My husband is a good man, and a good feminist ally. I could tell, as I walked him through it, that he was trying to grasp what I was getting at. But he didn’t. He said he’d try to do more cleaning around the house to help me out. He restated that all I ever needed to do was ask him for help, but therein lies the problem. I don’t want to micromanage housework. I want a partner with equal initiative.
However, it’s not as easy as telling him that. My husband, despite his good nature and admirable intentions, still responds to criticism in a very patriarchal way. Forcing him to see emotional labor for the work it is feels like a personal attack on his character. If I were to point out random emotional labor duties I carry out—reminding him of his family’s birthdays, carrying in my head the entire school handbook and dietary guidelines for lunches, updating the calendar to include everyone’s schedules, asking his mother to babysit the kids when we go out, keeping track of what food and household items we are running low on, tidying everyone’s strewn about belongings, the unending hell that is laundry—he would take it as me saying, “Look at everything I’m doing that you’re not. You’re a bad person for ignoring me and not pulling your weight.”
Bearing the brunt of all this emotional labor in a household is frustrating. It’s the word I hear most commonly when talking to friends about the subject of all the behind-the-scenes work they do. It’s frustrating to be saddled with all of these responsibilities, no one to acknowledge the work you are doing, and no way to change it without a major confrontation.
“What bothers me the most about having any conversation around emotional labor is being seen as a nag,” says Kelly Burch, a freelance journalist who works primarily from home. “My partner feels irritated and defensive by the fact that I’m always pointing out what he’s not doing. It shuts him down. I understand why it would be frustrating from his perspective, but I haven’t figured out another way to make him aware of all the emotional and mental energy I’m spending to keep the house running.”
Stop Calling Women Nags — How Emotional Labor is Dragging Down Gender Equality (via thatdiabolicalfeminist)
Men, if these ideas are new to you, here’s a whole thread to introduce you to some of the work that’s been invisibly done for you when you’ve lived with women, and the way it affects women to have to do it alone. I recommend working through it at your own pace and challenging the defensiveness as it crops up to block your view.
If you make a genuine effort to learn from this and to start taking back some of this work, you’re going to see a slow but drastic improvement in your understanding of and relationships with the women in your life.
(via organicgold)
whoooof. yikes. I didn’t really know emotional labor was a thing, but it definitely is.
(via hannaoliviaway)
(Source: harpersbazaar.com, via hannaoliviaway)
Can’t wait to get back in here tomorrow and kick off the new year. 💪🏼💪🏼
Up where everything’s simple.
Anonymous asked: Would you call it rape if a girl was drunk out of her mind and blacked out but still awake and functioning but the dude still goes for it? I'm conflicted.
If you really have to ask whether or not I’d “call it rape”, you’re the fucking problem. IF SHE’S BLACKED OUT, HOW CAN SHE COHERENTLY AND CONSENSUALLY AGREE TO SEX. Do me a favor, if you ever have to ask yourself (or anyone else for that matter) if ANYTHING is acceptable, don’t do it. It’s that simple. Do the right thing.
“if you ever have to ask yourself (or anyone else for that matter) if ANYTHING is acceptable, don’t do it.” Exactly.
Trevor breaks down the presidential race between Hillary Clinton and Donald Trump.
make sure you’re registered to vote HERE.
(via tyleroakley)
Trump says tax evasion is ‘smart’
That’s a crime. Why is he not in jail. They got al Capone for tax evasion. Why is Trump still not in handcuffs
What’s going on
(via leahclaire)
making moves in the bedroom
Rosenberg Loses It On Police Officer Over Alton Sterling Killing #BlackLivesMatter #AltonSterling
Show this to all your “#NotAllCops” friends.
(via flirtingwithdanger)