Are household chores actually the job of a woman?

Something I'm learning in college these days is to appreciate and understand ideas that are new to me. The essay below was a submission for my Humanities and Social Science course that has my thoughts and observations from a comic in The Guardian, which elaborates on ideas of feminism and gender equality. The article is hyperlinked for those of you who'd like to give it a read. Share your thoughts below!

To me, “The gender wars of household chores: a feminist comic” in the international edition of The Guardian was an interesting read. I found it slightly hard to relate to, probably owing to the fact that I’m yet to take up the roles of a wife, mother and professional. Still, let’s hope I can analyze this article well and jot down my understanding of the some prominent notions the article is trying to convey.

The most important concept this article is trying to convey I feel, is a strong gender bias towards women, in specific how household chores are branded to be the duty of a woman. As the author aptly says, she is the “manager of household chores”. As fancy as the title manager sounds, I don’t think the duties that fall under the title are fancy at all!

Source - The Guardian

The introduction to this comic article asserts the above mentioned. The author is at a friend's place for dinner and his wife is multitasking - she’s cooking, trying to feed her kids who are throwing a tantrum to eat and also being cordial to the guest at home. While she was trying to feed her child, unfortunately the pot started to overflow. And I quote her husband's reaction to this. “What a disaster! What did you do?” As his wife rightly asks him, “What do you mean what did I do? I did everything. That’s what I did!” She’s totally right. Couldn’t her husband have fed the kids while she looked after the cooking? I don’t think the guest would have minded at all. If I were the guest I’d be appreciative of the fact that my friend understands that such responsibilities can and should be shared with his wife.

Source - The Guardian

In the same instance the husband says, “You should’ve asked. I would’ve helped.”. Why do men think these duties shouldn’t be naturally taken upon by them but instead they need to be asked for help? Sometimes women just feel that they rather get the work done themselves in the time they expect their partners to help. And hence the vicious cycle just continues.

Quite to the contrary though, my house has a different lifestyle. Especially during the times of the pandemic, when we didn’t have any external help, my dad played a wonderful role of helping out my mother with household chores. My dad is an excellent cook, and on so many evenings when he could be back home from work earlier than my mother, he used to make dinner (and still does over the weekends :). He also helped relieve the workload from my mom by doing his own laundry, drying it on the lines and doing the dishes every night. 

As much as I come from such a progressive family, there are so many women out there who are forced to do many things because of the social notions and biases that simply brand chores to women. What can we do about this? If you are a young boy reading this essay, then remember to help your mother now and split chores with your wife when you are married. If you are married and take for granted that household chores are just an unsaid job your wife is supposed to do, then now you know it is not and that you must have your fair share in it. 

I would like to end with a quote by Evan Esar, that aptly describes the unfortunate situation of household chores these days, “Housework is what a woman does that nobody notices until she hasn’t done it.”