5 ms·

You say she is a meticulous planner, and maybe that's the case, but maybe you are missing the point(as is most of the other commenters here). the point isn't wh

by zie 9y ago

You say she is a meticulous planner, and maybe that's the case, but maybe you are missing the point(as is most of the other commenters here). the point isn't whether it's Restaurant A or B, the point is you have to make a decision about A OR B, or even going out to a restaurant at all. Someone has to think about: lets go out for dinner tonight @ restaurant A. Women generally do that thinking, because like you said, you just don't care. The point is, she is still doing the emotional labor, because she has to think about dinner tonight for both of you, and if it should be a restaurant, or making it at home or whatever. or TL;DR: She is still holding the responsibility of making sure you both eat dinner.

nkrisc 9y ago
You're exactly right, this was the point I was trying to make. I never realized this before. I used to only see it rationally, that she should choose since she cares and I don't. But then it turned into her always choosing and having to decide and plan it. Once I realized this is what was happening I made a conscious effort to ease that burden and take my share of the emotional labor. Of course choosing a restaurant is only a single, low-impact example.
- zie 9y ago
  exactly right. It's taking the responsibility for X happening, and dinner is just the icing on the cake as it were :) Maybe it's taking the responsibility for deciding what to do over the thanksgiving holiday, or christmas.. Do we go to in-laws, travel, do we do it here local, etc. It's not really making the decision, it's the responsibility for making it happen.
  - nkrisc 9y ago
    Right, choosing a restaurant in an easy example. It's managing the groceries too, it's keeping track of our social schedule, it's even keeping our chore tracker up-to-date (something I currently need to work on).
- raisedbyninjas 9y ago
  My relationship has this dynamic too for eating meals and other chores. The alternative IME is that I'll make a decision and then she complains about it. At which point we are both stuck with the hassle.
- logfromblammo 9y ago
  My spouse has assumed the responsibility for ensuring that the family has a dinner every evening. I have assumed the responsibility for ensuring that every individual family member is capable of providing their own dinner from available materials every evening, if they choose to eat a dinner. This is "give a man a fish" versus "teach him how to fish". In this, we are at cross-purposes. I can prepare salubrious meals. I rarely have the opportunity to do so, because the spouse oversupplies the household needs, such that on days when no meal is freshly prepared, there are still 3 to 4 different choices for which leftovers to eat. I frequently get asked about what requests I have for the grocery shopping. My response is always "get nothing", because our standards for the conditions differ so widely. This is not "get nothing specifically for me," but "do not go grocery shopping at all." When I look in the pantry and see enough food to last for three months, my spouse sees the same, and thinks "OMFG, we literally have nothing to eat; I need to buy more food right now." I could draw up an inventory and 90 meal plans using nothing but what we have on hand, and hear, "We're not eating that." In a sense, the burden of that "emotional labor" is piled upon a great sleigh of my spouse's own making. I cannot explain, "You should not be worrying about doing this, because this is a thing that no one needs to do." It gets done anyway. Often, the emotional and communications effort of worrying about doing the thing, or convincing me to do the thing, is greater than the actual physical effort of actually doing it and being satisfied with the result. Like some cousin posts, I often have no specific preference for what I may eat for dinner. I will literally eat garbage (if it's on top--the Costanza rule). As such, about any restaurant with a food safety inspection score rated at "Waffle House" or higher works for me. In the rare instance where I actually do want something specific, my suggestion is usually countermanded by, "I don't want that. Pick something else." You can imagine my "WTF face". It is largely self-flagellation. The only way I could ease the burden is by taking away my spouse's freedom to make those irrational choices, which results in a different set of problems. Or maybe by springing for some deluxe anxiety counseling. In this instance, choosing the restaurant is like volunteering to wash a compulsive hand-washer's hands once a day. Even if you are a surgery nurse, and have perfect scrub-in technique, your hand-washing will not relieve the emotional burden, because the irrational compulsion is still there. It's not something you can share.
  - xsmasher 9y ago
klipt 9y ago
> Women generally do that thinking Funny how the stereotype reverses after marriage. While dating, the trope (especially with platforms like OkCupid) is that the man has to perform all the emotional labor: He has to write tons of messages just to get a first date, pick a good restaurant (and pay for it!), be witty and entertaining all evening, and be just the right amount of seductive (but not come on too strong) in order to "win" a second date.
- ZenoArrow 9y ago
  Dating isn't one-sided. A woman is still expected to be charming/interesting/fun to talk to. If a man sees dating as one-sided, are they really that interested in the person they're conversing with or are they just trying to trick them into bed?
  - klipt 9y ago
    > Dating isn't one-sided. Initiating a relationship is indisputably one sided. The gender roles are so strong that many girls would rather say "when are you going to ask me out" than "will you go out with me"?
BeetleB 9y ago
>Someone has to think about: lets go out for dinner tonight @ restaurant A. Women generally do that thinking, because like you said, you just don't care. The point is, she is still doing the emotional labor, because she has to think about dinner tonight for both of you, and if it should be a restaurant, or making it at home or whatever. You say that someone has to think about it. But do they? When I'm suffering from decision fatigue and I have to make a decision on something I don't find too valuable (where to eat), I'll literally flip a coin or use a random generator. It offloads the burden tremendously. The issue the author has is not that the burden isn't being shared. It's that the values are different. I don't know about her, but I've met people for whom flipping a coin is not an acceptable answer - because they care, and they don't want a flippant method of deciding. The conflict is that one side cares and the other doesn't. And part of the problem is that not everyone takes ownership of the issues they care about. If you care about a lot of things, then yes, you will feel the burden. I like a clean house. It makes me feel much better than an untidy house. But I also feel that burden of cleaning, and the burden is worse than the feeling I get in an untidy house. So I keep it tidy enough such that there is a balance. Not too overburdened, and not too untidy. In my experience, most people do not understand this tradeoff. They'll have high standards, but will not to bear the burden of those standards, and will be impatient with everyone who has lower standards.
- flachsechs 9y ago
  > I'll literally flip a coin or use a random generator. this is also a good trick to find out what you actually want, which reveals itself when a choice is made for you.
- zie 9y ago
  Well, someone needs to take the responsibility on for making sure you eat. Generally that's yourself. Flipping a coin is making a decision. When in a relationship, however, that could be your partner, especially if you are male and your partner is female. Because it's generally expected that partners/families eat meals together. There absolutely is, with any responsibility a give/take about how you handle those responsibilities, especially if they involve another person. How you handle those decisions can be critical to your relationship. If they have very high standards, and you have very low standards, then you either compromise, or one of you changes your standards. Ideally you would talk about it, and come to an agreement, but that doesn't usually happen. Usually the high-standard person just takes responsibility and keeps it up to their high standards and stays upset with the low-standards partner. > The conflict is that one side cares and the other doesn't. So definitely there can be conflict here, the question is, does the conflict stay hidden, or do one or both of you bring it out, talk about it and reach a mutual decision around it? If you want a nice healthy relationship, I would hope you would talk about it. :) I know I have definitely felt upset about lower-standards before I finally wised up; now I force communication about it whenever I find myself owning responsibility for something because my partner has lower-standards than I do about something. I hope my partner(s) do the same thing, I know we have talked about it, but I don't get to control their thinking... yet :P haha
Noos 9y ago
The woman often takes that role on herself and refuses to relinquish it ever, though. If the man constantly decides, she will complain and second guess his usurpation of her emotional labor.
slavik81 9y ago
They are both adults. Neither of them needs to take responsibility for the other eating dinner. It's not like he's going to starve to death without her intervention.

by zie 9y ago

nkrisc 9y ago

You're exactly right, this was the point I was trying to make. I never realized this before. I used to only see it rationally, that she should choose since she cares and I don't. But then it turned into her always choosing and having to decide and plan it. Once I realized this is what was happening I made a conscious effort to ease that burden and take my share of the emotional labor. Of course choosing a restaurant is only a single, low-impact example.

zie 9y ago
exactly right. It's taking the responsibility for X happening, and dinner is just the icing on the cake as it were :) Maybe it's taking the responsibility for deciding what to do over the thanksgiving holiday, or christmas.. Do we go to in-laws, travel, do we do it here local, etc. It's not really making the decision, it's the responsibility for making it happen.
- nkrisc 9y ago
  Right, choosing a restaurant in an easy example. It's managing the groceries too, it's keeping track of our social schedule, it's even keeping our chore tracker up-to-date (something I currently need to work on).
raisedbyninjas 9y ago
My relationship has this dynamic too for eating meals and other chores. The alternative IME is that I'll make a decision and then she complains about it. At which point we are both stuck with the hassle.
logfromblammo 9y ago
My spouse has assumed the responsibility for ensuring that the family has a dinner every evening. I have assumed the responsibility for ensuring that every individual family member is capable of providing their own dinner from available materials every evening, if they choose to eat a dinner. This is "give a man a fish" versus "teach him how to fish". In this, we are at cross-purposes. I can prepare salubrious meals. I rarely have the opportunity to do so, because the spouse oversupplies the household needs, such that on days when no meal is freshly prepared, there are still 3 to 4 different choices for which leftovers to eat. I frequently get asked about what requests I have for the grocery shopping. My response is always "get nothing", because our standards for the conditions differ so widely. This is not "get nothing specifically for me," but "do not go grocery shopping at all." When I look in the pantry and see enough food to last for three months, my spouse sees the same, and thinks "OMFG, we literally have nothing to eat; I need to buy more food right now." I could draw up an inventory and 90 meal plans using nothing but what we have on hand, and hear, "We're not eating that." In a sense, the burden of that "emotional labor" is piled upon a great sleigh of my spouse's own making. I cannot explain, "You should not be worrying about doing this, because this is a thing that no one needs to do." It gets done anyway. Often, the emotional and communications effort of worrying about doing the thing, or convincing me to do the thing, is greater than the actual physical effort of actually doing it and being satisfied with the result. Like some cousin posts, I often have no specific preference for what I may eat for dinner. I will literally eat garbage (if it's on top--the Costanza rule). As such, about any restaurant with a food safety inspection score rated at "Waffle House" or higher works for me. In the rare instance where I actually do want something specific, my suggestion is usually countermanded by, "I don't want that. Pick something else." You can imagine my "WTF face". It is largely self-flagellation. The only way I could ease the burden is by taking away my spouse's freedom to make those irrational choices, which results in a different set of problems. Or maybe by springing for some deluxe anxiety counseling. In this instance, choosing the restaurant is like volunteering to wash a compulsive hand-washer's hands once a day. Even if you are a surgery nurse, and have perfect scrub-in technique, your hand-washing will not relieve the emotional burden, because the irrational compulsion is still there. It's not something you can share.
- xsmasher 9y ago

klipt 9y ago

> Women generally do that thinking Funny how the stereotype reverses after marriage. While dating, the trope (especially with platforms like OkCupid) is that the man has to perform all the emotional labor: He has to write tons of messages just to get a first date, pick a good restaurant (and pay for it!), be witty and entertaining all evening, and be just the right amount of seductive (but not come on too strong) in order to "win" a second date.

ZenoArrow 9y ago
Dating isn't one-sided. A woman is still expected to be charming/interesting/fun to talk to. If a man sees dating as one-sided, are they really that interested in the person they're conversing with or are they just trying to trick them into bed?
- klipt 9y ago
  > Dating isn't one-sided. Initiating a relationship is indisputably one sided. The gender roles are so strong that many girls would rather say "when are you going to ask me out" than "will you go out with me"?

BeetleB 9y ago

>Someone has to think about: lets go out for dinner tonight @ restaurant A. Women generally do that thinking, because like you said, you just don't care. The point is, she is still doing the emotional labor, because she has to think about dinner tonight for both of you, and if it should be a restaurant, or making it at home or whatever. You say that someone has to think about it. But do they? When I'm suffering from decision fatigue and I have to make a decision on something I don't find too valuable (where to eat), I'll literally flip a coin or use a random generator. It offloads the burden tremendously. The issue the author has is not that the burden isn't being shared. It's that the values are different. I don't know about her, but I've met people for whom flipping a coin is not an acceptable answer - because they care, and they don't want a flippant method of deciding. The conflict is that one side cares and the other doesn't. And part of the problem is that not everyone takes ownership of the issues they care about. If you care about a lot of things, then yes, you will feel the burden. I like a clean house. It makes me feel much better than an untidy house. But I also feel that burden of cleaning, and the burden is worse than the feeling I get in an untidy house. So I keep it tidy enough such that there is a balance. Not too overburdened, and not too untidy. In my experience, most people do not understand this tradeoff. They'll have high standards, but will not to bear the burden of those standards, and will be impatient with everyone who has lower standards.

flachsechs 9y ago
> I'll literally flip a coin or use a random generator. this is also a good trick to find out what you actually want, which reveals itself when a choice is made for you.
zie 9y ago
Well, someone needs to take the responsibility on for making sure you eat. Generally that's yourself. Flipping a coin is making a decision. When in a relationship, however, that could be your partner, especially if you are male and your partner is female. Because it's generally expected that partners/families eat meals together. There absolutely is, with any responsibility a give/take about how you handle those responsibilities, especially if they involve another person. How you handle those decisions can be critical to your relationship. If they have very high standards, and you have very low standards, then you either compromise, or one of you changes your standards. Ideally you would talk about it, and come to an agreement, but that doesn't usually happen. Usually the high-standard person just takes responsibility and keeps it up to their high standards and stays upset with the low-standards partner. > The conflict is that one side cares and the other doesn't. So definitely there can be conflict here, the question is, does the conflict stay hidden, or do one or both of you bring it out, talk about it and reach a mutual decision around it? If you want a nice healthy relationship, I would hope you would talk about it. :) I know I have definitely felt upset about lower-standards before I finally wised up; now I force communication about it whenever I find myself owning responsibility for something because my partner has lower-standards than I do about something. I hope my partner(s) do the same thing, I know we have talked about it, but I don't get to control their thinking... yet :P haha

Noos 9y ago

The woman often takes that role on herself and refuses to relinquish it ever, though. If the man constantly decides, she will complain and second guess his usurpation of her emotional labor.

slavik81 9y ago

They are both adults. Neither of them needs to take responsibility for the other eating dinner. It's not like he's going to starve to death without her intervention.