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Andrew Molitor

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Understanding Media: The Extensions of Man

by Marshall McLuhan

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Mar 20, 2022 05:33PM

Andrew Molitor is currently reading

Fed Up: Emotional Labor, Women, and the Way Forward

by Gemma Hartley (Goodreads Author)

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Andrew Molitor said: " Let me start out by saying that Hartley ain't wrong.

Secondly, my credentials. I am a stay at home dad, I do much of the schedules, maintaining shopping lists, remembering to set up the kiddos' doctor's appointments, then setting them up, then taking Let me start out by saying that Hartley ain't wrong.

Secondly, my credentials. I am a stay at home dad, I do much of the schedules, maintaining shopping lists, remembering to set up the kiddos' doctor's appointments, then setting them up, then taking the kids to them, and so on. I do the stuff Hartley is talking about. It's not easy. I don't do 100% of it, but let's get to that in a moment.

The biggest gap in Hartley's book is this: while she characterizes as "emotional labor" pretty much everything women do, and declares it invisible, she is notably silent on the similar work that men do. It is as if this work is, well, invisible to her.

At one point she is interviewing another woman, talking about that woman's emotional labor, and into the conversation as an aside we see that the interviewee is happy to let her husband take care of the insurance.

This is telling. Hartley believes that remembering the birthday present for the party is qualitatively different from buying insurance. That it is "emotional labor" whereas acquiring insurance is, something else. Something easier. Buying insurance isn't easier. It involves much of what looks a whole lot like emotional labor, as defined by Hartley. There are phone calls, comparisons, complex and emotionally charged decisions to make, and then there are payments to be remembered, to be made.

(I will use "man stuff" and "women stuff" to refer to traditional gendered jobs, and trust me, I know what a ridiculous breakdown that is)

As a dad who does a blend of "man stuff" and "women stuff" I can assure you that the gestalt of work around, say, coping with a leaking roof is not that different from the gestalt of stuff around getting Susie to her friend's birthday party with a present, a suitable costume, and the signed waiver for Trampoline Zone. I have done both. But to Hartley, the leaking roof, the car that needs an oil change, the life insurance policy that needs to be updated, the house that needs to be painted next year at the latest, these things are not "emotional labor", and therefore are basically easy work. Hartley is too busy telling us about how *her* work is undervalued to value *that* work, or even, let us be honest, mention it.

I can state unequivocally that the "man stuff" involved in running a house is modestly easier than the "woman stuff." It typically comes in large painful bites, but when you're done, you're done and there is a sense of accomplishment and completion in a way that there is not when dealing with many of the traditionally female work. Laundry never ends. Maintaining the grocery list, and the schedule of which child needs to be where, with what stuff, never ends. These are real, qualitative differences.

But there are also many similarities between the roles, there is much of what Hartley would call "emotional labor" in the life of Ward Cleaver. June Cleaver has no monopoly on emotional labor, it turns out. Hartley just can't see it.

Separately, I find myself puzzled by Hartley's descriptions of her husband. On the one hand she praises him endlessly, recognizing him as so much better, by her lights, then other husbands. On the other hand, when it comes to actually telling specific details of his life, he comes across as a doltish man-child. Is this guy real? Are these stories real? Are they composites? Are they outright fictional? Is Rob a doltish man-child or a great guy? I can't tell, and the whole narrative refuses to reveal him to me.

Ultimately, I have to agree, the book is just a magazine essay, fluffed up to book size by endless repetition of kind of muddled material.

It's not *wrong*, though. Hartley is right, there is work here, and it is hard, and we don't really appreciate it fully. ...more "

Feb 02, 2019 10:57AM · see review