This Thread On Twitter Talks About How Because Women Are Better Multitaskers, They Are Saddled With More Work. It’s So True
One thing that I often find myself hoping for is recognition. Any flattering adjective that is to come my way, pretty much makes my day be it as small as someone telling me I smell nice, or as big as my boss telling me I did a good job. And while every compliment brings a smile to my face, one that doesn’t is when us women are called multi-taskers. Sure many of us can handle more than one task at a time, and that’s a good thing but this has come to a point where it is being romanticised and women are now being saddled with more work.
A thought stirred in a lot of women through a twitter thread where a user spoke about how the use of words like ‘naari shakti’ have led to a culture of expecting too much out of women. A twitter user Rutuja dropped some serious truth bombs about this unfair stereotype that has come to be identified with women, making us seem strong but one that is now becoming a reason to give women more work.
She wrote, “I hate this trope of “naari shakti” and how a woman can handle anything because she is “janani”. Women are actual human beings who deserve breaks, rest and care. Not some superhumans who have eight hands to do all the work while you glorify them overworking.” And come to think of it, that is exactly how it has been. We steer women into doing all that extra labor by manipulating them into believing the philosophy of ‘if anyone can, you can’, while the others sit back and watch things getting done.
I hate this trope of "naari shakti" and how a woman can handle anything because she is "janani". Women are actual human beings who deserve breaks, rest and care. Not some superhumans who have eight hands to do all the work while you glorify them overworking.
— Rutuja (ऋतुजा) 🇮🇳 (@Havaldarshinde) October 13, 2020
Hate it when people say "women are so strong because they can cook, clean, work at the office/farm, bear a child and take care of a family all at once". Yes, they're strong because they don't have a choice. No one shares their burden. It's nothing to be proud of.
— Rutuja (ऋतुजा) 🇮🇳 (@Havaldarshinde) October 13, 2020
All those mother's day/women's day ads where the woman does everything in the house and the man does bare minimum by putting surf in the washing machine or making her a cup of tea are SO FUCKING ANNOYING
— Rutuja (ऋतुजा) 🇮🇳 (@Havaldarshinde) October 13, 2020
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She also wrote, “Hate it when people say “women are so strong because they can cook, clean, work at the office/farm, bear a child and take care of a family all at once”. Yes, they’re strong because they don’t have a choice. No one shares their burden. It’s nothing to be proud of.” Her post continued as she concluded by writing, “All those mother’s day/women’s day ads where the woman does everything in the house and the man does bare minimum by putting surf in the washing machine or making her a cup of tea are SO FUCKING ANNOYING.” Touché sister, touché.
We have held women up to such unreasonably high standards of getting things done, whether it is in the household, or on the job and because they haven’t had any help or an alternative than to figure it out by themselves, it has been assumed that we’re simply better at it. Where as in reality, they can’t be ‘better’ at something that only they are doing.
You see, better is a comparative adjective, one that requires two things or people to be compared to deem one better. So when you say that women are ‘better’ at multi tasking, you are implying that men even though also multi task, are just not as good as women. Which of course is a lie, because the last time we checked, men were conveniently living in the comfort of their gender roles decided by the patriarchal notions of the society.
In fact, several studies have indeed suggested that women aren’t better at multi tasking, they just do more work. In a world where we have normalised women doing more than they can probably handle, we need to normalise them being treated with just as much care and compassion.
I believe there’s a term for that “benevolent sexism” -echoes things like “my mom is a super human she works AND wakes up early to cook for us- I’m in awe”
— Mudra (@ferociousoxide) October 13, 2020
This false glory is the chokehold around our necks
— namita (@namitaj68) October 13, 2020
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Just because we have been quietly picking up your load, doesn’t mean we don’t need those days off, or that pampering, or that help every now and then to keep going. Society has romanticised this idea of women being able to do so much to the point that it has now come at the cost of a woman’s physical and mental health, as she finds herself burdened with added work, responsibility and an expectation to do it all seamlessly.
But not anymore. If anything, the pandemic itself has been an eye opener and telling of the way the society often manipulates us to keep us from stepping out of the roles they have defined for us. Which is why the next time you go ahead and call a woman brilliant for the way she handles 10 things at a time, remember that is exhausting and she can tire.
