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Same-sex couples divide chores much more evenly....until they become parents (NYT)
- Thread starter Kirblar
- Start date
Tbh I don't see what this has to do with gender so much—having kids is basically a full time job and society should really be structured so that you can treat it as such (ie being able to support a family on a single income—women should be just as able to be a breadwinner though, it shouldn't matter your gender). Then again, there should also be a societal structure that can support couples with children who both want to work or don't have a partner. Someone has to do the chores and it makes sense that the person with more time or less work pressure would do it. It's kind of weird to me to act like it's a gender thing. As the homosexual couples demonstrated, it doesn't matter what sex does what, as long as it gets done.
I agree with you. I love this post
It's unfair that woman are expected to carry so much burden. And any single guys out there, be aware, consciously overcome these ingrained societal values. If you do, you will have more work, but your wife will be happier. Your marriage a better chance to last. Your life will be happier.
Personally, I don't want to have kids, but as Celestine so accurately pointed out, it is probably because I don't feel it is worth it, given all the pressures we have to juggle.
Perish the thought. In my same-sex relationship, I already do most of the heavy lifting in regards to chores. I definitely don't want to be pigeonholed into caring for a child and maintaining the house.
But they got banned for it so it musta been a poor joke.
Let's all stop having kids and party to extinction like it's 2099.
Kids make everything harder... in the short term. But long term they can make life far more rewarding and meaningful. But the good things in life are rarely the easy things.
This is my general feeling. I wouldn't dream of having kids until I had a comfortable income and a reliable partner though. I'm not about to trade my meager comforts for the life of a struggling parent.
You ever hear of the "sunk cost" effect in psychology? Where you put so much effort into something that you justify it being worth it later on?
Yeah, that's what kids sound like to me.
Yeah, that's what kids sound like to me.
"sunk cost" is a deep misunderstand why people have the desire to have kids. And what people get out of having a family.
That's why you adopt children instead and only those above 7 so that they can help with the chores.
If both people work, both do the household stuff. It's simple.
Someone might be better in certain things than the other so you can choose what chores suit you best (for instance, i'm the handyman, my gf is more of a gardener). It's all not that hard, unless your ego is bigger than the love for your partner. Same when there is a kid. And when one person doesn't work, that person can do a bit more in and around the house. I have no idea why people are so talented in not making relationships work in a normal humane way. All i see is people shouting at each other, and that's probably the mild version of what they do at home. People rather stress each other out than get along, it seems.
Someone might be better in certain things than the other so you can choose what chores suit you best (for instance, i'm the handyman, my gf is more of a gardener). It's all not that hard, unless your ego is bigger than the love for your partner. Same when there is a kid. And when one person doesn't work, that person can do a bit more in and around the house. I have no idea why people are so talented in not making relationships work in a normal humane way. All i see is people shouting at each other, and that's probably the mild version of what they do at home. People rather stress each other out than get along, it seems.
Circumstantial moral is disgusting to observe. But i guess we all suffer from it.
Very true.
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It kind of makes sense if you live in a country with barely any safety nets, where it just makes more financial sense to let the highest earner continue working.
All the more reason we need to focus on egalitarian and humane safety nets.
All the more reason we need to focus on egalitarian and humane safety nets.
Yeah I feel the main issue here is the societal value placed on children and their education. The one taking care of the child is just doing it, but the one doing the job is the importand breadwinner.
It makes sense these patterns emerge, and it sucks.
It makes sense these patterns emerge, and it sucks.
Thank god I'm straight so. My girl does the cooking and cleaning, I'm happy to do the DIY jobs, look after the cars etc
Actually, I have never heard anyone say LGBT people are a disease. I have heard they have a disease, but this is drastically different. Do people actually say LGBT people []are[/i] a disease? Also, calling for killing all straights as an analogon to what happens in political debates when it comes to LGBT people is an exaggeration, at least for western societies. Even very hardliner right wing people I have yet to see say such a thing.
No, the desire to have kids is obviously different & biological.
In either case, I'm speaking broadly for how I would feel about it. Well, and all those mothers who end up wishing they didn't have kids (there was a thread about it). And honestly, how I see a lot of other people turn out. You watch their dreams fail OR they're never home anyways so they can accomplish their goals OR they struggle financially for years.
But that's not everyone. For others, they can handle it & they feel really accomplished at the end, which is great. Since that's important for raising kids.
You - and many others - are probably really happy with your kids. So... keep on keeping on :p
I'd imagine you haven't been on the receiving end of it? Probably just haven't noticed tbh
Interesting . I wonder how this will be impacted with more and more automation . I can send see laundry cooking etc becoming more and more automated where we're at a point I assume child rearing would be the main time consuming activity . Wonder if it will lead to similar divides being more amplified or less
Which part actually happens in a significant frequency, saying lgbt people are a disease or calling for their death (in western society)? Yes, I have not been on the receiving end but I am very sensitive to factually incorrect statements (humans being a desease...) and calling for the death of people, so I am rather positive that in my environment this is super rare.
this, similar to the gender pay gap, can be addressed through introducing ALL of the following reforms:
- government-paid parental leave that should be split down the middle between the parents (if the better-paid parent doesn't want to take time off work, the family will be leaving those months that parent refuses to take on the table)
- public daycare for young kids
- public afternoon care for school-kids after school
- individual taxation and tax brackets instead of basing the tax brackets on whole-family income
My Son is the best thing that has ever happened to me. I love him unconditionally.
When you get home, open the door and your son screams dad and runs to greet you and hug you with those loving eyes, all smiles and happy ... it's just indescribable. Best feeling in the world.
I'd take on being a stay-at-home dad any day of the week. Absolutely love (my) kids. Best part of my day/life is being with them.
My fiancee hates outdoor work, so I do all of it. She does 0% of it. I still help her with housework though.
My fiancee hates outdoor work, so I do all of it. She does 0% of it. I still help her with housework though.
If you force it, you remove the option for families to decide what is best for themselves, no wonder some families choose to let the higher earner keep working to maximise income over splitting parental leave evenly. Removing that option to split parental leave equally sounds nice in theory, but would have cost my family (where my wife is the breadwinner on a £/hour basis) money we don't have- she's freelance and I'm an office worker paid less than her but with company benefits, it made more sense for me to take the maximum time off (as my company paid into it with extra weeks leave over the state allowance) that I could and for her to take the minimum. Considering how hard and expensive it is to sort schedules out when you both work, I think you're always better off letting families decide for themselves which option works out best for them financially or in terms of who wants to do what as every family situation is different, some have help from grandparents, some don't, some have better company plans, some don't etc.
Enable this choice by doubling down on the methods combating the gender pay gap, stopping companies favouring men over women for promotion or hiring, seeing them as less risky options due to the societal expectation that they won't take long away from the office, reminding men how their workplace handles split parental leave etc. That stuff has been effective and increases options for couples. However, trying to force every situation into an incredibly inflexible single solution, even done with the best of intentions for society at large, wouldn't help families in the same way as methods aimed at equality in the workplace as it stops families from leveraging any of the far wider range of childcare/financial advantages they might rely on into the best possible package. If both of you earn a similar wage at that given point it doesn't matter too much, but for couples where, for any number of reasons, one of them earns far more than the other at that point, or one is freelance and the other isn't, then a 50/50 split can be a huge loss financially. It's essentially saying 'parental leave has a value based in average income and mandatory 50/50 split of unpaid labour regardless, even if one of you doesn't have an income at all at that moment but has all the time in the world'. That isn't helping families, it's just removing the flexibility they desperately need where two working adults is the norm but plenty of families still use a setup of one person specialised in a higher £/hour earning potential. Changing that equation from it being more likely to be a man is a good idea, penalising couples that use that setup isn't.
We found it to be really, really hard the first two years, but now it's getting more rewarding every day. I don't know whether we're just better at functioning on less sleep and more stress though! I look at it that every time I see my parents, who are 70, they are always happy to see us and have been looking forward to it, and I think that's how I'll feel in 30 years time too.
Actually I find wider social issues to still be just as important as local safety and schools when I'm raising a kid. There's time enough to do both, and although I obviously pay more attention to local schools now, I didn't suddenly only start caring about local community issues. A big chunk of my daughter's future will be affected by wider issues affecting her generation beyond those borders.
I do all the outdoor stuff, the rubbish, the DIY/repairs, the cooking and general tidying up as I find it relaxing. My wife does all the clothes washing (which to be fair seems to be about as much of our chore jobs list as everything else put together, little people generate soo much washing) but I suspect that's also because she doesn't trust me to wash her stuff/not damage her favourite clothes! :D Cleaning floors is something we both despise and is supposed to be done on a weekly basis. Realistically 'how sticky is it' and 'are people we respect coming over' are also taken into account :D
All the couples I know divide chores along lines of 'who perversely actually likes doing that', or at least 'who hates doing it slightly less'.
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That's more than slightly disgusting. The latter (calling for their death) would even be a criminal offense here in Germany (and rightfully so).
Chore distribution between my wife and me is pretty fluid outside of mowing the lawn and cooking. We both take care of basic household chores. I grew up having to clean and dust most of the house on weekends as did my wife. She never did laundry though since her mother was pretty controlling of that. Otherwise, we take care of the house when we need to and it doesn't matter who does what. I will say my wife is a better dishwasher organizer. I never had one so I'm shit at playing that sort of Tetris.
Jeeze there's a bunch of haters in here. My wife and I love having two kids. She's an elementary teacher that has a shorter work schedule than I do - so she does more of the house work. It balances very well for us.
On a slightly different note - I would kill to be a stay at home parent. It would seriously be the life. Especially once the kids hit kindergarten.
On a slightly different note - I would kill to be a stay at home parent. It would seriously be the life. Especially once the kids hit kindergarten.
http://time.com/4406337/mike-pence-gay-rights-lgbt-religious-freedom/
This is literally our vice president. Maybe think in the future before acting like LGBT people don't have extreme shit to deal with thrown at us constantly.
I love how every kid-related thread is full of drive-by posts about how horrible children are and how no one should ever have kids.
Raising kids is hard, and having kids is not for everyone. If you don't want kids, then that's totally fine. But why walk into threads to endlessly shit on the people who do?
I'm a guy and even before we had kids, I was the one who did most of the cooking, purely because I got home from work earlier. It just made more sense for me to do be the one to do it.
We split our work based on who likes doing what more, and who's better at it. Gender almost never factors into it.
Raising kids is hard, and having kids is not for everyone. If you don't want kids, then that's totally fine. But why walk into threads to endlessly shit on the people who do?
Yeah, it really shouldn't be about gender, but rather more about who's better at what, and who's the more logical choice for your given relationship.
I'm a guy and even before we had kids, I was the one who did most of the cooking, purely because I got home from work earlier. It just made more sense for me to do be the one to do it.
We split our work based on who likes doing what more, and who's better at it. Gender almost never factors into it.
I don't think that's really relevant.
It seems pretty clear that while for heterosexual couples the sole breadwinner/child supporter dichotomy often hews to gender norms, the fact that it happens with gay couples implies that the fundamental underpinning isn't the gender norms themselves. It makes far more sense for one person to work and one person to take the lead of raising the kid, and I don't think that's at all controversial. A career is a full time job and parenting is another one on top of that. If you can make it work on one income versus two, who wouldn't do that?
Problem is I don't see any support structure that really resolves the problem. Kids are a massive time sink. And companies are generally rational actors, and who are you going to choose for promotion, advancement, and more responsibilities? The person who can give it their all or the person who's constantly juggling childcare duties? Trying to raise kids with two full-time jobs is never going to be a good experience. Seems like the "support" in this instance is "hey let's not have wages stagnate for decades so that dual-income households are the only way a lot of people can make it in the current economy".
Oh no question about that, I am fully aware that LGBT people have to fight with extreme malice from the political right and are struggling for acceptance. It was really just the concrete demand for eradication and claiming they themselves are deseases that I was unaware any people outside of extreme fringe positions would ever say (in the western world). I did not want to diminish the struggle to obtain basic rights like the right for marriage - or previously even just the right to have sexual intercourse.
Yeah, I don't see how dividing chores based on how much non-domestic work each partner does is comparable to having domestic work divided by traditional gender roles. What are they even trying to say?
No kids, im afraid of raising a kid as things are but also need to learn to take care of myself.
Me, family life, and other humans are already quite scary without kids
That cooking and laundry thing is so cute
I have heard quite a few
(" waah if it were for me i wish homosexuals didn't exist", " kill them all ( then shoot sign with hands)" " in old times they would just burn them" " they should electroshock those fags' etc.
Doesn't justify a lame joke though :P
Me, family life, and other humans are already quite scary without kids
That cooking and laundry thing is so cute
Its not uncommon people just not say it in public but with "trustworthy" ones (family, classroom). Depends on the country/state.
I have heard quite a few
(" waah if it were for me i wish homosexuals didn't exist", " kill them all ( then shoot sign with hands)" " in old times they would just burn them" " they should electroshock those fags' etc.
Doesn't justify a lame joke though :P