This is very true. In my own experience, the married men I know have to be berated to get them to help out.

My wife just trades sex for housework.

//We have a very clean house.

well, duh.

Cleaning is mommy work.

/Ladies..... here's a tip..... separate the household duties and make sure your husband has the majority of tasks that must be done.... like buying the children new clothes or cooking. The children can't go to school naked and everybody will starve if meals are not made so he'll have to do these tasks unless you cave. Don't cave..... do your household task but don't do his.

Arthur Jumbles: Cleaning is mommy work.

/Ladies..... here's a tip..... separate the household duties and make sure your husband has the majority of tasks that must be done.... like buying the children new clothes or cooking. The children can't go to school naked and everybody will starve if meals are not made so he'll have to do these tasks unless you cave. Don't cave..... do your household task but don't do his.

ARE YOU NUTS? If I was a guy faced with a women that pissed an moaned as much as Author. She wouldn't be married anymore. I share household chores with my wife and we do just fine without all the whining.

Just try not use the word 'chore'.

Acceptable: hobby, specialty, quest, pastime, etc...

/ you have been tasked to decontaminate the bathroom

I not only do household chores, I'm also responsible for all the dirty work.

So, yeah, sometimes when she tells me to go do the kids' laundry, I tell her to go mow the yard, take the trash to the curb, and go figure out if the smell in the crawlspace really is a dead rat.

This is what happens when women want to impress a guy and do all his chores for him: he begins to expect it.

My boyfriend washes and dries the laundry; I fold it and put it away. My boyfriend loads the dishwasher; I put the dishes away. I'm on constant clutter patrol in the apartment, and he's happy to scrub and sweep once a week. He scrapes the cat box, I do almost all of the bike maintenance. We both take out the garbage.

We agreed on division of duties before moving in together. It wasn't a matter of "this is a girl job" or "this is a boy job", we divided it based on which one pissed the person off less. I *hate* doing dishes, he *hates* having to put them away, for example.

Hold on there...

During my 8yr relationship/marriage I did dishes, laundry, swept, mopped, planted and tended to the garden, did all the yard work, did my share of cooking, cleaned the bathrooms religiously, cleaned the pool, dusted, did the bills, and generally kept a very clean house. My ex was the one that didn't help at all.

So what I'm saying is..there are some men that do take part of the household chores.
If you've learned nothing else from what I wrote above, take this along with you - I'm single and I have domestic skills.

soze: We agreed on division of duties before moving in together. It wasn't a matter of "this is a girl job" or "this is a boy job", we divided it based on which one pissed the person off less. I *hate* doing dishes, he *hates* having to put them away, for example.

This is how it works for my gf and I. We both hate dusting and sweeping so when it gets bad enough we do it together.

Couldn't find a THAT'S SEXIST gif.

Wow.

How's about this: stop whining about it, and either pitch in or STFU?

I don't know any couple where there isn't some division in the household chores. Most men I know do some dishes, do some laundry, shopping, ect. It depends on who's closest to it when it reaches that critical mass point that something has to be done. That includes the cat box and the garbage.

If you need some chore list to take care of something that needs to get done, then GTFO. Seriously. What kind of happy horsehiat is this?

Step One: Grow the fark up.
Step Two: Date someone who's grown people too.

You accept this sort of behavior in your life, you've got only yourself to farking blame--more addressed to our Idiotic Dear Author...

All tasks in my house get done either by the person who made the farking mess in the first place, or the person with the most free time and energy, or both of us together. It's a partnership. Otherwise, our rule is that she cooks because I can't, and I clean because she won't. Worked well enough for 20 years.

Chores are not gender-specific, you skanky biatch, unless it's blowing him or flushing sand out of your vagina.

One of the great rules of relationship is: If you let it happen, then you have no right to whine and no one to blame but yourself.

There has to be some division of labor in a relationship.

In my single income family, my wife handles most of the household stuff, because I work all week. When I'm around, I help.

This, of course, is just fine. However, a male journalist making some negative claim about women or wives results in a major shiatstorm, ending with his firing or sobbing apology.

Why can't MEN be sexist, too?

I've been neater than nearly all of my girlfriends.

Which brings me to another point - who does the cleaning in a household, regardless of relationship or gender, usually depends on who has the lower tolerance for disarray. When I lived alone, my apartment was usually pretty clean, as I tend to pick up after myself and would do a full sweep of the place once a week or so.

Since I've been living with other people, I've had two roommates that have been unusually tidy people. Now, I'm far from a slob, but their "gotta clean up" mode generally kicks in about a day or two before mine would... with the end result that they nearly always ended up doing the cleaning, having gotten there just ahead of me every time. I'd have to make a conscious effort to look for things to clean just to get some in. Yet when my roommates left town for a week or more, I could always tell that they were surprised, and a bit confused, to find that the place was still respectably clean when they got back, because they had the impression that they were the only ones who cared about cleaning.

Point is, I'm sure some husbands are slobs, but I'm also sure there are plenty of others who aren't, but just aren't quite as orderly as their wives are. You want to find out what your husband actually will or won't do? Let it go for a while. All of it. Stop doing everything right away and see how long it takes for him to get on it. He might be willing to do more than you think, if you can wait an day or two.

nashBridges: All you have to do if you want a guy to do something is ask him whatever he wanted to do on any given day and explain that something is a little more important. Men are logical - use it to your advantage.

HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHhahahahahahahahahhaaaaaaaaaaaaahahahahahahahahaha

That's the funniest thing I've read in YEARS; the funniest part is that you actually believe this.

Oh, and I can guarantee that her husband Jeremy, having been treated like a child and humiliated world-wide by this article , will be banging the arse off her best friend, who thinks he's "sooo wonderful" and is treated badly at home. 100% certainty.

From the responses looks like all of us males on Fark do our half or more. Amazing Fark demographic there. Why does Fark attract so many useful and sharing husbands? Where is the science?

arkansas: Where is the science?

We're all screwing in the same lightbulb.

Oh christ. FTFA:

According to the Institute for Social Research at the University of Michigan, women spent an average of 27 hours a week on housework in 2002, while men spent 16 hours (which at least represents an improvement over the 16 seconds or so a lot of them spent a generation ago). Even today, married men perform little more than a third of household labor, whether or not their wives are in the paid labor force. And women spend more than twice as much time as men do on child care.

The conveniently-omitted key stat here is so blatantly obvious I'm sure I don't need to point it out.

Because it just isn't sexism when women do it.

Oh, it gets better. Let's look at Bennett's comments and go to her own source (new window):

Bennett: According to the Institute for Social Research at the University of Michigan, women spent an average of 27 hours a week on housework in 2002, while men spent 16 hours (which at least represents an improvement over the 16 seconds or so a lot of them spent a generation ago).

ISR: Overall, the amount of housework done by U.S. women has dropped considerably since 1976, while the amount of housework done by men has increased... In 1976, women did an average of 26 hours of housework a week, compared with about 17 hours in 2005. Men did about six hours of housework a week in 1976, compared with about 13 hours in 2005.

Also from ISR: Excluded from these "core" housework hours were tasks like gardening, home repairs, or washing the car.

...gardening is pretty gender-neutral, but also not really a necessity, and the others are typically male activities, and are not included.

Also, the study makes NO mention whatsoever of time spent at an actual, y'know, job. As far as can be told from the article, the study included both working and non-working wives. I'd like to see a combined statistic comparing men's and women's averages of time spent on BOTH earning household income AND doing housework. Can somebody come up with that?

Yeah well, Leslie Bennetts, in my experience women are -wait I can't say anything. That'd be sexist.

So how have I accomplished this? By holding my husband's feet to the fire every single day of our lives, of course.....

What a biatch!

arkansas: From the responses looks like all of us males on Fark do our half or more. Amazing Fark demographic there. Why does Fark attract so many useful and sharing husbands? Where is the science?

Maybe it's that husbands IN GENERAL are a little more useful and sharing than women like to think.

Women need to stop treating men like men used to treat women.

Problem solved.

Yeah I'm pretty much amazed that nobody here except for Mr Munky has mentioned having a job. My roomates are a married couple, he works all day, she watches TV. End of the day, he's doing all the dishes,laundry, etc. If one person is working all damn day at some shiatty job in order to pay for your fat ass, then clean the farking dishes.

Well, what's wrong with being sexy? Sexy's good!

nobozo:
/ you have been tasked to decontaminate the bathroom

That's a good way of putting it. Makes it sound like playing a level of Doom.

The truth. For the past 7 years I've worked TWO jobs (40
+20, for the record), yet I'm the one expected to come home and clean everything. Because he's had such a hard day, he "deserves to relax." If he so much as vacuums the hallway once a decade, he won't leave me alone until I tell him "wow thanks, what a great help you've been!" No matter that I spent the entire weekend washing dishes, doing laundry, cleaning the house that looks like a tornado spun through it...

If they do one damn thing they expect some kind of reward. Because he's such a slob and a hoarder, cleaning up after him is a full-time job in itself.

ARE NOT.

/felt obligitory

Damn it something happened to the picture.



Problem solved

Just kill the spiders and I'll be happy.

Men will do their fair share of the household chores... when women do their fair share of the household income, yard work, and household maintainance.

Fair's fair.

/Chalks it up to another case of the double standard
//waits for the "not my case so it's absolutely false" women to chime in

- Women tend to get uncomfortable about the state of a home much sooner than men. Heck, even most of the interior decorators I know are either ladies, or very feminine men.

- I have no problem with doing any task I'm asked to, provided you ask me as a peer, not as a child. A previous girlfriend said "I shouldn't have to ask" once, to which I responded "I shouldn't have to ask for sex more often than once a week...".

mowing the lawn
fertilizing the lawn
weeding the lawn
cleaning the gutters
raking leaves
painting the shutters
painting the house
shoveling snow
pruning the trees
washing the outside of the windows
cleaning the pool
taking care of the cars

Line up ladies, we got work to do!!!!!!

I do all of the above, why should I work inside as well???

Being gay rocks. I work a lot and do a few minor things, he works far less than me and does the housework stuff. I keep the finances, he makes dinner. It works out great.

About to sign on a house (in 2 hours!) so we'll see how well that carries over to a house instead of apartment...

Typhoid

The truth. For the past 7 years I've worked TWO jobs (40
+20, for the record), yet I'm the one expected to come home and clean everything. Because he's had such a hard day, he "deserves to relax." If he so much as vacuums the hallway once a decade, he won't leave me alone until I tell him "wow thanks, what a great help you've been!" No matter that I spent the entire weekend washing dishes, doing laundry, cleaning the house that looks like a tornado spun through it...

If they do one damn thing they expect some kind of reward. Because he's such a slob and a hoarder, cleaning up after him is a full-time job in itself.

You sound like you deserve him.

CheekyMunky: I'd like to see a combined statistic comparing men's and women's averages of time spent on BOTH earning household income AND doing housework. Can somebody come up with that?

Never mind, found it (new window). Again from the ISR:

Despite the popular perception that Americans are working longer than ever, the time diary data clearly show that total work hours-defined as labor market work plus housework-decreased substantially from 1965 to 1985 for both men and women. From 1989 to 1999, the questionnaire recall data indicate that paid work in the labor market increased by 10 percent for men and 17 percent for women, reflecting the decade's strong job market and the increasing labor market participation of women. As a result, total work time for men increased by 8 percent over that decade. But given the drop in housework time for women, their total work time increased by only 2 percent.

And:

Total work time (defined as market labor plus housework) tends to be higher for men than for women in countries with relatively high levels of income, including Japan, the United States and Sweden.

Add to this the fact that Bennetts' idea of marital "equity" involves thinking of husbands as "children" and using condescending, manipulative, and domineering "tactics" to control them, and this article is one big stinkin' heap of garbage.

Shut your f*ckin' yap, Leslie.

"In my experience, treating husbands are a lot like children doesn't seem to motivate them, much."

Admittedly, I am unmarried, but I do a complete, Überbatsnot, no lint left behind cleaning, about once every two weeks.

I think any capable woman could probably keep the maintenance on that, for fourteen days, with a duster and a vac without betraying her gender.

*snort*

So the author has a husband who at least makes a marginal effort to do housework, and she biatches about him to a wide audience.

In comparison, other women's husbands don't do any work at all, and they get off the hook.

...and she still wonders why more men don't chip in?

We had an argument over household chores, me and my GF.

It turns out that what she had a beef with was that she had the boring chores...of course, se complained and whined about me not doing enough. THEN I made a spread-sheet with the time consumption where we were evenly matched and she started complaining about me always doing the dishes and her making the bed...

Double standards FTW!

/I'm a slob - I could live on soil and pizza trays
//My GF is a neat-freak
///I think if she wants a clean apartment then she should work the hardest for it

just what i expected from the expected loudest noisiest idiots at totalfark, yes, your deadbeats make for gospel

Ceph: Being gay rocks. I work a lot and do a few minor things, he works far less than me and does the housework stuff. I keep the finances, he makes dinner. It works out great.

About to sign on a house (in 2 hours!) so we'll see how well that carries over to a house instead of apartment...

And how do you see that as different from a straight marriage?? Leave out the sex, thanks.

This is top main page article that I saw once I sat down from getting the groceries, cleaning out the fridge, doing a load of laundry, doing the dishes, and adjusting the doorknob so that the door latches properly again.

I really hate gender generalizations.

I was plenty willing to help out more, but after 30 years of living quite well doing things my way, she felt that my efforts are not up to her standards. I get fussed at for doing it wrong, so I stop doing it. Then she biatches because I'm not helping. I realize I can't win and so I'm back to doing it my way in another house where I can't hear her.

Wait.. what was the question again?

nashBridges

Newsletter? I want to subscribe.

Typhoid:

If they do one damn thing they expect some kind of reward. Because he's such a slob and a hoarder, cleaning up after him is a full-time job in itself.

Read my previous post. According to the very source quoted in the article, your husband is the exception and not the rule. You chose poorly. Sorry, but that's not our fault.