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How Emotional Labor is Dragging Down Gender Equality

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Re: How Emotional Labor is Dragging Down Gender Equality

#361

Post by scott_s »

Footkerchief wrote: post #355
BarkingChicken wrote: post #207

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think you might be missing the point. The gift that she wanted was the house cleaning service. She had already been planning/considering hiring someone anyway. The gift was that she would not have to do the work to find, vet, make the calls, research, arrange payment, schedule, etc. for this task. The gift was supposed to be him taking over that work. > The gift, for me, was not so much in the cleaning itself but t…

I may be missing something fundamental, but what is the point of a cleaning service, if not a clean house? Is there some other benefit to be gained from a cleaning service? Why did it matter how the house got cleaned? It's a normal and healthy part of relationships to come to an agreement about what tasks should be done, how thoroughly, and who should be responsible for them. It's something else entirely to stipulate…

> I may be missing something fundamental, but what is the point of a cleaning service, if not a clean house? Is there some other benefit to be gained from a cleaning service?

Not having to worry about a clean house. And a service is probably going to do a more thorough job that can be repeated. Hence, she asked him to arrange for a cleaning service. She did not, apparently, explain why she wanted a cleaning service, but he also did not ask her that.

Re: How Emotional Labor is Dragging Down Gender Equality

#362

Post by tcfunk »

Anecdote related to the part about ignoring the box:

My wife pointed out to me recently that I don't put away things if she leaves them in strange spots (out-of-place scissors, maybe). After some discussion, we both came to the conclusion that this is a side-effect of growing up with my mother.

In my childhood home, if you put something away in the wrong place, that was far worse that not having touched it at all. So I grew up conditioned to ignore mess that I didn't know how to fix.

Re: How Emotional Labor is Dragging Down Gender Equality

#363

Post by [deleted] »

sctb wrote: post #219
arkona wrote: post #142

> It was obvious that the box was in the way, that it needed to be put back. It would have been easy for him to just reach up and put it away, but instead he had stepped around it, willfully ignoring it for two days. It was up to me to tell him that he should put away something he got out in the first place. > “That’s the point,” I said, now in tears, “I don’t want to have to ask.” This kind of irrational thinking en…

Please try to be more civil and thoughtful when you comment here and leave out parts that clearly violate the guidelines. https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html

[deleted]

Re: How Emotional Labor is Dragging Down Gender Equality

#364

Post by ci5er »

dan00 wrote: post #197
zethraeus wrote: post #131

Earlier quoted context omitted.

As someone who often has anxiety: that anxiety is often irrational. Extrapolating fears rooted in one environment to another in which there is no danger is: 1) very human 2) irrational.

I think my point is: yes, the fear is irrational, but you're not irrational because you have the fear. Or saying it the other way, you can't be just rational and the fear will disappear. So it's quite unempathic to think about someone being irrational because he's anxiously, and you don't have anxiety because you're rational.

> you can't be just rational and the fear will disappear.

Are you sure? I find that mentally walking through a checklist of true-true facts makes my sweating/shaking/vomiting go away (for a while)

Re: How Emotional Labor is Dragging Down Gender Equality

#365

Post by ZenoArrow »

Mz wrote: post #358
ZenoArrow wrote: post #353

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> "I am the top ranked openly female member here. That observation is informed by long experience. In gendered discussions that get heated, the majority of people on HN will tend to side with the man or the male point of view." With all due respect, on HN I don't care whether I'm replying to a man or a woman, someone young or old, someone who lives close or lives far away. I barely even look at usernames, and will of…

Well, you are basically fighting with me (but not them) and your criticism of their remark was vastly more sympathetic than your criticisms of me. That is part and parcel of the pattern and it is incredibly insidious. I didn't expect you to know who I am. Nonetheless, it remains true that men will notice remarks they feel are disrespectful of men and pounce on them, oblivious to the fact that it is a woman being gang…

> "Well, you are basically fighting with me and your criticism of their remark was vastly more sympathetic than your criticisms of me. That is part and parcel of the pattern and it is incredibly insidious."

If I found gkya's comments more interesting than yours, then I'd be responding to them directly, and more openly discussing their comments. You could see this as argumentative if you want, but my main line of questioning was asking you to clarify a statement you made. If you can point to a single sentence I've said in our exchange that you found offensive I'd be interested to hear it.

> "I only mentioned my position as the top ranked woman here to advise you of my long standing firsthand experience. That's it. And yet it has become yet another reason for you to act like I am somehow doing something wrong."

I'm not suggesting it's wrong, I'm suggesting it's mostly irrelevant. I could say something like "I'm the most vocal proponent for Brexit on HN", and whilst that has a small element of truth to it, I don't think people hold it against me beyond a comment thread. I'll probably forget we had this chat in a week, and we may find ourselves agreeing on a different topic before too long. That's the impermanent, impersonal nature of HN, most of it isn't tied to identity, it's just people playing around with debating ideas and sharing experiences. What I'm saying is, I doubt people hold a grudge on HN, and if you choose to be openly female on HN and people like or dislike what you say, perhaps they're just liking or disliking what you say regardless of your gender.

Re: How Emotional Labor is Dragging Down Gender Equality

#366

Post by Waterluvian »

j45 wrote: post #346
j45 wrote: post #112

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Not all problems are solved or can only be seen through a lens of rationality or irrationality. Many things have to be understood with the heart, rather than the mind, or vice versa. I don't believe women or men are more logical or emotional based on their gender alone - most are adults who do not continue to develop both emotional awareness and thoughtfulness. When I'm presented with similar anxiety, instead of dism…

It's interesting the number of up and down votes this has received but no comments - open to feedback on and offline if you prefer.

I wish I had something worth saying to pay back your contribution in kind. But I don't. You've got a lot of interesting thoughts there. Nothing I strongly agree or disagree with. Nothing that leaps out as demanding my curiosity.

Re: How Emotional Labor is Dragging Down Gender Equality

#367

Post by fav_collector »

deweller wrote: post #14

Here's some advice for people of all genders: Learn to make decisions immediately and quickly. By laboring over a decision for hours or days, you can unintentionally turn a trivial task into a heavy one. By making decisions quickly you save yourself all the extra emotional and mental labor. Sure you will make mistakes, especially as you are learning to do this. But you will get better at it with practice. It is a ski…

This is the number one skill I've been trying to learn at work. Too many minor decisions add up and severely hurt productivity if they aren't resolved quickly.

Re: How Emotional Labor is Dragging Down Gender Equality

#368

Post by zug_zug »

BarkingChicken wrote: post #240
tejohnso wrote: post #35

"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 une…

I think that one of the things I'm continuously disappointed in is that comments like this tend to get more exposure and agreement than the concept that the author is trying to bring to light. I get so excited to see discussion about these concepts, but then the idea gets ignored because the author isn't using exactly the right words. It really makes me feel even more isolated and unheard. Yes, communication is a ver…

Well delivery can be just as important as the message. It sounds like she alienated male-audiences by implying it's a problem with a whole gender instead of implying it's a gender-neutral trait.

After all, how does she know who does the cleaning, planning, keeping track of birthdays in my relationship?

And I don't think it's fair to dismiss her gender-targeting delivery as a trivial detail such as grammar, she's clearly a professional writer and it's hard to imagine it's accidental.

I wonder if she's playing on her audience's pent-up emotions and intentionally stirring controversy to get more-internet attention? (not quite trolling, but a gentler form)

Re: How Emotional Labor is Dragging Down Gender Equality

#370

Post by lm_nop »

ashark wrote: post #183
Mz wrote: post #161

Earlier quoted context omitted.

And the author of the article states that communication is not happening effectively in her marriage in part due to gender norms influencing mental models and expectations. And I am telling you that effective communication in my marriage on that one detail took 16 years to finally achieve. Most of the comments here are pretty dismissive and attacking of the article and its author, while acting like she is just an unr…

I find altering environment to be much (like, much ) more effective than altering behavior. Clothes chronically on the floor somewhere[1]? That spot needs a hamper. Toddlers' toys all over the place and spouse vetoes throwing out like 80% of that junk? Bins, in child-locked cabinets. Time spent cleaning massive toy messes immediately down by well over half, for a one-time cost of a few dollars, time spent policing ho…

Taking a specific example to the next step... If wife places a hamper where dirty clothes have been placed previously, now she is tripping over the hamper instead of the dirty clothes.

In concept, your environmental adjustment makes a lot of sense, and probably works well for many (not all) use cases.

But again, here we are, where the WIFE takes the 'burden' of solving that problem. She has to put a plan together of how to change the environment, that requires time/effort.

Other comments elsewhere on this thread mention that the wife/woman should relax her standards. Not related to the above, but I'd like to just call out, why are we not asking the man/husband to raise his standards!?

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