Who cleans your house?
You need a person to help you clean the house.” Since I've been a father, many family and friends have been engaged in that advice. When I say I'm tired, that's the only solution that comes to you: the individual, the private, the commercialized solution.
They use the euphemisms “help” and “person”. They call “help” to precarious work. They say “person” rather than “woman.” Most of these women are also migrated and/or racist, who clean their homes because racism has reduced their job opportunities. In the rest of women, it is also easy to find many discrimination factors.
And who do these women help? The working conditions of domestic workers are so precarious that couples who earn just a thousand euros can easily afford that “help”. I believe that this is detrimental to the working conscience of the middle classes, because being a household employee is an indicator class. In the case of heterosexual families, women play the role of patriarchs, who, as they have been attributed by the patriarchate, are responsible for outsourcing the work. One motivation to make this decision is the blurring of conflict with male partners.
"Working conditions for domestic workers are so precarious that the couples we earn with a thousand euros can easily afford this "help".
According to sociologist Sara Lafuente Funes (read the essay Reproductive Markets published by Katakrak), “large numbers of domestic employment indicate the existence of great economic inequality, deep heteropatriarchal relations and the absence of collective responsibilities for the maintenance of life”.
According to Lafuente Funes, care is a component of the crisis, while women have moved to the public sphere, men, states and society have not made great moves to pay attention to the reproductive sphere. Therefore, care responsibilities remain feminized, but they are solved at the margins of the economic system, either with overload, tension and conflict, or with the solution of outsourcing other precarious women.
But for feminist women, this last solution does not (or does not) completely blur the conflict, because we are aware (we should be) that it is a sector centered on gender, race/origin and class oppression. Is it compatible to be a feminist and to be a household employee? The article was written by Beatriz Gimeno in 2013 and argued, among other things, that taking responsibility for her dirt should be a basic ethical, feminist and anti-capitalist duty.
In the opinion of the two feminists mentioned, Amaia Pérez Orozco, a reference in this matter, it is necessary to improve the conditions of domestic workers, but it is not enough: strengthening co-responsibility, strengthening care networks and reversing the dynamics of the labor market is essential. I believe that whoever hires a housewife (if she is politically conscious, at least) should think about how to help her in those profound transformations. The first step should be to support the struggle of the employees of the house.
The wording of this article has made me uncomfortable. In this debate, it is difficult for women not to get into the spotlight. That is why I would like to make the last direct question to the men of the left and pro-feminists who read to me: How many times has this theme come out, talking to your fellow militants, crew members or other school parents?
Bidali zure iritzi artikuluak iritzia@argia.eus helbide elektronikora
ARGIAk ez du zertan bat etorri artikuluen edukiarekin. Idatzien gehienezko luzera 4.500 karakterekoa da (espazioak barne). Idazkera aldetik gutxieneko zuzentasun bat beharrezkoa da: batetik, ARGIAk ezin du hartu zuzenketa sakona egiteko lanik; bestetik, egitekotan edukia nahi gabe aldatzeko arriskua dago. ARGIAk azaleko zuzenketak edo moldaketak egingo dizkie artikuluei, behar izanez gero.
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