Sit and be loud.

mrsconn23

Dear Prudence,

This is kind of an age-old one, but it came up AGAIN this year and will again come up at Christmas. In my family, the women clear Thanksgiving dishes from the table and then clean them. I just did not get up this year and instead stayed at the table with The Men (TM) to chat while my mother and aunt did this (all the other attendees of my Thanksgiving dinner were male, about five of them).

I feel like trash doing that. I don’t like leaving all the cleaning to my mom and aunt; we should all help clean. But it wasn’t at my house, so I didn’t feel like I could say to The Men “please help.” My dad, who was the only man there in my family unit (and is thus maybe more vulnerable to my chiding), is medically unable to help because of issues with mobility, but everyone else is literally playing tennis/hiking in their free time. (More context: the youngest person in this family is 20, the oldest is my father, in his late 60s.)

What’s the greater sin? Forgoing cleaning and letting other women pick up the slack? Or going to someone’s home and haranguing the people who actually live there into cleaning?

— Sit and Slack or Clean and Call Out

banana468

You are inappropriate if you chastise others especially in someone else's home. 

Is this an arcane practice or a distribution of behavior?  Are the men the breadwinners and women stay home and cook?  Or is this a non equitable distribution? 

The way you address this is not at the time.  You talk about it before the event and by doing this you also stuck your mom and aunt with the work too.  

climbingsingle

It doesn't matter whose house it is - I would not let my mother take the brunt of cleaning up after such a large meal. And yes, everyone should be pitching in. I would still have said something - "hey, let's all pitch in and help clean"

banana468

climbingsingle said:

It doesn't matter whose house it is - I would not let my mother take the brunt of cleaning up after such a large meal. And yes, everyone should be pitching in. I would still have said something - "hey, let's all pitch in and help clean"

Like, "Hey Uncle Ivan can you please grab the plates from the table and bring them to me?" 

I do not get the LW's tact of "I think this is dumb so I'm not going to help," when she knew that the result was that she jerked over her mom and aunt. 

MNNEBride

Use your words - "Hey Uncle, would you grab the silverware and bring it to the kitchen?" or similar.  

mrsconn23

I think it depends on who's cooking.  I'm inferring here that the women are cooking and cleaning up.  

I would pull mom aside now, before Christmas (or whatever the next major family GTG is), and be all, "I don't think it's fair that you spend all day cooking and then cleaning up after everyone. I'm also frustrated by the expectation that I as a female family member should also immediately offer my dish cleaning services after a major family meal.  Do you think there's any way we can work on changing this dynamic so it's more equitable going forward?"  

I don't think it's 'fair' if this is what is happening and LW should speak up if they are feeling the pressure of expectation to fall in line (especially if there are male relatives of a similar age that are just sitting there).  I just don't think it's going to change after 1 conversation or event.  But it's not the worst thing to try.  HOWEVER, making a scene at a holiday dinner or telling people what to do in other people's homes is not the best way. 

IDK, we are a family of all boy grandchildren. We make them clear all the time.  Also, our husband's ALL chip in to help with clean up. 

MissKittyDanger

My parents had a similar issue, they'd have a large family gathering and none of the guests would help tidy up except for one of my mum's brothers.

They actually stopped doing it because of this as it wasn't fair no one helped.

missJeanLouise

If this were my aunt's (or somebody else's) house I wouldn't say anything but since it was my Mom's I would have no problem asking (telling) the men to help. 

MyNameIsNot

I have 7 cousins on my mom's side, all guys and all between 21-27 and mostly all lazy. I take advantage of being the older, bossy cousin. "Cousin Joe and Tim, since Aunts Sally and Jane made this wonderful meal, the three of us are going to handle clean up tonight. You grab the serving dishes and I'll get the plates."  I usually warn my mom ahead of time who will comment about how nice it is before anyone can object. 

Tone would be a little different for uncles, but you can still do that, LW. 

levioosa

One time my mom asked my (then 17 year old) cousin to help clean up and my cousin responded “no, I don’t really feel like it.” I don’t think my mother has ever recovered from the brazenness. 

Obviously from my other post you can see I think it’s very rude to not offer to help if someone is hosting. It takes me days to finish cleaning up when I’m by myself. If I have a couple people helping the bulk of it can be finished in 45 min to an hour.