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Equal Partnerships Benefit Everyone with Dr. Kate Mangino
3.1k Plays1 year ago
Bi+ people tend to look at gender differently than most, and many of us are working toward more gender equality, especially in romantic partnerships. That's why this week I'm excited to share my interview with Dr. Kate Mangino, a gender expert whose debut book, "Equal Partners: Improving Gender Equality at Home", looks at gender imbalances in our personal lives and what we can do about it.
We chatted about the current landscape of domestic equality, how couples often split physical and emotional/cognitive labor, why women more often than not bear the brunt of the workload, how same-gender couples sometimes divide responsibilities differently (often because they are forced to write new scripts for themselves), how inequality can hurt men even (or especially) if they're doing "less work", what causes certain people to reflect on gender roles while others never think twice, what true equal partnerships look like (hint: equal responsibilities are not necessarily identical responsibilities), how to get there with your partner through communication, routines, and community support, how to raise kids who will grow up wanting to be equal partners themselves, and what to do when you WANT to fall into gendered roles sometimes.
In bonus material on Patreon, we continued talking about balancing gender parity with individual strengths and weaknesses, the importance of community in supporting equal partnerships, and how to actually find a partner who wants equality in relationships. Head to Patreon.com/RobertBrooksCohen to listen! (You'll also get EARLY ACCESS to AD-FREE episodes!)
Follow Kate on Twitter: https://twitter.com/ManginoKate
Buy Kate's book: https://us.macmillan.com/books/9781250855787/equalpartners
Visit Kate's Website: https://www.katemangino.com/
Connect with Kate on LinkedIn: linkedin.com/in/katemangino
State of the World's Fathers report: http://stateoftheworldsfathers.org/
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Transcript
Introduction and Guest Overview
00:00:12
Speaker
Hello, everyone. Welcome to Bye, guys. I'm very excited for my interview today. My guest has written an awesome book that I was fascinated with, and I think it will be very relevant to the Bye community, among others. My guest today is a gender expert who works to change harmful social norms through writing, training, and facilitation.
00:00:34
Speaker
She has over 20 years of experience working in the international development sector, writing and delivering curricula in over 20 countries about gender equality, women's empowerment, healthy masculinity, and much more. And her debut book, Equal Partners, Improving Gender Equality at Home, looks at gender imbalances in our personal lives and what we can do about it, and it's available now from St. Martin's Press.
Book Relevance to Diverse Relationships
00:01:00
Speaker
So welcome to Two Bye, guys. Dr. Kate Mangino, hello.
00:01:04
Speaker
Hi, thank you so much for having me. I've been looking forward to this for a long time.
00:01:10
Speaker
Me too. I thought I got emailed the description of your book, and that happens a lot these days. We get a lot of book publicists wanting to come on this podcast, and many of them I kind of ignore. And this one I read, and I just thought, wow, I really want to read that book personally. This is stuff I'm thinking about in my partnership.
00:01:34
Speaker
And then I think so many bi people will end up in different gender relationships. We'll talk about that in a minute, but that's sort of a very common experience and yet are working for gender equality and thinking about this maybe more than others. So it's really nice to have you to talk about this. Thank you. Well, full disclosure, I asked my publicist to try to get me on the show because I like your podcast. A friend of mine,
00:02:03
Speaker
sent it to me last spring is when I started listening.
Exploring Gender Norms Beyond Heteronormativity
00:02:07
Speaker
And a lot of the conversations that I've had since the book has come out and before are very heteronormative. So sort of assumptions about a different sex couple, assumptions that the woman is the one that's doing more work.
00:02:22
Speaker
And there's a lot of couples out there who mirror that. And so I understand that. I understand those conversations and they're important. But there's this whole other half of what I write about, about moving beyond gender binary and rewriting norms and thinking about same sex partnerships and queer partnerships. And so I asked my publicist to reach out to you because I was just, I was eager to have a conversation beyond
00:02:47
Speaker
heteronormative conversation. And so when you agreed to have me on, I was very excited. Yeah, me too. Yeah, and I mean, we'll get into this more too as we go, I'm sure. But like, you know, for me, when I came out as bi, I immediately started rethinking all of these norms. And that kind of became part of what was so interesting to me about being bi was like, oh,
00:03:13
Speaker
now that I'm dating men, it doesn't have to fall into this strict sort of structure that I always imagined in heteronormative relationships. And I kind of got to write the rules with my different partners, and my current partner is a trans woman. And so as she's transitioned, we've sort of figured out the rules as we go. But I always think there's no book for this. We write it ourselves. But now there's a book.
00:03:40
Speaker
So now you can still write it yourselves, but at least you have this book to kind of help guide you. Yeah. And I do think that there are a lot of universal truths that every couple, it doesn't matter what your identity is. When two people come together to form a long-term relationship, there's some stuff you've got to talk about.
00:03:59
Speaker
Yeah, indeed. Okay. And we'll get to it. But before we get to the book, as always, I would like to ask you, how do you identify on any spectrums you want to identify on and what pronouns do you use and talk about that for a bit? Sure. I use she, her, and I identify as a cis female. I knew this question was coming because I am a fan of your podcast. And I would say I have never used the word bisexual to describe my identity.
00:04:29
Speaker
However, I've also never really used the term straight to define myself either. It's just, I've never really defined myself either way. And I think that in my work, I understand more and more that social norms dictate so many of our actions more than we're probably aware of. And so I'm interested in
00:04:56
Speaker
investigating and intentionally talking about and learning about and working through how we can change those gender norms so that we can be more open in the future to other generations.
00:05:07
Speaker
I'll leave it at that. Is that cool? Yeah, that's lovely. I read your bio. Tell us a little bit more about your background and how you got involved in this kind of work and then, oh, hi, Kat. We love when cats and dogs join on the show.
00:05:26
Speaker
I can't. He doesn't stay away. I've tried. So we just invite them to be part of our show. Perfect. Love it. Yeah, tell us a little about how you got involved in this kind of work and then what led to actually writing this book and how'd you go about that?
Parenthood and Gender Expectations
00:05:43
Speaker
I've been doing development most of my career since I went back and got a master's in my
00:05:51
Speaker
mid 20s and I have worked in development, specifically gender and development for a long time. And so in 20 years, our concepts around gender have changed. I would say in the early 2000s development work. And when I say development, I mean changing behavioral norms in projects overseas for some sort of beneficial outcome, whether it's HIV prevention or it's curbing early in childhood marriage or, um,
00:06:17
Speaker
gender-based violence, there's usually a technical issue, but there's a gender norm that's limiting the success of that objective, right? And so they bring in different people from teams to talk, to help groups talk through those gender norms and think about their biases and think through what we can do to either navigate around or rewrite gender norms so that we can reach our objectives and make sure that
00:06:44
Speaker
fewer girls are getting married off and that more girls are graduating from high school and that more boys have access to healthcare. So that's what I've been doing for a long time and I would say that
00:06:55
Speaker
When I started in the early 2000s, people used the term women in development because everyone associated gender with women and girls, which we now is outdated completely, and that gender is about people of all genders, and it's about that equality needs to involve people of all genders. And so I think my work has come a long way just because the discipline has come a long way. I think differently about gender now than I did
00:07:19
Speaker
in 2003 when I graduated from my master's and then the different than I did from when I did a PhD. And I hope that in 10, 20, 30 years, we will continue to think differently. I think I went down a tangent there. I don't know if I answered your question, but... Well, I just want to interject because it's like, I mean, the idea that it's women interested in these kind of gender studies is like,
00:07:44
Speaker
very harmful and I'm glad it's changing. And it's also harmful to me because it kept me out of learning about this stuff. I remember in college, it was the women's studies department at my college that was talking about sexuality. And I didn't know. I was just like, I guess that's not for me. I didn't even consider it or make a conscious choice not to take those classes. It was just, oh, that's women's studies. But if it had been about gender or sexuality, I don't know.
00:08:13
Speaker
maybe I would have been clued in a little. Absolutely. And so what we thought was progressive 20 years ago, we look back and we realize it was harmful. So maybe what we're doing now is harmful and we won't realize it for another 20 years. But I think just constant self-reflection is pretty much the best thing we can do.
Inspiration and Writing Process of 'Equal Partners'
00:08:32
Speaker
Yeah, exactly. Well said. Okay, so then I guess bridge that gap to the book. Like how did you start thinking about writing this book and why and how did you get the process going?
00:08:42
Speaker
So that I think it started bubbling up in my head when I became a parent, which was 11 years ago. And I realized that our expectations around mothers are very different than our expectations around fathers. And I was getting increasingly frustrated that I was having unbelievably sophisticated conversations around gender in Zambia, in Indonesia, in Nepal.
00:09:05
Speaker
Then in the playground down the street from where I lived, I would have people say ridiculous things to me that were straight out of a 1950s sitcom like, oh, you're going away for work. Who's going to help your husband make dinner? It just astounded me how archaic some of those conversations were. That started bubbling the ideas up. Then I was doing research in Indonesia and I was
00:09:33
Speaker
working with groups of men around redefining masculinity. And they were lovely men and they welcomed me into their house. We're having great conversations. And after like three hours and everyone's just like covered in sweat, you've just been there for a long time, someone was like, what do American guys think? What are they like? Are they doing this hard work like we're doing? Are they thinking about their own masculinity? Are they
00:09:58
Speaker
Are they trying to be better or is it just us? And I was like, I don't know the answer to that question because I only work overseas. And so that's what really made me think I would like to apply all of this cool stuff that I do with my own community and start a conversation with my own friends and family about harmful gender norms that I still see us perpetuating purposefully and accidentally. Cool.
00:10:29
Speaker
All right, so let's get into the content of the book because there's so much. I have way too many notes on this book for us to get to in time, but hopefully we'll hit most of it. Okay, so you kind of opened the book with an anecdote about your friend who is sort of realizing that things are getting better right now with gender equality, and it's certainly a topic that's on people's minds more
00:10:58
Speaker
than it has been. And men are maybe making more of an effort to do household work than before, but that that kind of still masks a foundational inequality and an unequal divide. So can you tell us the lay of the land and describe what you call a neo-traditional home?
Defining Neo-Traditional Homes
00:11:20
Speaker
Yeah. And I will say the lay of the land has unfortunately been very heteronormative and a lot of the research that we have, the data that we have is grounded in different sex couples. And so I think we're just starting to get information on same sex and queer couples, which, and a few people I interviewed for the book were bisexual and would
00:11:37
Speaker
It was very interesting to hear how they would code switch between who they were in a relationship with and how that would impact who did what in the homes. We can get into that. Interesting. We will. I do think that I just want to preface this little lot of the data that I have and I can repeat is
00:11:57
Speaker
unfortunately heteronormative, but we're getting there. So academics have kept chore journals since the sixties, like in different sex relationships, who's doing what in the home? And in 1965, the average was in a different sex relationship, a man would do 15% of household work and a woman would do 85%. Looking at norms in 65, that probably meshes with what our understanding is, right?
00:12:24
Speaker
By 1985, it moved to 33 and 67. So between 65 and 85, there was a very big shift in patterns in our homes. And I think that also is reflecting women entering the workforce in much greater numbers. Between 85 and 2020,
00:12:47
Speaker
It's only changed from 33% to 35% in terms of male engagement in the home. And we also have realized in the last few years that chore journals only track physical chores, folding laundry, cooking dinner, grocery shopping. And now we talk about cognitive labor, all of that management, all of that, all the expectations, all of the looking forward to what is needed in the home.
00:13:15
Speaker
The dog needs to get groomed, so I need to make an appointment and I need to take time off work. All of that cognitive work that we do in the shower and while we drive to work and while we exercise and while we fall asleep at night isn't being collected. We have data to show that we still have in homes. When you asked, what is a neo-traditional couple? It's two people who both work, who both add to the economy of their household.
00:13:45
Speaker
but the vast majority of the chores fall on one person over the other. And we are seeing this flipped. We see in different sex couples, sometimes it's the man who it's predominantly folding on his shoulders. And we even see in same sex and queer relationships, typically closer to equality, but still nowhere near equal. And I think that that opens up this interesting discussion about how our structures inform our social patterns regardless of gender identity.
00:14:14
Speaker
Yeah. Interesting. Okay. I wanted you to continue on that, but I found it so interesting reading the part about cognitive labor, emotional labor, because I never even realized that's really happening or that that's something to divide. It's just things on my mind. But when I do think about it, it's like,
00:14:37
Speaker
I keep the calendar in our household, and I know what's coming up when we have to go out and do something. And that is an amount of cognitive labor, even when I think we're pretty equal in my household of chores. But it is interesting to think about this whole other aspect of it. Absolutely. And calendar keeping is one of the huge things that comes up time and time again. And the more people who live in your home, imagine if you had four or six kids,
00:15:07
Speaker
Calendar keeping is all you do. I don't have, I only have two, but I can imagine it. I don't even have kids and I'll, I mean, I can't imagine with kids also if I was the only one. Okay. Right. Okay. So, well, I guess I have more questions, but do, can you continue on what we, what you were just talking about, about the structure, the structures of these things that influence this? Yeah. So I think that, um, I think there's a lot of gender presumptions. I think that's one of the reasons why this, these patterns continue.
00:15:36
Speaker
to replicate these patterns. I talk about that earlier in the book when I talk about how oftentimes we'll say it's their personality. The partner that does the vast majority of work, they like it. They're good at multitasking. It's their personality. A lot of times that is
00:15:55
Speaker
That's gendered. That's the way they were brought up, the way they thought they need to behave in a relationship. I also think another big piece of it are structures. When you think about, okay, if you share a home together and the refrigerator gives out and the repair person says, I'll show up between eight and two.
00:16:15
Speaker
Well, if neither one of you work from home, one of you has to have a flexible job to be the one that's like, oh, okay, I'll stay home and wait for the repair person. Or we're getting a delivery and they gave me a five hour window, I'll stay home and make sure that someone doesn't steal it off of our front step. Or if you have pets and dogs need to be walked by a certain time. We often have one person who focuses on work and income and one person who takes a flex job that can handle all of those household
00:16:43
Speaker
stuff that comes up. And then if children enter the relationship, then you have schools that go from nine to three, even though the workday is eight to five, right? So someone has to watch them before and after.
00:17:00
Speaker
That school asks for one parent contact number. The pediatrician asks for one parent camps, asks for one. There's things that are required for childcare that happen within that workday, and they ask for one parent's name.
Societal Structures and Household Roles
00:17:18
Speaker
The structures demand, again, this enforcement of a flexed schedule
00:17:23
Speaker
And a work person and so i think that regardless of gender identity couples tend to fall into these patterns that accommodate our structures.
00:17:35
Speaker
Yeah. That is interesting. It's like you can't even say, okay, you, you get the school emails and you get the, the afterschool program emails. Cause then you got a court. So you almost have to pick someone. Exactly. And then it's like, it's more work. Um, it was, I interviewed a man named Christopher Carrington from my book and had a lovely conversation with him. He wrote, what is his book called? No place like home. And he researches same sex couples in Northern California.
00:18:02
Speaker
and has been for decades and he told me that he found that marriage equality actually made he saw a shift in household dynamics after marriage equality and that dynamics got more unequal and he said before marriage equality
00:18:18
Speaker
If you were in a same-sex relationship, you were both forced to own property. You were both forced to have your own insurance. Because you didn't have the privileges that everyone else had that you couldn't share. Well, after marriage equality, you had access to those structures. You could share insurance. You could co-own a home. You could have joint parenting for children. And he started to see one person
00:18:43
Speaker
focus on career and one person focus on domestic. And he said that just sort of reaffirmed that we are forcing our lives to fit the structures that we have as opposed to really living out how we want to be.
00:18:57
Speaker
Interesting. Okay, so I have a couple questions on this, but it makes me think of a lot of my straight married friends who probably are falling into this and going with these structures and dividing labor unequally. But if you ask them about it, they would probably say,
00:19:18
Speaker
this is fine. This is just how it is. It's how we've always done it. We don't even think about it. We're both happy with these roles. So I'm curious, how can this inequality harm a family unit even if the partners feel okay with it? So I don't know too many partners who are both okay with it. And I bet if you ask them both. They just say that to me. I think the person who's doing the
00:19:48
Speaker
the more work, I think the person who is tasked with all of that cognitive labor might be struggling. And it's just no one sees that struggle. And I think this is, you know, it traditionally is discussed in circles of women because this is something that often falls on women's shoulders of sort of like, this is really frustrating and he doesn't get it, right? And I've also had a lot of men write me since the book has come out to say, I'm the cognitive labor in my home.
00:20:16
Speaker
and I feel totally unseen and unheard because all these articles in the mainstream press are about how evil men are and how we're not pitching in to give our wives opportunities, but I'm the one pitching in and I feel very lonely because I don't know too many other men who are in this role. I don't have a community around me. So, I mean, at the end of the day, if two people are happy in their relationship and it's working, fantastic. I'm the last person that would ever want anyone to choose
00:20:45
Speaker
to change something that's working. Relationships are hard enough, so you're happy. But I do think that in a neo-traditional relationship, it would be interesting for you to ask your straight friends in relationships, are you both actually really happy or does one of you wish the other one did more? Yeah, and you probably got to separate them and ask them separately.
00:21:07
Speaker
Yeah, that might be helpful. You might get a different answer. Yeah, I think maybe that's what I'm running into is, you know, nobody really wants to get into it.
00:21:23
Speaker
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00:21:45
Speaker
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00:22:12
Speaker
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00:22:42
Speaker
It's time to share your story.
Challenging Traditional Roles for Emotional Fulfillment
00:22:57
Speaker
I have met a lot of queer and bi men who these are things that are more on their mind. They don't just want to go with societal norms. We've broken out of this sexuality binary and then you start thinking about gender roles. I mean, that's what happened for me. I was very locked into these roles before I was out and then all of a sudden I
00:23:21
Speaker
I was like, oh, I don't have to do that. I'm free to do what I want, and I wanted to find more equal partnerships. But I guess I have a question for other people who maybe aren't there yet. For men, they're doing less work. It might seem like a pretty good deal, but how do you think this inequality hurts men even if they're on the side of doing less work?
00:23:51
Speaker
So the harm is harder to see on a day-to-day basis, right? If you're the one who's doing the majority of the household work, you're exhausted, you're frazzled, you are not able to perform, you probably feel like you're failing your home and you're failing your job because you can't do anything well.
00:24:09
Speaker
If you're not the household laborer and you have a lighter load, it might seem like you have a great deal. Like you get to do less, right? You have more free time and you have more flexibility. But here are things that you don't have. And I think that when you truly have an equal partnership and you're both fully invested in your home and you have realized that age-old norm that we often code as men's work of providing for your family,
00:24:36
Speaker
is not just financial. Providing for your family means emotional work. It means spending time. It means taking care of, right? Whoever's in your household, it's taking care of that person, spending time with that person, fulfilling their emotional needs just as much as their financial needs. That is what providing really means. And the men who I interviewed who have
00:25:00
Speaker
understood this, have come to understood this, say that their lives are so much better when they are fully contributing to their families. They don't argue with their spouse over who has to wash the dishes because they both know they do their equal share. They feel like they have a true partner and teammate as opposed to splitting hairs over who's going to do what. Because they spend so much time in the home, they have a really deep relationship with their partner and with kids if they're kids.
00:25:29
Speaker
that you aren't just the guy that comes home for an hour in the evening and doesn't really get to know your kids as who they are, but you spend all of that time and you really form really deep relationships.
00:25:42
Speaker
And I interviewed several men who had grown kids, like teenagers or adult children, and they said, you know, if I hadn't have put that time in when they were little, if I hadn't have been there for them through all of those years, in the afternoons, on the weekends, being there when they were sick, being there to help them with their homework, being there to talk through all of those tween and teen drama issues, nowadays we're just good friends. They choose to spend time with me. I hear from them on text every day,
00:26:11
Speaker
we take vacations together, they're still open with me, and they recognize that it probably wouldn't be that way if they were that sort of part-time dad that mailed it in when they were kids.
00:26:24
Speaker
Yeah, interesting. It just makes me think of how like my partner and I have sort of talked about these things a lot, had like meta conversations about, you know, how are we going to talk about this and then who's going to do what and should we check in? And sometimes it's like,
00:26:41
Speaker
feels like so much more work to talk about it all. But then I do think that at least we're not then every time there's something to do or a decision to be made sort of having to figure it out or resenting someone for not doing something, then at least we have the structure to talk about it. But it does sometimes seem like more work upfront to get these things going.
00:27:11
Speaker
Yeah, I would agree with you, especially in newer relationships. I just think that there's a lot of stuff to decide, but it's worth the time to talk about it in the beginning because then you set really healthy patterns forever for the life of that relationship and you don't get stuck down the road. I encourage people to have these conversations when they're dating before they've moved in and before they've gotten married, before they've made a commitment.
00:27:41
Speaker
And everyone's like, yeah, no one wants to talk about this stuff when you're dating because when you're dating, it's like physical and it's exciting and it's romantic and like who wants to talk about gender norms. And yeah, I get that. But then how many, you know, really bitter people have I met who have been together for 10, 15, 20 years who are thinking about splitting up, who are thinking about leaving their partner?
00:28:03
Speaker
because there's just so much resentment there. So if you can do a little bit of work upfront, I think that it will pay dividends over the years.
00:28:12
Speaker
Yeah. Right. I think sometimes not doing that work upfront can mask stuff that will not come out for a while, but eventually might. Yeah. And I do think it's important. Oh, I'm sorry. I think every couple's different. I've met couples who they have a check-in once a week or once a month. And I know other couples that they just like to talk about it as it comes up. But I think figuring out when you want to talk about it and setting some boundaries, just to make sure that you're both
00:28:42
Speaker
um, like ready to have those conversations and they don't take over your life that you do have boundaries and be like, okay, we're going to talk about that on Monday and then we're going to not talk about it for the six days after.
00:28:53
Speaker
Yeah, yeah, yeah. Interesting. Okay, one more on the topic of men and masculinity. You write in the book about this image of the quote, ideal man and how it's like men are seen as providers and stoic and in control and decisive. And that when you really think about it, it's not very real and it's almost an impossible goal. And so it makes men try to fit that model but also feel like
00:29:23
Speaker
they're failing every day. So I guess how does that play out? And then how can working towards a more equal partnership help with that? So just as gender norms are harmful for women because they can be restrictive, they're harmful for everyone. And I think that in terms of living up to masculinity,
00:29:48
Speaker
Nowadays, a lot of boys are being raised in environments where they understand there's a range of healthy masculinity, but that's not always the case. I think there's still a lot of messages, especially in media, about the kind of man you're supposed to be. If you have this in your head of, I'm supposed to be tall, I'm supposed to be muscular, I'm supposed to be straight, I'm supposed to be
00:30:11
Speaker
Uh, in control, I'm not supposed to be emotional, whatever. If you have this in your head, like sort of that movie image of the strong in control guy. And if that's the kind of guy that people want to date, right? So you're trying to fulfill that for romantic partnerships. You might be trying to fulfill your parents ideal of what?
00:30:29
Speaker
you know, perfect man. Whoever is expecting this. If you fall outside of that, if you aren't straight, if you aren't tall, if you aren't muscular, if you are emotional, if you are a caregiver, if you're anything opposite, then you feel like you're not a successful man.
00:30:51
Speaker
And I think it's important for us, for everyone to realize, because I think a lot of times women force men in that box just as often as men force men in that box, right? Like, you know, women want to date a certain kind of guy. They want a guy to, you know, show a
What Equal Partnerships Look Like
00:31:08
Speaker
Lamont. I'm trying to think of her first name and I can't. She's a researcher in West Virginia and she studies the transition between dating and long-term commitment.
00:31:16
Speaker
And she says, a lot of times what women are looking for when they're dating are sort of this guy with the cool car who are totally in control and very strong and powerful. And then when they transition to a long-term relationship, they want like the carer, the equal partner, the one who listens, the one who's emotional. And she's like, this doesn't work. That's two different people. You need to be more clear with yourself about who you're looking for when you're dating, as opposed to thinking they're going to switch personalities when you have a commitment.
00:31:46
Speaker
Yeah, wow, that's fascinating. I guess maybe that's an interesting segue to talking about what these equal partnerships look like. But actually, on the way into that, tell us about the—is it the EP40? Yeah, it was a nickname. It was EP, so Equal Partners 40. I interviewed 40
00:32:08
Speaker
men who live as equal partners 35 of them are in in relationships with a woman and five of them in relationships with a man and One of them actually transitioned During the interview process. So when I first was introduced Identified as a man and then after my interviews were wrapping up identified as a woman And I just thought you know, I
00:32:36
Speaker
There's just so much media attention to what men do wrong. And I have an eight-year-old son. I don't want him to grow up surrounded by what toxic masculinity is. Can't we just talk about healthy masculinity or aspirational masculinity or just be yourself masculinity as opposed to this is what you could do wrong because of your body parts. So I just wanted to have an appreciative approach. And so I reached out and found these 40 men who are long-term relationships that
00:33:06
Speaker
consistently work to be equal partners in their home. That's just a big focus of their life and their relationship. 30 of them had kids, 10 of them did not. Most of them
00:33:22
Speaker
were born in the United States, but I had several men who came from Africa, Asia, South America, and were first generation Americans. So it was just interesting to talk about all different perspectives of how they ended up kind of all with the same philosophy of it doesn't matter what my gender identity is. Like this is a really important thing for me to do for a healthy relationship.
00:33:43
Speaker
Yeah, it's really interesting and we'll talk about what those relationships actually look like in a minute, but something I thought that was fascinating was you wrote about who these 40 couples are and where they came from and why they might
00:34:01
Speaker
be looking for equal partnerships. And you wrote that 75% of them, so I guess 30 out of 40, had the experience at some point of their life of being othered. I mean, I just connected that to what I was saying before so much that it was like, when I didn't feel othered, I never thought about
00:34:20
Speaker
this. I mean, not as much. I probably would have been fine with a 65-35 split or something looking like I'm doing more. But then as soon as I sort of felt other and was thinking outside the box in these ways, then all of this stuff made so much more sense to me and became a priority. So tell us about the 75% of that group.
00:34:44
Speaker
And it's interesting because the way they were othered is very different for each one of them. Some of them were othered because they were the only brown or black kid in a very white school. One of them was othered because he was the only kid with a disability in his high school. Othered because they were a new immigrant and they struggled to speak English. So everyone is othered in a different way. Some are othered because they grew up bisexual or gay and that they were othered due to sexual orientation.
00:35:15
Speaker
But just having that awareness, it's like, um, taking the rose colored glasses off and seeing things for what they are and experiencing being that minority group that makes you like, Oh, there are lots of people that feel this way when we're on the outside and we can't get in no matter what we do, because it's who we are. And having, you know, you would never, you would never wish your kid or your nephew or niece or whoever to be othered. But when it does happen and it,
00:35:44
Speaker
probably will for most kids at some point in their life to use that as a teachable moment and to talk about, you know, okay, how do you feel? And let's put words to those emotions and let's talk through that. And then let's talk about how you're going to work to prevent other people from being othered in the future. Right. And I think that that self-awareness can be a really important, you know, you said for yourself, it was a really important step for you. So use that as a teachable moment for everyone.
00:36:20
Speaker
I want to get into later how the queer and trans and bi couples may have looked at these things differently, but let's start with a baseline of what did some of these equal partnerships look like and what were some of the key takeaways or things you found interesting from this group.
00:36:40
Speaker
So what it looked like is that they didn't make any assumptions about who would do what because of gender identity. And they both worked very hard to maintain that both partners did half the physical and half the cognitive work in the home so that no one felt like they were shouldering a larger burden. Now, I will say that this, you know, relationships ebb and flow, right? I've been married for
00:37:06
Speaker
Oh gosh, I think 16 years and then we get in trouble. 17, anyway, right around there. I get it. I get that there are months that are going to, things happen, right? People get sick and jobs, I don't know, are more demanding. There are always going to be weeks or months where that shift is going to change.
00:37:28
Speaker
But when you're, so the couples did not follow each other around with like a spreadsheet or an app tracking what they're doing. That's not what it looked like. What it looked like is from 10,000 feet over the course of time, there was no resentment because both people were fully committed to the relationship and doing half of the physical and cognitive work. And that looks different for every couple, but it was that missing piece of no resentment, no animosity and de-gendering everyone's work.
00:37:59
Speaker
And so, you know, for some couples, it was like, we both hate cooking, but someone has to do it because we have to feed the household every night. So let's switch on every other month. Right. And because we just don't want to make one of us do it all the time. It was having conscious and intentional conversations about like, what
00:38:20
Speaker
What has to happen to make our house run and how can we divide this equally? A lot of people chose like domains and sometimes it would stay for the life of the relationship and sometimes it would switch monthly or annually, but like I'm going to be the food person. So I'm going to do all the grocery shopping. I'm going to make sure we always have staples. There's always going to be something in the fridge to cook for dinner. There's always going to be stuff in the fridge to put in lunches for kids.
00:38:47
Speaker
That's my job. The other person doesn't have to think about it. And by not having to think about it, that frees up so much cognitive capacity. And then the other person will say, okay, because that's a big job food. So the other person says, okay, I'm going to do laundry and cleaning. I'm going to make sure that someone always has their uniform clean for soccer practice. You're always going to have enough, you know, whatever shirts for work. And then the other person doesn't have to think about it unless you ask.
00:39:15
Speaker
Another interesting trait that all these couples had is if one of them went away, the other person had no problem keeping things going, which meant that they were both aware of what had to happen in their house to make it run. So it would be harder because it's harder when your partner's gone for a week or two on a work trip and you have to do all the things.
00:39:34
Speaker
But it wasn't, no one had to make a list, right? Like how many stories have I heard? A woman goes away for the weekend and has to like at four o'clock pick up Jimmy at five o'clock, put lasagna in oven set at 450. You don't have to do that because you both know what to do. You both know who the pediatrician
Health and Wellbeing in Equal Partnerships
00:39:55
Speaker
is. You both know that there's swimming lessons on Thursday nights. And so I think that by both of you knowing
00:40:04
Speaker
that also relieves a lot of pressure that one person doesn't feel like if something happened to me, my family would screech to a halt. Yeah, fascinating. And I've talked to so many women who are like, I lay awake at night and a few men, but whoever is in that role being like, I lie awake at night scared of dying because I don't know what my family would do because I do all the things. And that's an incredible
00:40:29
Speaker
stress and pressure. I think it must be to feel because you feel like you're the only one who knows what to do.
00:40:36
Speaker
Yeah, I'm sure I know many people who feel that way. Okay, so I asked this in a different way before, but it came up again in the book of, like, for men who maybe don't want to, like, have this, quote, privilege of, like, not having to deal with all that and, you know, having a more equal partnership will require this, like, sacrifice. I mean, that may be how some people look at it, but
00:41:04
Speaker
But you wrote in the book about how that's not the right way to frame it, and that being an equal partner is actually more rewarding for both partners. So how have both partners felt rewarded among these couples when they're actually doing that? I think that there's a tremendous amount of stress and pressure in sort of financially providing for your family 100%. And so when men, the men that I've talked to are like,
00:41:31
Speaker
when I took on more care work in the home and more labor in the home, I could also let go of a lot of that pressure because equal means that we are both equally responsible for bringing in money and we're both equally responsible for care in the home and that that was worth it to them because the carrying that sort of heavy, I have to make a certain amount of money. I can't switch jobs. It doesn't matter if I'm,
00:41:59
Speaker
horribly unhappy in my position. I'm stuck because I have to bring home a certain amount of money and it's not enough and I feel pressure to go out and get a second job, whatever that is. Equal partnership means you can give part of that away because you're sharing in everything. And so I think that that was one huge benefit for men that they would say, I used to carry a lot of stress around and now I don't have to. And men who are fully
00:42:27
Speaker
present in the home, again, tend to have those emotional connections with family members and their partner that more absent men don't necessarily have. And when you have those deeper connections, that brings you joy and happiness, and that also alleviates stress. So you actually see less physical health problems in the long term because you have less stress and mental or emotional health problems. Interesting.
00:42:54
Speaker
There was a good, I'm trying to remember the state of the world's fathers was a UN report and they do it every two years and it has really interesting data on sort of the health benefits to fathers in particular when they are involved fathers and equal partners in their homes.
00:43:14
Speaker
Huh, interesting. Okay, we'll try to link to that and put it in the show notes. Give men more motivation if they don't have it already. You also talk in the book about the spectrum of where men can be in these relationships and then sort of where women will fall based on that. And it's sort of from the king of the castle to the hands-on husband to the equal partner. And that
00:43:41
Speaker
We love spectrums on this show and they're not necessarily these distinct rigid categories, but that it's a spectrum and that these couples that you interviewed are moving towards it, but everyone's in a different place on the spectrum. Can you talk about that spectrum and where you see people moving sometimes? What I wanted to do is because I think there's a lot of men out there
00:44:08
Speaker
who think they're an equal partner and they're not. They're helping. Oh, I always do what my wife tells me to do. Okay, you're not an equal partner. She's the manager and I just help out. You're not an equal partner. But I think that we over praise men because we have a culture of over praising men. And so I just wanted to point out and clarify, helping husbands, okay, you're better than the king of the castle.
00:44:39
Speaker
You know, you're not like Homer Simpson, and that's great that you're better, but you're still not an equal partner and we still have further to go. It was hard for me to convince people that this book needed to be written because people were like, we don't have a gender problem. Like we've reached a quality that we're talking about. And so that spectrum was like to help me articulate where we are and be like, yes, we have come so far in the last several decades and yes, we have so much further that we could go.
00:45:06
Speaker
So by defining what that helper is and then what a true equal partner is, and then yeah, you're right. They're not three buckets. It's a continuum with like a thousand points in between. And there are men that do more than 50% of work in their house and the continuum can continue in both ways.
Navigating Gender Norms in Relationships
00:45:23
Speaker
Yeah, I thought some of the ways you reframed these things were so interesting in the book, like the one you just mentioned of the supervisor-employee relationship, which I've seen that a lot. It's like, I do whatever my wife tells me and I do more than her, but she tells me everything to do. And it's like,
00:45:43
Speaker
That's like a job, not like a co-manager situation. It's like a job, but there's no accountability. It's not like you can give a bad performance review or dock someone's pay or fire them. You're their partner. I thought that was so interesting. Yeah, and that's not sexy. Who wants to have their partner tell them what to do? I don't want a list of things to do from my partner. That's not sexy.
00:46:10
Speaker
I also thought the bossy wife decoy was so interesting. Do you want to explain what that means? I just, I see this all the time. I see it coming from not just men. I hear women defining themselves this way too, but just like I wear the pants and the family are like, she makes all the rules. And so it gives off this air of her being in charge. And so she's in charge. She's making all the rules. It's her choice to do things this way. I just show up. But you know,
00:46:39
Speaker
Again, she's still doing the vast majority of the labor. She's still doing all of the cognitive work. I think it's an excuse to sort of like, that's why I call it the decoy. It's like, look, there's a bird. It's like we're talking about gender equality and it's a distraction to get people to think, oh, but if she was wearing the pants and making all the decisions, then she's happy.
00:47:01
Speaker
But I think that's not the issue. The issue is we're talking about two people in the home. You're both working full time outside the house. Why is all of the cognitive labor resting with her?
00:47:13
Speaker
Yeah, right. Yeah, that one was interesting. I think I saw that a lot growing up. It seems like the woman's in charge, the wife is in charge, but actually, that's an illusion. Yeah, it's by default because the husband's not doing anything. It's like... Okay, right. So somebody has to take charge of it. The weaponized incompetence idea. Yeah, exactly.
00:47:40
Speaker
Let's talk about the queer and bi and trans couples that you interviewed or just sort of in general, like when we take heteronormativity out of the picture, how do we still fall into these traps or what does it look like to try to work towards an equal partnership when gender is fluid or equal already or something like that?
00:48:07
Speaker
So many thoughts I'm trying to think what do I say first? So yes, so kind of going back to your personal story that you shared earlier about how when you came out is by you were forced to rethink through gender norms and that helped you sort of process a lot of patterns that you know that are gendered that you have been doing that maybe you want to change now because of your identity.
00:48:29
Speaker
So I think that I saw a lot of that, of people who were like, we're comfortable. We're more comfortable talking about gender norms than perhaps a different sex couple or heteronormative couple. We do this anyway. We've been forced to do this since we were however old. Society has made us think through gender norms. And so we are more comfortable talking about it and thinking through it. And they still kept falling into gendered patterns.
00:48:59
Speaker
of sort of one person. Oftentimes, it wasn't coded as gender, it was coded as financial. So the person who earns more in the relationship would take on those male coded roles, and the person who earns less would fall into the female coded roles. Sometimes it was hours at the office. Oh, I have a really demanding job. I have to be present at work.
00:49:20
Speaker
60 plus hours a week, that person falls into the male coded roles. The other one would fall into the female coded roles. And interestingly enough, I interviewed two women who were bisexual and in the interview, they were currently with women and said that in past relationships with men, they would fall into this female role very specifically and heavily, but then they preferred being in a relationship with a woman because
00:49:49
Speaker
They were both women and so they had both been socialized to take care of the home and so they could have much more direct conversations and they were able to find equality easier than when they were in a relationship with a man.
00:50:05
Speaker
Yeah, I identify with that so much because my partner is a trans woman and now there are certain things she wants to be in the traditional woman's role because that's this thing she never got to experience and it's always been this desire. But when we met, she didn't identify that way, I didn't know. And it was really one of my first non-heteronormative relationships and
00:50:33
Speaker
I had always felt locked into these roles. And then suddenly with my partner, we got to figure it out ourselves. We didn't have to do it that way. And then even when I want to be in that traditional masculine role or in certain ways, at least it was a conscious choice. So we got to think about it and talk about it. So I identify with that very much. But I still think it's hard. I still think that even with all of that
00:51:02
Speaker
with all of that that you're bringing to your relationship and that excitement and that readiness to talk through it, it's still hard. And so I think just having that expectation that we're not going to fall into equality. And I don't think anyone, that's the message. No one falls into equality naturally. I think it takes intentionality no matter who you are.
00:51:24
Speaker
Right. Well, yeah, I mean, for all my talk about we get to write the book ourselves, we still had to then write it and figure it out. Oh my god, it's not easy to figure that out. And then sometimes we both want to do the same thing and don't want to do the other thing and it needs to get done. And
00:51:48
Speaker
I guess that's another question I have both with queer and same-sex couples, but also for anyone. Different people have different strengths and everyone is different. How do you balance gender parity or just equality in a partnership with also playing to each other's strengths and interests? What if you fall into these different roles, but it feels
00:52:15
Speaker
like your personality. How do you really know if it's equal or not? Yeah, I think that's a really good question.
00:52:25
Speaker
Want to hear Kate's answer? Head over to my Patreon. There's a link in the show notes and our social media bio. It's patreon.com slash Robert Brooks Cohen. There are six minutes of bonus content for this episode. Kate answers that question and talks about how to untangle gender roles from individual strengths and weaknesses. She talks about how to access our true feelings versus conditioned responses. We chatted about the importance of community and supporting equal relationships.
00:52:53
Speaker
and also how to actually find a partner who wants equality in relationships. I know there isn't a ton of content on my Patreon yet, but there's more and more every week, and I'm also planning some new things around November and December when my book about bisexual married men comes out.
00:53:10
Speaker
So thank you so much to everyone who has already subscribed. It really means a lot to me and helps me keep this going. And I'm doing my best to post these episodes extra early and without any ads, plus bonus content and bonus clips from old seasons. So I hope you have been
Raising the Next Generation for Equality
00:53:27
Speaker
enjoying that. And now here is a little bit more of my interview with Kate Mangina.
00:53:38
Speaker
In terms of raising kids, I don't have kids yet, but someday I hope to. How do you raise kids who will grow up wanting to become equal partners? And like, how do you model it? Does modeling it trickle down or are there other things you can sort of do in raising kids?
00:53:55
Speaker
We might need another hour to talk about that conversation. That's a big one. Yes, I think role modeling is really important, but I don't think it's everything. I think that role modeling is important, but talking about it is important. A lot of people I've interviewed over the years have said like, my parents actually role modeled equality and I still didn't get it. So you have to have that, those intentional conversations paired with role modeling.
00:54:21
Speaker
Or when there's negative role modeling, whether it's your own relationship or a neighbor or a relative, point that out, not in front of them so that it's weird, but like on the car ride home, just be like, Hey, how did that strike you the way they were behaving? And you don't talk about it out loud and that it is appropriate. I have talked to my children about gender and race and ability since they were toddlers. You just do it in stages. You know, you talk about,
00:54:49
Speaker
consent in stages, you just make it age appropriate. But kids are really capable of having deep conversations from an early age. And so I would just say don't shy away from it and be willing to have those hard conversations with kids and help them figure it out on their own. But I think that role modeling needs to be paired with conversation.
00:55:11
Speaker
Yeah, I also, I really connected with the part where you were talking about, I mean, it's related to what you said, but to teach kids and especially boys how to articulate their feelings and how to actually think about their feelings. Because I think that's something I've had to work on in adulthood, because I wasn't always comfortable articulating my feelings. And actually, you know, that may not seem totally related to
00:55:39
Speaker
splitting chores, but it actually really is the foundation of it, I think. You have to be able to check in with yourself and then express it in a kind way to your partner, but express it authentically. Otherwise, you're not going to move forward.
00:55:57
Speaker
Absolutely. I mean, we often with boys, we stop at mad sad, glad, right? Like those are the three feelings that are okay when you're a boy and anything else is not okay. And so we don't teach boys this range of emotions. And so we need to teach boys
00:56:13
Speaker
I feel humiliated. I feel left out. I feel othered. I feel inadequate. I feel scared. We need to have this broad range of emotions because we have evidence that shows that when people feel an emotion and they connect it to a word, they are more able to feel empathy for someone having that emotion in the future.
00:56:34
Speaker
So if boys can understand what humiliation feels like, they will empathize with that when they meet someone who says that's how they feel. So I agree with you. It feels like it might be a disconnect, but it's actually at the core of what we're talking about. If you're going to be the kind of person who is self-reflective and open to conversation and willing to do something different and to be an equal partner, you're going to have to have the ability for some self-reflection.
00:57:02
Speaker
Yeah, exactly. I love it. And it reminds me of this other quote that I think was at the very beginning of the book, but about how this is really an issue that needs to be looked at by people of all genders.
Concluding Thoughts on Gender Equality
00:57:16
Speaker
You wrote, focusing the message solely on women suggests this is a women's problem, implies that women need to fix it. But the truth is that household imbalance can restrict people of all genders and it can be perpetuated by people of all genders. And so
00:57:31
Speaker
That's something we talk about on this podcast all the time about how patriarchy is perpetuated by us all in it. And obviously it hurts women, but it also does hurt men too. And there's rewards in breaking these structures too, even if you're sort of seemingly benefiting from them. There's all these invisible forces that
00:57:55
Speaker
just drain the life out of you, I think. And it's just in these invisible things that are not good for anyone. And so hopefully all the men listening to this will take it upon themselves to help correct it. And I think it's a healthy place to start is that take it away from the personal. We don't need to be mad at an individual person. We can be mad at the patriarchy. We can be mad at misogyny. We can be mad that we were all raised
00:58:23
Speaker
In this socialized gender world but to recognize that we're all products of it and we're all gonna have to work to get out of it so i think giving each other some grace to.
00:58:33
Speaker
and asking some questions and not making so many assumptions, but taking the time to say, how do you feel? That's another good question when you're dating. What do you feel pressured to do because of your gender identity? And can I help you relieve that pressure and share that? And I think when women ask that question of men, you get some interesting answers.
00:58:55
Speaker
Yeah, many men probably haven't thought about that. Yeah, cool. Awesome. Well, that's a lovely note to end on. There's so much more in the book. I have a few pages of notes that we didn't get to. But hopefully that gives you all an idea. I encourage you to pick it up and talk about these things with your partners, your friends, your family. And thanks, Kate, for being here. This was really fascinating.
00:59:23
Speaker
Thank you so much for having me. This was just really exciting, so thank you. Two By Guys is produced and edited by me, Rob Cohen, and it was created by me and Alex Boyd. Our logo art is by Caitlin Weinman. Our music is by Ross Mincer. We are supported by the Gotham, and we are part of the Zencaster Creator Network. Use promo code TwoByGuys to get 30% off. Thanks for listening to Two By Guys.