The accelerating rise of capitalism has infiltrated every corner of the world, causing more and more women to join the global workforce. Pondering this trend, some argue that household responsibilities need to be shared equally between husbands and wives. While this notion is widely seen as a step toward fairness, it overlooks the deeper structural forces that have reshaped household roles in the first place.
Proponents of equal household chores may argue that it promotes equality and harmony. As husbands engage in these activities, the burden on their wives will be lessened, helping their wives feel respected and valued. This may ultimately lead to a harmonious environment scaffolded on cooperation and understanding. In Malaysia, for instance, there is a rising divorce rate partly due to the fact that a large number of men still cling to the traditional and conservative values, refusing to assist their wives in their daily tasks. From this perspective, perhaps allocating household chores is the answer.
Even if we assume both genders must work full time, sharing chores fairly seems a necessary step. Yet even this solution is reactive. To fully grasp this matter, we need to look upstream at how we have come to this point, the point of debating who should contribute to household chores more than whom. A few decades ago, a single working man was able to fully provide for a family of five or more. Rising inflation, precarity of employment, and economic uncertainty have forced mothers to be away from homes and into factories, leading to several pressing societal issues: late marriage age, lower birth rates, and surging mental health issues. This can be attributed to corporate greed and a thirst for economic growth, products of capitalism.
Therefore, I can only partly agree that household chores should be divided. Instead, we need a total recalibration of values. Our focus should not be on economic gains but on values that differentiate us from other species. If economic pressures are alleviated, more families might prefer more traditional arrangements, where one partner focuses on income and the other on child-rearing, not because of outdated norms, but out of intrinsic human values and familial needs.
In conclusion, simply dividing household tasks equally is not the answer to the crumbling social structure. Both genders being forced to work full time is only downstream of culture, and culture is shaped by the system, and in this case, the machine of capitalism. We need to stop this machine, restore our social values, and rebuild our society organically, charting a path toward a sustainable future for generations to come.