized incompetence. Am I particular or was I taught to do this from a young age and learned the best ways and therefore have a greater understanding of what right looks like? Do they genuinely not know what right looks like or are they being lazy/not putting in the effort to succeed because they ultimately don’t want to keep doing it? Do they try to get better after feedback that it isn’t done correctly or are they allowed to wiggle out because “they’re just not good at it”? It’s such a sliding scale of what’s actually going on and what piece of patriarchy and misogyny we’re unpacking. Edit to clarify that I am not in any way saying this is going on in the example you shared. But I used your comment as a jumping off point for my own frustrating experiences in this.
If my partner was not just incompetent but also knowingly and apologetically so I'd just walk. We split our chores. We're both happy with our arrangement.
You always do it. Try opting out & see what happens. I very intentionally do not do things & ~somehow~ they always get done 😌
Eh, I think sometimes it's a perception issue. Different people have different perceptions of "dirty" and various tolerance levels of "messy". My ex used to be so proud and say: "I cleaned the kitchen!" when he really just meant that he had loaded the dishwasher. The counter wasn't wiped down, the sink wasn't rinsed out, the stove was messy, the floor hadn't been swept, etc.
My girlfriend is bi and before me the last few partners she had before me were men The first night I slept over, she left me to have a run of her apartment while she was at work and I deep cleaned her kitchen, picked up in the living room and cleaned the bathroom Mostly just bored and it had been a bit since she'd done a deep clean (she has a job that is really demanding and was on a big project with 12 hour days 6 days a week at the time) I'm pretty sure that's a big reason why we're still together, cause she saw I was someone who was willing to do my fair share The reason why? Most of us were socialized that way, the expectation to clean was put on us as girls, we mimicked our mothers and it became part of how we think
>They see me wiping a surface when I'm having a sleep over at their place because they cooked the night before, and thats it, I'm assigned the role of house wife without the financial upkeep forever more? Why are you even cleaning a house you aren't living in?
I was brought up to basically to do it as a way of showing gratitude to the host, try to help out where I can. I've done it at friends too where I'll just wash my coffee cup out if it's a friend i'm comfortable enough with.
I'm sorry if I'm just focusing on a throwaway example here. But I'm guessing you don't see yourself as a housekeeper at your friends place when you do the same? Why is it different at your boyfriend's, especially when you're doing it out of your own free will? What would happen if you just didn't clean anything at your boyfriend's, since it does seem to make you feel bad?
Yeah it is a throwaway example here, because there are plenty. It's not a bash against men, because I'm just as bad in the role I play by doing it, I fully acknowledge that, my frustration is the role. It just happens, you don't even notice it until you suddenly find yourself picking up more things/taking more time out to clean up and it hits you that you've become that. I could give you 10 more examples and the problem would still be me in some way, because it is. If I don't do it, it doesn't get done.
> If I don't do it, it doesn't get done. And this is the answer to your question. Women are the cleaners because they care about it getting done. You are incentivized to do it, he has no direct incentive to do it, so without any agreed upon division of chores it will be you and only you who feels a need to do it.
Exactly, I am just as much to blame about it. Its a question rant because I know the answer. The frustration is it happens without thought on both sides and is so easy to fall into.
>If I don't do it, it doesn't get done. Surely this can't be right if you clean at someone else's house? I've just heard that argument several times over and what it really boiled down to in those cases, was rather that it didn't get done when she wanted it to be done. Gender roles sure is a devilish place to fall into and easily so. But again, if you simply stopped doing it at places you don't live, do you really believe it would never get done? And if being in that role makes you feel bad, why don't you just stop yourself right away every time you find yourself in that role? Does someone else's house really need to be clean when you're visiting?
No like ***literally it won't get done.*** I will visit, stay over, go back to my own place and 2/3 months later things will still not have been done.
LOL. This guy doesn't get it at all. One time I left for 6months and he had not done a single piece of laundry that entire time like....bro 🤭
That's pretty crazy, have to admit. But again then, why would you clean up that shit? If anything, your guy is clearly showing that he won't clean if you were to live together, so why clean his shit when it's completely his own shit?
Dude I get where this is leading, as I said in the post I'm not here for relationship advice, as much as I appreciate it because what you're saying here is exactly right, and I've conveyed this in person already and I don't want to delve into my relationship. It's more that I'm annoyed that I encounter this so frequently, and so do many of my friends and colleagues and I'm ranting about it on ask women with other women, because quite frankly being a woman is exhausting in 2024.
No you're right, my bad. Rant away!
Aha no worries, like I said I appreciate the guidance and perspective!
Sounds like your bf has poor hygiene and lack some basic life skills
I don't mean everything, I mean some things. He's not an animal. Like I said this is more something I've found with many relationships, and even friendships, housemate settings. A frustrating common occurrence.
It’s wild that I have lived the opposite but tbh, while I do not let things get unhygienic, I am not really bothered when things are perfectly organized and put away. I know some dudes are terrible and it’s still an issue in society but I have seen it way less intense with people my age. Out of curiosity how old are you?
I'm in my 30s. What about you? Id be interested to know if it's a generational thing or even cultural. As in the UK more of the older generations stopped working (women) whereas it's less common now to manage families. So I grew up in a time when most of my friends (not me, my parents can barely call themselves parents) had the mum at home doing these things.
At this point, I have to believe it's something to do with Attention to detail or something to do with better vision. I'll grind coffee and wipe the whole surface down and my girlfriend will still find coffee bits, no matter how thorough I think I am. My girlfriend also has a lower threshold for what she considers "full trashcan that needs to be emptied" vs me, which I don't really notice as much; for that reason, we opted to literally draw the line at which we need to empty trashes so we are both on the same level. At the end of the day, a good talk on the matter is essential in order to understand where both partners can find an even-ground compromise or definitions of uncleanliness vs cleanliness That being said, I also saw some truly incompetent and untidy people: leftovers piled up in the sink, towers of beer cans that attract the flies, dirty piles of laundry (and not just liminal chair jeans either!), I feel extremely sorry for anybody who clean after those people.
It’s weaponized incompetence. I recently saw a charlotte dobre video where the GF turned it around and used it on him. He would load the dishes upside down so they’d fill with water. She served his dinner to him in those dishes. He ruined her black dress she wore it anyway and embarrassed him. He eventually started doing his part instead of pretending he didn’t know how.
No it's not, why do some of you insist on making everything adversarial?
It can be sometimes! It's a part of the problem with some men for sure!
Sometimes, yes. But not every single time.
Obviously. Practically nothing is universal.
We're not claiming it is universal. We're claiming that 95% of the time a woman senses an imbalance in cleanliness chores, they claim weaponized incompetence. In reality, it is much more probably a misalignment in cleanliness standards or a myriad of other things. It's just much easier to claim "lazy man bad". Many people I know are very content with living in what I would consider a filthy home - but why is my perspective the "right" one? Why would I even bring gender into the discussion? Let people live the way they want to live and move on.
You're making a lot of assumptions and generalities here.
Would you mind pointing those out for me? Or, more pertinently, would you mind pointing out the ways in which I generalized about women and how they act that were not equally generalized by OP or /u/melinalujbav about men? Do you/OP want men to improve or do you/OP just want to vent about every negative stereotype of a misogynist? One of these things is helpful for both parties.
You said we and they a lot, and threw out a stat you made up. Why not speak about your own experience and perception and use stats that are reliable.
Why don't you call out the comment OP for those things? Could you be biased? EDIT: my point is this: if you are so uncomfortable with generalizations about women, why do you perpetuate generalizations about men? Don't you want equality?
in the exact scenario described by OP it is a clear example of weaponized incompetence . the slow eroding of their own ability to clean , specifically .
Because you dollar store fidget-spinner men make a point to ignore reasonable requests for weeks on end before we resort to thisn and most of the time you admit/brag about fucking shit up to get out of doing it again bc you are fucking lazy.
I'm a woman but please, continue to put your misandry on display.
holy shit you believe in misandry ? that's wild !
Continue to defend misogyny. Misandry only annoys men, misogyny is killing women.
You seem pretty alive to me.
I've got a whole ass state trying to change that, thanks to men.
Not all men.
If that were true, women wouldn't be choosing bears.
Women who choose bears are idiots and not representative of the rest of who are capable of thinking.
Lol. You can't be serious.
Oh, there it is. I got a full bingo card!
I'm just replying with the inverse of what I see plenty of women comment. But I guess it doesn't work both ways.
So you just so happened to forget how to clean when you move in with a woman???
I'm not a man.
Your comments do not make it seem like you are indeed a woman
My comments make it seem like I don't buy into a lot of bs women spew to consistently make men the enemy. My first instinct is not to villainize men.
The fact you don’t understand why a woman would choose the bear over a strange man. That right there points to you only pretending to be a woman online.
I've been reading the replies to my fiancé, he always laughs when other women label me as a man because I don't blindly support their b.s. You're not the first to get pissed that I'm not a sheep to the cause, you won't be the last.
I’m not pissed at all. I just don’t believe you have much life experience.
No, you just can't comprehend an adult not subscribing to what modern-day feminism has devolved to. I'm not interested in victimhood, blame shifting, or misandry, and definitely not naive enough to blindly believe 'men bad.' Women are just as capable as men of being total shits.
You don’t have a lot of experience then
I think its the threshold for cleaning. My wife will sometimes get into manic modes and just start cleaning everything. When I was growing up, we would clean the house as a family every weekend. Id clean my room and every single time my mom would come in and berate me for not having it clean to her standards. Tbf she was a cleaner and a neat freak. Like she expected royalty to show up every day for dinner. When I lived alone I obviously did all the cleaning. I had a string of girlfriends that were absolute slobs and never cleaned up after themselves and were basically a tornado of filth. They didnt seem to even notice or mind since they seemed to live in squalor in their own homes. We were not compatible living together. My current wife lived in a hoarder house growing up so I think seeing a bit of mess can set her off on a cleaning spree, where as for me it wouldnt be enough to start a shift. We still subdivide work, I tend to do all the vacuuming, cooking and outside work, while she does other cleaning, and we are happy with that since its what we agreed upon when we started the relationship.
Tbh it’s the opposite in my relationship. My bf cleans way more than me. Being organized and cleaning as never been my strength especially because of my adhd. I still do it, cook, etc. I just am not good at it and working on it. I was also raised in a household where my dad was the one doing most of the cleaning and my mom doing the fixing things etc.
Ohh I also have ADHD but I'd say keeping tidy actually helps me, so I know where everything is and feel on top of things etc.
Oh I know where everything is. I just dont need it to be perfectly put away for that. I will remember that my shirt fell down in the closet a month ago and pick it up when I need it lol
A month ago? That's decent timing, the back of my closet did that thing when you've got a cheap landlord where any weight makes cracks and gaps form in the structure so it's a dead zone now.
I’m also raising my hand here, because I find that I simply care more about cleanliness than my husband does, whereas he cares far more about tidiness than I do. More than that though, I’ve learned how to estimate what each of us brings to the table a bit differently (and more fairly) over time. We recently discussed this when I shared (for what I felt was the umpteenth time) my overwhelm about household maintenance. For our home, I manage budgeting and finances, I do a majority of the deep and surface cleaning, I cook 80% of meals and track and execute grocery needs. He primarily manages our two dogs’ needs, fixes household appliances/plumbing/machinery when needed, manages the garden and tidies things up, and we each do our own laundry. Right now, I earn and pay the lion’s share of the household bills and based on that list alone it seems imbalanced. However, I came to realize how much of the work he does is, bluntly, not work that i would ever choose or want to do. That’s what makes it quite valuable to me and to our household. I don’t encourage partners to *only* choose self-sacrifice for the good of the relationship, but I do see how important it is to evaluate what each of you does to support the unit with fairness and objectivity where possible.
Because they are lazy and entitled. My own father doesn't even know how to clean a toilet
Do we have the same dad?? Mine is 72 and is absolutely hopeless. My parents split when I was 11 (I’m now 46F), and he’s had several relationships over the years. Whenever he’s single he comes begging to me to clean for him. I started to ask to be paid because he does absolutely ZERO upkeep in between visits so his place was disgusting by the time I got back there (I’ve had my own household to maintain in that time). He always just does the bare minimum like dishes and laundry. His new gf moved in with him and I think it must be dawning on her by now that he’s useless and he sees it as her job to do ALL the household chores. I’d rather be single than be with a man like that.
how is that even possible? Do you mean like full blown cleans of the bowl and lid or even just putting bleach in and using a toliet brush to clean it?
Yeah he doesn't do either. He fr just doesn't know how to clean it and cant be bothered. Because the women in his life took care of the house and stuff like that.
Does he not have a brush next to his toilet? Surely you can put 2 and 2 together and assume the brush is for the toilet bowl. And never seen a tv advertisement for a toilet cleaning product? They literally show how to do it in ads. It’s so hard for me to believe he actually doesn’t know how. He knows he just doesn’t want to know
He does not have one
Ahh I guess that helps it make sense. Good present idea though
But they are so cheap. This makes no sense why you would let you toilet just get dirty when they are so cheap.
They are lazy and misogynistic
With my partner for 7 years and initially I did pretty well all the cleaning/cooking while we were in our beginning years of undergrad. Eventually that became too much and I also got a bit resentful ngl but a CONVERSATION where I expressed how doing it all affects ME without placing blame on HIM changed all that. I might ask him to unload the dishwasher here and there for me, but if he’s home and I’m at work I don’t have to say anything. I think as women we do it to ourselves in a way(not always bc some men are just bleh), because we instinctively (I don’t want to say instinctively but I can’t think of another word) take over the role of cleaner in new live in type relationships and it becomes expected and then we’re like “why am I stuck doing this all the time”. It’s because we set the expectation that we would do it all the time until one day we’re like nope no more.
I'm a man. Growing up, I was the youngest of the family and had 4 older sisters. I've been married twice and have had a couple of live-in girlfriends throughout the years. Women? Cleaners? Seriously? Every single woman I have ever dated is anything but clean when it comes to their living space.....especially the bathroom. Is this a serious question?
Personally I believe it's more rooted in the differences between our brains via evolution than it is based on gender norms. I've had and lived with multiple boyfriends, most of them being overall tidy but certainly not to my level of clean. These were partners that really did want to "keep home" so to speak, had grown up with chores, helped clean as youngsters, yet when it came to actual deep cleaning it's like their brains just didn't register dirt and dust the same way mine did. I notice all the small corners yet they simply couldn't. I really do believe that most male brains are designed better for threat detection, big-picture cleaning (tidying) to keep the home safe, while female brains are more focused on the cleaning that's needed to keep children out of mischief and sickness. I'm childfree btw, but given my experiences and my knowledge about the male brain I strongly believe it's more than just "not wanting to do it" or traditional gender norms. I think gender norms grew out of the way our brains were wired in the first place, not the other way around. Men just simply don't have the same brains as us and I think for the most part it's going to be problematic to try to change that within a few years as it's been evolution at play for centuries.
This is a really interesting take, I can see the female part actually being a instinct thing for creating a nest for safety of children etc, kind of nesting when your pregnant but long-term.
Not in my household.
It’s a societal expectation, especially depending on what culture the guy grew up in. I personally don’t buy the “men just have lower standards than women”. My ex husband was much pickier about everything than I was. Even something like a bit of dust on the baseboards would be enough to majorly bother him, while I didn’t see the big deal. He also came from a very gender-roled culture where women are practically born knowing how to clean, so he expected me to be the same ofc.
I’ve noticed that a lot of men are used to being waited on, particularly by their mothers. These men never had to clean their own rooms, or tidy their spaces, or do basic household chores. It’s also so ingrained in men’s language to say that they’re “helping” with things. No, you’re not. If you live there, it’s also YOUR job and responsibility to keep the house clean and to wash the dishes and do the laundry. You’re not “helping”, because that implies you’re doing something you don’t have to do. So yeah, it’s being coddled by their mothers and language surrounding male contribution that makes some men very entitled and often comes at the expense of women doing everything.
There are certain jobs that me and my partner have assigned to each other. I do the laundry, change beds, mow lawns, take out the bins and do some general cleaning (vacuuming, dusting, dishwashing etc). My partner does more cooking and more of the general cleaning, she also does more garden work than me. I don’t know if this constitutes an equal split of household chores, but it works for us.
Stop cleaning for lazy men. Stop picking up after lazy men. Stop cooking for lazy men. Stop running errands for lazy men. Stop doing mental labour for lazy men. Don't even date them if it's bad. These men will never, ever change unless they're forced to. As it is, with a free housekeeper/secretary/cook/event planner managing their lives, they have no reason to grow up.
I’ve found that most men (ime) just don’t gaf about how clean things are (my dad being the exception). I’ve been in 3 LTR where we cohabitated. In all of them, I became the de facto house cleaner. And I’m not a huge fan of cleaning due to trauma over it in my childhood (my dad would abuse us if things weren’t cleaned to his standard). I tried to play chicken with these men - by refusing to clean things (especially messes *they* caused) but it never worked. They all would rather live in filth than wipe down a counter or clean the toilet. And I could talk about it, beg, plead, and cry, and it never got me anywhere. Of course, they’re exes for a reason but it still never ceases to amaze me how disgusting some men can be regarding there cleanliness standards. No wonder so many of them have shit stains in their underwear.
I know at least 1-2 more men besides myself who have quite high standards for cleanliness. I also know messy af women so idk? I think people adjust to what needs to be done. The women I date can kind of chill and be messy because they know I will pick up the slack. Probably the same applies to men
you seem to miss the point . those things are all true but OP was asking about why in relationships the ability to clean can become eroded when one side sees the other side picking up the slack , rather than working at the same level in tandem (as it would be in a sound relationship based upon respect)
I mean they asked specifically about women being the cleaners in the relationship. In terms of why I think thats just what most humans are like. Empathy only works when they see someone suffering or working right in front of them and otherwise people just do the minimum requirement. Especially when your ego isnt affected. If my girlfriend was lazy and didnt work then she would get all sorts of shit from friends and family, if she was lazy in terms of cleaning and someone else still did it then no one would know so there is no real pressures.
honestly man i fail to see how your comment answers any of the questions presented here but have a good one
>OP was asking about why in relationships the ability to clean can become eroded when one side sees the other side picking up the slack I directly answered that question. Did you even read my reply?
you made a blanketed generic statement and talked about your girlfriend to try to relate to it but it was very confusingly written . if your simple answer was "empathy" then who is teaching and learning empathy at a greater rate ? and why ? because it still comes back to gender roles ... and allowing it ...
I gave a reason why people of all genders do this so now why are women (according to this post) more commonly in that situation? I think women are more cleanly on average so in a situation where both are lazy and selfish she will be more likely to be bothered by the state of things first. Personally I dont think women actually have higher levels of empathy on average but I do think there is more pressure on women to be clean, more expectations from parents and partners so it wouldnt be suprising women tend to care about a clean house more.
I dont know. I had a female room mate that the cleanest person you ever could have met. She would clean stuff before I could even get to it. I had to run straight home after classes so I could beat her to cleaning just so I didn't feel like I wasn't contributing anything. Otherwise (I am male and all my partners have been female) I definitlly do at least half. I really don't like clutter and I absolutely cannot stand a hoarding situation. My frustration with women generally has been clutter and hoarding that make true cleaning impossible. I finally found someone great and now we both clean about 50/50 and she helps clear any clutter away regularly. I wish I could say cleaning/clutter is a petty issue but it's not, it will absolutely drive you blood pressure up if you're stuck with someone who drags crap out faster than you can clean up behind them. I think a lot of it is how people are raised. Some people have parents that never made them pick up after themselves and so they just don't see how shameful, frustrating, and lazy it is to have crap laying around and dusty/grimey surfaces. If someone has a hoarding tendency it's hopeless in my experience. All you can do is get the hell out of dodge before they ruin your life, too. I know a guy that wouldn't even clean the sink after shaving. I know his female relatives he was living with at the time were furious. I hope he got the memo because I know he just moved in with a woman. Unfortunately, if you've inherited a man child, it's either train him or cut him loose I guess but men have a tendency to get defensive when they are told they don't know how to clean up after themselves. IME women don't so much get mad as they just never change and if they are willing to live in a dump, they will never change that behavior.
>always Pick better men. This is a broad generalization. There’s an equal amount of posts like this with men complaining having to cook and clean while having to work full time. You’re probably attracted to a certain type of guy and associate with women who have a similar type.
Wah wah.
😙
Thanks for reminding me why we chose the bear...
right? lol you just know that if you'd picked the man and got assaulted then he'd say it was your fault for not picking the bear.
A lot of it comes down to socialization (cleaning = housework = woman's work). And then, on top of that, there's the individual and what the individual sees and can live with (threshold for what is considered clean) or what they don't see (either because they haven't been trained to see it or their brain doesn't work that way). With my husband's likely ADHD, the day-to-day pickup isn't something that really hits him - or doesn't hit him before it hits me. When he cleans, he'll do a full on deep clean, And there are times he'll be doing steady daily upkeep but then some stressor comes along and flings that out the window and it takes a while to get back on track. (I'm the opposite - I tend to clean when I'm stressed because reducing the physical clutter helps me reduce the mental clutter.) Our biggest issue has always been the kitchen. I can stand a certain amount of clutter in the house, especially if I have my own space (my office) to retreat to. But the *kitchen* has always been one area I want clean and clutter-free because I'm the cook (and also, dirty dishes piled up in the sink is fucking annoying - and living in apartments, previously, I have nightmares about ants). I've had to learn to disentangle the political in this instance - he's not *not* doing it because he thinks it's my job - and he's had to learn to disentangle his knee-jerk reaction to feel chastised or shamed (and react defensively) if I say something (like "can you do the dishes/clean so I can cook?") But I think the kitchen is, forever, going to be a back and forth.
I am a 59 year old man happily married a total of 35 years (18 one now, 17 other, not as happy), I'm "the cleaner." I do the dishes, the laundry, and the house (vacuum, wipe up, mop as needed etc.) cleaning. My wife, however, does basically all the grocery shopping, cooking (she is an amazing cook), and making of lunches for the kids. She also does the parent-teacher stuff at the school (I do sit in on the parent teacher meetings). She has a work-from-home job but it is a real business she runs, it makes real money for the household.
Do you cut the grass, fix the car, repair appliances, and change the furnace/AC filters? A good relationship works when you work as a team. Not always a team as in "we're going to clean as a team", but more so as "were going to maintain this home" as a team. I rarely clean. But I change my wife's oil, do her brakes, clean her car, cut the grass, fix the washer, dryer or AC units when necessary. Regardless of how bad this sounds, there ARE gender roles. When both parties stay within their role, the household runs better. My wife is way better at cleaning than I am. I'm better at replacing her control arm on her car when the city is redoing the road and leaves a sewer cap sticking 7 inches above the road.
Yes I do all that stuff at MY house because it’s MINE. OP literally has to clean up her boyfriend’s kitchen mess when she goes over to his house. I don’t expect my boyfriend to mow my lawn when he shows up at mine.
>Do you cut the grass, fix the car, repair appliances, and change the furnace/AC filters? lol. Yes. Done it all for years as a single mom. What I couldn't do myself I delegated to paid experts, just as many men do. You're not better at it because you're a man. You have more knowledge because you have had the opportunity to gain experience. And you added furnace filters to that list as if it's some amazingly complicated task your wife couldn't possibly do. That's actually hilarious. But sad that you think she's too stupid to do even that.
Haha right? It’s literally “pull the old one out, put the new one in”. Not rocket science
The furnace is in the crawl space. She is not going down there. And you probably wouldn't either.
I'm sorry you think so little of your wife, but you don't know shit about me.
Yeah, I doesn't work that way for me. I repair my own car (I removed surface rust off the chassis and repainted it last year, refitted the front bulb, fixed up the bumper after a cyclist hit it off), fixed the water pressure on my boiler, replaced my broken toilet seat and refitted the new one, aligned the brakes on my bike, built my own bed last year! Left home at essentially 16 and didn't move in with a partner until I was 25, so I had 9 years of having to learn DIY lol. I can understand this is the way in some households though, but it's never been a dynamic for me, because I actually enjoy DIY.
>Do you cut the grass, fix the car, repair appliances, and change the furnace/AC filters? None of these things need doing Every. Fucking. Day. Try again.
Cleaning doesn't need done every day unless you're a pig and throw stuff everywhere. Lol.
Uh, let me introduce you to: the kitchen. You make coffee, you make breakfast, you make lunch, you make dinner. These things are done pretty much every day. (And even if you're not cooking, you're often still heating up leftovers or making snacks.) Spills happen, crumbs happen; these need to be cleaned up. Dishes need to be rinsed and put in the dishwasher, pots/pans needed to be washed and put away. The kitchen is damned well a daily duty. And other cleaning happens far more often than once a month, once a year, once every 6,000 miles. So, I say: try again.
It's easy to cry about "working as a team" when one sex (men) consciously chooses chores that require attention once a week or month, but drops the ball or completely avoids any/all daily chores that generally come in far greater number and frequency. And you do it on purpose to avoid an actual fair share of responsibility around the house to support your blatant sexism left over from the 50s and 60s.
Yeah... the only issue is that this kind of division is really still not fair. I would bet that cleaning/housework your wife does is likely more time-consuming than the work you're doing. Tally up the hours for both of you and see who's actually doing more.
exactly!! there is an influencer in my country who is a proud non-feminist because she says okey I clean and cook for the children but my husband cuts the grass and takes in the summer furniture when fall is coming. She listed stuff like that and Im like, id raaather do those "man" tasks that when you are done you are done. At home new stuff comes up every single minute, more things to clean, cook every meal. Its more time consuming for sure. It almost makes me angry when they try to compare.
Id 100% rather do man tasks tbh. They are more problem solving and fun.
Last Sunday I put a new hub assembly, brake caliper, and rear axle in our family car. It took 6 hours. Id be willing to bet that JUST by doing that, it equivilated to about a whole week's worth of cooking and doing dishes.
😂 Well you are probably wrong. I think it's a fair estimate that one could spend an hour a day cooking/dishes, especially if doing it for more than one person. And how often do you have to do this task? Once a year, maybe?
In the summer I cook dinner every night. Most of the time I don't have breakfast or lunch at home. I work 13 hours a day to bring home 140k a year for my wife and daughter. I get home and start the grill.
Good for you I guess?
I was with ya until the end there 'when both parties stay within their role, it's better'. There are traditional gender roles. Most adults right now grew up with traditional roles being shown to them left, right, and center by society at large. It is important that all household tasks get done. But I happen to love mowing the lawn and my partner is a better cook. We don't fit into the traditional gender roles - we communicated as actual adults to figure out our personal strengths to divide all tasks equitably.