GeniesLoki

What if the reason why women do most of the emotional labour is that we don't count it as emotional labour when men do it? (I was surprisingly reluctant to tweet this even on alt)

I’ve had similar thoughts, but struggled to come up with a lot of examples. Basically I came up with things that are defined as “courtesy” (asking about someone’s day, listening to someone without criticism or unwanted “fixing”) that may feel more like labor to men...

I think being a source of stability and calm is the most central example of emotional labour typically done by men. A lot of men describe it as being the only one not allowed to fall apart in a crisis. Many men don't do this and many women do, of course, but it's skews male.

That’s a good point

This is kinda what I was getting at in https://twitter.com/GeniesLoki/status/1298198816001331200 … If yo look at typical feminine examples of emotional labour yeah 100% men do less of that. Male emotional labour is generally about not exhibiting emotion rather than exhibiting it.

Another example of male emotional labour is making women feel safe around them. e.g. an angry man is treated as intrinsically unsafe, so when men feel anger they have to do a lot of work to manage perception if they don't want to scare people. (Many men don't do this of course)

To be fair, men on average are more dangerous. People probably know this instinctually or can identify certain features in the face and physiology of a man who is stronger and a better fighter. People use heuristics for safety/survival, not that they’re w/o drawbacks

Note that I didn't say men shouldn't do this! It's very reasonable and mostly good that men do this. "Emotional labour" doesn't mean "bad", it means "work done to manage emotions".