Pocket Realities

Take My Husband…Please  – by Jessica Valenti – All in Her Head by Jessica Valenti:

That’s why the idea is so pervasive—whether it’s the bitching hour, sitcoms featuring hapless husbands with fed-up (but loving) wives, or entire genres of standup comedy. The more culture normalizes the idea that women ‘hate’ their husbands for being fuckups, the more women start to believe that their husbands being fuckups is inevitable.

That’s how equal relationships become fantasies rather than a reasonable expectation. 

Just as insidious? The counterpart to women ‘jokingly’ complaining about their husbands not doing child care or domestic work is men ‘jokingly’ complaining that their wives are nags. It’s a way to make men’s petty grievance that their wives want them to do housework seem equivalent to the understandable complaint that men aren’t doing housework!

I hate this trope. Hopefully articles like this shine a light on why it’s harmful.