It is not politically correct these days to make assumptions about the proclivities of gender. Nurses may be male; truck drivers may be female; and presidential candidates may be either. But in some cultures, the presumption about who does the housework abides. In the sign above, the use of the word “asylum” might suggest that the students are being held like mentally ill young women who have had the temerity to think that, perhaps, there are other things than household work.
In today’s society, given the blurring of sex roles, there most certainly will be a consequent diminishing of hard and fast household assignments. Add to this, with most women working rather than staying home as “housewives,” why shouldn’t some husbands pitch in with the housework. I’ll be the first to admit that I can iron, wash dishes, cook, and vacuum carpets. Of course, I also chop wood, haul trash to the dump, smoke cigars, and spit.
There is a woman I know whose husband is, for lack of a better word, a rancher. He is apparently helpless, however, when it comes to taking care of himself. She has to run home at noon to feed him; he can’t even throw together a PB&J sandwich.
My sainted grandmother was an old-fashioned fulltime expert at “household work.” She was always two steps behind you, picking up your mess. Neither my mother nor my mother-in-law, on the other hand, gave housework much significance. In the latter’s home, particularly, roaches outnumbered human beings 1,000 to 1. No one ever remotely suggested that my MIL ought be placed in an “asylum” such as pictured above. Besides, she was no longer a “young female.”
While it may still be true that, when compared to men, women generally have larger breasts and smaller pay checks, we have come a long way (apologies to the late Victor Mature, who had larger breasts than most women). The days of the housewife, that is, the wife who stayed at home, are going the way of the printed newspaper. Asylums, too, are no longer prevalent; today we call it congress.