Is Working on a Kinder Marriage Woman’s Work?
Commenter kb left an interesting comment on my post, Working on a Kinder Marriage a few days ago, and I wanted to address it in a post rather than a comment reply because I think it is such an interesting question, and I’m sort of surprised none of my regular readers brought it up before. The comment read:
I came from Feministe, and, without wanting to criticize your marriage or decisions-how do you deal with the fact that it’s always [women] that are supposed to do this? That women are supposed to sacrifice for the relationship?
While I definitely do think it is a clear societal norm that women are supposed to be the ones that “keep the family together,” and it is also a societal norm that women are supposed to be the “gentler” of the sexes, I definitely did not mean to imply that I thought it was the job of the woman to be kinder and gentler to her husband in order to make a marriage work.
In my relationship, personally, it’s almost always me who flies off the handle at seemingly inane things. They don’t seem inane when I’m yelling at Tim about them, but once I back off and take a breath, I do realize that not pushing the chair in or not hanging up your towels like a grownup or not putting the dishes in the dishwasher is not really a punishable offense. My life will, in fact, go on like normal if the dishes aren’t done or if the chair isn’t in the right spot. And, instead of start yelling at him about OMG YOU NEVER PUSH THE CHAIR IN WHY CAN’T YOU DO ANYTHING RIGHT OMG OMG, I could just as easily calmly say, “Hey, dude. You forgot to push the chair in. Could you do that, please? And try to remember next time?” In fact, I think the latter is more effective as evidenced by my experience teaching. Start yelling, you’ll get someone to either shut down or yell back, neither of which is very productive.
However, this is not just the job of the woman. It just so happens that, in my relationship, I’m usually the yeller. Tim doesn’t really yell unless he’s being yelled at. In fact, he rarely even complains about any of my more annoying habits, like leaving half-empty water glasses all over the apartment. (Seriously, it’s like an Easter egg hunt every morning.) He usually just brings out a glass from whever it was and puts it in the dishwasher and says, “I’ll give you two guesses where I found this. You’ll only need one.” This usually just makes me laugh and say, “Oops, sorry,” and try to remember next time to put my water glasses away.
If Tim ever did start yelling at me the way I yell at him, though, my feminist self would flip out becuase that’s just not an appropriate way to treat an equal partner. So why is it OK when I do it to him? The answer is, it’s not. And that’s why I wrote the post on having a kinder marriage.
I do wonder, though, why it seems the woman’s tendency to get upset, criticize, and yell. All of the posts I’ve seen on this topic, and all of the comments I’ve received about it, are from women. As much as I hate to even ask it, is Deborah from Everybody Loves Raymond, who comes off as over-critical and whiney in literally every episode, really that close to the mark? I shudder at the thought. Yet, still, I wonder.
What do you all think about this?
I don’t believe at all that getting upset, criticizing and yelling are uniquely female behaviors. I think that because it’s a societal norm that women are “gentler” than men, it’s more noticeable and “shocking” when women act aggressively or negatively. But it’s hardly a women’s problem, in my opinion.
In my marriage, both of us slip up sometimes. Just last night, after we were getting ready for bed after a lovely date night, I was trying to be jokey with my husband and he wasn’t having it. And then right after I woke up this morning, he apologized for being cranky. It wasn’t even something that bothered me (I knew he was tired last night), but it meant so much that he was conscientious of my feelings anyway. A kinder marriage (loving this term, by the way) is something that benefits both partners, and in my marriage, it’s something we both contribute to and benefit from equally. I don’t think being a caring spouse is gendered.
I’m definitely the one who yells, criticizes, and nit-picks in my marriage. If my husband ever does it, it’s because I’ve started in on him and he’s fighting back. Typically, like Tim, Jon’s response to my annoying habits is more teasing and non-judgmental.
I can tell you though, that my parents are the opposite. I’m just like my dad, and Jon is pretty similar to my mom, actually.
Wow, I feel special now. I agree with you about the social norms, and that’s why I used the world supposed to. You make a good point everyone and every relationship is different, though. I do also struggle with “just because something is gendered female and I like it doesn’t make me a bad feminist” and “Is doing something 100% away from a social norm just because it is a social norm really something that challenges the norm? or does it just justify it?” And not all women are perfect(obviously).
I also find the “women get upset and nitpick” thing sets off alarm bells in my head-I was actually having a conversation with my husband just a few days ago about rock songs and how there are so many songs about “women had expectations and that was such a drag and killing me”(the killing me is literal from the song that brought this on, I’m paraphrasing the rest) why is women having expectations nitpickng? Why is it asking too much to just expect that towels will be hung up, etc? I know women can be too stressed about this, but I feel like our culture already has such a trope of “oh here is ANOTHER women nagging. man they’re such a drag” that we don’t really have a good bar to determine what is too far. ANYTHING is considered too far.
But thank you for taking the time to really answer the question.