Fellow Men: The Bar Really Is That Low
OK, this really could apply to anybody, but culturally it applies most often to CisGendered Men, Predominantly the Heterosexual Ones. In my experience.
Let’s talk about how low the bar is for us on some things.
When I was in High School, I wound up becoming the Football Equipment Manager. Which meant I had keys to (in land area) half the school’s campus, and a lot of responsibility for it.
Looking back, it was a LOT to put on a high school kid, but I am glad I did it, just as I am glad I am out of that scene now. Another long story.
I did a lot of cleaning. Janitors didn’t do that stuff, they only did inside the school. And I inherited a mess. I didn’t realize how bad it was before I came along until our first home football game.
A delegation of Ladies: the School Principal, some of my Teachers, a couple of my teammate’s Moms, and a few of the Cheerleaders and Statisticians, came to find me. I must have had a bit of a deer-in-the-headlights look when all these women and girls came looking for me, but:
“We just wanted to say Thank you for the condition of the ladies’ restroom here in the stadium!”
“Uh…I mean, I had to hose it out, but I figure it had been neglected since last year…”
“Oh, not only did you clean it, but…there’s toilet paper! Thank you so much!” All sincere. I could do no wrong in their eyes at that point.
The bar really was that low.
It took me a few weeks to finally figure it out:
It was the women’s restroom. Men and boys just did not enter there. The coaching staff and equipment managers who had gone before me were so conditioned into Southern United States Gender Role Expectations that they could not even bring themselves to unlock the women’s room on a day when no women would possibly be near it, go inside, clean it, and stock toilet paper. That was Women’s Ground, Men Did Not Go There. It Is A Forbidden Mystery. They not only did not worry about how it would get cleaned or restocked, the very question, when I asked it, was met with a quizzical stare.
Yeah, the bar really was that low. I started packing extra toilet paper from the supply closet and taking it to away games. I would ask the Principal or someone else I knew to scout their women’s restrooms and report back if they needed toilet paper.
About two-thirds of the time, they did. (I am going to bet some player’s mother cleaned and stocked the other one-third!)
Two of the coaches were single men, and…I don’t want to know what their houses were like. I just don’t.
Jump ahead some years, to when my wife started her job.
I packed her lunch for her every day. (She is working from home now, and I make lunch for her on time five days a week.)
Her coworkers found out that I did that, and they were amazed.
“He cooks for you? SERIOUSLY?”
She came home and said I was voted husband of the year by her coworkers.
A sandwich, a bag of chips, a drink, and a fruit cup in a bag with a cold pack, and I am husband of the year?
The quiche and the lasagna blew their minds.
Husband of the year? Seriously?!
The bar really is that low.
Listen, fellow men: if you are afraid to approach something that you think of as women’s work, then…you need help. Making food is not women’s work, men have made food throughout history. Cleaning is not women’s work, men have cleaned things throughout history. Stocking toilet paper is not women’s work, it is human work, humans have buttholes, buttholes have to be wiped, unless you have a bidet, somebody has to restock the toilet paper!
And I do not care what anybody tells you, if you do these things you are not amazing because of that, these things do not qualify you as Husband of the Year, if your greatest achievement is putting out a new roll of TP and making a sammich and I really, REALLY hope you washed your hands between those two tasks, if that is the most amazing thing you have done…
Aside from, yes, people who have disabilities that make these tasks difficult or impossible, I am referring to the average, abled person here, the bar should not be that low!