Who Takes Care of YOU?
Why are communal care networks a female phenomenon - and when will men start stepping up to take care of the women in their lives?
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In my book Fed Up: Emotional Labor, Women, and the Way Forward, there is an anecdote about the first wedding Rob and I ever attended as a couple. We were in high school, as were the bride and groom (growing up in rural Nevada will almost guarantee attendance at a teenage wedding). Even at sixteen, I went out and bought a waffle iron from the registry, wrapped it in beautiful paper, and signed a card from both of us —knowing instinctively that if I did not do these things, we would show up empty handed.
When it comes to labor that centers on caring for others, it is mostly women who do the noticing, planning, and execution of work — often without men’s involvement. They get the credit of having their name signed on the card, despite not having a clue what’s under the wrapping paper. Milestones are celebrated, relationships carefully maintained, dinners and gatherings planned, and men by and large get to simply show up and enjoy the relational fruits of women’s care labor.
By the time we started balancing the mental load in our relationship, it seemed like a substantial shift to finally have my husband buy Christmas presents for his own family members. To not remind him of his own brothers’ birthdays, or plan Mother’s Day brunch for both our moms while still mothering young kids myself. In short, to take care of his own shit — even though that didn’t necessarily mean I wasn’t in charge of creating holiday magic or the bulk of kin keeping labor.
These changes felt revolutionary because the bar is set so unconscionably low for the amount of effort we expect from men in relationships — even their own familial and friend relationships. Culturally, we don’t really expect any effort from men in terms of emotional labor and the mental load — because we have been taught that men’s financial contributions perpetually outweigh the intangible value of invisible labor.
As
writes on :I want you to consider the value of being provided for. There is financial provision. And then, there is: a meal on the table when you get home from work. Toilet paper always there to wipe your ass and you didn't have to buy it. Children who get picked up from school every day at 2:30 so that you can continue to keep working.
Beyond tagging along behind women’s care maintenance work, men are also the direct beneficiaries of the communal care that is largely undertaken by women.
recently wrote about the way she and her community “kicked into caregiving power mode” during her husband’s surgery recovery - and asks the pointed question:“How often do women get this kind of support and care from men?”
In my experience, never.
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I can expect my husband to care well for me when I am sick. We already share the domestic and mental load equitably, and that includes shifting into solo-mode when one of us comes down with the flu. I can trust the kids will be cared for, the dishes will be done, and meals will be brought to me at regular intervals, along with all the snacks and beverages of my choosing.
But did the men in my life rally around me to offer support when I had a newborn? Were they the ones cooking meals in large batches, and dropping off hand-me-downs? Do my male friends send a text asking if they can drop by some Gatorade when I’m at home with sick kids? It’s almost unimaginable, isn’t it?
Of course, American individualism plays a large role in creating barriers to these forms of communal care systems. We are supposed to handle our own affairs within the untenable bounds of a nuclear family — to the point where it feels like an imposition to ask for help, even when it’s offered. But still, women tend to step up to this work when it's needed. So this particular imbalance is more about the ease with which we let men skirt communal responsibility in favor of using women’s well-honed care labor skills.
I have so many “good men” in my life, but they are not in group chats creating a meal train for the friend who is having a baby or recovering from surgery. They are not part of the network that provides care; they are only ever the recipients. And the excuse seems to be the same one I heard ad nauseam when researching emotional labor and the mental load: women are just better at this stuff.
Why step in and offer help when there is already an army of care ready to deploy the moment need arises? Or phrased another way: why should men learn to do labor that is already being done for them?
I argue for it the same way I argue for the equitable sharing of any invisible labor: not only because it alleviates the burden of labor for women but because it is a crucial step toward valuing care work and creating a more fulfilling life. This kind of communal strengthening, especially when reciprocated, deepens social-emotional bonds and builds trust in moments of vulnerability. Known as social integration, it is part of the explanation for why women live longer and report deeper satisfaction in friendships. Showing up for one another is how we engage more deeply with our lives.
I also think communal care within our network of friends is a launching pad for how we are able to engage with our communities at large. I notice the same discrepancies of male effort in activist and humanitarian work as well. I find myself engaged in civic and communal action with women and the rare “exceptional” man when working toward goals like paid parental leave, postpartum and prenatal care improvements, and childcare subsidies (i.e. anything involving care work). While men might vote in a way that is aligned with these goals, they are rarely the ones calling their political representatives or organizing behind women for boots on the ground action.
I’ve noticed this in tandem with the rise of male mental load and care work influencers, whose work often parrots the research of women (with results that maddeningly exemplify the Ms. Triggs problem). Men seem happy to ally themselves in ways that position them in the spotlight, but rarely to do the less visible work that women specifically call on them to do. Just as many progressive men are more likely to say take their kids to a doctor’s appointment (praise! compliments!) rather than make said appointment and put it on the calendar (invisible, but necessary work) — many male allies are happy to lend their authoritative voices to “raising the issues” but less likely to show up for the drudgery that sustained care work activism requires.
This is where I return to
’s approach of hetero-insistence — and not letting good-enough men become the complacent enemy of progress. We are so often redirected toward gratitude for “good men,” but good in comparison to whose efforts? I do not need a partner who shows better lackluster effort than his friends or his father. I deserve a partner who takes equal initiative: not only in caring for our family, but our community as well.
Reading this and Kate Manne's newest piece in the context of the LA fires really has me thinking and noticing some new things.
So true. Resolving the disparities in community care is the next BIG frontier. Thanks for your work Gemma!