Polly Vernon has her say
WHAT DO I THINK about#tr ad wife, the movement (allegedly) sweeping Twitter, American and – as of last week – British households? Apparently, women are encouraged to do less in the way of earning a living, buggering off to the gym when they fancy it, getting drunk on a school night and generally pleasing their selfish selves, and rather more in the way of cooking, cleaning, child-rearing and refreshing their lipstick in advance of their husbands arriving back from the office and demanding supper, which lil wifey has, of course, lovingly prepared in advance. How do I feel about the wholesale promotion of a regressive, anti-feminist half-life, which casts the woman as supporting artist in the great oeuvre that is the man’s work, reduces her to semi-housebound breeder, nurturer and cheerleader, curbs her independence, parks her dreams, softens her voice and lessens her agency?
Hmmmmmm…
Let me think…
Honestly? I feel like: whatever floats ya boat, gals! Whatever gets you through the night – or in this case, daytime TV schedule! Same, tbh, re Make Women Great Again, the American conference scheduled for Orlando, Florida, in May, which invites women to pay $2,000 to hear a panel of men lecture them on ‘all forms of positive femininity’ and the importance of becoming ‘ultimate wives’. I mean, if I had an extra £2k splashing about, I’d spend it on Botox and handbags, which probably isn’t any more evolved, feministically speaking, than the conference itself, but horses for courses, and if that’s how you, personally, choose to set the clock back on women’s rights, who am I to argue?
I know I’m supposed to be outraged by these things, though. Like: fully triggered. To rail against the reinvigorating of a 1950s standard on lady-livin’, ask serious questions on the socials about whether this is a response against the #Metoo-ification of modern debate/a gussying up of misogyny/ the newest incarnation of the populist politics that surely spell the end for progressive conversation… But I can’t be arsed. Partly because it’s too predictable. Partly because I can’t honestly see that #tradwife is a zillion miles away from the versions of extremely traditional femininity regularly performed on Instagram, anyway – from the giddy, rapturous flashing of newly acquired engagement rings to the floral arranging, the showy baking, the speeded-up tidying-up montages…
But mainly because my own domestic arrangements involve a man infinitely more likely to cook/plump cushions than I ever am, a grand total of 0.0 children (on account of me having never been sure what they’d add to my existence, yet vividly aware of what they’d take away…) and great swathes of me doing exactly what I want – all of which, btw, I accomplish without ever having a hashtag about it.