sulawesigirl4
Rock n' Roll Doggie ALL ACCESS
I heard this story on the BBCWorldservice last night and thought it was interesting and might merit an FYM discussion. Here's the gist of it and a link to the full article.
So, what do you all think? Good idea, bad idea or just too utopic? I find myself of several opinions at the same time. One side being that hell yes it is about time that men were required to pitch in their fair share. But on the other side, how in the world could this be enforced and is it the government's job to do so? I'm not sure. But I like the idea of evening the playing field so to speak and adding equal housework to what is expected from people in a marriage.
My parents were a good example, I feel. They both did work around our house and they both took turns cooking and washing up. If my mom cooks, my dad cleans, and vice-versa. Even in my own relationship, my boyfriend does the majority of the cleaning around the house (sweeping, mopping, etc.) while I cook and we take turns doing the dishes. Here in Mali for the most part women are treated as domestic servants. It is completely normal to see a man come home and sit and demand that his wife bring him a cup of water or a cup of tea or whatever he wants. Like a little king. Makes me want to pour the cup of water over his head and tell him to get his own damn water.
Housework looms for Spanish men
Spanish men who refuse to lift a finger around the house are facing new legal sanctions.
MPs in Spain have drawn up a marriage contract for use in civil ceremonies which obliges men to share household chores and the care of children and elderly family members.
The new law, which will be introduced this summer in Spain, promises a revolution in a country where nearly half of all men admit to doing no housework at all.
Puffing and panting and swearing under his breath, 36-year-old Santi Risco tries to put up an ironing board. He doesn't have much success and it's a pretty painful sight watching a previously undomesticated Spanish male trying hard to change with the times.
"Spanish law is changing so men have to do 50% of the housework," Santi tells me, rather red-faced. "I am getting married this autumn so I am learning things I've never done before: ironing, cleaning floors and doing the washing up.
"It's not that I'm a macho man. It's just that I've never been taught these things before."
Upbringing
Santi's trying to make up for lost time. He gives up on the ironing board and heads for the bathroom, ready to clean the mirrors. He is a man with a mission. The contract he will sign at his civil wedding ceremony this September will oblige him - by law - to share domestic responsibilities with his partner.
Failure to do so will affect the terms of a divorce settlement, should he ever find himself in that position. But even as Santi cleans up his act, Aintzane, his wife-to-be, says she remains sceptical about the new law.
"It's good that Santi is beginning to do things in the house. Well, he has to. I told him about the consequences if he doesn't. But it's not just men. Women in Spain are also part of the problem.
"Our mothers tell us to do the housework when we are little girls. So when we go to a relationship we do the housework."
So can this "housework law" as it has been dubbed here really change Spanish cultural traditions? Statistics show that Spanish women spend up to five times longer on housework than their husbands.
If they have a full-time job, they still do three times more housework.
A study five years ago by the Centre for Sociological Investigation concluded that Spanish fathers spent an average of 13 minutes a day looking after their children. And only 19% of Spanish men thought it was right for mothers of school age children to have a full-time job.
Margarita Uria is the MP who set up the new law.
"It's all a question of education", she says. "Starting with this law, but we should also teach children in schools. Men have to learn to start taking more responsibility in the home and women have to help them do it. This is beginning to change. After all, the Spanish parliament was unanimous in approving this law."
...rest of text here at the BBC website
So, what do you all think? Good idea, bad idea or just too utopic? I find myself of several opinions at the same time. One side being that hell yes it is about time that men were required to pitch in their fair share. But on the other side, how in the world could this be enforced and is it the government's job to do so? I'm not sure. But I like the idea of evening the playing field so to speak and adding equal housework to what is expected from people in a marriage.
My parents were a good example, I feel. They both did work around our house and they both took turns cooking and washing up. If my mom cooks, my dad cleans, and vice-versa. Even in my own relationship, my boyfriend does the majority of the cleaning around the house (sweeping, mopping, etc.) while I cook and we take turns doing the dishes. Here in Mali for the most part women are treated as domestic servants. It is completely normal to see a man come home and sit and demand that his wife bring him a cup of water or a cup of tea or whatever he wants. Like a little king. Makes me want to pour the cup of water over his head and tell him to get his own damn water.