So the point of this video (which went
viral earlier this week) is to tell everyone in America how great "moms"
are (psssst, buy a card from Cardstore). Cynicism aside, celebrating
mums is great! We all need reminding of the amount of blood sweat and
tears that goes into birthing and nurturing sprogs, and women
definitely do not get enough recognition for the work they do.
In fact, UN Special Rapporteur Magdalena Sepulveda said that women's unpaid care work is a major human rights issue.
The people being 'interviewed' for the
hardest job in the world were quite rightly outraged at the job
description:
- "the job requires that you must be able to work standing up most or all of the time"
- "you must be constantly exerting yourself" for "135 hours to unlimited hours a week"
- "There are no vacations - on holidays your workload will increase"
- "There is no time to sleep"
- "If you had a life we'd ask you to give that life up"
One perplexed candidate for the 'job'
asks "is that even legal?" Well, quite. For 'real jobs' we
have labour laws making sure we get leisure time, breaks, comfortable
working conditions, and fair pay. When those things are absent, we're
used to interpreting the situation as a human rights violation (one
interviewee calls the requirements "inhumane").
Just the fact that they can pull this
stunt off, with a big reveal at the end that the 'job' is actually
motherhood (haha, who'd have thought it, motherhood being touted as a
job!)- proves the fact
that we simply aren't used to thinking of childrearing as 'proper
work'. Why not?
Society sees it as just something that
women do, because they're biologically programmed to do it. It's
still considered somewhat weird and deviant not to. If I ever tell
anyone I'm not sure if I want kids, they have an infuriating
propensity to smile knowingly and tell me that "the time will
come". This sounds to me like a death knell of impending doom,
but no matter.
The point is that women are mothers by
default. As soon as girls are born they're born to
be mothers. Whatever
else they may turn out to be professionally, their reproductive
capacity means that society expects them to settle down and have
children. And just as girls are assumed to like playing
with dolls, so motherhood is always assumed to be something women do
because they just love babies
SO. FRIGGIN. MUCH!!! OMG!
Babies!!! EEEEE!!
"But
you enjoy your job, so
it's not a job really, is it?" Imagine if your salary decreased
as your job satisfaction went up. "Don't look like you're
enjoying your career too much, we'll assume it comes naturally to you
and make you do it for free for the good of mankind." That logic
is very warped.
So what
are the merits of recognising women's care work as 'proper work'?
How about increased welfare payments to
primary carers? Mandatory creche facilities in the workplace? Free
childcare facilities? Dads sharing more of the workload?
Now, before I stand accused of inverse
sexism, check out these
statistics from EIGE and pipe down.
What's the problem with not viewing
women's unpaid care work as work? Well, for a start it leads to the
wealth ignorance displayed on the YouTube comments page. More
importantly, it means that, where increasingly women work and
raise children, they end up with
a double-burden to shoulder. Because the caring part isn't seen as a
legitimate job but rather something that women do by default, men
simply don't help out as much as they could. Don't argue, it's in the
stats.
The
whole unpaid care-work thing might not be such a big deal if you live
in a welfare state, or a state whose legal system recognises that
women often take time out of work to care for children in divorce
settlements. Or even, shock horror, a legal system that recognises
that, post-breakup, children still cost money and women should get
financial assistance for with their upkeep. But what about women
whose governments don't provide for them? Whose legal system denies
them rights to property, equal employment rights, or even equal
status under the law?
The
fact that their care work doesn't count as 'real' work has massive
repercussions. Take, for instance, the
homemaker who tried to claim for an equal share in the property with
her husband only for the judge to accuse her of trying to "sit
on her husband's back with her hand in his pocket." Think
about all the micro-finance schemes for developing nations which all
focus on women's
apparently infinite capacity to make bracelets for tourists and
create their own pottery start-ups while the men are out doing 'real
work'. Did the people who came up with these schemes consider the
fact that women's time is not
infinitely elastic?! Just
because they're working in the home doesn't mean they're not working.
Taking
care of children may not be 'work' in the eyes of society, but it's
just as exhausting. Plus, whatever
the ad might say about "the meaningful connections" and
that "feeling that you get from really helping your
'associate'", it's often a pretty thankless task.
"The position is going to pay
absolutely nothing". Too right. Still, if you're lucky, you
might get a card.
LK
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