Gender Programming

The Mental Load

How does gender programming affect the mental load?

All of this to say that women are taught from an early age that our worth and value comes from the house we keep and the kids we raise. Dads are taught that their job is done as soon as they’ve provided shelter and money for the family.

What this looks like in Women:

• Programmed to think self worth comes from the house we keep and the kids we raise
• Are taught to be the caretakers (therefore we prioritize this within our do to list)
• Nice vs Kind: Being nice is when you are polite to people and treat people well. Being kind is when you care about people and show you care.
• "Being Nice" means we avoid confrontation and is dishonest. Kind would be honest but often uncomfortable
• Confrontation in relationships feels like it could be the end rather than an opportunity to understand more or accept differences
• Nice leads to guilt over having our own needs
• We police our own behavior:
• Tone of voice (harshest for women of color who battle the “angry black woman” trope in all areas of life)
• If we ask for something, say at work, we risk being labeled “aggressive”
• Nice is transactional but “kind” positions us as worthy to give and receive kindness
• Our time and work is seen as less valuable than when men can contribute - both at home and in the office.

Women are often seen as multi-taskers that it’s part of their personality

if being a “multi-tasker” was a personality trait, we would see it spread across genders. But as it stands, women are the ones being assigned with this label.

What programming looks like in men:

Men are programmed to believe their worth comes from providing for the family. Once those jobs are complete, they deserve to be cared for. Men are raised to be:

• Breadwinners
• Protectors
• Hold jobs that are more highly valued
• Disconnected - emotions are weaknesses

But,

• Women are seen as “right” when it comes to the safety of the (shared) children

In a study, young men supported gender equality in theory. But many held on to traditional ideas about gender roles. They saw men as “breadwinners” or “protectors” and women as “carers” and felt that societal attitudes hadn’t changed dramatically.

One of the ways we reinforce gendered behavior is by focusing on economics. If one partner earns more money than the other, we tell ourselves that the partner who earns less or works fewer hours has more time for household work. Each week, according to Pew, mothers spend nearly twice as long as fathers doing unpaid domestic work.

Men are simply not taught to look at the things that we look at because remember the mental load is largely anticipating and monitoring the outcomes, the shit end of the process to do and that’s how gender programming contributes to the mental load.

when women say they're solely charged with handling their child's well-being, including being attentive to their emotions and relationships, it can lead to lower satisfaction with their partner and their life, as well as feelings of emptiness. That included whether the women felt unconditionally loved and accepted as well as how they viewed intimacy with their partners. Even when taking such variables into account, Luthar found that being solely responsible for a child's emotional development was negatively related to women's well-being and satisfaction with their relationship.

Stereotypical expectations about what constitutes women’s and men’s work are not simply the outmoded relics of past generations. Research shows they persist even among LGTBQ families as well as millennial couples.

Should women care less?

In a reel we were sent it's a lady who, upfront, seems like she's explaining something everyone can get on board with: men aren't taught to "need" things to be clean, so they don't like to clean. It's useless to convince them they should like to clean. But they can be convinced to clean because you care about cleaning and "men will do a lot of stupid shit for the women they love". But then she ends with a zinger: "But women, you should also just care less".

Women shouldn't have to care less. We shouldn't be expected to be the ones that adjust our needs and wants. Men are capable of doing it too and there's plenty of research that shows why they should.

Should men care more?

Going back to gender assumed roles. They don’t have as much emotional skin in the game to care about a tidy home so their care meter is different than ours.

Mentioned in this episode:

Our House Children's Learning Center

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