Husband-Bashing…Again!
I think today’s For Better or For Worse offended me. I read it and I feel very defensive. Normally my reaction to a For Better or For Worse strip is:
a. That was an awful pun.
b. Look. Elly acts like a self-centred, stuck-up jerk …again.
c. Kids don’t talk or act like that.
d. I think Lynn has done that joke before, and it was better the first time.
e. That was creepy. I hope Lynn didn’t mean to do that on purpose.
f. Another joke about body waste material. Yawn!
g. Wait a minute! That’s not her history.
My reaction is different this time. I find myself wanting to rant about how I take care of my kids, even when my wife isn't there.
The joke of today’s For Better or For Worse is that the mothers of the children have been away from their kids for so long, that their husbands are going to make them pay. The pay, presumably, is for having their children’s father take care of the children for longer than some prescribed period of time that is universally acceptable to fathers. At the heart of the joke are the following beliefs:
a. The father of the child can’t take care of their own child for an evening, or rather, he can, but only for a limited time.
b. The mother of the child can’t have a full evening off from her kids.
c. The idea that a father would extract some kind of payment from the mother for spending too much time away from her children is not only acceptable by both parties, but is something the woman is worried about.
d. What I listed in a-c is true not only for the warped Patterson family, but for all mothers and fathers. It is a universal truth.
There was a time when jokes that ended with lines like, “That was no lady! That was my wife!” were considered to be funny. Now they are considered antiquated and offensive. Eventually, we will look back at husband-bashing strips from this time period and consider them to be just as offensive. I am already there.
a. That was an awful pun.
b. Look. Elly acts like a self-centred, stuck-up jerk …again.
c. Kids don’t talk or act like that.
d. I think Lynn has done that joke before, and it was better the first time.
e. That was creepy. I hope Lynn didn’t mean to do that on purpose.
f. Another joke about body waste material. Yawn!
g. Wait a minute! That’s not her history.
My reaction is different this time. I find myself wanting to rant about how I take care of my kids, even when my wife isn't there.
The joke of today’s For Better or For Worse is that the mothers of the children have been away from their kids for so long, that their husbands are going to make them pay. The pay, presumably, is for having their children’s father take care of the children for longer than some prescribed period of time that is universally acceptable to fathers. At the heart of the joke are the following beliefs:
a. The father of the child can’t take care of their own child for an evening, or rather, he can, but only for a limited time.
b. The mother of the child can’t have a full evening off from her kids.
c. The idea that a father would extract some kind of payment from the mother for spending too much time away from her children is not only acceptable by both parties, but is something the woman is worried about.
d. What I listed in a-c is true not only for the warped Patterson family, but for all mothers and fathers. It is a universal truth.
There was a time when jokes that ended with lines like, “That was no lady! That was my wife!” were considered to be funny. Now they are considered antiquated and offensive. Eventually, we will look back at husband-bashing strips from this time period and consider them to be just as offensive. I am already there.
posted by howard at 10:40 PM
23 Comments:
howard,
There was a time when jokes that ended with lines like, “That was no lady! That was my wife!” were considered to be funny. Now they are considered antiquated and offensive. Eventually, we will look back at husband-bashing strips from this time period and consider them to be just as offensive. I am already there.
Sadly, Lynn will never join us there, not as long as she's capable of resenting Rod for being who he is instead of who she wanted him to be. I should think she still believes that people take things too seriously when they call the first joke you listed offensive. After all, she does believe on some level that a husband has a right to begrudge his wife a social life. Remember how she pointed out that since Rod didn't want her to watch the Late Movie, she didn't?
Since my husband has been our son's primary caregiver for over two years, this strip rings false to, and I don't blame you for taking offense, howtheduck. I'm glad my husband doesn't read this strip!
dreadedcandiru2,
Remember how she pointed out that since Rod didn't want her to watch the Late Movie, she didn't?
Yes, I remember she had a whole laundry list of things she got to do, now she was single. Somehow, the woman who managed to get her husband to leave Lynn Lake and restart his dental practice in Corbeil, didn't have the power over her husband to watch a late movie when she wanted. Nevertheless, the whole joke today is based on the premise that the husband does have the right to begrudge his wife a social life. She is giving lip service to the belief, and whatever limited degree it actually applied to her own life.
aprilp_katje,
Since my husband has been our son's primary caregiver for over two years, this strip rings false to
It's odd thing when Lynn thinks her situation is everyone else's situation, especially when it is probably only her situation in her mind. Your husband's example flies in the face of such wrong thinking about men and their capability of taking care of their own children.
BTW, that was supposed to be "rings false to me." Dang morning brain! ;)
I picked up a sexual innuendo in today's strip which may not have been intended. Namely, that the women all have to go home and sleep with their husbands as payment for the husbands taking care of the kids for the evening. The longer the wives are away from home, the more elaborate the payment must be... hence wanting to get home sooner rather than later. From the wording, it sounds like the husbands plan to extract a payment immediately upon their wives' return.
Though I suppose the husbands could also inflict a big guilt trip, start a fight, or become whiny and needy as soon as their wives walk in the door instead.
The whole thing was offensive and bizarre, in any case. Times have changed, Lynn.
Anonymous
I picked up a sexual innuendo in today's strip which may not have been intended. Namely, that the women all have to go home and sleep with their husbands as payment for the husbands taking care of the kids for the evening. The longer the wives are away from home, the more elaborate the payment must be... hence wanting to get home sooner rather than later.
I myself doubt that was what Lynn had in mind. She is something of a prude so any off-color humor that might appear in the strip is the province of people she doesn't want us to like.
Umm...sorry, but this was reality for my mother and her friends in the late 1970s and early 1980s. Husbands got very upset if they were left home to care for the children. So much so, in fact, that my mother never went out alone like this, just for fun, but only did it for a good reason.
I don't think it's offensive to realistically describe what is/was a reality for many people. What, people who have gone through this shouldn't talk or joke about it, because you're not that kind of husband? Seems rather unfair.
In fact, I know men who still behave this way today. An acquaintance of mine had a baby six months ago and her husband has never been alone with it. He refuses, saying it's not his job because he's the man. Interestingly, both of them work full-time! So it's not even just a 1970s thing.
If you're really so offended by this, maybe you can start some kind of movement or training course to end this very real behavior that still exists in (some) men!
Anonymous
I picked up a sexual innuendo in today's strip which may not have been intended. Namely, that the women all have to go home and sleep with their husbands as payment for the husbands taking care of the kids for the evening.
From “We’re gonna have to pay big time.” I guess that could be sexual innuendo, depending on what “big time” means. The presumption is that it is something the wives don’t want to do that their husbands do want them to do, and the usual joke about that is sex. Personally, I prefer to do things like that with my wife, when she doesn’t think about it as some sort of punishment.
From the wording, it sounds like the husbands plan to extract a payment immediately upon their wives' return.
It does sound like that. That’s pretty funny, when you think about it. I can imagine John Patterson in slinky underwear, waiting for Elly to come home, and he says, “I put the kids to bed. You were out too late. Now it’s time for payment, baby!”
Though I suppose the husbands could also inflict a big guilt trip, start a fight, or become whiny and needy as soon as their wives walk in the door instead.
I believe that is the stereotype for the wife waiting for the husband to come home. The way new-run John has been lately, that could also be the case.
DreadedCandiru2,
I myself doubt that was what Lynn had in mind. She is something of a prude so any off-color humor that might appear in the strip is the province of people she doesn't want us to like.
Lynn has done sex jokes before, but she does disguise them pretty well. It could very well be her intention.
If you're really so offended by this, maybe you can start some kind of movement or training course to end this very real behavior that still exists in (some) men!
Perhaps LJ's toothless social commentary might even be useful for the truly out of it. Maybe some modern working mother will let her co-workers know how this strip spoke for her tomorrow around the water cooler. (Or waiting at Starbuck's.) The cries of derision from her (male & female) co-workers might help her wake up from her delusion.
My brother was a parent in "the old days" of this strip. Even before his wife went back to work, he enjoyed spending time with the kids. All by himself!
Both teenage Daughters Next read the strip in over breakfast, and said, what, are they all abused wives? The payment sounds threatening, as if the women sneaked out, and if they're late home, they'll get a whupping.
Anonymous, I get that behaving in this way is something more people may have found acceptable 25+ years ago, (barring some current bastards, of course) but it's in a paper now, and it just doesn't work.
Is this strip vintage? Will the cars all be 1979 Fords? Will hair all be feathered? Everybody grooving to Abba and wearing Icelandic sweaters? In other words, is it supposed to be vintage, is it simply dated or is it supposed to be somehow classic? If it's the last, as I suspect, then it's just as stupid to have people discussing outmoded thought as if it were current as it would be to have them passionately discussing Brian Mulroney's economic policies.
thursday next, I think Lynn is going for some sort of timeless/classic thing with her strips (hence her comment in interviews about leaving out old strips that have typewriters). And I think she's failing.
qnjones,
Umm...sorry, but this was reality for my mother and her friends in the late 1970s and early 1980s. Husbands got very upset if they were left home to care for the children. So much so, in fact, that my mother never went out alone like this, just for fun, but only did it for a good reason.
In fact, I know men who still behave this way today. An acquaintance of mine had a baby six months ago and her husband has never been alone with it. He refuses, saying it's not his job because he's the man. Interestingly, both of them work full-time! So it's not even just a 1970s thing.
If you're really so offended by this, maybe you can start some kind of movement or training course to end this very real behavior that still exists in (some) men!
qnjones, you have startled me out of my offense. I remember you have told us stories several times about how you were from a well-off family, but the rules of behaviour for parents and your siblings were very strict. My own experience as a father, my memories of fathers when I was young, and my understanding of the people around me often seem like a foreign land, when you describe the situation of your family. I was a child in the 1960s and 1970s, and I remember my mother spending time with other women while she was in Beta Sigma Phi (an adult women’s sorority) or in activities with the United Methodist Women or even with other mothers of kids my same age. In those areas, the community moved and accomplished based on the actions of the moms.
I have known and worked with a few fathers who refused to spend time with their children; but usually the situation was overshadowed by much more severe problems in the family relationship (unemployment, drug and alcohol abuse, etc.) However, I would be hard-pressed to think of a situation where the family was relatively well-off and stable where this was the case with the father and the kids. However, I will grant your point, that it could still exist, and maybe somewhere out there are still communities of women who are afraid to spend too much time out together for fear of retribution from their husbands. I have never seen it, but that doesn’t mean it doesn’t exist.
maggie-texas said...
Maybe some modern working mother will let her co-workers know how this strip spoke for her tomorrow around the water cooler. (Or waiting at Starbuck's.) The cries of derision from her (male & female) co-workers might help her wake up from her delusion.
That’s a good point. Maybe this strip will be used as a call for abused women to learn that they are abused.
Thursday Next,
If it's the last, as I suspect, then it's just as stupid to have people discussing outmoded thought as if it were current as it would be to have them passionately discussing Brian Mulroney's economic policies.
So far the women’s conversations in the new-run strips are generally about things in which modern Lynn Johnston is interested. I believe that dreadedcandiru2’s perspective above is the correct one. Lynn Johnston specifically mentioned this whole list of things she could do as a single woman, she was not allowed by her husband to do when she was married, like not being allowed to watch a late night movie. It seemed preposterous to me, but in the light of qnjones comment, maybe Lynn Johnston really was in an abusive relationship, which she thinks is the way all marriages operate.
aprilp_katje,
thursday next, I think Lynn is going for some sort of timeless/classic thing with her strips (hence her comment in interviews about leaving out old strips that have typewriters). And I think she's failing.
This is true too. She has shortened up John’s sideburns and draws all the characters in almost formless clothing. On the other hand, she did have John mention Popeye and Wimpy the other day, which I think few modern kids would know. My kids know them, but that’s only because I have a few Popeye cartoons on videotape.
Everyone seems to interpret my comments and this strip as being that the "payment" will be some kind of physical abuse. This is not what I'm trying to say. I am saying that, in the community where I grew up (late 1970s, early 1980s), the "payment" would have been emotional/verbal in nature. My father, for example, would have made a huge mess in the kitchen and left it for Mom to clean up, or not spoken to her for a day or two. Or would have picked some stupid fights when she got home. Or put us to bed without our baths, left toys around for her to clean up, etc. This stuff was definitely pretty standard amongst men in that neighborhood. Men simply didn't believe that they should be asked to do housework. Ever. Kids were a wife's responsibility.
Jerkish behavior, definitely. Emotionally abusive, possibly, depending on the specific acts. But I'm not talking about wives coming home to beatings at the end of the evening. There are a thousand different miserable, manipulative stunts a motivated husband can play.
I think this is where Lynn's attempt to take the old strips out of their context (1970s) is failing. This scene definitely fits with what I remember growing up. But, these days, men who pull that kind of behavior (like my acquaintance's husband) are in the minority. I think this is just like how Lynn doesn't realize that child rearing has changed.
Howard, I am also quite surprised every time I hear you say you didn't grow up in a sexist household, even though I think you are 10-15 years older than me. I thought this stuff was pretty ubiquitous back before, say, 1985 or so.
One correction: I never called our family wealthy. Just upper-middle class. Our neighborhood was all professionals (doctors, dentists, lawyers, ibankers) with housewives. I realize that sounds wealthy to some folks but my parents would be mortified to be called wealthy.
qnjones,
Everyone seems to interpret my comments and this strip as being that the "payment" will be some kind of physical abuse.
I have read your comments on your family enough to know that physical abuse was not your family situation, although you could make a case for emotional abuse. Your additional description makes that clear. In the case of the strip, I am not so sure. The ladies seem to laugh about it, but I remember episodes of I Love Lucy or The Honeymooners, where the potential physical abuse of the wife by the husband was used for comic effect. So, it is difficult to say what is actually going through Lynn Johnston’s brain.
I think this is where Lynn's attempt to take the old strips out of their context (1970s) is failing. This scene definitely fits with what I remember growing up.
But, these days, men who pull that kind of behavior (like my acquaintance's husband) are in the minority. I think this is just like how Lynn doesn't realize that child rearing has changed.
Good point. As Thursday Next pointed out above, the new-run strips do not seem to be set in a particular time period, which makes it difficult for Lynn to fall back on the excuse “That’s how child rearing used to be.”
Howard, I am also quite surprised every time I hear you say you didn't grow up in a sexist household, even though I think you are 10-15 years older than me.
I certainly did not say that. My parents were very old-fashioned in their views. It was mom’s responsibility to take care of the kids. Dad’s responsibility was car, yard, and home repair. My mother certainly would not have gone to a fancy restaurant with her women friends and done toasts “To us” while drinking wine. However, if it was an activity for the kids’ school (Parent-Teacher Association for example), or for her sorority (known for doing good acts within the community) or something of that nature; then there was an understanding that my mom was serving a higher purpose that kept our family involved in the community, and it was not physically possible for her to do that and take care of the kids. This doesn’t mean that dad made a dinner for us kids, or gave us baths. Oh, no. Mom either prepared the dinner in advance to be reheated, or it was frozen dinner night. Pot pies were the favourite.
The difference that I noted when you talked about this before was not the old-fashioned nature of your parents, but the extremely restricted community in which your parents lived. Where I grew up in Western North Carolina, things would simply not happen, if the wives were all locked up at night. Somehow, where you grew up, they did.
One correction: I never called our family wealthy. Just upper-middle class. Our neighborhood was all professionals (doctors, dentists, lawyers, ibankers) with housewives.
I believe the phrase I used was “well-off,” which is the way I think of upper middle class. Nevertheless, point taken. You were not wealthy.
Two points.
Point One. Following my parents divorce when I was one and my sister was still an infant it was my Dad who, at 47, recieved full custody of us. In the 20 years since then Dad has never bad mouthed Mom or her reasons for leaving or discouraged us from visiting with her, he never once told us our place was in the kitchen popping out babies, nor did he allow us to feel inferior to men. Even now as my sister and I are both *gasp* single at the moment he is more proud of our academic accomplishments as well as just growing to by well rounded human beings. He is a product of his time and he may chuckle at the occasional light attempt at chauvenistic humor but even he was confused by the strip. "What's funny about this? What's it even about?" Needless to say when I gave my interpretation he was appaled at how anyone could think such a thing funny.
Point Two. I actually had an English teacher, same age as my Dad oddly enough, my senior year of high school who not only bragged about having little if anything to do with his two sons before they turned five but defended it by saying "The male beast is not epuipped for such things." When I mentioned what my own Dad was able to do despite having a Y chromosome he snidly replied "Well I guess he's a better man than I" Damn straight was my reply. Needless to say we did not get along well. So I guess what I'm trying to get at is even tho their are idiots out there who have Lynn's warped view of gender roles it's just not funny. In fact I don't even see how such an exercise is theraputic. Perhaps I'm wrong on that point but I feel that strips like these do more harm if any good.
Some things I should clarify:
Actually, I think our experiences are probably closer together than they sound at first blush. I think it was similar, but the pressure was ratcheted up a bit in our town because everyone was striving so hard. Men worked very long hours and even decent guys tend not to want to do housework after a 12 hour day and 3 hours of commuting. (We were near NYC.) Also, sometimes they just weren't home. There were plenty of weekdays when we didn't see Dad because he was gone when we got up in the morning and still at work when we went to bed at night. Pretty typical all around.
I think part of the difference is also that women who participated in community activities (outside the PTA) in our community tended to be those with older children, or empty nesters, or women with no children at all. Or the rare woman who had only a couple of kids and a more forward-thinking husband. Women with young kids had a hard time getting out of the house, but once those kids could microwave a dinner and bathe themselves, there was more freedom.
One other exception seemed to be if a certain kind of women's social group helped the husband's business standing in the community.
Re: what Lynn is picturing as the payment--yes, she's so nuts lately that it's hard to guess what she means. Physical violence? I doubt it, because most gals won't go out and drink wine and laugh knowing they're going home to get slugged. But then again, Lynn's nuts. Sex as compensation? I don't think so, but maybe. I keep thinking to myself that her next interview might very well include a tale about how Lynn Lake was a nest of spouse-raping wife-beaters.
Moving the retread into a nebulous time period was a huge mistake.
ruth,
Your situation with your father is very similar to the one my wife had with her father, who raised her and her younger brother by himself. He did not teach my wife traditional gender roles either.
So I guess what I'm trying to get at is even tho their are idiots out there who have Lynn's warped view of gender roles it's just not funny. In fact I don't even see how such an exercise is theraputic. Perhaps I'm wrong on that point but I feel that strips like these do more harm if any good.
This is at the heart of a good number of Lynn Johnston’s strips over the last few years. Very few have been funny, and quite a few have been somewhat offensive. What makes them interesting a lot of times, is the bizarre world view which comes out of her mind.
qnjones,
Actually, I think our experiences are probably closer together than they sound at first blush. I think it was similar, but the pressure was ratcheted up a bit in our town because everyone was striving so hard.
Men worked very long hours and even decent guys tend not to want to do housework after a 12 hour day and 3 hours of commuting. (We were near NYC.)
This is an advantage of working in Western North Carolina. When I was growing up a 30-minute drive was an extremely long commute. Most people worked with 15 minutes of where they lived. Also, the towns were small and with few exceptions (restaurants, movie theatres), the town shut down at 5 pm at night and stores did not open on Sunday.
One other exception seemed to be if a certain kind of women's social group helped the husband's business standing in the community.
And there you have it. That is very similar to my mom’s situation. Of course, business standing in NYC is different from business standing in western North Carolina.
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