Housewives and Homemaker

In the 70s, our mothers were all "housewives" (not a hmemaker, since hat term not yet come in vogue then). They were busy caring for us toddlers, and take care of the household activities. They also used to host parties for their husbands' bosses and colleagues, not because they loved it all the times, but more because they had no choice. Their husbands would call them and declare, "my boss and 5 other people coming for dinner tonight"...not a request but more of a command, and the next thing you know the wives are busy planning, shopping, scrubbing, polishing, decorating, cooking, and stressing out. Naturally, none of this work is compensated in any way. At the end of the dinner party, the husband's boss turns to the housewife with a condescending smile and says, "This was really quite a spread that you put on. It's nice that you have something to keep you busy."!!!

If you are born in the 70s, you would have seen your mother be at her husband's beck and call for massive unpaid projects such as this. And you would become a feminist early on because, even as a little girl, you would be sick and tired of seeing your mother being regularly treated with an enormous lack of respect. And not only hosting parties, so many rituals our mothers were supposed to do just based on their gender. Now that I am a 34 year old married woman juggling my career and family, I wonder why one part of the society would always be the victim of "lack of respect". Now, a lack of respect is probably inevitable when a class has no money, no power, and no public voice. But our mothers...many of them have had a good educational background, came from respectable families but then why, just because they were women, even worse, housewives, they had to go through millions of big and small humiliations? So much so, that most of them probably didnt even think of them as humiliations? Women being taken for granted became inevitable in and around the 70s when they were simply doing something they had little choice in.

My personal observation is that the status of "housewives...homemakers" has improved with the rise of feminism in our country (note, am talking mostly about the educated, middle/upper middle class society). Even the relatively modern term "homemaker" evinces a recognition that women who cook and clean and sew and decorate and budget and care for children are more than just wives who stay at home. Today, homemakers are more powerful than ever before. They are more organized, more outspoken in the public sphere, and more likely to have educations and careers that make them less dependent on their husbands than in the past. They are less likely to be disregarded or excluded from the conversation or treated condescendingly if politics or other Important Subjects arise. They are less likely to be taken for granted since they have other options. So things are definitely getting better for women. I know of certain aunties who, despite having good education, could never have a career of her own as her husband was worried about the chilren's upbringing in the "absense of their mother at home". I know of an uncle who proudly states at each and every party that he attends that he has never let his wife work because he could always "afford" whatever furnitures his wife wanted to buy! (as if aunty would have worked only to buy furnitures)...

I am glad that I am born in an age where people dont raise eyebrow because I am a career woman (even if they do, it hardly matters as my family supports me thick and thin). Today homemakers are much more than housewives... they are like this juggler who balances everything with great ease. In todays age, there are planty of stay-at-home mothers for whom such a decision is entirely voluntary and not being forced upon. All I am trying to emphasize on, here, is that the furtherance of women's equality in all spheres of life will help to make homemaking a truly voluntary choice and will thereby also raise the status of all women. And this has happened to a great extent, thanks to the rise of feminism. After all feminism is not any extremist operation. It is just a way of socially upgrading the status of women and helping them realize their true value and potential.

Womanhood is a celebration...so celebrate it. Embrace it with love and dignity... and stop taking things which your heart doesnt allow you to. Break free... Homemaker or a career woman...it is and should be "your choice" and not imposed on you by any third person singular number!