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DAE find those “haha bf/husband has to wash the dishes because gf/wife is strong” jokes sexist? (self.AskFeminists)

submitted by Emergency-Vehicle352

Call me oversensitiv/a snowflake, “take a joke,” “its not that deep,” or whatever, but I always found these kind of jokes really sexist, unfunny, and it always rubbed me the wrong way. Whenever there’s a video(or even in real life) of a woman who does martial arts, fighting, weightlifting the comments are filled with comments like “haha bf/husband have to cook, clean, and wash the dishes now” or making jokes about him being scared that he‘s gonna get beat up/get beaten up by her (Call me woke, but I’m strongly against jokes about beating your bf/gf, husband/wife up)

It also indirectly implies that that “washing dishes, cleaning, cooking is “a woman’s job” and now that a woman is strong, “she’s the man in the relationship” and the male partner is now the ”weak woman who has to wash dishes and is at the mercy of the strong partner.” A woman simply being strong, doesn’t make her “masculine,” strength and feminity arent incompatible. And anyways bf/husbands should be helping out with “female chores” whether their gf/wife is intimidating/strong or weak/harmless.

Like those Dr. Sleep jokes are funny (Shi Meng is a full time doctor who does UFC as a side gig and sent one of her opponents on the stretcher, so people make jokes that she makes her own patients, makes patients if they aren’t enough, etc.) but this one isn’t.

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[–]-Ambiguity- 62 points63 points  (0 children)

Preface: I don't like the 'victim mentality' stuff. This is just how it is. But-

I don't even think it's an indirect implication - the entire joke is women have to stay in their lane.

You see it all the time on insta / any of the cesspooly social media platforms like Facebook. Women literally get attacked for anything from emoting as openly or upfront as a man does, to fitness / hobbies like you mentioned.

And yes, I'm using the word attacked, because we make comments and societally shape each other by social "jokes" like these.

Women are so used to comments like these that it doesn't realistically affect anyone- but it's annoying? Lol

[–]Skydragon222Data-Driven Feminist 61 points62 points  (6 children)

Here’s my perspective on what makes it uncomfortable: 

The implication of the joke is that by default a woman is only doing the dishes because the man will hurt her if she doesn’t.  The joke is “funny” because it flips the script, but it makes it clear that physical strength decides who does what chores in a relationship.  

(Also all the stuff you said in your post about gender roles,  but you already covered that so well.)

[–]MorganaLeFaye 20 points21 points  (0 children)

Yeah this was my take too. Like you're doing the dishes because suddenly you don't want to piss her off? That tells me 1) you're a dangerous person and 2) you know you should be doing the dishes and cleaning the bathroom as part of the partnership, but you don't because you think your partner can't "make" you, and upsetting them doesn't matter to you.

[–]VFTM 34 points35 points  (1 child)

It’s almost like it’s not funny to hit your domestic partner, or refer to them as “the dishwasher”

It’s almost like it never has been.

[–]TimeODae 9 points10 points  (5 children)

Playwright David Mamet has a lifelong fascination with “the joke”, which kinds are ‘making the rounds’ and why. He has insightful essays on this subject. He’s deconstructed sexist, anti-semitic ones… Most interesting and revealing, and well worth reading if you come across him.

[–]CaliLemonEater 1 point2 points  (1 child)

That sounds interesting. Is there a particular article or piece you'd recommend? I did a search for David Mamet "the joke" but the results were… less than focused, let's say.

[–]TimeODae 1 point2 points  (0 children)

He’s got books that are a collections of his essays. There are three or four places where he talks about it. I read some of this decades ago, tbh, so sorry I can’t get more specific.

[–]Sweet_Cinnabonn 7 points8 points  (1 child)

I've never once seen those jokes, but I agree that as described they sound terrible.

Only commenting to help the discussion about how wide spread they may be.

[–]MorganaLeFaye 8 points9 points  (0 children)

I got showed a video yesterday of a woman punching one of those carnival games that test your punch strength. She maxed it out, then the video switched to a man doing a bunch of domestic labor with a smile.

[–]WebBorn2622 8 points9 points  (0 children)

They know they control women through fear of male violence. If they didn’t they wouldn’t make those jokes.

[–]Goldf_sh4 4 points5 points  (0 children)

Yes, the joke is never funny, it's just raw mysogeny based on outdated assumptions.

[–]EarlyInside45 6 points7 points  (0 children)

It also implies that if a woman doesn't wash dishes, etc., her husband will beat her up because he's stronger.

[–]gvrmtissueddigiclone 2 points3 points  (0 children)

Yeah they are annoying. Also the memes of a woman being super-strong physically and some guys film themselves rapidly racing to do chores like 'oh she is so 'scary' i would actually do my part ha ha'

[–]osoatwork 1 point2 points  (0 children)

Yes

[–]Street-Media4225 1 point2 points  (0 children)

Yeah. It's sexist and reinforces patriarchal thinking even if the dynamic is inverted. There's a lot of supposedly subversive things that do this.

[–]plasma_pirate 0 points1 point  (0 children)

I tend to not like any sexist jokes that rely on tropes inverted or otherwise. They just perpetuate the problem in a "innocent" (not innocent) fashion.

[–]Etainn 0 points1 point  (0 children)

"find" is the wrong word here. These jokes are objectively sexist.

However, not everything sexist is necessarily evil, so we could talk about if these are good jokes, or even jokes at all.

[–]georgejo314159 -4 points-3 points  (2 children)

I'm unfamiliar with the jokes. I think it's true, if you are a man and your female partner refuses to take BS for an answer that you might do more chores. It's more about force of character than physical strength though.

[–]Emergency-Vehicle352[S] 1 point2 points  (1 child)

Im not sure about real life, but it’s really popular on social media(Instagram, TikTok), I’ve come across more than 10 videos where a woman punches the punching bag on the Boxing arcade machine, and the video switches to a man doing dishes.

[–]georgejo314159 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Interesting

My partners's losing patience with me tended to overcome my ADHD inertia.

Physically, I am stronger than all the women I dated. They had more force of character

They weren't violent people. Just assertive