Here comes the overwhelm!

Nothing says Christmas like an unfairly stacked to-do list…

This is a free post from The Flock with Jennifer Crichton. Happy holidays! If you’re a subscriber, thank you for being here and keeping this newsletter going though a very tricky year! If you’re not, exciting things are coming in 2023, so if you like what you read below, please consider signing up to join us.

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Have you seen that viral SNL sketch? The one that’s, ostensibly, about one woman’s robe, but is, in reality, about millions of women’s lives.

If you don’t know what I’m talking about, I’ll give you a moment. Be sure to watch until the end!

I was musing on that sketch this week as I sat on the plane, preparing to fly home after an utterly bananas two weeks of work at COP 28. I was exhausted - so exhausted that for the first time in my life, I opted to leave my laptop at home for the Christmas break.

As a sidebar - I’m writing this, late, on my phone. Apologies for the typos and how long it’s taken me to suss out the Substack app!

As I sat waiting for takeoff, I was going through my morning’s emails - more chaos, plenty of commercialism, and an email offering me a discount on something called “The Busy Mum Family Calendar.” No such discount forthcoming for the Busy Dad version oddly…

It all hit me as a little ironic, given it’s Rich who has been doing most of the childcare and work juggling the last few weeks as I’ve been glued either to a studio desk or to my phone throughout conference. So much so that, when he contracted Covid (yep!) in the last few days of COP, the wheels well and truly came off for our household.

Of course, there’s no question the SNL sketch hits because it’s true for so many - including me, in the past. But I wonder, too, when we decided as a society to accept as a truism the idea that mums come last? Are we railing against it hard enough? Perhaps the railing just isn’t as funny…

So, to end the year, I’m resharing one of my favourite pieces from the past, about that very gender divide and the way it is portrayed in popular culture. I’m going to be pausing the newsletter next week for the festivities and will return in the new year post my first-ever attempt at a social media detox.

Until then, have a wonderful festive season with your loved ones, however you choose to mark it and thank you again for being here. You all deserve much more than a robe xx

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Not all (wo)men

The #MenAreTrash narrative is back following a 2023 makeover. But does the glib bloke-bashing harm us as much as them?

Something strange has happened to my social media lately. I’m not sure why, but suddenly, my suggested videos and accounts to follow all feature influencers whose stock in trade is making a mockery of men. And I want to laugh. Really, I do. But instead, I’m cringing.

Of course, I know algorithmic targeting isn’t accidental. Perhaps I hovered too long over a video dissing some bloke being useless at something or other and I’m simply being fed more of the same. But having long worn my feminism badge front and centre – and dealt with plenty of random angry men in my inbox over the years as a result – I can’t help but feel the sudden, unprompted shift is less feed-specific than societal.

And it seems I might be right, for according to a mounting number of magazine articles and podcast episodes over the last month, the #MenAreTrash narrative is back, albeit after a social-media friendly makeover.

If the origins of the phrase ‘men are trash’ remain unclear, its cultural permeation is glaringly obvious. Used as a sort of glib shorthand response to everything from pay gaps to rape conviction rates, the hashtag became so prolific in the late 20-teens that it was banned as hate speech on Instagram and Facebook. Today, posts featuring the phrase are still routinely removed, while the inevitable stock whataboutery of #NotAllMen lives on.

But as anyone who has ever tried to ban anything knows, prohibition is futile. Inequality, meanwhile, is still trash, so it’s hardly surprising the narrative is now back in a more subtle guise - less shouty hashtag, more sarcastic eyeroll.

The problem is, the new version of the argument comes across less as a feminist statement, more as a sort of resigned acceptance of gender inequity that does us all a disservice. 

Today alone, as a case study, Instagram has served me up three videos by an influencer whose specialism is sarcastically smiling Reels about her useless husband, two memes offering up sample household to-do lists - the ‘mum’ tasks running off the page, the ‘dad’ side limited to one item such as “pack own bag” or “take a poo” - multiple videos of an eternal man-child ‘babysitting’ his own kids with chaotic results, and a sweary live about the joys of divorce. 

Now, I’m absolutely the first person to hail the benefits of leaving a bad relationship, so more power to that last woman’s elbow, frankly. But beyond that caveat, I fear the “all husbands are shit” narrative is now harming women more than it’s harming men. No really, stay with me here.

In my previous relationship, the emotional load wasn’t just unfairly stacked, it was entirely one-sided. From suitcase packing to cooking, medical appointments to household maintenance, my to-do list was eternally endless. I was just “better” at those things, my ex would shrug, piling his stuff up on the bed for me to fold. And it’s true, I was. I put the effort in, but I was also deeply bitter. I would lie awake at night stewing about the unfairness of it all, as he slept soundly beneath a squishy warm comforter of learned hopelessness. For years, I thought this was normal. 

I knew I wasn’t happy. But who was? So sucked in was I by the women spin plates, men eat off them narrative, I truly believed it was what I’d signed up for. What’s more, I became so accustomed to the eye-rolling exhaustion of these male-female tropes that I regarded any healthier relationship I saw with abject cynicism, fully convinced it was little more than showmanship. Because when we constantly portray marriage as a disappointingly wonky see-saw, the emotional load piled on one end and weighed down with breeze blocks, why would we believe in anything better? 

Now, I call bullshit. I’m not saying there’s no such thing as a useless men - far from it. But as funny and on-the-nose as mocking them can be on occasion, this now relentless, if determinedly gentle, reiterating of the stereotype lets us all down - insulting the good men, excusing the lazy, spoilt ones and lowering women’s expectations and self worth in the process.

What’s worse is that, in the words of the Manics, if we tolerate this, our children will be next. Because what the hell is the point of filling their wardrobes with gender neutral clothes and resolutely rejecting pink or blue toys if we’re not walking the walk in our own relationships?

Of course, I understand the temptation to make light of gender imbalance at home. It’s not an easy topic to tackle, and many a true observation is made in jest. 

But as a very wise - and very happily married - friend told me recently when I praised my husband’s superlative school lunchbox packing skills, men doing their bit shouldn’t be noteworthy. It should be a basic expectation in a loving, respectful partnership. She’s right, of course.

Equality at home might not make for a viral real. But anything less is #trash.