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An X user once said, we often talk about Santa Claus but not Santa’s wife, who must be doing all the gift wrapping. Of course, we know Santa is merely a tale, but this depicts the real situation of women: wives who do the work and husbands who sit at the head of the table to do the toast, mothers who bake the turkey and fathers who sit at the head of the table to announce the food. Right after she labours, they swoop in like Santa to take the glory.
Santa Claus is similar to every man at Christmas. It is not a story; it is a realistic depiction of women’s underappreciated, unpaid labour. Women are the Santa’s wives of Christmas, those who labour in the background. Men are the Santa Clauses of Christmas, those who flamboyantly pull the reindeer and take all the glory.
Understanding the great cost of men’s profession and love
There is something we need to address, and we need to address it quickly if we want to resolve the issue of women’s unpaid labour. Society has taught men that it is okay to profess love without showing up in love.
- He can profess his love for his children so much that he can’t bear the thought of them growing up without adequate parental care and affection. However, he expects his wife to give up her career and become a stay-at-home mommy while his career remains unscathed by his decision.
- He can profess that he is not ready to have children, yet goes ahead to have unprotected sex, then blames the woman for trapping him with pregnancy because he expects her to do all she can to prevent the baby he does not want from forming, even if it means taking drugs that are damaging to her system.
- He can profess his love for family values and traditions, yet have numerous baby mamas everywhere while worrying so much about the body count of all the women he’s involved in (picture every republican conservative, alpha male podcaster and men in general around you).
- He can profess his love for clean table tops, shiny floors, and fresh meals, yet expects his wife to do the cleaning and cook to make it happen.
- He can profess his love for neat-looking children, yet expects his wife to do the bathing and grooming because he has never changed a diaper for any of his six children.
- He can profess his love for morals and fidelity so much, yet expects fidelity from his wife and 10 side chicks while he goes on a frolic of his own.
- He can profess his love for his parents because of the great sacrifices they made in his life, yet he expects his wife to shoulder the burden of elderly care when they are sick.
- He can profess his love for the Thanksgiving tradition so much, yet his wife is expected to do the cooking while he merely shows up at the head of the table to carve the turkey.
That is because each time a man professes to love something, a woman bears the brunt of that love. Women are the sufferers of men’s love. This is why someone said men love children the way children love puppies. You will still be the one to clean the excreta and feed the puppy. That’s how men love: they show up for the fun part but not the part requiring labour. That one is for women to shoulder.
By now, you should know where I am headed because the same pattern of thought is evident in Christmas and all its traditions, which men claim to love so much.
A man can profess his love for Christmas and talk about the beautiful childhood memories he has about Christmas memories: the many meats to be eaten, the gifts hidden under a Christmas tree, the house enveloped in smell of baking, yet he expects his wife to do all the cooking, grocery shopping, baking, cleaning, gift wrapping to preserve the tradition he professes to love so much.
Can we see the pattern? If a man professes love, he expects the women around him to work it out and make it a reality! It’s almost as if men think Father Christmas does the cleaning and not real people—the women.
Christmas will come, and as usual, we will have men who just want to relax during the holidays, but guess who never rests: their mothers, wives and sisters. While the grown sons and now husbands catch up over bottles of beer and meat, their wives keep the plates filled and the jingles rolling; their wives are expected to bond over cooking.
Men do not realise that rest actually requires labour. For a man, Christmas holidays are for relaxing, eating and recharging. For a woman, it is bigger pots of food, more dishes to wash, more mouths and visitors to feed. All the man does is drop money and expects it to magically transform into hot turkey, wrapped gifts, a big bowl of steaming chin-chin, and Christmas pyjamas. It doesn’t matter that these women are equally providers in the family.
Men see their money as an end, but women see money as a raw material that they need to labour to transform into food, gift cards, fries, etc. Can we see how money works differently for men and women in a patriarchal arrangement? Men call it “allowing the wives to bond over cooking,” women call it labour.
It is only men who rest during Christmas and holidays. Women understand this; they live through this, but men do not. Men are grown enough to realise Santa is not real, yet, they are still stuck in that la la land where they think Santa makes it all happen, not the real and hard labour of women.
The Way Forward
1. Inclusive involvement: For the mothers, sisters and wives out there, insist on involving all your sons, brothers, uncles and husbands. Assign something to them and don’t do it if they fail to do it. Let them feel the burden of their profession. Don’t rush to cover up for them.
If the person assigned to fry the meat refuses to do so, then it means there will be no meat this Christmas. It requires labour to create magic. Christmas magic is a fancy word for unpaid labour; this Christmas, all hands should be on deck!
2. Imperfect perfections: Women need to throw perfection out of the window. If you want to rest this holiday season, then you must embrace the fact that less is more. If men want more on their plates, then they should do more! I am saying this because men have learnt wilful incompetence. They do domestic work assigned to them poorly, so they are not asked to do it again.
Remember, you weren’t born baking perfect pies. If they say they can’t do it, remind them that you also did a bad job at some point, but you had to learn. They should do it again and again until they learn! Don’t take over just because they did not do it well. You can laugh over the baked pie your husband made. It is part of the bonding.
When you refuse to step up each time a man steps down, when you refuse to cover up for men’s lapses each time they underperform domestically, instead, you insist on them doing it again and again until they get it right, then men will come to learn that wilful incompetence cannot be used as a tool against you.
So don’t be quick to jump in to rectify that bad pie your sons or husbands make. Remember, you once sucked at it too, but you did it over and over again until you got it right. Be comfortable with the men around you failing the first and second time. Don’t take the work off their hands; allow them to do it again and again until they get it right.
If you don’t like many people in the kitchen, then leave the kitchen for them to do their portion before you return. Stop taking the initiative, stop covering up for men’s lapses. Sit through the discomfort of learning. Be okay with the imperfections until everyone gets it right. The imperfections are all part of the learning process.
3. Let their actions match their profession: A comedian once said men shout their needs instead of doing anything about it because they know women will jump to fix it. All he needs to do is shout “I am hungry” without even speaking to anyone in particular, and the women around will jump to prepare a meal.
In fact, it’s as if men have Pavlov’d the women around them to respond to their needs the moment certain prompts are said, the same way dogs will wag their tails when you clank their plates.
If you want to change patterns, you need to stop being the automatic fixer. If he shouts, “I am hungry,” direct him to the store where the raw rice is, or simply continue doing what you are doing (my preferred response).
When he says, “So what should ‘WE’ do this Christmas?” meaning what should you do, immediately divide the chores. Men need to learn the price of their professions and affections. They need to learn that:
- It takes Labour to satisfy hunger.
- It takes Labour to keep the house and children clean.
- It takes Labour to pacify a crying baby.
- It takes Labour to preserve Christmas traditions.
- It takes Labour to create Christmas Magic!
Not wishes, labour, real labour, and hard labour. We need to stop shielding our sons, brothers, and husbands from the laborious aspects of their needs, professions, and affections.
Santa Claus is really fashioned after men who, just like children, are used to waking up to see things done.
4. Outsource: Outsourcing is the 21st-century woman’s best friend! So long as the funds are there, outsource to the best of your financial abilities. There is no price for who suffers the most. There is no price for the woman who starts everything from scratch.
A man who doesn’t want to work domestically should have his cheque work for him. As much as you can, outsource. Not all outsourcing requires money. It can start with the little things, such as cutting your own veggies at the market, buying already-mixed flour, or purchasing gifts from gift shops that can be wrapped. It can also involve including your children and spouse in domestic tasks, outsourcing to machines (like buying a washing machine), or seeking help. You don’t have to do everything on your own! Start small.
Outsourcing is anything that makes work easier and saves time. And the more money you make, the more you should be able to buy time and rest! Stop trying to prove that your money hasn’t gotten into your head. That is society’s palava, not your burden to bear.
5. Distance: After my service year, I decided I wanted to rest. I didn’t want to return home. The tradition was that immediately I returned, everyone dropped their gloves and let me take over. I had protested, I had rebelled; I had done less in the past. Now, I needed distance. Distance meant complete hands-off.
My mother complained to everyone. She made it sound like abandonment, as if I didn’t care. But when I look back at my childhood memories, it was labour and more labour. My eldest sister called, and I confided in her. When my mother called, she berated her and asked her why I would want to come home only to pack the dog’s shit and work endlessly. When I came home the next Christmas, I did less, and I relished it. My youngest brother learnt catering and handled the frying and baking.
My eldest sister understood. She told her husband that she no longer wishes to spend Christmas with his family because she always returns home to HBP within the few days she spends there. She said his siblings come in a day before Christmas, when all the cooking and cleaning have been done. Even on days when she decides to spend time with them, she chooses to visit a day before the festivity, as she deserves to be taken care of. I did it in my father’s house, and my eldest sister did it in her marital home. If rest means distancing yourself from labour, do it!
It gave me control over my time, body, labour and rest. You’re your best advocate. I wanted to do less and had to put everyone through the discomfort of expecting less from me, which invariably forced them to do more. My mum, who had previously expected me to do everything, started delegating tasks to my brothers because I had blatantly refused to do my fair share of work, even if it meant sitting in the mess.
People around you are doing less because you keep supplementing for their failings. Do less, and everyone will be forced to hold their own end! They are adults; they can figure it out themselves. I assure you, when you die, life will continue. They will adjust, so the adjustments should start now, while you’re alive.
“Nothing will change if men do not begin to suffer losses from the system they upheld,” says Roxanne Gay.
If men were actively involved in the laborious aspects of the things they profess to love, so many cultures and traditions they claim to hold dear would automatically fizzle out. Many traditions survive to this day because they were built on the backs of women and sustained by their sweat and blood. If you claim to be tired of it, then stop lending your back and sweat.
Do what the boys do—sit, be selfish. Do less this Christmas and expect more from those used to doing less in previous Christmases.
Conclusion
For a system built on the back of women’s unpaid labour, for a system where women are Pavlov’d to respond to men’s needs, choosing to rest is an act of rebellion. Who would have thought that doing nothing is rebellion?
Editor’s note: This article was first published on SheResonance.
