[runnybabbit]

So the other night I happened to spend about an hour with my MIL and her SIL, and it was a bit of an eye-opener, sitting in on their conversation (and participating). It seemed like they were just swapping stories about who had the worst/most forgetful/most frustrating/messiest/etc husband.

"Oh, X never puts things back where he takes them from!"
"Oh, Y is the same! And I swear his memory is going."
"X is EXACTLY like that, he just makes things up!"
"Oh, I was ropeable the other day when Y kept asking where's this, where's that? I said to him, 'Can't you just LOOK?'"
"X is always doing that, too!"

Okay, I get small talk, but this seems to be a recurring theme among some older women that I've met, and I honestly don't get it. I know it doesn't mean they don't love their other halves, but why is there this very acceptable male-bashing of the man of the house as an aging bumbling fool?

It reminds me of when I went to the Outback Spectacular on the Gold Coast (shudder, don't ask), and there was this big show and dance on how these male horse handlers were trying to use brute force to bend a horse to their will, and along comes this young lass, all horse whisperer type, and she goes, "Oh, step aside, you don't know what you're doing!" and proceeds to gently coax the horse to do what it was supposed to do.

I guess I just don't get why there is such a double standard. If men were sitting around telling women that they were doing things incorrectly and HERE! THIS is the right way! and criticising their wives "Oh, she never cooks a good dinner, I swear she just empties food out of jars!" even in a jocular way, they'd be lambasted for it!

Why the double standard? I think it's my extended family in particular that making fun of silly/forgetful/messy Grandpa is acceptable, but I just don't get it.

It seems mean.

[BetteBoop]

Err it's called joking around.

My DH says my Indian name is Squaw-Three-Horses because I nag nag nag.

People laugh when he says it. I never realised how oppressed I was until now.

[runnybabbit]

But it's not just joking around. Not in this family.

It's constantly running down the men at the dinner table. "X, go and have a shower. You stink." "X, do this. Do that. You need to do this other thing." Probably 1 in 3 times it ends up in an almost argument that ruins dinner and makes things tense and awkward.

[Tesseract]

Why do women get on internet forums and complain about their family members? That might also be an interesting question for you to ask yourself in this context.

People talk about other people. It's not very nice, but they do it. Who knows why they do it - probably because they're bored, probably because it's a shared experience, probably because they have no other outlet for their frustrations in the home.

But honestly these threads about how evil women are to men are just so boring.

[peking homunculu...]

I get very bored with these men bashing conversations. They seem to say more about the women complaining than their men folk.

Seriously, if your blokes are that bad, why did you choose them?

[SophieBeagle]

Oh dear god.

[katpaws]

If men were sitting around telling women that they were doing things incorrectly and HERE! THIS is the right way! and criticising their wives "Oh, she never cooks a good dinner, I swear she just empties food out of jars!" even in a jocular way, they'd be lambasted for it!

How many male forums have you ever seen? I know at my husband's work they guys talk about what they do with their partners and what they don't do with their partners (if you get my drift) and they whinge about their partners as well as other things like housework, kids, etc.

We can do to dinner parties and my husband will tell people how lazy i am. They often just roll their eyes because they know i work two jobs, do the majority of housework and am the primary care giver of our child.

[Drop Dead Fred]

We all have to whinge to someone. Some do it IRL others do it on forums

[niggles]

I do it to my husband. It irritates him no end I'm sure but he's pretty good about it because when I say "you've had a boy look, try having a girl look" or "well now it's dry you fold it and put it away" he knows I speak the truth. Plus he has an excellent sense of humour and knows those feeble attempts at funny are my very best efforts. It might help if admit I blame his mother.

[ekbaby]

I think a lot of the time the joking talk about how "useless" men are is coming from a place of frustration about the fact that in many households men are still not really sharing the load.

Eg the thing about them not being able to find anything- it's not like women have any magical powers to find stuff, it's just cos men give up looking quicker. Or the man never put the kids clothes away so he has no idea where to find a hat for the bub etc.