Speaking of backlashes...

[Gato_Solo]

This pisses me off. Most of you know my feelings on the sharing of household 'duties', but thie description is what galls me. It used to be that most jobs involved some kind of physical labor. You worked hard to get your paycheck. My father used to come home physically worn out. My mother was, in the parlance of the day, a housewife. Yep...she used to complain about my father's 'lack' of help on the household chores...but she never came by his job to help him with his labor. She never did lawnwork, either. I know I'm going to hear from the modern ladies on how the housework should be divided, but this isn't about today...where women make up a huge percentage of the work force and, thusly, deserve the help on household duties, but, if all you're doing is housework, I have a problem with the complaint. When I was single, guess what? I did all the housework, and my job, too, and it took...on average...15 hours a week to do the cooking, cleaning, and laundry. If you don't believe me, time yourself when you, not a machine, is actually doing something.

NEW YORK - American men still don’t pull their weight when it comes to housework and child care, but collectively they’re not the slackers they used to be.

The average dad has gradually been getting better about picking himself up off the sofa and pitching in, according to a new report in which a psychologist suggests the payoff for doing more chores could be more sex.

 

[greenfreak]

I know I'm going to hear from the modern ladies on how the housework should be divided, but this isn't about today...where women make up a huge percentage of the work force and, thusly, deserve the help on household duties

Don't assume just yet. Since we moved into the house, I've become quite the Suzy homemaker. I have 5 'free' hours after leaving work and getting home to do with what I will. Rusty has 2. It's only right that, as a team, I am doing everything I can for him. A typical weeknight for me is washing dishes, running errands, some light cleaning, paying bills, making him dinner, perhaps a load of laundry... I seldom take a 'day off' and do nothing. Although I will admit I'm looking forward to better weather so some of those chores can be yard related.

But that doesn't preclude weekend chores that we do together. Laundry, cleaning, food shopping, yardwork, and bill paying. Since we are doing them together, they get done a heck of a lot faster than if I did them alone.

Rusty also makes a lot more money than I do. Not that that should be a deciding factor but that is why he works so many hours. And in my mind at least, that means he's bringing more to our 'team' than I am. While we joke about the salary threshold that would allow me to work part time, I don't know if I could. I would have to start a home business or something because I think doing house chores in solitude would drive me crazy.

I've known plenty of lazy-ass male coworkers that used the "I work all day" defense and then played online games the whole night, not helping their wives who also worked all day. I knew how little work they really did at their jobs but as long as their wives didn't, that's all that mattered.

Everyone's situation is different, you can't just say all men do this or all women do that. Not every man works his ass off all day. Just as not every woman will demand more work from their husbands when they return home at the end of the day.

 

[SouthernN'Proud]

I ain't got no complaints here. AE does more inside stuff than I do. I do the overwhelming majority of the cooking, and we each do our own laundry throughout the week. When it comes yardwork season, she helps a lot. I do more when my health allows, but I have never been able to gripe about her not pitching in. I do more in the garden, mainly because I'm the one who wants a garden. But she helps with it.