Unclutterer

1. Posted by Brad - 05/09/2011

   I always find this type of discussion interesting because my wife and I are the opposite. She is on the cluttered side, while I am more likely to be orderly. From my personal experience, when a guy is seen as clean and orderly it too comes with some “gossip.” I have been called a “neat freak,” “anal” and etc. Where if I think I was a woman, my desire to shut a dresser drawer after opening it wouldn’t get a second thought.

2. Posted by Carson Chittom - 05/09/2011

   I would say that there are multiple standards, and that the issue isn’t so clear-cut as just male/female. You’re drawing a sharp line for something that is pretty fuzzy even for sociologists and neuroscientists. Isn’t it just as likely that women, on average, prefer order more than men for (insert evolutionary reason here) and that the societal expectation stems from that preference? Note that I’m not arguing for or against either thesis—I’m just saying that there are multiple possible explanations, or a synthesis of them.

   Especially, I think there’s also something to be said about age distinctions: there’s a big difference between what was acceptable to and for me as a 21 year old young man in my first off-campus apartment and what would be acceptable now, nearly ten years later (I say “would be” since my situation is different now, with a wife and children).

3. Posted by lafou - 05/09/2011

   Perhaps the double standard is a vestige of housework=woman’s work. I think the division of labor in households still leans more toward woman taking day to day responsiblity, and “man’s work” is more sporadic.

4. Posted by Craig - 05/09/2011

   Like Brad, I am the clean one and my wife is the “less clean” one. There can be a bit of conflict when it comes to clutter, organization, and cleanliness, but since these tasks aren’t the sole responsibility of one gender in the marriage (we both clean and organize), it’s not unfair as a husband bossing around his wife would be.

   For example, we’ve had an ongoing disagreement about kitchen towels and kitchen washcloths in the context of for what purpose they should be used and how often they should be washed.

5. Posted by Linda - 05/09/2011

   Thank you for this post; it’s one of your best.

   I remember back in my first solo apartment, a male friend came over to help me with a repair and said “you live like a guy.”

   Gee, I didn’t know most men like Mary Cassatt prints.

   I’ll admit that I’m never going to be the best housekeeper (which is why I visit this site), but I think he expected fresh flowers, frilly curtians and a enough food on hand to throw a spontaneous dinner party for twelve. Instead he got a bicyle in the hallway, somewhat dusty blinds and beer in the crisper.

   I laughed at him and said more or less what you did about gender stereotypes. I think women are expected to be more “house proud” than men and for a lot of women (especially me) that just isn’t the case. I’m just not the kind of person who aspires to the Martha Stewart ideal; For me a house is simply a “place for my stuff.”

   Now if I could just find a boyfriend who likes to dust the blinds…………..

6. Posted by Jen - 05/09/2011

   There’s absolutely a double standard, but I believe that it’s continually diminishing as gender roles even out.
   Strangely, the tidiest people I know are all single men. Perhaps someone should tell them that they’ll never find a woman if they insist on being so neat.

7. Posted by Kathryn Fenner - 05/09/2011

   Two of my friends have middle-aged male boyfriends who are hoarders–the end result, perhaps, of “boys will be boys”? There is another male hoarder in my neighborhood. None of them gets a pass, but perhaps it is because of the level of clutter.

   My father would be a clutter hound if my mother let him, and is to the extent she lets him–when she goes on multi-week trips, he has to spend a couple of days restoring the house to her standards. She’s not a neat freak, but she likes reasonably clean kitchens and baths, and cleanable living spaces.

   My husband’s away office is a mess, but he does cooperate with keeping his spaces at home fairly tidy, including his home office. I have to coach him sometimes, but he likes a neat space–he just doesn’t realize how important clean-as-you-go is–he leaves things to the last minute and then doesn’t do the last steps of tidying up. People think it’s cute that he, a computer science professor, is messy. He’s “above all that” they think, as do my parents-in-law–they have that academic pack-rat style.

   My sister-in-law is judged more harshly than my brother is, by my mother, for their cluttered home, although she works from home a good deal of the time while he commutes. I’m not so sure I do–I’m 51.

   Some law firms I have worked at chuckle at messy lawyers, and I didn’t see any sexism in it; some law firms are more concerned with the malpractice potential of disorganization and either truly messy lawyers go elsewhere or they raise their neatness game a bit.

8. Posted by Suzy - 05/09/2011

   When I moved into my loft, I put my bed in a corner out of sight behind a folding wall. When I was debating placement, one of my friends said, “You’ll have to keep your bed made because people will see it.”

   I was trying to figure out “why” that was necessary because;

   #1: I’m the only one to use the bed other than my cat.
   #2: Why would people find it necessary to inspect my bed.
   #3: It is hidden in a corner so people shouldn’t be able to see it.

   I don’t “make” my bed to military standards. I pull the comforter down to air the bed for a bit, then I pull the sheet & comforter up and that’s it. The bed is used nightly & during the day I may put stuff there to sort through projects & so forth.

   My place isn’t pristine. It is lived in. It is a living place. A home. Not a showcase.

9. Posted by ninakk - 05/09/2011

   In my opinion, it goes way past home keeping. Boys who are rowdy and loud in class are tolerated better than girls who can’t sit still and who keep talking even after the teacher asks everyone to be quiet. For some reason, it’s “to be expected” since he’s a boy.

   My background is in a Northern European country, where we supposedly are so equal, but we’re not. It’s still mostly women who fret about the state of their homes, precisely because they have heard all their lives (often in between lines somewhere) that it’s a woman’s job to see to it that the household is in good shape and that the family is held together. I don’t know anyone, neither woman nor man, who wants to stay at home when they have graduated from either high school or university, but it’s still us women who seem to strive for *cough, better just get it out* perfection in all areas, no matter how big or small a career we might have to take care of, as well.

   For this reason I haven’t touched an iron since forever to mention one example; I just can’t do everything perfectly, or even close to that, everywhere and at all times. My home is occasionally a mess, even though everything in me hates it, but there are things I want more (meeting friends, having hobbies) and so it just has to stay a mess until I get around dealing with it.

   When I’m invited to a hetero couple’s home, if some words are uttered in the line of “Sorry, it’s a bit messy here”, they always come from the woman’s mouth, never the man’s. I would be coming with false statements if I’d insinuate that men don’t participate in household work where I come from, because they do; most men I know want or at least accept 50/50 as much as women do, but some expectations, or whatever I should call them, underneath the surface are still bothering a lot of women for some reason. Maybe it’s a phase and it will look different in a generation or two? Personally I hope for equal salary for equal jobs and equality everywhere by then.

10. Posted by Nancy - 05/09/2011

    We’ve been quite aware of the double standard recently. Our house is in its best shape ever now that it’s for sale. Our friends walk in and compliment me on the clean, pared-down look, but don’t praise my husband for his share of the work. He has to say, “Hey, I scrubbed baseboards, too!” He takes all the blame for our pathetic lawn, although I’m the gardener.

    No matter how equal the division of labor is in a home, it seems that the average woman’s image is tied more closely to her home than a man’s.

11. Posted by You Suck at Kijiji - 05/09/2011

    So, society pressures us to keep clean houses.
    That’s nice to know, but not everything “society” pressures us to do is bad. You always have the option of ignoring the social pressures and leaving a messy house. If society shuns you, at least you’re making an informed choice.

12. Posted by Ellen - 05/09/2011

    While this may be the standard for some… I actually feel pressure the OTHER way around. In my circle, it is frowned upon for an educated woman to be interested in/enjoy housework. I suppose the burden to keep the place _presentable_ is still on her shoulders – but many find fault with me because as woman with a PhD in a scientific field I enjoy housekeeping, baking, sewing, etc.

13. Posted by Peggy - 05/09/2011

    I agree with your article…in fact it really hit home. I am pressured by my mother about the condition of my house on a regular basis. I readily admit it tends to be messy but due to frequent severe back pain it can be nearly impossible to do housework on some days. I think the thing that bothers me the most is that her house isn’t clean either but as she is already married it doesn’t matter. I don’t understand how a clean house will land me a husband but in her mind it will.

14. Posted by Jessica - 05/09/2011

    I just think you can’t win with some people. My coworkers make catty comments about women they know that have very clean homes or are able to whip up impressive meals, or even worse BOTH of those things. I don’t get why Martha Stewart is villianized either, I don’t remember her saying you must do all these things I demonstrate. And when I hear women putting down their friends, coworkers, neighbors, family members for having clean homes, a thinner body, nice meals, or whatever, it makes me sad and ticked off at the same time because it seems so backwards to hate on people for doing something well. If someone can keep a super clean home and knit fabulous sweaters while tap dancing, I say good for them! Lets not take others accomplishments as a threatening challenge to how we live our lives.

15. Posted by Em - 05/09/2011

    This is interesting. I’ll be the first to admit that I’m not the prettiest flower in the vase. I think that I try to make up for my physical shortcomings by having a lovely home. Perhaps I subconsciously believe what your family members said about not being able to “get a man.” However, I don’t believe anyone has even come close to saying that to me.

16. Posted by Anna - 05/09/2011

    I’ve improved a lot with my housekeeping skills over the past 11 years of marriage. I am a stay at home mom, so I do believe that a big chunk of the housework should fall on me. BUT… when the kids are home and the husband is home I believe the work should be evenly split. I expect everyone to put their dishes in the sink, put away their clothes I folded during the day, pick up their dirty clothes if they want them washed.

    As far as expectations of how clean a house should be… I don’t expect a spotless house. We live here and want to relax and use our stuff. But, I do like it clean enough and organized enough that if company came over unexpectedly, it would only take a few minutes with everyone helping to clean up the little daily living clutter.

    A quote I’ve heard and liked: “If you came to see me, come right in. If you’ve came to see my house, make an appointment.” I like my house clean and it is in no way filthy. But if someone comes in my house and it’s a mess and they judge me because of it … that’s their problem, not mine.

17. Posted by Kari - 05/09/2011

    I know I can’t well in a cluttered, untidy place (and luckily my husband agrees and shares in keeping it that way). I keep my house clean and tidy because that’s how I like to live–my house, my choice. But I really don’t care what other people’s houses look like–it’s their house, not mine.

18. Posted by cheesehead4ever - 05/09/2011

    I agree that those stereotypes exist. However in our house, while hubby is more of a packrat, he can’t stand stuff being “out”. He hates things being out on the counters, the tables etc.
    While I tend to overlook stuff being out, I am the one that is constantly trying to get rid of stuff we own!

19. Posted by Jill - 05/09/2011

    I’ve always been stressed out about the notion that I (as a woman) should want a neater, beautifully decorated house. The fact is my husband is the neater of the two of us. Also, Pre marriage, I primarily had male roommates and I would hear comments about “not being able to tell a woman lived here” because I didn’t decorate, clean, etc.

    I’ve also heard that the reason I’m messy is that my *mother* didn’t train me properly as a child. My poor Mom.

20. Posted by Whitney - 05/09/2011

    What I find interesting is how we react to those societal expectations. I’ve had horrible morning sickness for a month while also working. Needless to say, the house is well on its way to disaster (my husband seems to follow my lead on the housekeeping front, for good and bad). But while I apologized to even the catsitter, he blithely continued to invite friends over and have a good time anyway.

    Also, sometimes stereotypes aren’t the worst thing – whenever my mother in law comes over, she kindly assumes that any mess must be her son’s fault!

21. Posted by Sky - 05/09/2011

    I am by nature a neat-freak and regardless of my accomplishments, that is the one thing everyone comments on.I’ve never understood it and don’t care what other people think but it is strange the labels put on me for being clean and organized.

    I’ve been called anal retentive, a show off and told I must have had improper potty training!

    It’s crazy.

22. Posted by Natalie - 05/09/2011

    I like this post a lot. Home is about expressing who you are and it being a comfortable retreat from the daily pressures of the world. If you aren’t “organized” or even really attuned to the aesthetic of things, your home isn’t naturally going to be all the things society has said a woman’s home should be. Feeling forced into that standard makes home not feel so much like home, but another standard to live up to, duty to be performed or pressure to live under. That robs home of what is truly important at home to me.

23. Posted by ninakk - 05/09/2011

    Wonderful comments, I had to come back and read again. A couple of women have mentioned their academic background as well as a “Martha Stewarty” approach to their homes. Well, that is me exactly, too, and while I don’t always succeed in keeping everything spotless, it is indeed my goal (my struggle now is to find a rhythm that allows maximum output from minimum input, simply put).

    Like Sky, I’ve heard a lot of comments voiced as friendly banter regarding my cleanliness and yet they still don’t make me laugh inside. I love a fresh home with floors clean enough to eat from (won’t happen though due to our kitty) and why is it a laughing matter? For me, it’s a constant battle between clean and “just let it go, go out and have some fun too”, but I’m still aiming for Martha Stewart and why should it be okay to laugh about it? Even my American hubby finds this a bit amusing and I’m still not laughing…

    My home is my sanctuary but only if it is reasonably organized and uncluttered; maybe there is something to feng shui? What bugs me is that cleaning is still an issue somehow, still a discussing matter between people who don’t think the same of it. I never, ever walk into anyone’s home expecting anything other than a friendly atmosphere and would never comment on the state of their home either (because I don’t even care since it’s not my abode), but when I enter, they ask for forgiveness of the state of it since it’s not “up to my standards” in some strange way. It’s really awkward and I wish they’d just relax, but no matter how much I’m trying to tell them I don’t care, they don’t believe me. Makes me a bit sad.

24. Posted by Heather - 05/09/2011

    One of the most engaging books I’ve read in a long time was “Outliers” by Malcom Gladwell. The thesis of the book is that society has a lot more impact on people’s ultimate successes (or lack thereof) than we realize. He further proposes that societal “memory” lasts a really, really long time. So in this case, if women are viewed as solely taking care of the home a hundred years ago, there will still be a strong societal memory of that and there will be direct consequences in how we treat women today.

25. Posted by Anna - 05/09/2011

    For a year my husband and I lived apart due to my work – I lived in Australia while he returned to Halifax.

    He had visitors who repeatedly told him that what he needed to keep his house clean was a wife. Because apparently even though he was living in an apartment I never stepped foot in, it was my job from Australia to keep his place clean.

    That was the first time it occurred to him that my fretting about housekeeping might be because people had higher expectations for my keeping a house tidy than they did for him.

26. Posted by ninakk - 05/09/2011

    Oh, and notice how Sky uses the word neat *freak*, like it’s bad somehow, an apologetic shrug of the shoulders, while trying to laugh off this silly trait. That’s how I’m about it too, since I really don’t want people to feel uncomfortable if they don’t “perform as well as I do”. I don’t put anyone else down, they do very well on their own though.

27. Posted by JCos - 05/09/2011

    I just wanted to add, on the dating thing as guy who is still at that stage.

    I strive to have a more organized home, and I prefer to date a female who leans the same way. I don’t feel it’s a double standard if the expectations are the same on both sides. And personally, I would get stressed out if I ended up moving in with, etc is a person who lives in clutter – and that very thing nearly almost happened to me.

28. Posted by Dorothy - 05/09/2011

    Yes, there’s a double standard. The double standard threads through society; why would it not be present in considerations of housekeeping.

    However, beyond the man/woman issue, I think one of the culprits is cable TV with its staging/decluttering shows. As an example, staged homes often have the dining romm table set as for a meal. I think that’s absurd. I’d rather see my table completely empty, or simply centered with a lovely ceramic bowl I bought on a trip to New Hampshire, than set for some phantom guests, then have to wash the dust out of the dishes before I can serve a real meal.

    Another example is “accessories”. I think acquiring a tchochke simply for its appearance — how well it “goes” in a room — is nuts. my knickknacks are items I love. For me they “go together” because I like them, but I have far fewer pillows, throws, bibelots and so forth than a “decorated” home. I think sometimes guests praise my “spacious” home when they are really thinking “bare”.

29. Posted by Rachel - 05/09/2011

    Do you like worms? I hope so, especially considering the size of the can of worms you just opened. My husband may know how to do what he calls cleaning, but he is just as likely to break something as help – like my little spare refrigerator that he defrosted with a hammer and let all the freon out and ruined that had worked fine for thirty or more years. Or my art nouveau flamingo salt and pepper shakers that were smashed in the persuit of a fly. The bookcase I didn’t need because I had too many books already. And why am I still married to this unsympathetic man? I don’t know some days. He can’t rinse the sink in the morning and leaves water all over the counter. He hangs up towels, but rolled up in lumps so they can’t dry properly. And as a self employed male, he always needs my help with something. And since I work nights I sleep too much and should be able to help at a moments notice to drop everything and go get what he needs. With a diabetic dog, I try to keep some regularity in the dogs schedule, so he’s jealous of the dog getting more attention then he does. Wait. This was about cleaning. Somehow I managed before marriage and kids and working full time. It should be a snap. It’s not. I am a terrible wife and mother. Shame, shame on me.

30. Posted by Holy Moly - 05/09/2011

    The personal is the political.

    There is a huge backlash against women’s right currently that permeates all aspects of “Feminine” culture. I mean, Maryland Republicans ended all funding for low-income childcare/preschool, because (no joke) “Women should be home with the kids.”

    It’s not a double standard as much as it’s an attempt to ‘remind women where they belong.’

31. Posted by Heidi Poe - 05/09/2011

    Take a good look at commercials and ads for cleaning products and other household items. Most of them feature a woman using the product or cleaning up the mess that her husband and kids just made (with a smile on her face, no less). Only in the last few years have I noticed a few commercials showing men pitching in with the work, but I can’t recall one where there’s only a man doing the cleaning.

    The double standard is reinforced all the time and most of us don’t even notice. Because that’s what’s “normal.”

32. Posted by Adrian the bachelor - 05/09/2011

    Erin, please lead me to these clean and tidy women! I wish I could find a girl that was able to ‘keep house’…sadly these days the vast majority of women seem to struggle with basics like hygiene and cooking, sigh! What’s a clean well-educated bachelor who can cook, clean and sew supposed to do?! ;0)

33. Posted by Rick - 05/09/2011

    As an unclutterer, nearly every female I date has a messier place than me, and they become very self-conscious of their messes. Most of these girls are a few years out of grad school, well employed, and very driven. I’m impressed by their accomplishments and they’re terribly worried about how well they keep house. It’s flattering in some sense, but mostly just confusing.

    Here’s the weird part: most of these same girls can’t seem to cook to save their lives, and they are almost proud of that fact. It’s like most are totally oblivious to the societal double standard on cooking, but are terribly self-conscious of the ‘keeping house’ double standard.

    To review: I meet driven, professional women who won’t lower themselves to cook for a man, yet seem to want to show their abilities to clean house, and it’s confusing.

    Huh… women.

34. Posted by susanintexas - 05/09/2011

    I was born into a home where a woman’s domain was expected to be “kinder, kuche, kirche” (my grandparents were all German immigrants to the US) and this held true until my mother died when I was 13 and my brother was 10.

    For the next 8 years we were periodically visited by social workers who didn’t really believe that a man and two kids could keep a house (this was the mid-1960s.) We could. We quickly figured out that if we kept things picked up and did a little dusting and sweeping every afternoon our house could be as tidy (if not tidier) than everyone else’s.

    My father subscribed to “The Ladies Home Journal” until the day he died, more than 35 years later. One thing I noticed about my dad — he treated housekeeping like a science experiment. He LOVED gadgets (he would have been all over the “roomba”)

35. Posted by Rebecca - 05/09/2011

    In my marriage, I am definitely the more cluttered one. We have similar thresholds for “messiness”, however, and we define “messy” differently. We are both pilers instead of filers. He has a higher tolerance for dirty dishes in the kitchen and a heap of receipts and dry cleaner tabs/safety pins on the dresser; I tend to mind less if I can’t access the surface of the dining room table (which we almost never use) or having clothes and shoes strewn about the home. I think the real issue is, however, that we both work hard and long hours, and I volunteer (too) extensively. We’re never home, and when we are, we’re exhausted. Many of the gender roles were assigned when one person “kept” the home and one person “brought home the bacon”. I promise you, if we were both home a lot more (or if one of us was a stay at home spouse), the expectations and the reality would shift considerably! But not necessarily along the lines of gender – more along the lines of who has the most time and best ability to address the particular chore(s). Which is basically what we do now.

36. Posted by infmom - 05/09/2011

    My mother was of the “Feminine Mystique” generation and her life was made profoundly miserable by the general assumption that all she should be interested in was “keeping house.” It did not help that my father went merrily off ot work every day, taking our only car, and then would come home and criticize. His mother had a full-time housekeeper, so he thought everyone’s house should be just like the one he grew up in.

    My mother would fly into rages over my untidy room. Not my brothers’ rooms. Boys weren’t supposed to know how to be tidy. They were going to grow up and have some woman do all that for them (and no, she never noticed that she expected the policy that was making her miserable to continue into the next generation).

    A year or so before she died, she called me in an absolute fury because all the buttons had fallen off the overcoat my oldest brother had inherited from our father four years before. Apparently my sister-in-law was falling down on the job, not sewing those buttons back on. Mom really hit the stratosphere when I told her quite firmly that I didn’t sew on other people’s buttons either because it wasn’t rocket science, and if my brother had been raised to be that profoundly helpless the least he could do would be to take the coat to the cleaners and have them sew on the buttons.

    My husband and I split the chores pretty much evenly because we have different expectations. To him a clean house is a clean kitchen. To me a clean house is a place I wouldn’t die of shame if unexpected guests arrived and walked into the living room.

    Oh, and although he’s not happy about it (his mom’s views were similar to my mom’s on the subject) he sews on his own buttons.

37. Posted by Jen - 05/09/2011

    Heidi brings up a fantastic point. There was a series on Current TV called Target : Women that mocked the way advertising companies presented their products to sell them to women. They did a montage of cleaning product ads that all featured thirty something women wearing nice pants and cardigans while cleaning the house. Because that’s what women are supposed to wear when they clean. And, like Heidi said, they’re always wiping up after their ridiculously inconsiderate kids and husbands with a smile on their faces.
    At first I found the series funny, but the more I watched, the more disturbed I became by how much we unconsciously absorb as a society through commercials, especially about gender roles.

38. Posted by KateNonymous - 05/09/2011

    I think there are two double standards here. First, that women are better at (and should be more interested in) keeping a house clean and orderly. Second, that men are incapable of doing so.

    Fortunately or unfortunately, both Mr. Nonymous and I tend toward clutter. It just isn’t a priority for either of us. There are ways in which this shared tendency obstructs us, and we’re working on them, but neither of us is ever going to be Martha Stewart.

    But at least neither of us is expecting the other to behave in a way that is determined by society, rather than by individual preference.

39. Posted by Catherine - 05/09/2011

    Great post!! I think about this a LOT. A lot of people in earlier comments say “Oh I’m the guy but I’m the neat one, she’s messy” or something like that, and I believe them. But here is some food for thought. How many times have you ever heard somebody say “Oh their house is a mess, she’s a terrible housekeeper” vs “Oh their house is a mess, he’s a terrible housekeeper”?

    My answer would be that I hear the “she” variant a lot, but have never heard the “he” variant EVER in my life. I also think that neat guys get some kind of “bonus credit” for being neat (once people figure out that he is the one doing the tidying up), but no demerits for being (a little) messy; but women get no bonus credits for being neat, yet big demerits for being even a little messy.

    Generally speaking, though, I think that the best statement in the post is:

    “I believe we need to stop cluttering up our thoughts and time by concerning ourselves with how other people have chosen to live. ” The corollary to that is “I believe we need to stop cluttering up our thoughts and time by concerning ourselves with what other people THINK OF US.” I think that if you’re doing the un-cluttering thing because it makes you happy and your life easier, then you are doing it right. If you are doing it because you are worried what other people think of you, maybe you need to evaluate that.

40. Posted by infmom - 05/09/2011

    It occurred to me that some people might get a laugh out of a song parody I wrote a couple years ago, inspired by “Dirty Jobs.”

    (to the tune of “I Will Survive”)

    At first I was so clean, I was sanitized,
    As dinner plates my floors were oh so very highly prized.
    But then I spent so many nights watchin’ Mike Rowe on TV
    I changed my mind, and I thought dirt’s the way to be.
    But he’s not here, not at my door,
    He’s chasing catfish round the pond and grabbing gators off the floor.
    I should have cleaned up all that poo, I should have kissed that owl goodbye.
    If Discovery’s not here soon the smell will make me puke and die.
    Help me please, can’t find the door
    Got piles of filthy turkey feathers sliding slowly to the floor.
    Where can I go to learn to feel a cow’s behind?
    It looked so easy, I’m sure the cow wouldn’t mind.
    Oh someone please, please call DC,
    I’d post a message on the board if I could only see.
    I’ve got such a filthy place, don’t need egg upon my face,
    Please call DC, please call DC, hey hey!

    I bought all the Mr. Clean at the corner store,
    I went through every single Swiffer and sent out for more.
    And I used oh so many sponges cleaning up that pile of poo,
    It made me heave, and now my landlord said to leave.
    And here I am, out on the street,
    I’m not that dirt-encrusted fan who thought that filth was neat.
    And so my cell phone gave a ring and it was someone from DC,
    Who said that Mike the Dirty Jobs guy would be coming after me.
    Help me please, I’m on the floor.
    There’s not a cow flop on my back bumper any more.
    Where can I go to get my Dirty Jobs degree
    Who do I thank, for pointing Mike Rowe to me?
    Oh someone please, please call DC,
    I’d post a message on the board if I could only see.
    I had such a filthy place, now I’ve got egg upon my face,
    Please call DC, please call DC…….

41. Posted by Ariel - 05/09/2011

    Thanks for this post. I think that the double standard starts very early in life. Girls are dressed in little dresses and expected not to get dirty, and boys are dressed in camo and told to run around and have fun. Parents reward destructive behavior from boys, like knocking down block towers, while girls are rewarded for more constructive play.

42. Posted by DJ - 05/09/2011

    Yes, and I dislike it intensely. It especially bugs me when my mother brings up the state of my home, as if I am either the only person living in it (hello, three other people here) or as if I am the sole person responsible for its upkeep (hello, I have a job and I am not the messiest person in this house by any means, nor are any of the others suffering from some mysterious ailment that would prevent them from cleaning up… unless laziness counts.)

43. Posted by Alice F. - 05/09/2011

    Beautiful post, Erin. Thank you.

44. Posted by Alix - 05/09/2011

    I have never stepped into a woman’s car without her apologizing for its slovenly condition, even if it was as pristine as the moment it was driven away from the dealership. I cannot recall *any* instance in which a man has apologized for the condition of his car; I’ve heard them say “Let me get these things out of the way” if stuff was piled on the passenger seat, but that’s it.

    Perhaps it’s not so much a gender issue but a left-brain/right-brain one? Right-brainers thrive on visual stimulation, and like to have things “out there” when they can be seen. For left-brainers, all that visual “inspiration” is clutter that keeps them from focusing on the task(s) at hand.

    Interesting post, great comments from all!

45. Posted by Alix - 05/09/2011

    BTW, my mother is convinced that a cluttered house (not necessarily dirty, mind you, just messy) leads directly to all sorts of evils. Upset stomach? Colds/flu? Allergies (okay, a possibility there)? Headaches? Swear to God. She even opined once that a giant hornet had flown into my apartment because it was attracted to the piles of papers/books on the living-room floor. (Personally, I think it came in because the window screen blew off.)

46. Posted by Ashlee - 05/09/2011

    There is absolutely a double standard. I am a female and keep a very clean and well organized house. I take PRIDE in my home and worked hard to purchase it and even harder to maintain it. However, a male friend of mine insists I am a ” neat freak” because there is rarely a spec of dust or item out of place. He doesn’t own a home, but does own a “fancy” truck. The truck is ALWAYS spotless, he washes it every day: rain or shine. Is it just me or does he also take pride in his truck? But… refuse to see the double standard?

47. Posted by momoboys - 05/09/2011

    Although the societal pressure definitely exists, I am not sure that it’s any worse than the societal pressure on women to breastfeed, fit in a size 6, or pick some kind of “nurturing” profession. I actually find all of these gender-related societal pressures to be more and more defined the higher I moved on the socioeconomic scale. Because frankly, in my lower middle-class upbringing, things were more egalitarian and less catty than they are in my new, upper-middle class circles. Or, in other words, those striving for minimum wage really don’t give a *#&! what Martha Stewart thinks, does, or buys. What do the rest of you think?

48. Posted by Emilie - 05/09/2011

    I think this is just one more area (like weight/appearance and being a “good mother”) where women just can’t win. (While I’ve never heard a woman criticized for being “too neat” myself, other people here are saying it.) All the women in my family are messy. Growing up, I only saw my mom clean house when relatives were visiting. Goodness knows my dad never cleaned. But this was a much bigger source of shame for my mom than for my dad. It still is. Although my mom still rarely cleans, it’s like she feels obligated to bemoan “the mess” and her dissatisfaction with it, even though she doesn’t seem to want to do anything about it.

49. Posted by Vanessa H. - 05/09/2011

    I used to feel less pressure when I was single than now when I am living with my soon-to-be husband. His bachelor apartment was clean and decluttered, my single life apartment was small and cluttered. Now that we have moved into a new apartment together, even though we have a lot of square footage, the place gets messy, and I feel the pressure to “keep house” more now, even though we both work full time jobs and have no children.

50. Posted by Rachel - 05/09/2011

    I know I ranted earlier, but now I want to add that one thing that really irritates me is when others in the home “borrow” things they need, but never return them to where they got them. Scissors have a home, they should be returned there; nail clippers, too. China, glasses and flatware all live in the kitchen whether clean or dirty – take them back! As a country girl, one of the rules was “Leave the gate like you found it”. You don’t know why that gate may be opened if usually closed at someone else’s home, or why today it’s closed, but be sure they have a reason. Need to know? Mention it to them, but leave the gate the way you found it. Put the scissors back where you got them; return the nail clippers to the bathroom where they reside. Hang up your coat or put it in the dry cleaning pile. Folded clothes store better that piles or clothes – and wear with less ironing.
    Why are we disgusted more by other people’s messes than we are by our own? When my daugters where babies going to Grandma’s every day (Thanks Grandma! oh the money I saved!) I knew when I picked them up they would have eaten and would not be starving if they didn’t eat much later, and any dirt on them was “domestic” friendly dirt, that could wait a little bit to scrub off, where as dirt from somewhere else was “foreign” terrorist dirt and must be immediately removed. Weird huh? Yet my children managed to survive childhood and grow into reasonable young ladies. Go figure.

51. Posted by Dorothy - 05/09/2011

    Well, Rick and Adrian, perhaps you cannot find Ms. Right because you’re looking for the wrong person.

    Adult, female human beings are called “women”. If you’re looking for “girls” … well, you get the picture.

52. Posted by Jude2004 - 05/09/2011

    When I was born, in the 1950s, standards were much more impossible to achieve, in part because everything took longer to clean. The first dishwashers were terrible; no iron clothing wasn’t invented until after my childhood spent ironing 3 hours every Saturday afernoon; vacuum cleaners were bad. Women spent a huge percentage of their time cleaning. There was no such thing as a self-cleaning oven, for example. My mother’s standards were evil–she cared more about having a clean house than she did about any of us or our happiness. I’ve refused to inflict that on my own children, and so the house isn’t clean. A former therapist pointed out to me once, though, that a lot of the clutter was projects. We were always busy doing and creating, and that caused clutter.

53. Posted by Irulan - 05/09/2011

    momofboys, I agree with you that there’s a major class aspect to this, although I think that what some others have said above about higher education also fits into it somewhere. It’s like there are stereotypes and then backlash stereotypes (e.g, it’s demeaning for a professional woman to like stupid ol’ women’s work like cooking or sewing). For upper classes that have been upper/UMC for at least a generation, then it seems to play out exactly the way you’ve described. My mother-in-law was flabbergasted to learn that my dad cooks every weekday because he gets home from work earlier than my mom.

54. Posted by Per Edman - 05/09/2011

    I see Jen has already mentioned Target: Women, an awesome show, and that ninakk has already mentioned most of what I was about to say, perhaps we are from the same northern european country?

    So as one of the minority sex in this thread, I will instead tell you about a workplace in this northern European country:

    It’s not just dirty. It’s not only cluttered. It’s the way things are left where they were dropped, coffee cups on shelves holding cables and signed contracts under piles of ripped-open envelopes. It’s as if the place is instilled with the belief that “someone” will pick up and move all the things that have been misplaced. There are cardboard boxes on the floor. There are RAM modules on the floor. The floor in front of the coffee machine is at once balder and darker than anywhere else. You guessed it – it’s a company of only men.

    Eight men, all very slightly autistic, all very slightly terribly cluttersome, work here. Their desks overflow with paperwork, some as old as four years. Underneath, old computers. And under the desks – more computers. Some in boxes, others in piles of dust on the floor.

    Perhaps they’re all stressed. Yes, probably. Perhaps they are all very set in their ways. Absolutely. Perhaps they don’t want anyone to move their important stuff, or perhaps they believe it would be demeaning to anyone cleaning the place, to be put through all this muck.

    What I do know about this place is that I once tried recruiting an old colleague of mine, a talented salesperson AND technician with multiple skill sets. Recruiting went fine and once the boss finally read the curriculum vitae, he basically wanted to hire my friend on the spot, although not to the position originally recruited for, but something like a controller, manager, organizer – something only the boss himself seems to spend time on. And I start getting these questions:

    “So does she have any kids?”
    “What about our jargon – you think she’d be embarrassed?”
    “She’s married, you say…”
    “Our place really needs a woman’s touch, you know”
    “I think she’d make a much better manager than a technician”

    Yeah. Except she hates kids, she’s as filthy in the mouth as he is, her hubby has exes with kids, she’s not getting hired as our mom and she’s a much more skilled technician than she is a manager and she doesn’t really want the managerial position because she likes her nails short or the grime accumulates too quickly.

    Again, keep in mind, this is in one of those norther european countries you hear about on TV being the most gender-equal in the world, blaha. Well, if that’s true, I pity women in the rest of the world.

    Thank you so much for this post, Erin. If you weren’t a favorite person of mine before, you would have been one now.

    / Per

55. Posted by Marilyn - 05/09/2011

    Yes! There is a double standard. I have 5 girls, no boys. I admire the women who taught their sons to keep a tidy home and to be organized.

56. Posted by Per Edman - 05/09/2011

    As background, I was oldest of six kids. My father hoarded electronics in one room and my mother, knitting supplies in another. Toys where everywhere and occasionally you’d find _sand_ in the kids’ rooms.

    Against that background, I crave change. I love vacuum cleaners and HEPA filters, microfiber cloth and rainbow colored artificial feather dusters (that’s what your guy needs, Linda). And I love throwing away clutter.

    / Per

57. Posted by Anne - 05/09/2011

    I think saying “not everyone needs to be an unclutterer” or “it’s ok for a woman not to keep her house clean and tidy” reminds me of moral equivalence in foreign policy. I hate to frighten the horses, but I think we should be proud of being unclutterers, and not be afraid to say that uncluttered is better than cluttered and clean is better than dirty. If we are too tolerant about things that matter, people suffer because they think it’s ok to live like pigs. When I find myself lapsing into this “anything goes” mentality, I’m reminded of my mother, who would never entertain the idea that it’s acceptable to live in a mess and always maintains high standards. It should be a source of pride for women. As my mother says when she chooses a hotel, “We live in a lovely clean home, so we wouldn’t stay in a horrid dirty room when we travel.” I don’t think there’s any denying there’s a lot of wisdom in that.

58. Posted by Erin Doland - 05/09/2011

    @Anne — Being an unclutterer does not make you better than someone else. Believing this farce only ADDS clutter to your life. Being an unclutterer may be better for YOU, but it is thankfully not the only path to a remarkable existence.

59. Posted by Margo - 05/09/2011

    In my early 20s I had a male friend over to visit. He was upset about something else, so he lashed out over “usually people clean when they have guests” – I had scrubbed the bathroom and kitchen, but when it came to tidying some things got tossed on the desk and covered with a sheet.

    When I’d been to his place a month prior, he hadn’t vacuumed and wouldn’t even let me shut the door to keep the cat out (I’m allergic) while I slept.

    I threw him out of my house.

    He never understood what a ridiculous double-standard that was!

60. Posted by Karen Newbie - 05/09/2011

    I think the double-standard might actually exist on a few different levels:
    if you are female, if you are a stay-at-home parent (regardless of your level of volunteering), if you are a part-time employed parent (again, leave room for volunteering), or if you were raised in a military household, there is some sort of subconscious or mildly conscious expectation that you will keep a tidier home.

    Unfortunately, it sometimes is more effort than it’s worth to point out the double-standard. I know I’m just too dog-tired to get into it, and as a stay-at-home parent who just launched a business, I’d rather reinforce good behavior – “Thanks for doing the dishes tonight, honey” than draw a line in the sand.

61. Posted by anitamojito - 05/09/2011

    I am a single, professional woman. I generally keep things tidy and clean at home. As for cooking, I’ve never enjoyed it. I usually make very simple, healthy, and strict vegetarian meals. To some men, that doesn’t count as cooking – but that means we’re not going to be compatible anyway, so it’s no loss. I’ve been criticized both for being too clean and not clean enough, the same place and the same condition. And both the men who complained were living in conditions only the CDC could love! Now I know, if a man has an awful lot of rudely phrased, unsolicited opinions about my home he doesn’t belong in it for any length of time.

62. Posted by Joke - 05/09/2011

    Haha infmom great song!

63. Posted by puggleville - 05/09/2011

    Even if in a straight relationship the woman is the relative slob/hoarder compared to the man, there is still gender profiling/stereotyping that people criticize their living situation and consider it her “inability” to keep law and order in the house.

    Thanks for writing this great blog entry!

64. Posted by Linda - 05/09/2011

    I agree with Dorothy that tv has raised our expectations of cleanliness and complete lack of clutter. The rooms are always perfect, clean, everything is put away. The furniture matches. Many of us don’t live that way. We fight the clutter and mess all the time. It’s a daily battle I wage – I am not a neatnik, but my husband is totally oblivious to any mess and a total sentimentalist who feels it is his obligation to keep all of his daughter’s scribbles in a date book when she was 5, the family photos no one else wants, etc., etc. Maybe if I didn’t see all these “perfect” houses, I wouldn’t feel so bad. But now, with the advent of Hoarders, I am even more worried that my house won’t pass inspection and instead will wind up as some kind of special!

65. Posted by lisa - 05/10/2011

    THANK YOU, Erin, for addressing this so well! There are some great comments, too! I have always feared that I alone was being judged, despite being part of a couple and now a family of 4. I work part time, volunteer in my kid’s elementary school, and do the lion’s share of after school homework help, cooking, cleaning, social calendar arranging and uncluttering. Our house is usually somewhat to very messy or cluttered and I usually feel embarrassment when having people over. This is compounded by renovation work that is yet unfinished due to lack of funds to complete it. I do not aspire to some staged tv version of a home, but rather something relatively clean and comfortable that works well for me and my family and would make people feel at ease when hanging out with us. When I was single, my home-keeping skills seemed adequate, but now, it’s not just cleaning, it’s running a household, and I am in over my head! I cannot, nor do I want to do all the housework, nor do I think I should. And so if there is something more pressing (work?) or enjoyable (playing with kids?), I will shirk it until I just can’t take it anymore or guests are coming. So does my messy house reflect on me, the wife and mother, unfortunately, it sure feels like it does!

66. Posted by Mid America Mom - 05/10/2011

    So true!

    And as a stay at home mother and wife I feel it even more. Yes I am in charge and most of it is willingly my job but that does not mean I claim 100% responsibility. The kids and the husband do and should have some accountability- if not- this place would look like an episode of hoarders.

    Oh having recently moved like you, with boxes galore but renovations starting I feel like HEY I can be cluttered- for now.

    Mid America Mom

67. Posted by Anne - 05/10/2011

    @Erin – Let me clarify: I’ve no doubt you can be dirty and uncluttered and lead a remarkable life, but I believe a remarkable life lived somewhere clean and uncluttered will always be superior. As my mother said to me when I was younger and tried a similar argument to yours, “Don’t play the sexism card as an excuse for low standards!” It was tough love, but later I realised she was right. In any case, I think an uncluttered home is a lot easier to keep clean, and I would encourage busy women like myself to arrange their homes with easy cleaning in mind. Or give back to society and just employ a cleaner – there are lots of poor people who would be glad of the job.

68. Posted by Anne - 05/10/2011

    Sorry, I mean “dirt and cluttered” not “dirty and uncluttered”, of course.

69. Posted by Lynda - 05/10/2011

    Here in the UK, there seem to be ads for cleaning products that feature men that are wimps, useless at cleaning or clutterers. Or need to get the job done quickly with this amazing product so they can spend time on more important stuff like football (soccer) or computer games. Does that happen elsewhere?

70. Posted by Abigail - 05/10/2011

    FWIW – this is not an American thing. Indeed, it’s better in America than in most European countries. (I have lived in Europe for about half my life, in several different countries along the way….) And in Asia, it’s even worse than that. Bad as it is in the US, at least men are wiling to help out at home. You won’t find that in most of the rest of the world.

71. Posted by Julia - 05/10/2011

    I am a single woman living alone, and I seem to be unable or uninterested in doing extensive housework. Finally, I am “freeing” myself to hire a cleaner.

    Talk about having to break through a lot of self-talk on that one!

    Maybe after they’ve kept the house for me for awhile, I’ll get interested in doing it again. For now I want to hire someone competent, pay them fairly, and enjoy the fruits of their labor. And stop beating myself over the head about why a single woman in an apartment shouldn’t need a cleaning service.

72. Posted by ninakk - 05/10/2011

    @Abigail: Maybe you could specify which countries in Europe, because I most certainly don’t recognize your statement from my part of the continent.

73. Posted by Donna - 05/10/2011

    Of course this is a gross generalization BUT, I think women are more concerned in general with the condition of their home or their “nest.” This is true even for women whose homes are cluttered or messy — they may be living like that, but they are more likely to be ashamed of their living conditions than a man who is living the same way.

74. Posted by katherine - 05/10/2011

    My husband and I fit the stereotype. But I blame his mother (insert joke here). Not only is she a disaster/hoarder she told me one time he was just too busy to clean up after himself. (!)

    It took some time for him to get used to the fact that I will not clean up after him and the inquirys to “where are my ___” are answered with “I am not responsible for your keys/sneaker/blazer/etc” Busy my ash.

75. Posted by Scienter - 05/10/2011

    This double standard makes my blood boil! My husband and I share an equal amount of the housekeeping drudgery. Neither of us enjoy cleaning, and there is no reason that this chore that neither of us like should be my sole responsibility just because I’m a woman. It would be different if one of us worked significantly more hours than the other, but that would be based on time, not gender.

    I was brought up with all the cliches about how a house should reflect the woman’s taste, and that if the house is messy people will judge the woman rather than the man. Among my friends, this is not true. If my house is a mess, they would think, “Scienter and Mr. Scienter are slobs,” rather than “Scienter doesn’t know how to keep house.” People who would judge just me probably wouldn’t stay my friends for long because that type of thinking usually means that there’s some underlying sexism going on.

    I agree with Holy Moly that double standards like this exist to keep women in “their place.” But, I wish that they were vestiges of a bygone era that has no relevance in modern society.

76. Posted by Kate Bird - 05/10/2011

    Wow. This was helpful! I feel so ashamed/guilty all the time about being a poor housekeeper. The fact is, I have tons of projects and interests that take most of my time – and I don’t want to give them up in order to focus on the house. However, I’m realizing that I think I have to be perfect in my housekeeping – and have given up in advance because I don’t want to give up my other activities in order to meet the standard of perfection. But, that standard is societally imposed, I now realize. And I can choose a middle road in which I spend enough time cleaning to be comfortable in my surroundings, but not so much that I have to give up my other activites. Thanks for the therapy, unclutterers!

77. Posted by Alix - 05/10/2011

    @Julia: Good for you!

78. Posted by Sylvia - 05/10/2011

    Thank you for finally saying it. Yes – I agree, there’s a definite (and absolutely unfair) double-standard.

79. Posted by CR Linda - 05/10/2011

    There are many reasons for the way we live, we don’t need to make excuses or identify reasons for same. It is just fine. Unless the health department is at the door, you are free to live in the manner you wish. But when living with other people, there is usually a compromise that needs to be achieved for peace to reign.

    We all work, whether for a wage/salary or whatever. No one gets a free pass unless we let them. Certain things need to be done to get from day to day. So if one of the occupants won’t clean, and this is abhorent to others, said person needs to provide someone who can. If you cannot/will not cook, you get take-out, frozen meals, or go out to eat. If you would rather not iron, you buy appropriate clothes or use a dry cleaner or wear it the way you find it. If you are on a budget, and any of these things are out of your reach, you need to cooperate to accomplish the level of clean you all require. Some people have clean/clear zones where it is free of clutter, dirt, etc. to help keep the peace.

    When all is said and done, it is the relationships we live in that supports us, not the lovely picture-perfect home. This needs to be included in the perspective.

    Yes, society has a great impact on us, but we don’t need to satisfy everyone. That is a problem for some of us who do not like conflict or critique (me). Yet it is only those who live with us that need to be heard, and solutions discussed. Develop a thicker skin and a phrase to shut the masses up who would impose a level of order not acceptable to ourselves and our cohabitants.

    Loved the quote…If you came to see me, come right in…

    Great comments from all and it is very thought-provoking and insightful.

80. Posted by Liz - 05/10/2011

    Great article and spot on! For as long as I can remember, I have detested housework. Oh, I do it — but it’s the minimum I need to get by, and I try to get it over with as fast as possible. There are only so many hours in the day, particularly when I have a full time job and a part-time job on the side. Kate, above, has nailed it – I too have other activities in my life that I don’t want to give up, and that’s just how I see housework: an intrusion that takes time away from that. When we have company, our living room, dining room, kitchen and bathrooms are neat and clean, and that seems to be OK with everyone. I will admit to the spare bedroom filled with extra furniture, books, office equipment, etc., but that’s what doors are for – to be kept closed – and my relatives and in-laws don’t tend to wander all over the house being nosy.

    I might add that I came from a family of pack rats, especially my mom. I’m not as bad in that area as she was, and I have wholesale thrown out stuff I’ve previously kept, but overall, I have a good-sized clutter tolerance. My husband, on the other hand, is the neat freak with some curious contradicting tendencies: he hates clutter on counters and tables, but he has bins and boxes of unsorted mail all over the house, clothing which he hasn’t worn in decades still in closets and drawers and tends to leave dishes where he’s sitting instead of putting them in the dishwasher. I won’t go through his mail and his clothes because it’s his stuff and he should be the one doing that; I have my own mail and clothing to go through. I’m the one who loads and unloads the dishwasher 99% of the time.

    Needless to say, I’ve pretty much given up on expecting any help from him with any housework. Forget cooking, too, as I do all of that. One thing I really find curious is that both of my husband’s brothers are good cooks and they are willing to pitch right in and cook any day of the week, even after a long day at work. “How did that ‘cooking gene’ pass you by?” I always ask my husband. So, yeah, the differing expectations for men and women are alive and well in our house, although I think my husband is the one who is mystified over my relative lack of guilt over being ‘a good housekeeper.’

81. Posted by Kris - 05/10/2011

    What a surprise, someone posting about a supposed double standard and how much harder it is on them. The only thing that is truly a standard in society is how everyone complains that society is so much tougher on their race, gender, sexual orientation, hair color, height, weight, pet preference, kid situation etc. etc. Us single guys hear about the condition of our houses all the time. Maybe its just your own bias about men that makes you think there is a double standard.

82. Posted by Dee in BC - 05/10/2011

    I agree- in my house if I didn’t do the housework the place would be a literal sty- (Anyone who disagrees can just remember the disgustingly filthy, yes – I mean filthy,as in the bathrooms & kitchens not cleaned ( Ever until moving out , losing the damage deposit & the landlord doing it) – places my Hubby lived before we got together. Our sons are learning what they live – their Dad doesn’t much care- Mom will make them clean up after themselves. What really ticks me off though is Hubby’s mom ( who is a NASTY neat freak as in “No, you can’t have friends in _ I might have to re tidy something” – ditto pets, ditto collections of anything & who NEVER had a job out side the home, either)comes to my house & calls it cluttered & goes to her daughter’s & calls it clean- While the sister in laws home is not quite as bad as Hubby’s batchelor pads- The stove looks like it’s never been wiped the the decade they’ve lived there, the bathrooms smell like pee & I wondered why we somehow always seem to suffer from the “stomach flu” after we visit there until I realised they just dump the dishes, pots,pans & plastic containers that were growing science experiments in the fridge in the sink , give them s swish around & call the dishes done – No scrubbing or rinseing required EWW- So… Clean is in the eye of the beholder ( But according to the mom in law- poor sis- in- law works full time, goes to school in the evening & her hubby doesn’t help much & it’s really not THAT bad)- hmmm… Actually I also work full time, do my educational advancement from home & I wish my Hubby would do more too… My house is for sale & the comments we get back are ” Immaculate”. “Tiny but super organized” “Really deep down clean” So, I guess while I’ve sure seen lots of male vs. female double standard, I’ve also seen Family or friend vs. outsider double standard, too! Thanks for letting me rant!

83. Posted by Sue - 05/10/2011

    I was thinking about double standards recently, but in respect to child rearing. It’s tied into the housekeeping issue, and I think is even more lopsided.

    My friends who are moms seem to always be the ones doing the clothing shopping, the meal planning and cooking, making the doctor’s appointments, taking the kids to the doctors, keeping track of the school calendar, leaving work to pick up a sick child, etc. This seems to be the case even when their husbands have jobs with similar hours and demands, and sometimes when their husbands have jobs closer to their home. Several have husbands who seem to spend a lot of their free time playing video games or other leisure activities, while the wife spends all of her time looking after the family.

    So I was wondering how much of this was the man simply not stepping up to the plate and how much was the woman not allowing the man to help. I asked this very question, and got some interesting results. One admitted that her husband wasn’t good at recognizing that she was frantically trying to keep the household together while he was goofing off, but then also admitted that she didn’t ask for help because she was worried that he wouldn’t do anything right. I could tell that my questions really got her to think about her own need for control.

    Another didn’t have as much need to control things (she regularly has a “daddy day” in which he got the older girl ready for school and spent the day with the younger one). If she got home to find that her daughter wore mismatching socks and her dress was backwards all day, she really didn’t care. But it seems her husband was a lot less interested in stepping up to help her find some free time for herself than he was in hiding in his man cave.

    I’m a married woman, with no kids. This is just something that I’ve been observing for some time among my coworkers and friends.

    And for the record, my husband is the neat one and does most of the house work. But he absolutely refuses to pick up after me, and I can’t exactly complain. I didn’t marry a personal housekeeper. I do apologize to guests for the messy house, but that’s because it’s mostly my mess.

84. Posted by Sam - 05/10/2011

    Since we’re talking about judgments, I’ll share a different experience. I’m a forty year old, unmarried male in the US. My parents were horrible housekeepers and hoarders. I hated it and I’ve always kept a clean home. I was a semi-minimalist before I’d ever heard the term. I don’t spend a lot of time on housekeeping. I just try not to make messes, clean them up when I do, and clean as I go. Not that difficult for a single man or a couple.

    Now to my point. Something I’ve noticed from some women is that they are disconcerted that I can keep my house, buy groceries, cook, do laundry and maintain my own hygiene without the assistance or supervision of a woman, or being overwhelmed. There’s a before and after difference of attitude after they see my house for the first time. Very often they ask if I have a maid or cleaning service. Some act like it’s a flaw, like I’m anal retentive or obsessive compulsive. Some wonder if I’m gay. I’m none of those things and generally pretty laidback. I’ve wondered if these feelings were rooted in insecurity about their identity and value. Maybe they feel that being superior homemakerd gives them value and they are diminished somehow if men don’t need them for that. Possibly they have an equation of attractiveness, personality, intelligence, education, maternal potential, career potential, homemaking ability, etc. that they see as their ‘total package.’ If their mother tells them they need to be good housekeepers, it might be disturbing not to be needed for that. They may think, “Oh $%^&!!! He’s better at all this stuff than me and I’m ten pounds too heavy!” What do the ladies here think when you see a man that can keep his own house?

    Since leaving my parents house, I’ve had roommates, live in girlfriends, and lived alone so I’ve experienced a wide swath of co-housekeepers. There’s no real rule about who is tidier. I’ve found that it’s pretty much about who is more considerate or selfish. The worst was a girlfriend.

85. Posted by Raf - 05/10/2011

    Oh, Europe, that elusive faraway country Americans dream of!

    I live in Italy, where men are supposedly mommy’s boys all their lives but I know many independent men who certainly can “keep home”, studying or working far from their families. My partner is one of them. We’ve been living together for years now and we share all housework. He also irons his own shirts, which always amazes people.

86. Posted by Vanessa H. - 05/10/2011

    @Sam: I think you might be on to something. When I met my future husband and discovered he could cook better than I can (he is French, I am American), it really threw me for a loop. But as far as cleaning, it did not throw me that he could keep house (his place was clean and minimal). I don’t know why that would bother some women; you almost wonder if they *want* the guy to be a slob! For me, I was happy that he kept a clean house. Once I came over, I never left!

87. Posted by Rachael - 05/10/2011

    What a fascinating topic. I was thinking about this on Sunday as I did some last-minute tidying before we had my parents and my parents-in-law over for Mother’s Day brunch. Even though we planned to be outside, I still insisted on cleaning the entire first floor, as I didn’t want a messy house to reflect poorly on me (we’ve lived here for years, both sets of parents have seen the house often, had just gotten home from a trip, and no one would ever suggest a messy living room was because my husband is a poor housekeeper). I do think, though, that societally we’re more likely to blame a guy when a lawn is unkempt than a lady.

88. Posted by Tweetie - 05/10/2011

    My husband and I split the chores around the house pretty evenly, and we do make sure the house is clean and tidy when we are expecting guests. I have never noticed any of our friends (couples or single) make remarks *at all* about the cleanliness of our home, so for me personally I can’t say any of our friends are putting pressure on me specifically to keep house a certain way. I have noticed our single friends (male or female) tend to be more messy and lackadaisical in their housekeeping, but it might be due to not having guests as often. I think couples tend to entertain more often, simply due to having more space available to host everyone.

    I grew up in a home where neither of my parents really cleaned much (unless guests were coming over, which only happened for birthdays), the place was always cluttered with knick knacks and piles of junk mail on the kitchen counters (they are mild hoarders), and neither parent took the initiative or seemed bothered by the mess. When people would drop by unannounced, I was mortified at times with how messy our home was (dishes on the coffee table from all of us eating dinner while watching TV, visible dust on the furniture and crumbs on the couch and floor). No one ever said anything about it to my recollection, but I remember, even as a teenager, feeling “house shame” that outsiders saw how messy we really were.

    I think I became an unclutterer and a bit of a neat nick in response to these early memories. I feel pressure *from myself* to make sure my house is clean and tidy when I know people are coming over; I think it is a sign of respect to guests that you feel their visit is important enough to tidy up and make sure they are not going to be covered in pet hair when they sit on the couch, or be forced to use a dirty toilet or sink and start to imagine what germs are growing and what’s safe to really touch in the bathroom. That’s not to say the house is a disaster when it is just my husband and me–I have a regular cleaning schedule and try to make sure the house can be tidied up in 15 minutes or less, since we don’t like living in clutter and dirt, either. But I know I feel the pressure to keep the house clean (as in, disinfected-type of clean) more than my husband. He is more bothered by clutter, I am more bothered by actual dirt. I can’t say for sure if this is gender-related, though–it probably has a lot to do with the fact that I worked as a professional house cleaner (first in a hospital, then in people’s homes) for over 7 years.

    The real head-scratcher is my mother-in-law, who has only ever been a stay-at-home wife/mother. She does laundry every day. She cleans her house every day. She seems to be constantly cooking, and then spends another hour cleaning up the kitchen. When hubby’s parents come to visit (both our families live a plane trip away), she has a hard time respecting our rules (such as no shoes in the house, or use a towel more than once so as not to create extra laundry–we don’t own scads of towels), and then gets mad at *me* that I’m not cleaning as much as she would! Her whole life revolved around keeping house, and she expects me (but not her son) to do the same. We try to keep our house as clean as possible for as long as possible (hence, the no shoes in the house rule) so that we’re not creating extra work for ourselves, yet she sees that as some sort of hardship for her, while simultaneously thinking it’s a sign of slovenliness that I’m not willing to bend over backwards and clean up after the dirt she thinks she has a right to track into our house. I clean before guests arrive so that I can enjoy spending time with them while they’re here; I don’t want to be stuck in the basement doing laundry or scrubbing the floors (and I don’t want *her* to do it for the same reason).

    Thanks for letting me rant.

89. Posted by Tweetie - 05/10/2011

    Rachael–that is a good point, and I meant to mention that same thing, but was sidetracked by my extra-long comment!

    Yes, there is a double-standard for men, when it comes to how the outside of the home/the cars are kept. My husband definitely feels it is his responsibility to keep the lawn mowed and the house and cars in good repair. If the grass was 2″ high, or shingles were falling off the roof, no doubt our neighbors would hold him responsible, rather than me (even though I am quite capable of pushing the lawn mower, at least). I think it comes down to who is more experienced. I don’t trust my husband to do the laundry b/c I have more experience doing it, whereas he wouldn’t trust me to fix a leak in the roof (and I can’t say I blame him!).

    Double-standards: it cuts both ways!

90. Posted by priest's wife - 05/10/2011

    yes- there is a double-standard, BUT I’m okay with it as long as my husband doesn’t cause me extra work (by leaving dirty clothes everywhere)and he appreciates my efforts (by eating what I happen to cook, etc)—in any case, the kids are getting older, so I can do less work!

91. Posted by Janelle - 05/10/2011

    I’m a stay at home mom and I’ve never been interested in cleaning. Organizing, yes, but cleaning is hard for me. I do it, perhaps not as often as some of the people commenting, mostly because of guilt from childhood (,I think; My mom’s house is spotless; It is her joy to clean) and because I think that children don’t need the chaos of a dirty, terribly messy home. Saying this, there is laundry to be folded and put away, the stuff in their lunch bags to empty and wash up and many other things I could be cleaning. I probably wash the floors once a month. I’d rather be gardening, playing with the kids, reading, spending time with friends, crafting to name a few things. But the guilt is always there, in the back of my mind.

92. Posted by Jeanne - 05/10/2011

    Would I love a well-organized home that’s always tidy & clutter-free? Sure. It’s the stuff of daydreams for me, although I sometimes make efforts in that direction.

    Does the clutter that I do have keep me from living a remarkable life? Not that I can tell. I learned to live with clutter when I was working more than full time, working on my doctorate, and raising my son. What was most important? Raising my son, paying the bills, and getting the dissertation done. If I NEVER filed all papers that were piling up at the end of my desk, so what? If I never spent time with my son or finished my dissertation… now THAT would have mattered.

    In a full life, where there’s so much to do, we all make choices about how to spend our time. There are always trade-offs. For me, there are more things to do every day than can possibly be done. Not obsessing about “perfect order,” whatever that would be for me, allows me to spend time with friends occasionally or to take a nap on a Sunday afternoon.

    So, in some ways, I think that keeping the uncluttered, tidy house could be a recipe for never having time to live a remarkable life. Although I enjoy organizing & decluttering & so forth, I see nothing all-that-remarkable about spending too much of my time doing that. I’m for “balance” in that regard.

    As for the sexist views on a cluttered house… one day my mother-in-law was visiting. My then husband was using brass cleaner on a teapot (something I never did & probably won’t ever do). She turned to me, pointed her finger in my face, and said, “That’s YOUR job.” Phew. Not a good moment for in-law relations.

93. Posted by Tricia - 05/10/2011

    There’s a great book: “Home Comforts: The Art and Science of Keeping House” that opens with a chapter on social pressures around housekeeping. It’s quite funny, and an inspiring read if anyone (male or female) wants to get motivated to clean.

    Personally, I’m impressed by people, male or female, who can live well. This includes keeping things together, and maybe also the ability to laugh about things when they’re not. How’s that?

94. Posted by mandy - 05/10/2011

    I recently read a book called “Be Happy without Being Perfect” and one of the articles talk about the same topic. I found it especially interesting when the author describes how many people actually helped create the picture-perfect look of Martha Steward’s homes in her magazine. That was an eye-opener and I finally came to the conclusion that there’s no way to keep up with that image and my house doesn’t look too chabby with two toddlers running around and just my husband and me doing the housekeeping.

95. Posted by Another Deb - 05/10/2011

    My husband and I both have the same career and do the exact same job, teaching science. It involves a lot of clutter and a lot of homework. During the school year the books lie open across any flat surface, the fridge literally DOES contain science experiments, and red pens, paper clips and scraps of paper all breed like.. well, you know.

    I do most of the housework, what there is of it. After years of sorting mountains of “clothes clean enough to wear again” and picking up books left right in the middle of the bathroom floor, I decided that my philosophy is “Mind over matter. If no one minds, it doesn’t matter”

    We are both stressed, sleep deprived and tangled in clutter, but at least it’s mutually understood mess. I like the term used earlier in the comments: “academic pack-rat style”

    On the other hand, I usually avoid inviting family over. They know how it is, mostly, but some of them can’t get over it. I hear how they judge everyone else, and I am not about to open the comments section for my housekeeping.

96. Posted by Deneen - 05/10/2011

    This post resonates with me…a lot. I’ve read Unclutterer for several months but never felt compelled to comment until now.

    I have always been able to do a pretty good job of ignoring society’s expectations about “my place” as a woman. My housekeeping insecurity came from my mom.

    My mom is a white-glove housekeeper, trained in her ways by post-WW 2 tyrannical German parents. My abilities have never been up to her standards. Even as a kid something was always wrong: a smudge in the sink, flat sheet a few degrees crooked on the bed…do it over. And Saturday was housecleaning day for us kids…ALL day. Imagine how fun THAT is when you are ten and all your friends are playing kickball in the street while you are vacuuming under your bed.

    Her rationale was that a good wife knows how to clean and keep house, and people will talk if you don’t, and not only would I look bad, I would make her look bad because people would think she hadn’t taught me properly.

    But I am not a bad housecleaner, even if I fail to live up to my mom’s standards. I spent a year working as a death investigator before going to grad school. The job involved going to the scene of death, so I got to see plenty about how other people lived. I’ve been in a lot of houses: hoarders, terminal alcoholics, big families, people who were stretched so thinly they didn’t have enough time to get everything done. Not all of these houses were in appalling shape…but a lot of them were.

    I directly attribute my minimalism to the “perfection is barely good enough” upbringing I had with respect to housekeeping. I know the value of, and want, a clean home and it’s easier to clean if there’s not much stuff to work around. I’ve heard our house described as “spartan” but I don’t take that as an insult. Maybe some would.

    That job was what taught me to stop worrying about perfection. I realized cleaning is not an end unto itself, it’s to keep a healthy and comfortable home. My house is clean and organized, even if there’s sometimes cat hair under the sofa and kitty nose prints on the windows. (They will get wiped up on Saturday.) My mom has even relaxed some, now that I’ve proven my housekeeping skills were good enough to land me a husband (/sarcasm).

    Anyway, thanks for letting me ramble and I do have one confession: on hot summer nights I miss my mom’s cool, crisp ironed sheets.

97. Posted by Sally - 05/11/2011

    My cleaning philosophy has changed a lot over the past year or so. I used to just let the house go during the week because my boyfriend and I were too tired after work and I really only felt like I had enough energy to cook dinner (my boyfriend doesn’t cook at all), read a bit or watch television, and get ready for bed. On Saturday I would get up and do the whole weeks worth of cleaning and laundry with minimal help from my boyfriend since he always seems to find some other chore to get him out of the house, and then be exhausted and cranky for the rest of the weekend.
    He and I have very different standards of clean. We are both naturally messy don’t get me wrong, but I am more aware of the mess and he just glosses right over it. He cleans to his “standards” and I clean to mine, so I guess I end up doing the majority of the housework by default. I hate cleaning as much as he does, but I like living in a clean house much more than he does.
    As far as pressure from others goes, it doesn’t really exist in my life. I make all my own pressure. For example, one night last Summer a bunch of friends showed up unexpectedly at the house with a couple of bottles of wine and a huge tray of sushi and begged to use the pool (we were in the middle of an awful heat wave). I let them in, but I felt frantic and started trying to straighten up the place a bit. I really couldn’t relax and have fun at all even though none of my friends really cared how messy my house was, they just wanted to hang out and have a good time.
    My Mother was the same when it came to having company over. She was a stay at home Mom and her “job” I guess was managing the house. Our house was always clean, but very messy/cluttered, and she would really only straighten up if other people were coming over. She and I used to have endless screaming matches about the state of my bedroom (I’m still really bad about keeping clothing off the floor and chair in the bedroom). I hated the rushed, frantic few hours before we had guests, I swore I wouldn’t care when I had my own place…but guess what? I realized that I was acting exactly like my Mom if not worse when my friends popped by unexpectedly. Something had to change.
    My new philosophy is to always keep at least the public areas; living room, kitchen and dining, and both bathrooms clean enough that I wouldn’t be embarrassed if someone stopped by, and that I would do that by cleaning a tiny bit each day instead of letting it all build up. With the help of this site and others I am slowly teaching myself to find those little moments to do things that need doing. Like while I wait for the water to boil for my tea in the morning I might unload the dishwasher from the night before, or spray and wipe the sink. Little things really add up. I’m also trying to encourage my boyfriend to join me in trying to put away things when we finish with them. So far, so good, though we both slip on occasion, and when I get sick it’s a quick downward spiral.

98. Posted by Mletta - 05/11/2011

    Do we even have to debate that there is stereotyping when it comes to cleaning and housework? Some things never change, or take a long time to change.

    I’ve dated some guys who were skilled in housekeeping, great cooks, etc. I’ve watched my friends date some incredibly liberated men who had no problem maintaining their bachelor pads on their own before marriage. I’ve then watched these same men, once married, seem to loose every skill set for housekeeping as if on cue.

    How can you have a partnership of any kind where you live together and just automatically assume the other partner (male or female) will do the cooking and/or cleaning? People defend themselves with “I don’t like that.” “I don’t know how.” or the ludicrous “I don’t have time. ” (Hint: No working person does!)

    But you know what, you can learn, you don’t have to like something to do it, and you can make time. Or, you can hire someone to do it, if you’re lucky enough to afford that type of service.

    I don’t care how much we love our families and want to do things for them (like maintain a lovely home or make a lovely meal), the issue is not being forced to do so by some societal default system. Choice is the key here and also not making anything unilateral.

    There is no reason that a healthy man or woman (or whatever combination of partners) can’t both do their share of household stuff if they can’t afford to hire someone else. I am personally turned off by any guy who can’t simply clean up after himself in basic ways. And guys who are “above” cleaning or laundry or chores? Don’t care how otherwise appealing you may be, I”m not sharing my life with someone who expects me to be the equivalent of a house maid/servant.

    The fact that women go along with this is infuriating. I get why: Who wants to live in a pigsty. And who wants to play games (withholding sex) to get what you want.

    I say if you can’t share the drudge work, you dont’ get to share in the good stuff. So pitch a tent in the back yard for those guys who won’t help. Let them be messy outside the house.

    To be fair, the above should apply to either man/women who won’t help.

    And for those of either sex who play the game of “not doing it right” or breaking stuff while cleaning, etc., well, two can play that game if necessary. Whooops. What happened to the video games? The computer? The flat-screen TV?

    Adults should act like adults and take responsibility for stuff. Does anyone really LOVE cleaning or household chores? Not even Martha S. (and sorry, she does not keep all of her houses. She’s not even home that much. Come on.) Do we all wish we were doing something else? Of course. BUT…that said, there is a thing called pride of place and we can all work towards that.

    The reason so many men today are the way they are is because of mothers who let them get away with doing nothing while growing up, from what I’ve observed. Thankfully, there were mothers and fathers out there who raised their kids to understand that EVERYONE has work to do in a household. And it’s not based on gender.

    Some folks (men and women) do get a bit obsessive about cleanliness and neatness. Sadly this discourages a lot of folks from even trying. You don’t need a home that’s so spotless it could be photographed for a magazine and you don’t have to look as if your house is ready for a dinner party at a moment’s notice. But there’s a wide space between that and pigsty.

    And there’s a difference between comfortable/cozy and OMG.

    People spend a fortune on their homes, work like dogs to keep them and then somehow fail to want to maintain them? Makes no sense. Scale down, work less out of the home and recommit to making your place comfortable and clean and livable.

    And please: Teach your boys and girls the importance of learning how to do stuff for themselves, and not just till they are paired off!

    Show me a man who can iron and do laundry, is into vacuuming, and like it, and I’m halfway in lust.

99. Posted by Ms. D - 05/11/2011

    Forgive my economist brain for a second, but one thing *I* run into a lot is men SHOCKED that I pay someone to do lots of stuff for me. I have a couple-times-a-month housekeeper. Anything that needs ironing goes to the cleaners. Just a few examples. Many of these men who are SHOCKED that I would pay for these things pay for them, too, or expect their spouse to do most of it, but still expect that I would do it myself. Listen, guys, my time is worth AT LEAST as much as my hourly salary (and so is their spouse’s), and my free time is worth MORE (and my time spent on professional organizations/development is worth EVEN MORE, because that time increases my earning potential). So, yeah, those 4 hours of salary I spend a month on the housekeeper, or that 30 minutes of salary on the cleaners for things I COULD iron myself…WORTH. EVERY. PENNY.

    I’m not going to apologize for valuing my time enough to find ways to make that time work harder for me, and I’m not going to apologize that, because my time is valuable, there are things in my house that are just not perfect. There are unfinished projects laying around. While the current bills get filed, the old ones sometimes take a while to get shredded. I SWEAR I’m making a wall hanging with all those wine corks…some day. When someone says something to me about a particular mess or clutter pile, I just look at them and say that as soon as it’s worth $40+ an hour for me to clean it up or finish it, I will. Not that someone will pay me to organize it/finish the project, just that it will be WORTH that much to me in ease of use of my home/efficiency/beauty/etc.

    I’m not a complete slouch. I installed a custom closet to make it more efficient for me to put my clothes away in a neat and organized manner (I used to suck at this, clothes everywhere, but the closet is PERFECT). I’ve decorated my home with unique and beautiful items to my liking…including many, many pictures I took on my travels, which are SUPER valuable to me (hence the time to take them, touch them up, print them, frame them, and hang them). I cook, well and often (but hate dishes…thank the flying spaghetti monster for dishwashers and housekeepers who hand-wash). I file bills and other important paperwork neatly, and my CDs and DVDs are all in alphabetical order (I value not having to hunt for what I want to watch/listen to). Trash makes it into the trash and items go back to their home…most of the time. I even have a vegetable garden…not because tomatoes are expensive, but because the ones I grow are better and therefore more valuable. But, yeah, when it comes down to doing something I don’t particularly like, that someone else could do for less than the cost of my time to do it, or that just *isn’t* important to my quality of life…yeah, that’s getting farmed out or put off.

    I’m not suggesting that everyone can afford a housekeeper or to take most of their clothes to the cleaners instead of doing their own laundry, but we ALL can decide how to make our lives most efficient for us. We can all decide what’s most important and dedicate our time to that. And, if you are willing to put in a little initial leg work, even without a lot of money, you can trade work you love for work you hate. Time swaps have been in the news recently, and ANYONE could trade a few hours of babysitting (if they love kids) or sewing (if they love sewing) or gardening (if they love gardening) for a few hours of housework (if they hate housework) or cooking a big batch of meals to be frozen for later use (if they hate cooking) or whatever. Use your imagination.

    Even explaining this concept when questioned, I still catch flack. I just don’t let it bother me. Maybe explaining this to the critics will give them some pause, maybe not. Do something because you love it/want it…because it’s VALUABLE to you, not because you feel obligated to. Maybe I have a better sense of value because I spent years learning about it, but I think that it’s a concept we could all think a little more about, and improve our lives because of that moment of thought.

100. Posted by katrina - 05/12/2011

     A healthy and safe home is important to me.
     Neat is nice but not necessary. Ultra-clean and completely co-ordinated always feels a bit artifical to me, probably because my family’s always had mismatched, unusual furniture.

     Living in Australia with small poisionous spiders that hide under clutter, mouse plagues and ants that get everywhere in a messy kitchen (we had 4 varieties of ants in the house last summer), healthy and safe often means uncluttered and relatively clean.

     As to criticism about ‘home pride’ or ‘home messiness’, I think it may have lasted so long because its not recognised as a generally offensive ‘-ism’. It’s not racism, its not overt-sexism (it’s more like passive-aggressive-sexism LOL), it’s not about a person but their behaviour. And no doubt some people think that because it’s just like all those cheesy cleaning adverts on tv then it must be acceptable.

     To me, none of that makes it acceptable. It’s passive bullying.

     @Ms D. Those men who criticise you for hiring someone are amusing. As if they’d never hire a mechanic or a plumber or a builder or a carpet layer. H
     mmm, now why can’t those critics do all those things stereotypically “manly” themselves in 15 minutes? LOL

101. Posted by Tweetie - 05/12/2011

     Wow, after reading a lot of the other comments, I feel I really lucked out with my DH. We usually cook dinner together (or take turns cooking it), he washes the dishes and cleans up the kitchen every night, and he still takes responsibility for mowing the lawn and maintaining the cars. I weed the flower beds, do the laundry, clean the bathrooms, scoop the cat’s litter, and dust. We share the responsibility of maintaining the floors (they need to be swept and mopped, and the rugs vacuumed). In all, the house keeping is split pretty evenly, although I still feel he has more to do since our house and cars need constant repair that I’m not really qualified to do.

     One time my grandparents were visiting and we were going somewhere that required the men to wear a dress shirt. My grandpa saw my DH pull out the iron and ironing board to iron his shirt, and my grandpa asked him, “Aren’t you going to make Tweetie do that for you?” to which my DH replied “Why should she do it? SHE’S not going to wear it!” My grandpa didn’t have a good comeback for that!

102. Posted by Liz - 05/12/2011

     One of my co-workers in his 20s is the chief cook and bottle washer for his current girlfriend, and before that, a couple male roommates. He regularly described cooking fairly elaborate meals for everyone and being the chief cleaner in the household. I also might add he made it a point to inform his male roommates that they were not pulling their weight when they didn’t clean up after themselves. After he told me this, I remarked that he’d make some lucky girl a wonderful husband and did he charge for lessons for *my* husband.

     I agree with what another commenter has said regarding some men either not knowing how to perform basic household tasks or playing dumb about them, which is what I suspect is going on with my husband in some areas. To me, it’s a basic lesson in self-sufficiency for men *and* women knowing how to cook and clean for yourself, whatever your age.

103. Posted by Allegra - 05/12/2011

     Regardless of all the different points of view, I am deeply impressed by the civil and courteous tone of all these comments (well, nearly all). It is refreshing to see people posting thoughtful, nicely expressed views without putting each other down. You may already have guessed that I am from an English-speaking country on the other side of the Atlantic, where the level of discourse, even in the ‘quality’ newspapers, can rapidly descend to a vulgar and insulting level. God bless America!

104. Posted by lady brett - 05/13/2011

     my personal experience with this is that it is heavily influenced by relationship/living arrangement.

     that is, when i was single and in my own apartment, i was perfectly comfortable describing the mess as “my bachelor pad” – and having it described that way.

     now, married (and the previous time i’ve lived with a girlfriend), i feel a great deal more pressure to keep house. most of that is self-inflicted, but i feel like it’s part of taking care of my family – and a measure of how well i am doing that.

     that said, my “bachelor pad” was usually way cleaner than our house. *sigh*

105. Posted by pt - 05/14/2011

     Thanks for setting the stage to vent (for me, anyway)! I feel the need to preface this by saying that my kitchen is always spotless as is my childrens’ shared room – I can’t go to bed when the kitchen isn’t clean, whether it’s 10pm or 2am. I’ve definitely got a clutter issue going, though. With work, a husband who’s almost never home from work before 11pm, and two boys – 4yo, and 2.5 yo, I make the choice to spend my time on 1. playing with the kids 2. Putting way things could do harm 3. Cleaning the dirty – in varying order.

     I feel guilty about the mountains of clothes to purge (in our bedroom), and toys to get rid of, but I’ve also been the one to teach my boys to ride their bikes, hold their breath under water, garden with me on the balcony, alphabets, numbers, intro to math, thinking of creative activities to keep them engaged, and away from the tv. etc….Counts for something, right?

     But I still feel like I’m underperforming at times (not guilty enough to keep my self from having fun with my boys), while my husband comes home and does ‘what he can’. Admittedly, he’s exhausted. I am, too.

     We both work hard, with me on 3 jobs: the office, household cleaner, and involved mother 0 but I’m the only one who feels guilty and pressure about the state of the clutter.

106. Posted by Cherry - 05/15/2011

     Being a domestic goddess/housewife/fulltime sahm, I’ll address the issue of people (always other mothers in my case) coming into my neat (but not immaculate home, we live here) and responding with either guilt-ridden self-consciousness or defensiveness (though they work). I’ve had a great response by telling them that I consider this my job and I do it the same way I did my job when I worked outside the home. I’d be scared of (for?) a working mother who kept house the same way I do. I find they respect this view. Also I’d say if you respect what and how you do things other people tend to respect it too.

107. Posted by klutzgrrl - 05/15/2011

     @ Rick, that you find it confusing that successful, driven women should be embarrassed about their housekeeping is exactly what this post and discussion is about – it’s not a case of ‘uh, women!’ but ‘uh, society!’ – it shows just how indoctrinated we are that, despite everything we achieve, we feel we will be JUDGED on our home cleaning and decorating.

     What a great thread. I’ve experienced many sides of this discussion, from being a student, to SAHM and WAHM. I hate housekeeping.

     There was a wonderful post from a guest writer, a while back, which said if you feel that housekeeping is beneath you, you’ll always have a messy home – I forget the exact words, but the message was, this work needs to be done, so get off your butt and do it. It was a great wakeup call.

     I’d love to be a domestic goddess but I have too many other things to do, so Unclutterer has been such a help – with less clutter, it’s easier to clean, so I can find at least a happy medium.

     SO many great comments on this thread – it’s lovely to hear differing viewpoints shared openly. Great references too – I’ll be looking for the Malcolm Gladwell book.

     @ Holy Moly. “The personal is the political.” – what a great line!!!!

108. Posted by Iseabail - 05/16/2011

     I have never read all the comments to a post before now, but find this fascinating.  I am a single mom.  I work full time, am pursuing an MBA, and volunteer.  I have found that my children and I live better, with more time to do the things we love, if the house is neat and clean.  The “I don’t have time” excuse wears thin on me. I, too, enjoy spending time with my children, and part of that time is spent teaching them to care for themselves.  We teach our kids to bathe, why do we not teach them to clean the tub?  Their paternal grandmother is a hoarder and I have spent the last 18 years studying the disorder to help my children overcome it.  It is costly in so many ways: health, money, time, but it is Not simply a life choice.  It is a disorder.  If they were dyslexic, I would study that to help them overcome it.  I find people who don’t bathe (but can) to be offensive, and I find dirty homes offensive too – man or woman, although it’s not my place to tell them that.  It’s not about me, it’s about a  demonstrated lack of care for self that makes me unutterably sad.  

109. Posted by Laetitia in Australia - 05/22/2011

     It’s not just in USA society that this stereotype exists – it’s alive and well here in Australia.

     A friend wrote on her blog about how she had a hundred things to do including cleaning up before visitors came. She said that her husband commented that their place is much tidier than most of the places he visits and she pointed out to him that that is “probably because no one bothers to tidy up if it’s only a guy coming round”.

     II commented that “Women do things to impress other women (‘or rub their noses in’). We also tend to think that all males don’t notice or care about a tidy house.

     Sadly, we’re also more likely to judge and be judged by (or feel we’ll be judged by) other women on the state of our abode, even though males in the house may be as much or more responsible for the state of the house.”

     I’m fortunate to be married to a man who can and will ‘keep house’ and actively enjoys cooking (I cook meals to live and, at times, bake for fun and the enjoyment of the end product).

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