RBG, Gender Roles, and the Pandemic

RBG.jpg

Topics Discussed:

  • Beth's Family Update

  • Ruth Bader Ginsburg

  • Gender Roles and the Pandemic

  • Outside of Politics

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Episode Resources

Transcript

Beth: [00:00:00] Hello everyone. Thank you for joining us for this episode of Pantsuit Politics. We are of course, going to be commemorating the life of justice, Ruth Bader Ginsburg today, and talking about what her life and death have meant and will continue to mean. We are going to spend some time talking about COVID-19 and gender roles.

Which is a really good introduction to a conversation that will continue on Friday with Anne Helen Petersen, as she talks with us about her book, Can't Even on millennial burnout, we will discuss Schitt's Creek outside of politics. I'm not going to bury the lead. I'm really excited to talk about Schitts Creek.

It is giving me life right now. And so we'll do that. And before we get started, I just want to spend a minute sharing. What's going on with me personally, as many of you who follow us on social media know, my, my mother is in a critical care unit as we are recording battling COVID-19. Sarah, I'm worried that I'm going to make a short story long, so just, you know, chime in and cut me off if you need to.

 The weekend before labor day, I was taking a walk and just all of a sudden found myself in tears, missing my mom and dad. And I miss my parents a lot, but not to the point of tears. So that was kind of strange. And I came home and said to Chad, I'm going to put the girls in the car. I'm going to go see my parents.

And he was like, I'm sorry, what what's happening right now? Because that's a big trip. It's about a four hour drive. And I said, yeah, I just, I need to see my parents. And so I called my mom. And she said, well, actually your dad's not feeling well. So probably we should wait. I hate to tell you not to come, but we probably should wait.

He's just not feeling well. And I started pushing him to get a COVID test based on the symptoms he was experiencing. And then my mom started having those same symptoms and a much higher fever than my dad had had. And my mom has rheumatoid arthritis and a host of other health conditions and a very complicated medical history.

 Every time you and I have talked on this podcast about COVID-19 my mom is the person in my brain as the one for whom we are wearing masks and not gathering in big groups because she is particularly vulnerable to this virus. And so the idea of my mom having COVID-19 has been my disaster scenario since March. So the two of them got tested finally, and they both came back positive.

The next day, last Friday, my dad watched my mom start to sink onto their bed and he said it was like, The life just was leaving her like a balloon deflating and he called an ambulance and she was taken to the hospital where she's been ever since with dangerously low oxygen levels and she's well cared for.

And I am very touched by the many messages of support from all over the country and world that I've received. And I just am struggling through kind of all of the emotions that come with something like this. I want you to understand if you haven't had a family member in this situation and many many of you have, I know.

 And many of you know, my family is lucky that there is seven months of experience behind the people giving my mom care now, unlike those of you who endured this early on. But it was a full 36 hours before we were able to have any communication with mom at all. And knowing that she is sitting and having panic attacks as she is because of the mask that she has to wear to get oxygen and just the knowledge of what's happening in her body and not being able to sit with her is unbearable.

 So please wear your masks and wash your hands. And be willing to continue to make these sacrifices, because I don't want this for any other family. And when I think about the fact that almost 200,000 people have died from this, and we still have people walking around saying, Oh, but they had something else going on.

That's my mother and her life matters as much as people who don't have underlying medical conditions. And knowing that what she's going through is a policy failure. This is a policy failure that is causing this in my family. I will be forever changed in how I feel politically because of this. And my heart was already moving in that direction, but I can't even put into words what it means right now to know that this is a choice that our society has made that has caused my mom to be suffering this way.

 So thank you for your good thoughts and your prayers and your messages of support and empathy, and just please keep them coming. She needs them. And so do I, 

Sarah: [00:05:31] Beth, when I reached out to a friend who wanted to put your parents on their prayer list, she wanted to know their names. Would you like to share your mother and father's names with our audience? 

Beth: [00:05:42] Sharon and Kelly Thurman 

Sarah: [00:05:43] think that's important. I think that the reduction of our fellow Americans to a medical chart or medical diagnoses or preexisting conditions is in full, we are all complex human beings.

Much bigger and wider than our medical conditions with families and universes of people who love us and are impacted by us and who want us here for as long as humanly possible. And I hope that listening to you right now, we can all feel that profoundly encourage others in our lives to feel and understand that as well. 

Wanting someone with us for as long as humanly possible seems like a great transition to the life of Ruth Bader Ginsburg and the loss of her on Friday. I think before we talk about maybe what happened to each of us, when we found out in our thought processes, let's just start with her life.

 Ruth Bader Ginsburg is an American icon has had an historical impact on the lives of every single American here with us now and for generations to come. And I think a life like that, that ends at the age of 87, surrounded by those who love her is something to celebrate under any definition. Um, she lived an amazing life. She lived a long life and she left this life surrounded by those who loved her, knowing that she has made an incredible impact on history.

And I think that that is the absolute best anybody could ask for. And I am so happy to have lived while she was here on this earth and to have been impacted by her work. My life would not have been the same without Ruth Bader Ginsburg. And so to celebrate that life and that impact is, is really a gift.

It's a moment to reflect on the lives we live. Um, the people who impact us, the decisions that impact us. No, it's the, the other side of the coin you were just talking about. We can each live our lives, knowing that the impacts of our decisions will be felt some of us more than others. Um, either negatively or positively.

And her legacy is absolutely one of incredible impact, particularly for the lives of American women. And I'm so grateful that she was born and that she lived the life she did, and that she lived for as long as she did. 

Beth: [00:08:26] I think at a time when we are governed by so many people who have failed upward. Who are not deserving of, or even really cognizant of that power that they wield.

Sure. Reflecting on the fact that she made it from being one of nine women and alone, well class with a baby three through a career where she couldn't get hired despite having the top grades in her class, to the Supreme court. 

It's, it's extraordinary to be only the second woman to sit on the Supreme court and to have even in that context have the vision to tell us that this country will be fair and equal when there are nine women sitting on those seats to be able to envision nine women sitting in their seats when you've come from that history, it's extraordinary. And I love reading justice. Ginsburg's writing. I love hearing her talk about dissense as a vision for the future.

Okay. She is just a remarkable human being who clearly was destined to be where she is, because how can you live with pancreatic cancer for 10 years, if you've ever seen pancreatic cancer to know that she not only lived but thrived through it, it's just extraordinary. It blows my mind. And I'm so grateful for her example.

I'm grateful for the book about her life, that Jane and I read together, I'm grateful that she possessed this fierceness in such a delicate effect. I'm grateful that she wore that lace on her robe, which just means more to me that I can really find words to frame up. I'm grateful for this friendship that she and Antonin Scalia had.

You know, there there's such a, a balance with each other. I hope that Neil Gorsuch and Sonia Sotomayor are going to have that same kind of dynamic. You can see that emerging a little bit in the way that they write and the way that they think and are rumored to have some similarities and some friendship as well.

 But she's just an incredibly powerful example of what people who ascend to that level of power in our country ought to be like, and I am so sad that she's gone, but also no one deserves to sit back and rest with the knowledge that they left the world better than they found it, like she does. 

Sarah: [00:10:54] Well, if you have not read Linda Greenhouse's New York times obituary, I highly highly recommend it. I just think there are so many flash points in her life That illustrate that power that you were talking about.

 Not like exactly, like you said, she was one of nine women. They did not want her there. They saw her as taking a man's seat. She had a baby, she had a husband with cancer and she's out here getting a law degree. Like, let's see how many of the most stressful life events you can check off at once, Ruth.

 Like it's unbelievable. And you know what else I was really struck by as I was reading her obituary? You know, at so many points in her life, there were because of the point in history that she lived, like the role men came in and played and pushing for her, either the support, the unbelievable support of her husband, that loves story all day long, the mentor, who said, if you don't put her as a clerk, I will never send you another clerk again, like all these moments where men stood up. 

And I also love that she, you know, her understanding of the law, how she would put men as plaintiffs and these discrimination cases, because she saw like these stereotypes limit everyone. Putting women in a box, put men in a box too, like the complexity, the comprehensiveness of her vision for what the law was doing and what it could possibly do, should we shift our understanding, I think is striking. 

I think, I think it's striking that there were feminists who opposed her appointments to the Supreme court cause they felt like she wasn't strong enough on Roe V. Wade. I think her friendships with Scalia, her friendship was Sandra Day O'Connor, her understanding of their legacies and how they work together, like all of that, that balance, that the comprehensive nature of, of her understanding of gender discrimination and its insidiousness and the law.

 I just it's truly breathtaking the scope of her intellect and her legal activism and her opinions is just in her relationships and the way she articulated her values is it's breathtaking.

It is truly breathtaking. 

Beth: [00:13:13] When I think about her as a jurist, you know, a lot of what you said, I think is why she and Scalia had such a friendship because she argued from the text just as he did. They reach different conclusions, but they both had such respect for text and what words mean. And I think that's why there was such respect existing between the two of them.

And I'm sure that the personal side of that, I mean, you can imagine only get their words in this very formal context, but you learn a lot about a person when you read a many of their words and those formal contexts. And, and I can just imagine that. They both had a very grounded, philosophical underpinning.

And I think there was something really important about them serving on the court together. I think that the seriousness with which they both approach their roles and the way that I think they both in different respects understood the gravity of the role. You know, she certainly saw the role much more as protecting those who could not protect themselves and Scalia more as a defender of what he viewed as the importance of history.

But I just, I think there's something really beautiful about, about the way that they opposed each other and fought, and also so understood and cared for the institution of the Supreme court. I hope that her death renews a commitment in people who sit on the court today to see it with that gravity, to see themselves as keepers of this place, that Ruth Bader Ginsburg occupied and shaped in so many ways.

Sarah: [00:14:53] So before we move on to talk about the political impact of Ruth Bader Ginsburg's death, I just hope everyone can sit with the legacy of her life, because that is powerful and that is bigger than whatever happens to her seat. I believe that I believe that 50 years from now a hundred years from now, the impact of her life will matter more than the fallout from her death.

But there will be follow up.  Beth, where were you when you heard the news? I think it might be helpful to walk through our stages of stages of grief shock when we heard the 

Beth: [00:15:40] news, I was sitting in my living room kind of desperately staring at my phone for some news about my mom. And I got a text message from our friend, Dante that she had died.

I had not been on social media at all. You know, I was just in the, the sludge of that fear that you feel when a crisis has hit, do you know where you can't move very quickly or process information? And so it was a surprise to me. And I think I was a little bit too numb to feel much at the time, other than just an even deeper sense of dread.

For us as a country, because the first thing you said to me when we texted was just like, I'm not sure that we're up for this, America. And I that's, that's how I have felt too. And I really have struggled because, you know, especially if you're part of our nightly nuanced family over on Patreon, you know, like I am such a Supreme court nerd and.

In any other time, I would just be flying through some of my favorite of her opinions to just remember the w the way that she wrote so special. And I just have not had the energy for that. I hope that I am doing her memory justice in the way that I'm able to. Now she's just been very important. Very, very important.

What about you? 

Sarah: [00:17:07] Well, The universe is so cruel. I had this, I shared this moment on Instagram. On Friday, I had gone into Walmart with my brand new Biden Harris shirt on because I like to live on the edge and I thought I'm gonna wear my shirt. I have a face mask. I know where I have a yard sign that I pull in every single night.

Cause I'm afraid somebody will steal it. And I went into Walmart kind of like. Armored up for somebody to say something nasty to me. And I saw people, you know, give me some looks, but I got to the checkout line and there was this little old couple in front of me, probably in their eighties, going through the checkout line he had on a veteran's hat, mask obviously.

They stepped through the line, I'm checking out. And you know, it's always the moments where you really are not expecting something, somebody to say something to you that they do. And he turned around and said, I really like your shirt. And I said, Oh my gosh, thank you. And he said, I just feel like a voice in the wilderness sometimes.

And I said, well, you're not alone. I promise you, you are not alone. And he said, well good. Cause I'm really worried about what's going to happen. And I said, me too. And it just filled me with such hope. And I thought, and I, you know, I'd been reading a lot of the polling about the election and I thought, okay, we're getting close.

Like, and I told myself, you know, any sort of last minute surprises will have less impact because of early voting. And we're just, we're getting there. People can see what, uh, what kind of person he is. We've, you know, the issues are, you know, on display every day in the news and we're going to get there.

And I was feeling hopeful and I had dinner that night with my husband and a dear friend, and was so excited because I've been on the whole 30 to be eating out and walked in and my friend said Ruth died. And I said, what? Ruth Bader Ginsburg died in my, I had a total adrenaline dump because when I have an adrenaline dump, I start shivering and I was shivering uncontrollably because it just, I was just feeling a little relieved and hopeful about the election.

And there's no way to hear that news. You know, especially in that moment without just being completely consumed by what's going to happen with the election. And my husband was like, I'm like they can't do it. They can't force it through. And he's like, what are you talking about? Of course they will.

Here's a little fun side note. The audio they keep playing of Mitch McConnell saying of course we'll fill the seat. And the crowd laughing obnoxiously, is from Paducah. I know the person that asked him the question. I could probably list the people that laugh for you if you'd like me to, it was at a local event where he was speaking.

I believe it was for the rotary club. And, you know, he was like, of course he will like, you know who he is. We all know who he is at this point. And we confirmed while we were still at dinner an hour after her death that he said he would feel president Trump's nominee. And I just, in those moments, I just felt so despondent.

Like I told Nicholas, like I have been so capable of just, you know, putting the unfairness of this political moment on so many levels in a box, because it's not helpful to just put it in a box and not let me, let myself be consumed by the unfairness. But in that moment, it's like I could not contain it.

And the unfairness of it all just felt so profound and so devastating. And I was really in and continue to be fearful. Like I we're all, so. Taxed right now. There's, you know, it's that cascading crisis as wildfires, hurricanes, a pandemic and election. And now this, my husband said like, it's like a hacky political novel.

Like you, if somebody wrote this, she'd be like, Oh yeah, the favorite liberal justice, like only thing can make it worse is if she'd been murdered. I mean, it's just, it's so much, it's so ridiculous. And it's so over the top, and when you play out the other events leading up to this, particularly with Merrick Garland, it just feels.

You know, I just felt so consumed by the unfairness. In that moment, 

Beth: [00:21:18] I think as you make a list of ways that Mitch McConnell has broken the United States, and it's a long one, you can add to it, depriving Americans of the opportunity to truly grieve the death of someone who has made such an impact on the country, because it wasn't five seconds, you know, before he was even issuing a truly gross, I think, statement about his intentions here and that we cannot even pause for a moment to reflect on her life and legacy before getting into just such a depraved political calculus. 

And, you know, it's, it's just going to be like this. Right. We haven't practiced anything else. Since Mitch McConnell has been the majority leader of the United States Senate. And we will not know how to practice anything else until Mitch McConnell is no longer in that seat. 

Sarah: [00:22:17] Well, and then let me just be really open and vulnerable for a minute. Sat there. And I kind of went through these stages and when I got angry, it was not at him. I felt angry at her. I'm just going to be really honest.

I felt this anger at her for not retiring. And I kind of sat with it and thought about it. And I know that she felt strongly, as you know, you look at the history of the court, lots of liberal justices feel that it shouldn't be politicized and that, you know, when you should retire, if she should retire, all of these calculations are so complicated.

And then I thought, okay, Don't do that. That's not fair to her. It's not fair to a single human being to shelter, the weight of this type of decision making to have the fate of a nation on whether or not. And when you retire to be able to bend stuff this way, like Kennedy did by retiring at certain points in history, like I just thought, like that's really unfair.

That's that's a failing of our system. One human being should not have to hold up. Everything that we ask these people to hold either by staying going, retiring, like all that. It just it's ridiculous. It's ridiculous. But I, you know, it's like in that moment, that calculus and in the, you know, writing since then, like it's.

It's so heavy and we want to make it about one person's decision making. When we should look back over the last decades and see like this, it shouldn't be like this. It should not be like this. 

Beth: [00:24:02] I agree. I think a number of reforms are in order for the Supreme court, given where we are in America and culture and politics today.

And I think one of them should be a retirement age, which I know is difficult. Not because I think they are incapable of doing the work into their eighties. She's a great example. I mean, she's still writing excellent legal opinions because they shouldn't have to, after, I don't know, 75, you shouldn't have to make those of decisions anymore and you shouldn't have to feel that weight and you shouldn't have to be calculating.

And, and I know that there will be machinations around that kind of change if such a change were to ever come to pass. But. We need something that takes that, that individ decision-making pressure off these justices who are already making, you know, when you're a Supreme court justice, the power of one vote is overwhelming.

 It's what every American acts like they want, when they say, well, my vote doesn't count anyway, they act like they want the power of a Supreme court justices vote. Can you imagine though, having to wield that power in truly life or death situations all the time routinely as part of your job, it's too much.

And so I do think as a package of reforms are discussed with respect to the judiciary, one of them ought to be alleviating that decision making for people. 

Sarah: [00:25:28] Well, and then here's what else I've decided. I do not like being buffeted by the winds of history. I would like some sort of excuse or app like excused absence.

I don't like this at all. It sucks. And I just want to articulate that for anybody else. Who's feeling like, you know, just a teeny tiny ant in the middle of a hurricane. Cause that's what I feel like right now. I feel like I am being tossed about. And it's freaking exhausting. 

Beth: [00:26:00] I kind of wish to be an ant because at least the ant doesn't have to know what's happening and the ant doesn't have to say, gosh, I still have it better than a lot of other ants.

And I should be grateful for that, but also aware of how to use my privilege as the more as the luckier aunt. I mean, and not to whine about holding privilege. It's just that it's such a confusing time. And I especially feel that as a white suburban woman, because every time I. Click on to a news website.

There's some opinion piece about the power of white suburban women. And I feel so incredibly frayed right now. And we're going to talk about that in the next block. That's probably a good segue. I feel so afraid right now that I don't feel powerful. Right. And, and so it's, I agree with you, it sucks and it's overwhelming.

And even as you have that knowledge that it's overwhelming knowing. That you are better situated than others kind of adds to it. Um, and then holding your personal tragedies as part of a whole, it's just a lot. 

Sarah: [00:27:05] I was still pretty consumed by the unfairness of it all. Still feel the unfairness of it all. I will say there was a moment where I realized with regards to the political fallout, I was really being consumed.

Bye. Well, how does this affect the independent voter or how does this affect the former Trump voter? And, you know, I'm sort of embarrassed to admit it. That was thinking through all these calculations. And then I thought like, I'm forgetting how powerful. And impactful. Her legacy will be on voting decisions.

You know, like I think that there is this sense of, it can only motivate people who are, you know, motivated by judgeships, which has traditionally been conservative, leaning voters. And I thought that's not fair. Like we don't really know the impact of her life and legacy on people's decision making, uh, both sides.

I mean, we definitely see an outpouring of passion if fundraising dollars are any indication over the weekend. And I thought like, no, you know, this does crystallize in a lot of way. What's at stake in this election. The only thing that I just, I cannot, I cannot do. And this is what I was trying to articulate when I said America's not up for this.

Like, I just cannot do another round of intense conversation, predictions, calculations about abortion rights. I had somebody roll into my DMS on a post I made about the symphony saying, Oh, well, the, you know, the blood of thousands of children are on her hands. I hope they fill somebody with someone who doesn't excuse infanside and I about lost it.

I about. Lost it like I CA I just I'm. That's what I'm afraid America is legitimately not up for everything we're dealing with. Oh. And let's throw a big old bucket of reproductive rights and emotional battle over that issue on top of everything else we're already dealing with. 

Beth: [00:29:29] Here's how I feel about this.

It's very straight forward. It was wrong for president Obama's nominee to the court to not receive a vote in the Senate. It was wrong because the president is a president for the entire term and it is not made right by the fact that it was done. And so in my mind, President Trump wants to hastily nominate someone he's entitled to do that.

The Senate judiciary committee is charged with vetting that person. And I think the Senate could take an up or down vote on that person. And I also think in the process of that they should vote that person down because this president is corrupt. Not because it's an election year because this president is corrupt.

He is entitled to nominate a Supreme court justice. He is not entitled to get his justice confirmed and against the larger backdrop of his behavior, he does not deserve to have a Supreme court justice confirmed. No voter is entitled to have their elected officials give them a Supreme court justice, and every Republican Senator out there talking about how our voters expect this.

Our voters also expect whether they know it or not for you to do your job all the time, not just when it's politically expedient. And there has been zero leadership from Republican senators for the last four years. And I hope it's about to cost them their majority. But the reason not to confirm a justice right now is not because of the election.

It is because of his corruption. This seems very straightforward to me. And I don't understand why we're all like doing back flips to talk about the hypocrisy of it. Of course, it's hypocritical. It's worse than there's a great piece from slate on that today that we'll put in the show notes, it's worse than hypocrisy.

It's staring you in the face and saying the people who hold all the power. The people who have the most votes can do whatever they want to. And that's how this country has been governed for the past four years. And it will be even worse over the next four. If we reelect this president and a Republican majority in the Senate, he is corrupt and everyone knows it. That's why he should not get a justice confirmed. 

Sarah: [00:31:37] And the reason that it's particularly offensive is because when you say they have the most votes in the Senate, but they do not have the most voters. This is minority rule. He didn't have the most voters in the presidential campaign and they don't have the most voters in the Senate, even with the majority vote in the Senate.

This is minority rule. That's what this is. And I think that's what just intensifies the unfairness of it all. Just the unfairness of it all. Well, 

Beth: [00:32:08] I would just add that even minority rule can be done with some amount of integrity and decency. Mm. And I think to the extent that people riding think paces about how suburban women are so important to the selection result are underestimating the offense that we will take to the indignity of how justice Ginsburg staff has been handled. 

It's not been a full three days. And the crassness of the remarks made from Republican elected officials, not just from some dude in your dms, the crassness of the way that they are just almost gleeful about this is so offensive that I think women who weren't already going to vote with an exclamation mark will now, and I hope that's right.

And I think we need to, because at some point there must be a limit to the craven, unethical, disgusting exercise of power that Senate Republicans have been wielding. 

Sarah: [00:33:11] And I will say this, you know, I was. Still stewing in the unfairness of it all. When I found an essay from Debbie Thomas, and we'll share the link in the show notes, it's a sermon and it's really beautiful because the lectionary this week, if you follow the lectionary and the Episcopal church or Presbyterian church was about the day laborers. 

Do you know this parable, Beth? It is one of the most frustrating in the Bible. It's the ones where some people work at from the Dawn of the day. And some people come in at the last minute and the boss of the fields pays them all the same. You remember this story? Like he comes and gets people at different parts in the day.

And even the people who worked for like five minutes get the same amount of money as. The people that worked all day and he says, are you in Vietnam generosity? Or the translation she says, is, is your eye evil because I am good. And that she uses this parable to really talk about fairness. And she says, Maybe if God's generosity offends us it's because we don't have eyes to see where we actually stand in the line of God's grace and kindness.

Where would we rather stand in the end at the front of the line were bitterness and judgment rain or at the back where joy has won the day. And no matter the fallout, the political fallout of her death, I would rather be at the end of the line in the dissent with joy. With justice, Ruth Bader Ginsburg than anywhere else.

Beth: [00:34:40] We're going to segue to a conversation about the way the pandemic has been effecting women. And Sarah found a really awesome anecdote from justice Ginsburg's life to share as we do. 

Sarah: [00:34:52] Oh, I love it so much. It says her son, James, which she called a lively child. I hear, I hear what you're containing. First of all, justice Ginsburg in the phrase, lovely child.

I hear it all. I'll see it. Times three in my house, the grace of motherhood. And you, I hope I recognize it in myself. Okay. That's the first thing he was, she would get calls from his school at the time. And she finally told the school, this child has two parents, please alternate calls. How many times have I looked at my mother and said he has two parents.

I am in the other room. His other parent is sitting next to you. My, I advise you to direct your concerns to the parent sitting directly to your right.

Beth: [00:35:49] And Helen Peterson has written a book called Can't Even about millennial burnout that we're going to discuss with her at length on Friday show. I can't wait to share that conversation with you. She is a gift and her insight is remarkable. So that's going to be a great conversation in advance of it.

Many of you have sent us emails you know that just peer into the window of our souls, by saying I'm concerned that the pandemic is setting gender relations back a long way, and I'm here to tell you that your concerns are valid. 

Sarah: [00:36:22] And here's why Ann Helen's book is particularly. Important because she has a final chapter on parenting as millennial and the burnout, that results of that.

And there's all this data that we were already behind. Let's like, let's not paint pre COVID as some paradise, right. Women were shouldering the majority of the caregiving, the majority of the housekeeping, despite the fact that they will work more than their mothers and grandmothers did. And so, so this, this task intensity was already bad.

And then COVID rolls in and the weight of these roles that women were already carrying the majority of quadruples, the weight of watching out for your children's education, the weight of discipline, the weight of, you know, scheduling the weight of caring for children or caring for older family members intensifies, and you're doing all of this while still working full time.

And you know, the task intensity to me became task impossible, right? Like I loved the piece from Smitten Kitchen in the New York times. It was like, you can have a job or you can have kids and an and pandemic, but it seems like our society is saying you cannot have both. There is no way, no way to work full time from home.

And also shepherd your children through virtual learning. It is not possible, period. 

Beth: [00:37:58] And it's not possible. Even when you have everything working for you, the opportunity to stay at home. I mean, There are so many people who don't have the opportunity to work from home right now and whose children are at home and whose access to childcare has fallen apart.

Not just because school is closed, but so are all their other options or those options are unaffordable or they live in a place that just doesn't have enough of them. On a regular day and especially doesn't right now. And I think that the pandemic and we've talked about, but this before, but it has just exposed our absolute unwillingness to grapple with how every single whole human being and thrice as much for women, um, is impacted by caregiving roles.

We just don't value it. And I, I think that we would value it more. If those roles were more equally distributed between men and women, Liz Lenz has this great piece in glamour called it, took divorce to make my marriage equal. And she, because about how she envisioned this equal distribution of roles.

First, she would be more supportive of her husband's career, but then he would be supportive of hers and she was trying to write and squeeze her writing in to all the cracks in their day. And every woman listening has some project like that or some, or even just like, I try to paint my nails or take a shower in the cracks in the day.

Right. Every one of us knows what that means. And she says it wasn't until she had a court order that required 50, 50 parenting that she was able to actually get it. And it's just a really powerful illustration. I think of how we just aren't even close to there because so much of taking care of children is about meeting their emotional needs.

And we have not asked for a man to have to do that. We have not given them examples of people who are good at it. We have not given them enough emotional care because of our beliefs about men and boys and emotion. And so all of that stuff falls to the moms and with it, everything that touches on it, how are you feeling about school?

How are you feeling about your birthday? Are you missing your friends? It's just, it is a bottom line, less well of what our kids need from us right now. And there's nowhere to really go with it. Even when you have a great partner who says, how can I help? There is still in that the decision making and the ascertainment of needs to be able to say how you can help, right? Because the help is not the same as a steering and understanding the entire big picture. 

Sarah: [00:40:44] As I think through sort of my own marriage and the impact of COVID-19. There's a couple of things that I realized, like one that conversation, the, I don't want to be the CEO. That's what I articulated all the time.

Like, I don't want to be the CEO of this family. You are not my employee. We were having this conversation long before COVID, which I think was incredibly. Helpful. I will never forget, except for the problem is I will never forget this article and I cannot find it or remember the name or the author where Reddit.

Um, I wish I could, but it was about this couple who shared maternity and paternity leave, which they say is the absolute, most impactful thing you can do for the equality inside your marriage is have the husband partner particularly stay home with the baby. So I think this mother stayed home for like the first six months, and then he took the next six months and I'll never forget this.

He comes in on the first day of his paternity leave and she has a list. Okay, here's the baby schedule. Here's how this is going to work, blah, blah, blah. And he wanted it up, throw it away, like in front of her to say, that's not how this is going to go. This child will benefit from two types of parenting.

So it's not going to be me trying to prop up your parenting. I'm going to have my own approach. This article also did a good job of articulating. Yes. And sometimes that's not fair because your different approach as a man is going to come down as judgment on me as a woman. If you decide it doesn't matter what the kids do like cool, great.

But nobody's going to look at the messy. You know, mismatch kid and things. Oh, what a cute father. They're going to think. Where is his mother and why are they not dressing him appropriately? Right. So there, there is like, it's not that simple, but I just remember thinking like, like, Oh my gosh, like, that's so good.

Like, that's so insightful to say, like this isn't just, I want to direct you. That's more emotional labor helping you is more emotional labor. I should not have to write out a schedule or a plan of attack or whatever, because. You know, as I often say to my girlfriends, like these are professionals, right?

Lawyers, accountants, bank managers, if they can't handle a five-year-old and I'm definitely not gonna give them my business, you know what I mean? So like, I think having that framework and like, be thinking about that for literal years and fighting about it for literal years. Up into COVID was like the only running start we had because they, and I think for so many people that had not been articulated inside their relationship, no one had at like this stuff is like, like I said, COVID shakes flues and makes us all, see things kind of sees, sees the matrix.

I mean, I think there had been a lot of. Um, narrative about like even emotional labor that wasn't even a word when Griffin was born. That was not a term of art when my son was born. Right. Like the idea that some people were carrying emotional labor. But I think that being able to articulate that and see that, because if you're having to start from scratch on top of this, of a pandemic, that's too much to like face all this, articulate it, work through it, work through people's defensiveness.

Oh, by the way, in the middle of a global pandemic. No wonder people are about to fall apart. 

Beth: [00:43:58] And what we're talking about is the highest class problem. When I think about just the teaching profession, how underpaid it is, because when you say bankers lawyers, teachers are professionals, just like all of those folks are, you know, and I can say that because I've been a lawyer, I know what that is.

And I understand that a lot of lawyers will go, Oh, but they don't work as much. They do. And they deserve to be paid for it. Just as people who work in other professions deserve to be paid for their work and they aren't. And a lot of that is gendered. And a lot of the failure, the utter failure around schools and policy towards schools right now is because schools are largely created and operated by women and the fact that no one has a good solution for teachers who are also mothers is ridiculous.

 And that no one has a solution for mothers who are essential workers, for mothers who have been checking out groceries and working a window at a drive through, there is just no consideration here.

We still have not gotten anything new out of Congress. It's been months. And that's another thing, honestly, to circle back that offends me about the instantaneous reaction from senators to justice Ginsburg's death. They're really eager to get into a confirmation battle when they've been sitting on the Heroes Act for months and haven't acted on it.

Where are your priorities? People can not breathe the air in the American West without getting sick. Right now, we have this virus continuing and every expert says it's about to get worse. The economy has recovered in wall Street's eyes, which bears no relationship to how so many people are living right now.

You still can't order lots of things, right? Our supply chain hasn't even come close to recovering, and yet the Senate thinks the best use of its time right now is a confirmation battle. It's crazy making 

Sarah: [00:45:56] well and not to just continue to Anne Helen Peterson stay in here, but she wrote a email about vocational awe.

I saw this sense with like teacher and nersus, and I think motherhood too, where we'll give you all this cultural cache. We'll talk about how mothers and teachers and nurses are heroes, right? Because we know that if we prop up this job, this work that you do with all this gendered expectation and cultural significance, often religious significance, then we don't have to pay you.

But you know what? I don't want your awe. I want to be treated fairly. I want help. I want payment, you know, like I want my work to be valued. Like my friend Kate said this, she was like, I'm not your hero. I'm a professional. And I expect to be treated the same way. And that's kinda how, I mean, I feel like we do this, this gender thing we do inside marriages and as mothers is the same bullshit because that's what it is, is bullshit.

It's this we'll put you on a pedestal, but that's it. Oh. And by the way, the pedestal comes with a lot more expectation and work and not the commiserate pay. No, no, no, no, no, no. I don't think so. Hard pass. So here, here's what I just want to lay a little word down about you are not alone. And when you articulate these needs, the classic cultural response often coming out of the mouth of your own partner will be that you are alone.

And you're the only one that feels like this and you're demanding too much. Do not listen. Even if it is coming out of the mouth of someone you dearly love do not. Listen, you are not alone. This is falling on the shoulders of women and it is unacceptable. It is unacceptable. It is unacceptable in the failure of leadership coming from the very top, all the way down to it is unacceptable in the narratives coming out of the mouth of the people we love.

It is unacceptable. It is a disservice to ourselves, to our sisters and our friends. It is a disservice to our daughters and our sons. You know, a lot of time I spent pushing back against this idea is with my own. Children. I don't just tell my mother and my grandmother, they have two parents. I tell them that all the time don't come to me, go find your father.

I am not the only person that can help you with this problem mom's done today. Go find dad. I need them to understand two equal partners here too. And it's hard and it's exhausting. And I wish I didn't have to do it, but by God, I'm going to do everything I can to find a way to at least be one of the last generation to do it.

Because this is not set in stone. This is not genetics. This is cultural. This is what we value as a culture and who we place the burden on as a culture. And we are all feeling the impact of that right now.

Beth: [00:49:12] There has not been a whole lot of outside of politics for me as I have been in crisis. And as our nation has been in crisis and here is how like deeply distressed I have been over the past few days. I hate read an article. About things that Joanna Gaines believes are tacky to have in your living room.

I liked Joanna Gaines. I don't have any problem with Fixer Upper or Magnolia or any of that stuff. But this article enraged me and it felt so good to be so mad. She's like, don't have weird lamps. Don't have cliche art, don't have all white rooms or rooms with too much color. I was like, get out of here. Joanne. Again, I was so.

Man, and it felt so good, 

Sarah: [00:49:56] but 

Beth: [00:49:58] the healthier things that have been encouraging to me 

Sarah: [00:50:01] also, we will give you the link to this article. So you can hate 

Beth: [00:50:04] me a long way. You need to feel the rage about this, that I felt, 

Sarah: [00:50:08] but I always find home decor as an excellent, excellent conduit for stress or frustration. I joked the other day.

I feel like my house is like. Girl, can you give me a minute? Can you leave me alone for like five hot seconds? It would be great. Thank you so much. 

Beth: [00:50:27] Well, so I watched Bridget Jones's diary, which is my favorite maybe of all time, which is so weird. Cause I'm not like a romcom person, but I just think it's delightful.

Sarah: [00:50:35] Yeah. I would not have called that. I would not have called that 

Beth: [00:50:38] my best friend in law school. He was also named Sarah and I quoted it constantly. It just, it was like a survival anchor for us during law school to have that movie and all the little phrases in it. But the other thing that is getting me through it Schitt's Creek.

Now I know you've not watched it yet. I have not watched it yet. 

Sarah: [00:50:56] No I've watched, like, I've probably seen half of the first season. Okay. So I'm not like all the way in, but I have seen it enough to love it and appreciate. And I think that episode, she cannot remember the daughter's middle name. I laughed.

It's all about, Oh my God. It's so funny. 

Beth: [00:51:10] I treat Schitt's Creek like a box of the most expensive decadent chocolates I've ever received. So I don't sit and binge watch it. I pull one little piece out when I really need something, you know, and then I just put it back because I don't want to run out of them.

And that's how I feel. I don't, I know that I can watch it again, but I don't want to lose the pure delight that Schitt's Creek gives me on my first viewing. So I'm just very slowly making my way through and it, it just feels so good. I just watched the episode where David calls Patrick, his boyfriend, like he's, he makes a comment about his boyfriend's ugly boots and they're like, Oh, your boyfriend.

And it's just like, it just. Fills me with such happiness for them as I'm watching them fall into this relationship. And I think it's just a really important show. I'm so happy that at one, all the Emmys, because. Here are these ridiculously imperfect people who we can love so hard. And I just think we need that.

Sarah: [00:52:19] Well, I also had a nice little intermission from the cascading crisis. I got to see live music. Our symphony opened it season. They did this event called Brass on the Grass where they played way up high on the balcony, all spread out from one another. And we all sat socially distanced in the grass in Adirondack chairs all spread out and they brought us little boxes of charcuterie.

and it was cool outside. I even needed a blanket at one point. And you just forget how. Lovely. It is to hear live music. Like how much we just need that as humans. And it's not, Griffin was like, I didn't know. You were like a big fan of brass instruments. And I was like, I'm not, I'm not a big fan of brass instruments.

You know what? I am a fan of, uh, getting to do a thing. Like I thing where I go and listen to the live music and with other humans around me at a safe social distance and, and just feel. Nice. It just felt so nice. And I forgot kind of what that was like to just go to an event with other people and look around and smile and wave and listen to live music.

And it was just, it was such a sweet moment of relief. 

Beth: [00:53:37] I think that being in a live venue like that has this in common with Schitt's Creek, they are both like this collision of fantasy and reality. Hmm. You know, what Schitt's Creek does so brilliantly is it's like being in a created world, you know, it's, to me, what they have done with that show is every bit as world creating as like Harry Potter, there is, uh, there are places of significance.

There is language there's more, more roses like. You know, bizarre accent that you've never heard in your life, but it suddenly becomes this important soundtrack to you and, and all of that fantasy of their richness and the clothes and the wigs, just collides with the reality of not having any money. And I think that's, what's so beautiful about live events because you just get transported by the music, but then at the same time, there's the realness of like, is the room the right temperature or is it where's my seat outside comfortable enough in it just kind of having that juxtaposition and makes you feel more alive in a lot of ways.

And especially when there has been so much sameness, that feeling of being alive is necessary and life giving. We hope that you are finding those places where you're feeling transported. And you feel more alive. Thank you again for all of the support that you've given to us. And to me personally, over the past few days, we will be back with you here on Friday with Anne Helen Petersen.

Don't miss it and on The Nuanced Life. Between now and then, keep it nuanced y'all.

Alise Napp1 Comment