>On Jul 12, 2007, at 7:41 PM, bitch at pulpculture.org wrote:
>
> > judging by what happened to the break area where we get coffee,
> > water, the
> > refrigerator, etc. when the admin. assistant on our floor was away for
> > vacation, i'm kinda thinking that 90% of the guys there (there
> > about 50
> > employees in two quandrants, 20% of whom are women) and 75% of the
> > women
> > would wallow in shit up to their eyeballs before they'd lift a finger.
>
>Jezebel's been writing about the dismal revolting state of women's
>bathrooms in offices in NYC. I was shocked. I thought women were
>fastidious!
>
>Doug
From the courses I taught, in which I did a lot of surveys of my students as well as life histories, kids these days don't do chores. (Nor did they ten years ago 7 years ago when I was teaching). Similarly, all but the poorest folk I know tend not to ask kids to do any work around the house. My son's ex-gf, didn't know how to cook a thing. He'd do all the cooking.
Ehrenreich hinted at this in Nickle and Dimed, I think.
I'd guess that has a lot to do with it. And I think Ehrenreich is right to think that we ought to have our kids do work around the home. Sonshine participated in household work from the time he wanted to "help". E.g., I'd let him peel eggs or help me mix up bread or whatever. My mother was aghast because, if he peeled carrots, it was a crappy job. Foo. I figure that if I hounded him about his lack of perfection, I'd spoil. Consequently, as soon as the kid saw me getting something together to cook, he'd get all excited, run for a chair, shove it up near the counter and demand to "help". Same thing with groceries, he'd be in charge of taking them from the cart and putting them on the conveyer belt. Not much, but he got so much praise for "helping" that the kid would flip cartwheels at the thought of it.
All that and going on strike once meant that my kid turned out to be someone who, when I'd be away grocery shopping, would clean the house while I was gone. Unasked. He kept his room clean without asking, a little of a slacker with the bath.
And yeah, our restroom at work, some days, what a mess. And I confess, if I weren't standing around waiting for the pot to brew, I probably wouldn't pick up or restock supplies much either. When I was teaching, different story, because that was seen as a communal responsibility. But I did notice that most of the profs who were women would leave behind a mess in the conference and meeting rooms -- something that Dorothy Smith once wrote about in a rather abstract way.
I asked V and K, the two Indian guys I work with how, it works over there. Same story -- but of course, they live in 35 room homes and have servants. K is 30 and has to room in a dorm type situation because he doesn't have a clue how to cook. He's got some deal where he pays rent and someone else cooks for him. V, on the other hand, is frugal, so he's learned to cook.
I didn't know that Walmart set up shop in Inda. Gah. But I did laugh my ass off taking V to his first Walmart experience. We rammed all over that store for two hours. This bitch was beat.
Bitch | Lab http://blog.pulpculture.org (NSFW)