The recognition that the weight of emotional baggage is unevenly distributed has, amongst some contemporary feminists, morphed into the idea that any sense of obligation is itself the enemy. There’s been a sense of mission-creep from women don’t owe you sex, domestic labour, or prettiness to the idea that women don’t owe anybody anything. “Imagine the person you’d become,” implores Given, “if you stopped trying to fix others and put that energy into yourself.” The elasticity of emotional labour as a concept means you can apply it to anything you feel is emotionally taxing, boring, or personally disruptive. Want to learn something? Google it, I’m not your teacher. Need care, love, or support? BetterHelp it, I’m not your therapist. What do we owe to others? Nothing, it seems, other than what’s identified as personally nourishing for ourselves. To issue the rebuke of “not my problem” is a revolutionary act of boundary setting. Self-care is warfare, and all that.
But imagine if men actually performed the same level of emotional labor as we do for them? If they can't, we won't.
But imagine if men actually performed the same level of emotional labor as we do for them? If they can't, we won't.