Millennial men pitched themselves as equal partners. What happened?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Maybe men do a ton, an equal share let’s say, but are simply less vocal about their contributions and, especially, their complaints. Women, biologically, are programmed to be more emotional. They’re more chatty. They initiate 70% of divorces and 90% if they’re college educated. They’re more flighty, and variant in temperament, and neurotic in general as has been reported by top scientists. https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3149680/

So a woman might complain a lot about feeling the emotional burden of parenthood, and a career, but perhaps that’s just her subjective, emotion-based, rather than a fact-based, objective assessment of her situation, we’re outside observers able to quantify her particular case.

I have heard this a lot. If the labor that women are complaining about is all emotion based, and there isn’t really any substance to it, then why don’t their spouses just take it over?
If it’s not actually difficult to get out of work by 3pm every day and arrange childcare and know when picture day is, then why don’t you just do it? Why leave it to the person who is stressed out about it?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I think men DID want equal partners, to be involved with children and egalitarian marriages. But it's just really, really hard. There's so much working against dual working parents.
-school hours are atrocious
-school is basically closed one day a week at least and you need to figure out coverage
-kids are always sick, all winter long
-parenting is extremely hard
-it's very, very difficult to be successful at your job if you left work at 3pm when school ends every day. My boss would have a fit and I'd miss out on lots of meetings.

Dh and I have figured it out and have a nice 40/60 marriage (I'm the 60%), but it's a combo of zero-5 minute commutes, telework, lots of grandparent help, back up nanny and a lot of work.

+1 word for word

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Maybe men do a ton, an equal share let’s say, but are simply less vocal about their contributions and, especially, their complaints. Women, biologically, are programmed to be more emotional. They’re more chatty. They initiate 70% of divorces and 90% if they’re college educated. They’re more flighty, and variant in temperament, and neurotic in general as has been reported by top scientists. https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3149680/

So a woman might complain a lot about feeling the emotional burden of parenthood, and a career, but perhaps that’s just her subjective, emotion-based, rather than a fact-based, objective assessment of her situation, we’re outside observers able to quantify her particular case.

Study after study shows that women spend more time on childcare and housework than men, even in marriages where both partners work and earn about the same amount. And men spend more time on paid work AND on leisure activities. It's literally study after study, I've never seen a study on allocation of labor in marriages that found the opposite. This is one from just last week:

https://www.npr.org/2023/04/13/1168961388/pew-earnings-gender-wage-gap-housework-chores-child-care

Self-reported study.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I think it's a few things.

First, as a woman, I am so much more aware than my husband and better at multi-tasking. If I notice something needs to be done, I do it soon because otherwise it takes mental space to remember. Meaning that it is actually less work overall for me to sign up for music lessons instead of discuss it with my husband and wait for him to get to it and remember the deadlien to sign up and then subtly check in with him as we get closer to the deadline because if I ask outright I'm "nagging."

For many things, the easiest thing is just doing it myself. The only way that I've found to split the work is for each of us to 100% own things. I own more than he does though, and it's self fufilling because I am busy so I want things to be done, and I have a lot of things on my plate so I want to manage work myself so I can plan around it. This means I continue to take on more than my fair share.

I think a big piece of it is mental load. I've tried to implement different mechanisms to share it but it's nearly impossible with someone who was socialized without mental load. It's like my brain has a rolling ticker at the bottom of things that need to get done and I can't turn it off.

The mental load is real. My sister’s husband has a diagnosed anxiety disorder, and it comes with its own issues, but part of it is that he wants to be in control of everything, so he deals with all of the crap…arranging childcare, finding music lessons, opening 529’s, getting the leak in the ceiling fixed, planning vacations, figuring out why the dog keeps vomiting, etc.
I had thought this was all BS when other women complained about it because it could be done between other things, but I can’t tell you how much easier parenthood has been for my sister when she doesn’t have to think about all of this stuff. She goes to work, then comes home and plays with her girls. If she has to go out of town, then she tells her husband and he just deals with it.

I mean...I do this... What am I supposed to be doing exactly? I'm going out of town next weekend to see my college friends. I asked my husband about the weekend ahead of time, put it in the joint calendar, and the on Friday I will leave. What else should I be doing before I go?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Maybe men do a ton, an equal share let’s say, but are simply less vocal about their contributions and, especially, their complaints. Women, biologically, are programmed to be more emotional. They’re more chatty. They initiate 70% of divorces and 90% if they’re college educated. They’re more flighty, and variant in temperament, and neurotic in general as has been reported by top scientists. https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3149680/

So a woman might complain a lot about feeling the emotional burden of parenthood, and a career, but perhaps that’s just her subjective, emotion-based, rather than a fact-based, objective assessment of her situation, we’re outside observers able to quantify her particular case.

your "study" was self-reported.

Sorry you’re not happy with the results. There are a lot of other studies that show women always score higher than men in levels of neuroticism. That definitely correlates to a perception of disparate levels of domestic contributions between married men and women.

its not the results I'm unhappy with, its the research. You talk about fact-based objective assessments but your study is self-reported the opposite of objective and emotion-based.

and lets also separate unprompted and prompted in the domestic contributions meaning what a man/woman does without having to be told to do it or reminded by the other person.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Maybe men do a ton, an equal share let’s say, but are simply less vocal about their contributions and, especially, their complaints. Women, biologically, are programmed to be more emotional. They’re more chatty. They initiate 70% of divorces and 90% if they’re college educated. They’re more flighty, and variant in temperament, and neurotic in general as has been reported by top scientists. https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3149680/

So a woman might complain a lot about feeling the emotional burden of parenthood, and a career, but perhaps that’s just her subjective, emotion-based, rather than a fact-based, objective assessment of her situation, we’re outside observers able to quantify her particular case.

your "study" was self-reported.

Sorry you’re not happy with the results. There are a lot of other studies that show women always score higher than men in levels of neuroticism. That definitely correlates to a perception of disparate levels of domestic contributions between married men and women.

its not the results I'm unhappy with, its the research. You talk about fact-based objective assessments but your study is self-reported the opposite of objective and emotion-based.

and lets also separate unprompted and prompted in the domestic contributions meaning what a man/woman does without having to be told to do it or reminded by the other person.

I think it’s more that women’s levels of neuroticism lead them to take on a lot of additional worrying, work, or generally kid related things, that are unnecessary. Men may not see the utility in that type of behavior, to undertake things that aren’t worth their or their kids time, and therefore are usually not prone to even initiating them. Basically women get all spun up, or hoisted by their own petard, in terms of planning, activities, etc. So of course they feel the emotional load. Because of a proclivity for neuroticism, they engage in neurotic busy work. Then they complain about it, as their personality, biologically, is also prone to conversation and emoting.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Maybe men do a ton, an equal share let’s say, but are simply less vocal about their contributions and, especially, their complaints. Women, biologically, are programmed to be more emotional. They’re more chatty. They initiate 70% of divorces and 90% if they’re college educated. They’re more flighty, and variant in temperament, and neurotic in general as has been reported by top scientists. https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3149680/

So a woman might complain a lot about feeling the emotional burden of parenthood, and a career, but perhaps that’s just her subjective, emotion-based, rather than a fact-based, objective assessment of her situation, we’re outside observers able to quantify her particular case.

your "study" was self-reported.

Sorry you’re not happy with the results. There are a lot of other studies that show women always score higher than men in levels of neuroticism. That definitely correlates to a perception of disparate levels of domestic contributions between married men and women.

its not the results I'm unhappy with, its the research. You talk about fact-based objective assessments but your study is self-reported the opposite of objective and emotion-based.

and lets also separate unprompted and prompted in the domestic contributions meaning what a man/woman does without having to be told to do it or reminded by the other person.

I think it’s more that women’s levels of neuroticism lead them to take on a lot of additional worrying, work, or generally kid related things, that are unnecessary. Men may not see the utility in that type of behavior, to undertake things that aren’t worth their or their kids time, and therefore are usually not prone to even initiating them. Basically women get all spun up, or hoisted by their own petard, in terms of planning, activities, etc. So of course they feel the emotional load. Because of a proclivity for neuroticism, they engage in neurotic busy work. Then they complain about it, as their personality, biologically, is also prone to conversation and emoting.

My husband said to me, word for word, "what's the point in cleaning because it's just going to get messy again." And we're not taking about dusting the baseboard here. There's such a thing as too much, sure, but I don't know any women with full time jobs and young kids who are doing "too much."

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Maybe men do a ton, an equal share let’s say, but are simply less vocal about their contributions and, especially, their complaints. Women, biologically, are programmed to be more emotional. They’re more chatty. They initiate 70% of divorces and 90% if they’re college educated. They’re more flighty, and variant in temperament, and neurotic in general as has been reported by top scientists. https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3149680/

So a woman might complain a lot about feeling the emotional burden of parenthood, and a career, but perhaps that’s just her subjective, emotion-based, rather than a fact-based, objective assessment of her situation, we’re outside observers able to quantify her particular case.

OP here. None of the men in my circle would say they actually do their fair share. Some have many excuses for why, but no, none would argue that it’s actually fair. So if situations like you imagine exist, I’m not talking about that.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:You can’t expect it to be totally equal until you respect DHs who earn less and step back from careers to raise kids and want to go to Mommy and Me and story time.

The vast majority of you do not actually respect that as much as the high earner, so you can’t be surprised that men are gravitating toward the roles that society respects.

I’m that dad. It sucks. And I know DW wishes I could earn more but since I built my career around family friendly it’s hard to change that ship.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Maybe men do a ton, an equal share let’s say, but are simply less vocal about their contributions and, especially, their complaints. Women, biologically, are programmed to be more emotional. They’re more chatty. They initiate 70% of divorces and 90% if they’re college educated. They’re more flighty, and variant in temperament, and neurotic in general as has been reported by top scientists. https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3149680/

So a woman might complain a lot about feeling the emotional burden of parenthood, and a career, but perhaps that’s just her subjective, emotion-based, rather than a fact-based, objective assessment of her situation, we’re outside observers able to quantify her particular case.

your "study" was self-reported.

Sorry you’re not happy with the results. There are a lot of other studies that show women always score higher than men in levels of neuroticism. That definitely correlates to a perception of disparate levels of domestic contributions between married men and women.

its not the results I'm unhappy with, its the research. You talk about fact-based objective assessments but your study is self-reported the opposite of objective and emotion-based.

and lets also separate unprompted and prompted in the domestic contributions meaning what a man/woman does without having to be told to do it or reminded by the other person.

I think it’s more that women’s levels of neuroticism lead them to take on a lot of additional worrying, work, or generally kid related things, that are unnecessary. Men may not see the utility in that type of behavior, to undertake things that aren’t worth their or their kids time, and therefore are usually not prone to even initiating them. Basically women get all spun up, or hoisted by their own petard, in terms of planning, activities, etc. So of course they feel the emotional load. Because of a proclivity for neuroticism, they engage in neurotic busy work. Then they complain about it, as their personality, biologically, is also prone to conversation and emoting.

Interestingly, men falsely believe women are doing more talking than they are. If this is your experience, that you think women around you are talking more than men, it might be your misogyny causing you to simply find their talking more voluminous.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Solidly millennial here (35) and I can only think of one person in my orbit that is a SAHM.

The men I know pull their weight within their relationships and with the kids, and both sides of the couple have jobs that are fairly equal (I would say most of us are at about $400k HHI.)

I worked my tail off for my career and my husband and I earn about the same. Why would I give that up? I couldn't be with someone who expected me to downshift my career or step away from the workforce... which is fine... because there are plenty of people with different outlooks on the situation and are better suited for each other.

Solidly millennial male (41) here, and opposite for me. Most in my circle have SAHW. Of the two that don’t: one wife works a couple of shifts at the hospital a week. The incremental money is important to that household. The second wife has some high GS job where she still makes less than 20% what her husband makes. The husband doesn’t get it from a *financial aspect*, but he shrugs his shoulders as that was the deal they made.

I think this is really an assortative mating issue. People who want a a SAH arrangement sort into those circles much earlier and date from that perspective because SAH is correlated with other identities people find important. FWIW, my wife told me on our second date that she would work if the family needed it, but she felt it was her calling to be a mother and we’ve been fortunate enough to live that out.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Maternity leave sets up the paradigm that moms are the primary parent and household manager.

If dads were expected and encouraged to take paid family leave and actually take care of the baby, it would go a long way to supporting a more egalitarian split at home.

I’ve noticed my Scandinavian colleagues seem to have more balanced family responsibilities, and I think this is a big factor

I agree with this, and I would say breastfeeding too is really bad for dads in ways we don’t talk about. I’m in no way against breastfeeding - I did it! But it definitely didn’t help our parenting dynamic. I agree that anecdotally, paternity leave and formula feeding seem to lead to better parenting outcomes. Not saying they are cure alls or main causes of course.

[Anonymous]

I handle more of the work inside the house, while he does yardwork and drives the kids everywhere. I suppose we'll re-evaluate when the kids leave the house and he's too old to do yardwork.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I think it's a few things.

First, as a woman, I am so much more aware than my husband and better at multi-tasking. If I notice something needs to be done, I do it soon because otherwise it takes mental space to remember. Meaning that it is actually less work overall for me to sign up for music lessons instead of discuss it with my husband and wait for him to get to it and remember the deadlien to sign up and then subtly check in with him as we get closer to the deadline because if I ask outright I'm "nagging."

For many things, the easiest thing is just doing it myself. The only way that I've found to split the work is for each of us to 100% own things. I own more than he does though, and it's self fufilling because I am busy so I want things to be done, and I have a lot of things on my plate so I want to manage work myself so I can plan around it. This means I continue to take on more than my fair share.

I think a big piece of it is mental load. I've tried to implement different mechanisms to share it but it's nearly impossible with someone who was socialized without mental load. It's like my brain has a rolling ticker at the bottom of things that need to get done and I can't turn it off.

The mental load is real. My sister’s husband has a diagnosed anxiety disorder, and it comes with its own issues, but part of it is that he wants to be in control of everything, so he deals with all of the crap…arranging childcare, finding music lessons, opening 529’s, getting the leak in the ceiling fixed, planning vacations, figuring out why the dog keeps vomiting, etc.
I had thought this was all BS when other women complained about it because it could be done between other things, but I can’t tell you how much easier parenthood has been for my sister when she doesn’t have to think about all of this stuff. She goes to work, then comes home and plays with her girls. If she has to go out of town, then she tells her husband and he just deals with it.

I mean...I do this... What am I supposed to be doing exactly? I'm going out of town next weekend to see my college friends. I asked my husband about the weekend ahead of time, put it in the joint calendar, and the on Friday I will leave. What else should I be doing before I go?

I don’t know. I would have to figure out childcare or play dates or carpools or something for the time that my husband was at work and not available to do the kid stuff.
My sister’s husband would just figure it out.

I don’t mean to be a jerk here, but it’s not like I am struggling to work full time while I’ve got a partner who is home every evening and takes two days off every week.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Maternity leave sets up the paradigm that moms are the primary parent and household manager.

If dads were expected and encouraged to take paid family leave and actually take care of the baby, it would go a long way to supporting a more egalitarian split at home.

I’ve noticed my Scandinavian colleagues seem to have more balanced family responsibilities, and I think this is a big factor

I agree with this, and I would say breastfeeding too is really bad for dads in ways we don’t talk about. I’m in no way against breastfeeding - I did it! But it definitely didn’t help our parenting dynamic. I agree that anecdotally, paternity leave and formula feeding seem to lead to better parenting outcomes. Not saying they are cure alls or main causes of course.

Dads can figure it out. I took 6 months FMLA to stay home with baby while DW went back to work. I often stopped by the office for her to breastfeed, with WFH that would be even easier. Of course Im a low paid Fed so I don’t have to worry that it would “look bad” to my boss or any nonsense like that, but if more dads did take the time to be home, it would make it a nonissue.