Response to "He Won't Take Out the Trash!"

     I am particularly eager to respond to this post since it was due to my comments on it that I got blocked from Lori’s page!

     Lori wrote this post as a response to a woman who wanted to know how to get her husband to remember to take out the trash without nagging him or becoming mean about it. Her response is made up mostly of comments made by some of her readers. 

     One woman says she just takes out the trash herself:    

"I just take out the trash myself. I expected my husband to when we got married because my father always did. When I asked him why he didn't take out the trash my husband looked at me like, 'Are you handicapped?!' So, I have taken it out for over 20 years and it isn't so bad. In fact, right now we don't have trash service so I have to take it to a dumpster. Sometimes I look forward to taking it out so I can stop at the thrift store, etc." 

    Nearly as disturbing as this husband’s reaction is the fact that his wife apparently sees nothing wrong with it. And, of course, neither does Lori, who includes it as an exemplary model for the woman who asked the original question to follow. I thought husbands were commanded to lay down their lives for their wives in Eph. 5:25; how willing is this husband to do such a thing if he isn’t even willing to take out the trash if she asks? He hasn't taken out the trash a single time in 20 years? That doesn't sound like much of a servant to me. 

 Lori adds a brief reply to the comment: 

"Instead of getting offended and angry with her husband, she obeyed him and found good that came from it! Instead of tearing her marriage down because her husband wouldn't take out the trash, she decided to take out the trash and build up her home." 

     Seriously, if a marriage can be "torn apart" by one spouse asking the other to take out the trash, it is an extremely unhealthy marriage! In fact, this is what I said in my last comment on her page before being blocked. 

     Another woman says she never asks her husband to do anything if she can help it: 

"In my marriage, I no longer ask my husband to do anything, if I can help it. if I want the trash taken out, I either do it myself or I tell one of the kids to do it. This doesn't mean my husband does nothing around the house - he's very domesticated as his mother raised him to be - but it means there is no more bitterness with me feeling annoyed that I have to keep asking him to do stuff, and him getting annoyed at my nagging." 

     This is held up as the ideal for marriages? So women can’t even ask for a favor and should have no expectations of their husbands in order to avoid disappointment? This sounds very depressing and defeated to me. 

     Lori then makes this comment: 

"She has decided that instead of nagging a husband to do something, she will do it herself since she desires a peaceful home over being a contentious wife. She is pleasing the Lord as she serves her husband." 

Once again, a false dichotomy is presented. If it's not one extreme it must be the other. Apparently merely asking your husband to take out the trash is "nagging" and being contentious." May I suggest that mature, loving husbands actually don't mind being asked to do things (or reminded when they forget)? 

     Next, she features a long comment )and goes out of her way to point out that it was written by a man): 

"Different husbands lead (and delegate) in different ways. Some husbands will just tell their wives what they expect of them, what they desire, what they prefer, and what they don't prefer. For example, they want their wife to be responsible for taking out the trash. Other husbands will let their wishes, preferences, and desires be known through indirect comments and/or through their actions. M's husband expressed his wishes with a 'look' and M got the message, submitted to her husband, and has experienced blessings (from God and her husband) for doing so every day since."

It's fascinating how fixated he is on the husband's preference. I would like to propose the radical idea that perhaps the wife's preference is important too! In fact, maybe the best solution is simply for both of them to talk each other and agree on whatever distribution of various household duties works best for them. This certainly seems better than arbitrarily deciding that maleness somehow entails the exclusive privilege of having preferences. 

     And let me speculate for a moment that any "look" that communicates the message that you consider taking out the trash beneath you and are offended by the fact that your wife even asked you is likely to be anything but a kind look. I don't know the details of that marriage, but the idea of husbands communicating such things through only a look and wives reading the message loud and clear and obeying it unconditionally sounds a little too much like an abusive relationship to me. 

     I'll conclude with three obvious points: 

1. IT'S JUST TRASH!!! Do we really need to make such a big deal about it? If someone sees that it needs to be taken out, take it out, rather than philosophizing about the role gender ought to play in such a task. And the same goes if your spouse asks if you would mind taking it out. 

2. Lori's use of the word "peaceful" (in this and other posts) is interesting. She seems to equate "peace" with a lack of conflict, as well as "happiness" with a lack of disappointment. Her solution, then, is to avoid conflict (even at the cost of communicating) and disappointment (at the cost of resigning oneself to having literally no expectations). There are far worse things than conflict, such as, for example, a marriage in which there is no communication. Can such artificial avoidance of conflict really be called peace?  

3. As I mentioned before, the image being put forth is (not surprisingly) not one of a healthy marriage at all. Are there really couples out there who would be driven toward divorce if the wife asked her husband to take out the trash? It would be funny if it weren't so sad that, apparently, such marriages very well may exist.  



Link to the original blog: https://thetransformedwife.com/he-wont-take-out-the-trash/