Can we make 2020s the decade where men not doing their fair share of house chores and household management becomes as socially shunned as blatant misogynists who flat out say 'a woman's place is in the kitchen'?
The popular comparison in feminist and feminism-aligned circles is to compare them to toddlers... but that's unfair to toddlers. Little kids often WANT to help their parents out with household tasks, even (sometimes especially!) when it's a task you really can't trust a preschooler with!
No, men who are happy to let their girlfriend or wife do 90%+ of the housework, even when she works just as many or even more hours in a paid job than they do, are outright stealing time and wellbeing from their partners for their own benefit, and most of the time get away with it completely scot free. Or the woman is shot down if she dares to voice any negative opinions about it whatsoever.
I'm fed up of every TV sitcom ever treating the 'idiotic lazy dad' as a comedic figure rather than the malevolent enforcer of sexism it is.
If you're a guy in a hetero relationship reading this and think 'Well that doesn't apply to me', then great! Men are just as capable as women of running a household and keeping home life going, but that should be the expected standard, not a pleasant exception.
Here are a few ways you can help reverse the trend and force society to view the division of labour in a more equal light.
* Stop referring to men as 'helping' with the housework. 'Helping' with housework is something you might do for a sibling, a friend, an elderly family member, a favour to assist them when they have too much on their plate or they can't accomplish the tasks themselves. It does NOT apply to the house that the man himself lives in. Every adult in any household has a responsibility towards maintaining its upkeep. He isn't 'helping' - he's doing his fair share.
* Having meaningful, two way conversations with partners about what an even division of labour looks like. Nowhere near enough people do this and it shows. Exactly what the split looks like will be different from couple to couple, but the important thing is that you're both putting in more or less equal effort overall and that both of you will be better off for it.
* If you have kids, make sure that both boys and girls are taught the same way of the importance of maintaining a house and how to do it. Schools have a part they should be playing here too, but that's a different topic altogether...
* Doctors/schools/vets/etc. have a tendency to prioritise contacting the mother over the father, even when no parent is specified as first contact over the other. To achieve parity, the father needs to make it explicitly known that he should be contacted. If it's left unsaid, societal biases rear their ugly head.
And no doubt a whole bunch of other ways I completely missed.
There are so many men out there proving the bullshit wrong and being active and present partners and fathers. But there are also oh so many that refuse to move with the times and coast by doing as little as they can get away with.
Time to let them know that their actions aren't without consequences any longer.
ellievsbear
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